James_Miller comments on Article on IQ: The Inappropriately Excluded - Less Wrong

4 Post author: buybuydandavis 19 September 2016 01:36AM

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Comment author: James_Miller 20 September 2016 04:44:14PM 2 points [-]

IQ tests aren't designed for high IQ,

But they might work on children with high IQs because you can compare their performance to older children. A genius 8-year-old does as well as a typical 14-year old, whereas a super-genius 8-year-old does as well as a 16 year old.

Comment author: Douglas_Knight 20 September 2016 05:35:57PM 2 points [-]

Doesn't that sound like my second paragraph?

But there is an assumption here, that childhood IQ predicts adult IQ. In fact, it isn't very good at age 8. The SMPY age of 12 is better, though by no means perfect. When I say "good" or "better" I mean, of course, stability at the center, which might not predict stability at the tails. When SMPY finds that age 12 tests predict life outcomes, they are testing this directly. But what we really want to know is whether the SAT score at age 12 adds information to the low ceiling SAT score at age 17. I think that the SMPY results are strong enough to guarantee that, but I haven't checked.

Comment author: James_Miller 20 September 2016 06:49:44PM 2 points [-]

Doesn't that sound like my second paragraph?

Yes, my error.

But what we really want to know is whether the SAT score at age 12 adds information to the low ceiling SAT score at age 17.

For testing error/randomness reasons you would think so even independent of the low ceiling problem.