I think IQ tests are an important measure, but they don't measure everything important. FDR was not nearly as bright as Richard Nixon, but he was probably a much better president.
Ed Porter ----Original Message----- From: a [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, October 09, 2007 4:19 PM To: agi@v2.listbox.com Subject: Re: [agi] Religion-free technical content & breaking the small hardware mindset With googling, I found that older people has lower IQ http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/05/060504082306.htm IMO, the brain is like a muscle, not an organ. IQ is said to be highly genetic, and the heritability increases with age. Perhaps that older people do not have much mental stimulation as young people? IMO, IQ does not measure general intelligence, and does not certainly measure common sense intelligence. The Bushmen and Pygmy peoples have an average IQ of 54. (source: http://www.rlynn.co.uk/) These IQs are much lower than some mentally retarded and down syndrome people, but the Bushmen and Pygmy peoples act very normal. Yes, IQ is a sensitive and controversial topic, particularly the racial differences in IQ. "my ability to recall things is much worse than it was twenty years ago" Commonly used culture-free IQ tests, such as Raven Progressive Matrices, generally measure visualspatial intelligence. It does not measure crystallized intelligence such as memory recall, but visualspatial fluid intelligence. I do not take IQ tests importantly. IQ only measures visualspatial reasoning, not auditory nor linguistic intelligence. Some mentally retarded autistic people have extremely high IQs. Edward W. Porter wrote: > > Dear indefinite article, > > The Wikipedia entry for "Flynn Effect" suggests -- in agreement with > your comment in the below post -- that older people (at least those in > the pre-dementia years) don't get dumber with age relative to their > younger selves, but rather relative to the increasing intelligence of > people younger than themselves (and, thus, relative to re-normed IQ > tests). > > Perhaps that is correct, but I can tell you that based on my own > experience, my ability to recall things is much worse than it was > twenty years ago. Furthermore, my ability to spend most of three or > four nights in a row lying bed in most of the night with my head > buzzing with concepts about an intellectual problem of interest > without feeling like a total zombiod in the following days has > substantially declined. > > Since most organs of the body diminish in function with age, it would > be surprising if the brain didn't also. > > We live in the age of political correctness where it can be dangerous > to ones careers to say anything unfavorable about any large group of > people, particularly one as powerful as the over 45, who, to a large > extent, rule the world. (Or even to those in the AARP, which is an > extremely powerful lobby.) So I don't know how seriously I would take > the statements that age doesn't affect IQ. > > My mother, who had the second highest IQ in her college class, was a > great one for relaying choice tidbits. She once said that Christiaan > Barnard, the first doctor to successfully perform a heart transplant, > once said something to the effect of > > If you think old people look bad from the outside, you > should see how bad they look from the inside. > > That would presumably also apply to our brains. > ----- This list is sponsored by AGIRI: http://www.agiri.org/email To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: http://v2.listbox.com/member/?&; ----- This list is sponsored by AGIRI: http://www.agiri.org/email To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: http://v2.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=51654844-578b6d
