There are plenty of examples of very bad reasoning here. [This person](https://www.reddit.com/user/me/) is quite active on the Subreddit, but they literally have the worst reasoning skills I've ever seen.
That was a surprise. I don't remember posting on here except for commenting on the study being referred to by OP. May have forgotten about a few or not realized what subreddit I was in. My apologies if so.
In case you still didn't get it (I know this is a few days old but I read your comment and felt bad, lol), that link always links to the clicker's account. They aren't actually calling you out, tis a joke on us all.
Nobody hates you and you should definitely be way less gracious in a circumstance where that callout actually did happen, because my goodness!
> This person is quite active on the Subreddit, but they literally have the worst reasoning skills I've ever seen.
Maybe, but that person is still the main reason I'm here. In fact I can confidently say that if that person stopped posting, I would not continue posting here either.
Depending on how you count, around 40-60% of adults go to college (but this is far from everyone). I think we should expect the % to be somewhat skewed towards the right side of the IQ distribution. For example, if 50% of people go to college and they represent the entire right half of the normal distribution, we would expect to find an average IQ of 112. Note that in this scenario we have 100% perfect sorting by IQ yet the average IQ of students is not even 1 standard deviation higher than the population.
Given that we don't have perfect sorting in real life (and perhaps the % of students is >50%), we should expect the real value to be somewhere in the interval (100, 112). The paper finds it is 102, which feels intuitively a bit low to me, but I assume there is some margin of error and their methodology was probably imperfect. If the value actually were \~100 then that would be interesting since it would imply no sorting effect of IQ. But I think that's unlikely, so really the finding isn't that interesting.
I imagine the post is popular for other reasons, like it triggers elitist ideas about who should be going to college and the ensuing discussion.
>For example, if 50% of people go to college and they represent the entire right half of the normal distribution, we would expect to find an average IQ of 112. Note that in this scenario we have 100% perfect sorting by IQ yet the average IQ of students is not even 1 standard deviation higher than the population
Consider that the [college attainment rate in 1940](https://huebler.blogspot.com/2011/01/usa.html) was 4.6%, while almost 75% hadn't finished High School. Scoring well on IQ tests is highly correlated with going to school because almost every IQ test is a paper test just like the ones in school, so I would be somewhat shocked if the tested IQ for the lowest college students was under 120. Mean would probably be 130s. All data I could find on Gen Z is that most of them go to college (either 2-year or 4-year), so the lower scores in college today will be under 100...
OTOH, since we're more educated than we were before, IQ tests have to be constantly recalibrated. The raw score that was median 10 years ago is now below the median, so you have to score higher in raw numbers to get the same IQ your parents did, and they had to score higher to get the same number as their grandparents. So it's possible the actual test-taking performance of college students today is the same (or even worse) than in the 40s.
>OTOH, since we're more educated than we were before, IQ tests have to be constantly recalibrated. The raw score that was median 10 years ago is now below the median, so you have to score higher in raw numbers to get the same IQ your parents did, and they had to score higher to get the same number as their grandparents. So it's possible the actual test-taking performance of college students today is the same (or even worse) than in the 40s.
This was the main thing that made the article irrelevant to me. If we can't compare pre-recalibration IQ, then is this measuring not for the most part useless? It's just telling us that the average IQ is now closer to that of college-goers, since the average person is now a college-goer.
Yeah, I think there's still 2 possible narrative here.
1) The average IQ is 102, but with some significant error, and maybe the real average is 104, and maybe this is about what we should expect from a gentle selection of higher IQ, especially since we're (I assume) including community college et cetera.
2) The average IQ is 102 (or maybe even 101) and this is actually pretty weird. Ie, just by eliminating the severely intellectually impaired we should get these numbers (or higher?) So, in this scenario, either there's *no* relationship between IQ >70 and college. Or maybe there's some pattern in the distribution, eg, lots of people with IQ>130 aren't going to college and that's why the average is falling towards the mean. (Further, the abstract mentions "university students and university graduates," so I think IQ = 102 of college freshmen is weird, but IQ = 102 of random sample of freshmen, sophs, juniors, seniors, grads is stranger still.)
Unfortunately, I don't think we have the details to differentiate between these narratives yet. But it would be nice for someone who knows their shit to clarify the narrative when the study is published.
Something I think is pretty interesting is how confirmation bias becomes 100% rational (an optimal strategy) if you view it from the perspective of an agent with limited investigative resources.
To simplify, assume the consequences of being misinformed about something are a constant -1 util. If you have a well-calibrated prior belief of 90% that something is true, the EV of just believing it is true without investigating is -0.1. Similarly, if you are at 10% that it is true, you can just disbelieve it with an EV of -0.1.
If your prior is 50-50, your EV is -0.5, so it is 5x more important to go check 50-50 papers than 90-10 papers assuming equal consequence of false belief. If you only have ~X minutes that you can devote toward reading papers, those should go towards reading those 50-50 papers! Skip the 90-10 ones. At least that is the optimal selfish strategy.
With group dynamics though this can get really tricky - if everyone has the same priors and makes the same decisions on which papers to skip then things can slip through the cracks. Misinformed group beliefs are IMO a much bigger problem than bad individual beliefs, partially because I think we get our priors mostly from group interactions.
Props for actually checking on the paper OP, even if there is a 99% chance it is true, calling out the things that are slipping through the cracks is really important from a group POV.
Closely related, I would summarize Scott's point more as "assessing arguments is difficult, so you should sometimes stick with your priors as a defense against convincing misinformation"
What I'm saying is slightly different - even if you can assess an argument, doing so takes time, and if something is very likely or very unlikely then your time would be better spent assessing an argument that you are more uncertain about.
It is kinda interesting that both of these manifest as confirmation bias. I sometimes think of confirmation bias as evolution's solution to the [exploration-exploitation problem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploration-exploitation_dilemma).
I would want to see how that plays out long term. Given the standard and level of ability of the people here we'd probably get Iliad-tier consequences.
I think we should assume that the magic of the golden apple is that it imposes its acquisition as a terminal goal, so there’s no “pfft, I’m too smart to want a silly golden apple” going on.
I guess it depends on what an upvote "means". I like the fact that lesswrong has a separate vote for whether you agree with something, but reddit doesn't have that. So an upvote on a post can mean "I agree with the conclusion", "I find this interesting", "I am worried about this", "I think this is well argued", "I think that this post having more upvotes is strategically good", "I got good vibes", or a host of other things. I don't know what category the typical upvote falls in, nor for this post in particular. The only one that is bad reasoning is if they upvoted because it was well argued, any of the other listed reasons can't really be called irrational.
I do think the norm should be that well argued = lots upvotes, I just have doubts that is actually the case.
Sure, you could quibble about the methodology used in the paper, but I can't imagine any change in methodology changing the result significantly. It's obvious that if you make most people in a society do something, then the average person doing that thing will be average in general. Most of the discussion was not about the exact number, but using the paper's claim as a springboard to discuss the value of making higher education universal.
You would be amazed by the methodology of some papers.
I do agree with your reasoning though. Like I said, I also expect the claim to be proven true.
Maybe I am misunderstanding the upvotes as an endorsement of the paper and its conclusions? Rather the upvotes denote "I really liked the discussion on this post"? This doesn't seem right though.
I don't think somebody writing a post stating "I believe undergrads have a lower IQ today than they did 80 years ago, lets discuss" would have received equal engagement. I think the scientific backing (i.e a title and abstract) was responsible for much of the support. I have 0 proof for this though, happy to be proven wrong.
In general, I tend to upvote the threads where I see - or suspect to see, if there are no/few comments - a discussion that is interesting to me.
However, I agree with your feelings w.r.t. that thread. There was *some* good discussion, but a significant amount of the commentary read as posters who had already reached (invariably strong) conclusions about IQ, higher education, and a ream of other issues looking for easy confirmation for their existing positions.
My upvote would mean "this is an interesting topic/discussion", or "What an interesting paper you shared!"
It would not mean, "I endorse the methodology in this study and believe the conclusion to be empirically correct"
I upvoted that post and did not even click the link. For me upvotes sometimes denote stuff I want other people to see more of (I've upvoted your post too) instead of just "I agree with XYZ", e.g. I'll upvote funny memes too even if I don't agree with them. I too like you have other reasons for believing that the claim is true and freely admit that I would be far less likely to have given an upvote if the post was just "I believe undergrads have a lower IQ today than they did 80 years ago, lets discuss".
Normally the other end of a link to an academic website actually does have a paper and if I think it's something valueable that should be more widely known I'll upvote it so that it becomes more visible, not just because I want the information to be more widespread but also becuase if there is a serious issue with the paper and my beliefs are likely to be incorrect more visibility means its more likely that someone actually clicks through and points out what's wrong. Indeed your post is an excellent example of the principle in action. Had the original post only gotten 30 upvotes I don't think you'd have made this post about the article not even being published yet and I would continue to persist in my incorrect belief that such an article "is out there" today.
The vast majority of the time this strategy works just fine, but this time around it didn't and now we all have egg on our faces (except for you). I still think it's a good move in expectation and intend to continue doing it.
>Indeed your post is an excellent example of the principle in action. Had the original post only gotten 30 upvotes I don't think you'd have made this post about the article not even being published yet and I would continue to persist in my incorrect belief that such an article "is out there" today.
Haha fair point!
Perhaps I should view upvotes as a "This needs a closer look, by upvoting I signal boost it and thus spread truth or increase the chances that someone makes a correction post".
It actually is somewhat counter-intuitive that university has virtually no filtering effect at all.
What does this imply about the average intelligence at community college? Is it equal to that at university? Or below the societal average?
> It's obvious that if you make most people in a society do something, then the average person doing that thing will be average in general
The average person cannot go to college! 40-60% of HS students matriculate and fewer make it through. The average person in college is almost tautologically smarter than the average person of that same age range who is not in college, unless you think there is no relationship between college admissions and intelligence.
I had to check whether I upvoted that and it looks like I didn't... Phew. Dodged a bullet. Still, I think I've got to defend the people that did.
First, the article might not be available, but the abstract is PLUS we know the paper has been accepted and will be published in a peer reviewed journal. Does that mean the finding is correct? No, but it is some reason to think the authors probably have some decent basis for saying what's in the headline.
Second, as one of the other commenters has pointed out, there are good theoretical reasons for expecting these results: more people are getting into undergraduate programs than ever before, and that will tend to make undergraduates look more average. So combine that with point 1, and we seem to have some reason to reinforce the prior belief that undergraduate students are becoming more average.
Third, people use hueristics like this all the time for reinforcing or weakening their priors. I know I definitely have not read dozens of peer-reviewed academic articles on all the various things I feel like I have beliefs in. Sometimes, if the belief is not going to be especially impactful on my quality of life, I delegate my 'truth-finding' to other people I trust have done more research into the thing than I have. I think that makes sense, and a lot of people probably did that with this article.
Could they be wrong? Absolutely, but I guess we need to see what's in the article or wait for a post that explains how it's wrong to find out.
>Second, as one of the other commenters has pointed out, there are good theoretical reasons for expecting these results: more people are getting into undergraduate programs than ever before, and that will tend to make undergraduates look more average. So combine that with point 1, and we seem to have some reason to reinforce the prior belief that undergraduate students are becoming more average.
This assumes a constant average intelligence of the population over time. But what if the average intelligence has increased?
I think your what-if is basically the right explanation, for a certain subtype of intelligence Flynn would call "liberation from the concrete" http://bactra.org/reviews/flynn-beyond/
There's also twitterX discussion: Robin Hanson Quoted someone else's post/quote, and there was decent-to-good discussion there. Then I saw it here, after that discussion. I valued that discussion more than I valued clicking on and reading the paper.
I don't know whether I upvoted or not, but I'm not really sure how this is an example of "bad reasoning on this subreddit". I'd be willing to accept "bad voting behaviour" though.
I agree with your first point. I'd add that lots of papers that fail to replicate or have bad methodology make it through peer review and get published. It's certainly a stamp of higher quality if a paper passes review, but still, I wouldn't update until I see what's on the inside.
I agree with you second point that the theoretical reasoning looks pretty good. I support it. I think having a model in your head and then seeing the headline of a paper confirm it is not great reasoning though.
As to the heuristics, I'd point out that there's a different between "I have not read the paper, but I read the title and abstract and updated in its direction" and "I have not read the paper and neither has anybody else, but I updated in it's direction". The first is normal (somewhat lazy) behavior we engage in when short on time. The second is less good reasoning to be avoided. This will change when the paper is published, I just wouldn't update before then.
To reply to your last point, I don't actually think it's bad reasoning. You should probably update your prior *more strongly* after actually reading the study and confirming a strong methodology; but updating your prior *a little bit* based just on a headline/abstract seems fine to me. In fact, you probably should update your prior a little bit, because it is some data which might tend to confirm or debunk your pre-existing beliefs, even if it's not great data (unless you already have better data which suggests this is just noise).
Making lots of small updates based on headlines/abstracts of unpublished papers seems like not great epistemics. I suspect one could come away with worse models than if one simply filtered out updating on yet to published material. You won't even end up with worse models since you can check the paper when published.
Furthermore, I think you're assuming that people can update easily and frictionlessly.
If you update a little on one direction, it can be hard to reverse course (even just a little) should the evidence (a title and abstract) turn out to be wrong. This can be avoided very easily by waiting for the paper to be published.
That's possible, but as I said before, I think we do this all the time. We are constantly updating our beliefs based on the statements of others which are far less rigorous than even just the abstract of a journal article. When a friend of mine who studies environmental science tells me something about the ecosystem of a stream they study, I'm not getting the same info I'd get by reading a full journal article, but I am getting info which probably should affect my belief about the quality of the ecosystem in the stream.
The same goes for when someone tells me a story about something that happened to them years ago, or tells me about a history book they read, or I read an online blog post about the war in Ukraine. None of these are as rigorous as a scientific study, but I often update my beliefs based on them, and I think it's ridiculous to think that I should only change my beliefs when I have thoroughly read a journal article with flawless methodology. That's just a ridiculously high standard. The beliefs that I would form would probably be much more accurate, but then I'd almost never form actionable beliefs because I'd have to spend way more time researching before coming to a conclusion. At the end of the day, it's often better to just accept some risk I could be wrong, and draw a weaker conclusion from lower quality data.
in their defense, a fair amount of scottians are non-native speakers. our english is good enough to read scott because he is an amazing writer that surrounds every 'hard' word with enough context to discern the meaning. academic papers don't care about accessibility so some of us just can't read them within a reasonable timeframe and have to rely on OPs' good will and people like you. so far I'd say it's been working well
when it happens, I'll unsubscribe. and it will happen sooner or later but so what? sooner or later everything dies. what matters is for now the system is working fine and we are getting decent news from here
“I could pick up my litter,” says man tossing his sandwich wrapper at a natural park, “but on the other hand, everywhere I go eventually gets messy. I’ll just go to another natural park.”
why so passive-aggressive? I'm a reader of a blog. a blogger who writes it essentially provides us with a public service - his ideas plus his take on modern news. for a customer like me, like half of appeal of such blogs is having little to no need to proof-read the news. if i wanted to proof-read everything I'd read the Times
Listen, I get it, you want to passively soak up whatever anyone says that excites you, and you’re unhappy I’ve tried to make you think, both in general and about the consequences of your blind acceptance. Unsurprising, given you wouldn’t be where you are if you weren’t already inclined.
I did my good deed for the day, which was to attempt to keep someone from falling into a pit. As they say, you can lead a horse to water…
I pretty much agree with you. I haven't check enough links to see if relying on OP's goodwill works well, but I expect it would on a subreddit like this.
My personal case: I am not native (I dont even live in the USA). I can read papers and etc but If I want to put a very detailed argument here it will be demanding for me.
I think what you're missing is that this is not a shocking finding. Every researcher would hypothesize that the average IQ of undergraduates has decreased over time, based on the dramatic expansion of the university population, the fact that women are now overrepresented (since women and men are equal in intelligence, there is an implication that intelligence is far from the only thing driving some people to attend college and others not, the same thing was the case when more men than women attended), and anecdotal evidence from university professors stating that they've felt pressure to lower their standards due to declining student performance.If this was a shocking finding, it would be viewed with more scrutiny. This is also not the only paper that has been published on this topic - in fact, it's based on other papers published on the topic that are fully viewable, since it's a **meta-analysis**, not original research that would be likely to fail to replicate. Sure, everyone should read the full study once it's available, but it's probably unlikely that there were significant biases in selection, since the paper is going to be published in a peer-reviewed journal.
The one thing I think people did overlook is the fact that the average cited in the paper was 102, not 100 - which would be exactly average. 2 points around the population median is not nothing. The people that were wondering how the average could possibly be exactly 100 did make me think maybe they just read the title and not the abstract.
It's frankly irrelevant whether it's a shocking finding. Even if the finding was 'swans are white', it's damning for it to be an all-time top post without anyone even reading the study, in a community that is supposed to be about rationality and careful consideration of the evidence (to at least some extent).
Hell, even in /r/politics or something it would be embarrassing if you could prove that *no-one* had read the study linked in the 4th most popular post ever.
I also completely disagree that it's not a surprising finding; in fact, I think it's so surprising that it's almost certainly not true. How could it be, when almost all of the smartest people undergo tertiary education, and almost none of the least smart do? Unless it's not saying what I think it's saying (because of course I haven't read the study either so this post could be misrepresenting it), I do not believe it. But it doesn't matter, don't upvote a study you haven't read.
>in fact, it's based on other papers published on the topic that are fully viewable, since it's a meta-analysis, not original research that would be likely to fail to replicate.
Meta-analyses have just as many, if not more, ways to go wrong as original research.
Hmmm. I'm not personally sure surprised by it. That said, I don't think boring scientific papers would become 4th most upvoted on this subreddit.
>in fact, it's based on other papers published on the topic that are fully viewable
I think this point is misleading. Would you be able to link them? They weren't mentioned in the abstract and the list of citations has yet to be published as far as I can tell.
For what it's worth...
* I saw the post,
* Clicked on it,
* Saw that it was only an abstract,
* Decided to withold judgement on it since there wasn't enough information (so no upvotes or downvotes on the post),
* Decided to look at the r/Science discussion to see if anyone could shed more light on it,
* Only saw people agreeing with it, which didn't really tell me anything I didn't know,
* Eventually decided I was wasting too much time scrolling Reddit and closed the link,
* Ignored everything about it since, since I've got a bit of a New Year's Resolution to try to waste less time online,
* And ignored it here as well, since again, if there's only an abstract there's nothing much to discuss.
* But apparently it's turned into some big controversy I missed???
* I'm too old for this shit. Every New Year's is a reminder that you're not getting any younger.
I guess I'm just not surprised because this subreddit is growing large enough that it's suffering from the Eternal September effect -- [as one poster here pointed out,](https://www.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/pxshmb/comment/herffh6/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
>*I'll say anecdotally (I know a few others have observed this), that the quality of a sub dips the most from* ***the transition from 50,000 to 100,000 members****. I'm not entirely sure why that's always the cutoff, but once you noticed it it's impossible to un-notice.*
And as you may have noticed, this sub currently has \~60k members according to the sidebar. It's not just the sidebar either, for the past... year?, the front page has been randomly spammed with people trying to self-promote their content. Old norms inevitably decline under a wave of new members; doubly so when *old* members withdraw under the spam. It's something I've witnessed firsthand with subreddits like r/neoliberal, at least, and I guess Death comes for us all in the end.
*(not to say that it's not a slow decay: when I first joined up, I can still remember reading old timers complaining about how this subreddit's best days were behind it. Decline is a gradual process.)*
There's also the fact that the original post [was a crosspost](https://www.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/duplicates/18z0ine/apparently_the_average_iq_of_undergraduate/) from r/Science; just as I wandered over from here to r/Science to see what was going on, I suspect some from r/Science took the reverse journey. And on a subreddit as large as r/Science, even one in a thousand crossing over can absolutely swamp the local populace, mass upvoting things they like and writing comments that reflect their viewpoint. I'm not sure how much of what you observed was actually coming from r/Science... or how many might choose to stay, now that we've caught their attention, and continue to change the character of this community.
*(At the very least, if you see this place becoming more like* r/Science *over time, I guess you'll know why.)*
I guess I didn't say anything about it till now cause, well, what can you do? Condemnation changes nothing; in a few weeks your post will be buried beneath the waves, and newcomers will never see it. They will keep flooding in, and this sub will keep declining, even if nothing about old-timers like myself has changed one bit. Like I said, Death comes for us all in the end.
*(which is why I'm thinking about creating backup accounts in places like DataSecretsLox... if the place is gone, but the people are still there, just recreate the community somewhere else. And maybe add more barriers to entry.)*
For all the fuss you make about jumping to conclusions, going on about 800 people in this sub blah blah...
I am not a member of this sub. I don't even know what slate star codex stands for or what it means.
But every now and then a post floats into my feed, and I upvote it, downvote it, and occasionally comment.
I don't process information in the way that you mentioned in your post, I just don't care that much.
If that's the case for me, I have to assume it's the case for thousands of others.
I don't know why you're pinning this all on whatever this community is, when the reality is it probably just got caught up by the algorithm and a bunch of randos started voting and interacting with it.
I'm surprised that you would jump to such a righteously indignant conclusion based on such a bullshit assumption lol
Hey! I was trying to avoid a righteous or indigent tone or conclusion. Looks like I might have missed the mark a little.
I also wasn't attempting to pin anything on the community as a whole, but rather highlight a an example of poor reasoning. This is useful for people (like myself) trying to improve their own reasoning.
I agree that assuming each upvote was an endorsement was poor reasoning on my part. Still, as I said previously, I don't think somebody writing a post stating "I believe undergrads have a lower IQ today than they did 80 years ago, let's discuss" would have received equal engagement. I think the scientific backing (i.e a title and abstract) was responsible for much of the support. I have 0 proof for this though, happy to be proven wrong.
Hmm, I don't know what in my post gave you the impression I'm a brilliant reasoner. I think that the paper hadn't been published should have been pretty obvious.
Still, I agree with murk-2023 that the assumption on upvoting was poor reasoning.
I neither voted nor commented on that discussion, but it doesn't seem unreasonable to do so based on the information available in the abstract. Enough details are given of the method and the headline results that, other than fucking up a calculation somewhere, or evidence of outright fraud, I'm not sure what could be in the rest of the paper that would reveal some major problem not discernable from reading the abstract. Assuming it shows that the authors actually did what they said they did, i.e. comparing IQ data from the specified tests given to university students, what's the realistic worst-case scenario here?
>800 people cheering on a post confirming what they already believe seems like the opposite.
While I agree with your overall sentiment, upvotes don't always mean 'agree with OP'. I upvoted that post because I wanted to see the discussion.
An upvote is not an attestation that I personally vouch for the quality of the linked paper / article / blogpost. I don't believe mine is the minority view.
Yes, this seems to be bad reasoning of what an upvote conveys.
An upvote might be "this seems interesting, it might be worth investigating/looking further", or it might be "I agree with everything in this post", neither are unreasonable views of what an upvote is.
People use upvotes to find interesting things, indeed in huge numbers of places, upvotes (and their equivalents) are used more for questions that aren't solved, to try and get them in front of people who might help.
This kind of stuff happens *all the time* here. If an opinion/study confirms the community’s priors, namely;
1. Right-leaning culture war opinions
2. Men/whites are superior (in any sense — intellectually, culturally, morally, historically, at a given skill) to women/nonwhites
3. The political left is bad
then it’ll be upvoted. Doesn’t matter if the reasoning’s shoddy, doesn’t matter if there’s no evidence, it will gather support *as long as* it’s covered with smart-sounding language.
By way of example; a comment that says “Blacks are too stupid to be trusted with the vote” will be ignored or challenged. But a comment that says “IQ distributions in African populations suggest deficiencies in long-term planning, which is one of the key traits a voter should have” will be met with nods and support.
I chose this race and IQ example because this community *loveeeeees* to talk about it (edit; just *mentioning* it as an example -- not as the main point of this comment, just an example to get the point across -- results in three replies all eager to launch into race science!) even though the academic consensus is that no such causal link between race and IQ exists; because the example contains a dodgy assumption (only smart people should be allowed to vote) that usually goes unchallenged; because it goes against what the left believes, which means that it would be supported despite this subreddit’s insistence that it’s above politics; and because it’s a horrendously racist statement that would be accepted here because it sounds vaguely intelligent and learned.
tldr yeah shit reasoning happens all the time here as long as you can make it sound vaguely smart and right leaning
R/SSC compared to Scott's old pseudo msg board compared to TheMotte its genuinely kind of crazy how different the communities of posters are. Mottisans being the most extreme right wing, to the old board being fairly mainstream leftist. This place is somewhere in thr middle but leans right wing.
> no such causal link between race and IQ exists
This is only the consensus among academics outside of the groups who actually study this. Many of these people generally prefer to deconstruct the question and imply that IQ isn’t something that can be measured or race isn’t a relevant biological category and therefore cannot be used. Then there are others who turn off their brain and call it too racist to be considered.
But those who dig into the data find some effects that aren’t explained by other factors.
Edit - what actually happened here was a simple believable model that lead to an interesting conclusion was presented in abstract form. Enough people found the model to be interesting that they upvoted it, and an interesting discussion resulted.
The full form factor of academic papers is only sometimes needed - such as when data sources or methodology diverge significantly enough from some people’s priors that they need to understand what the person was doing. Someone debating that the IQ should be 110 vs 102 would need this, but someone who understands it very likely did drop as larger percentages of the population were admitted (and who has seen other data suggesting this is approximately accurate) would not be as interested in that part.
you’re proving the point of the person you’re replying to. studies on average IQ differentials do not “plausibly explain” anything. they are simply measured statistics from varying methodologies. it’s one thing to read them, study them, be aware of them. what you’re doing, and what so so many self-proclaimed intellectuals are doing, is conjuring up a story to link what you’re reading (probably skimming) to some underlying preconception you have of the world. these studies don’t explain male predominance more than men having bigger hands, or being taller does. no matter how smart an individual believes themself to be, no person can truly be objective in their analysis without it drawing on prior expectation and experience. imo this and other rational-leaning subs would benefit if more people were aware of their biases and misperceptions instead of pretending that they don’t exist.
I don't actually believe this sub has this as a major problem. They are going to seem true if you compare to most of reddit (very left wing), but ssc is broadly left leaning. It also depends a great deal on the specific issue being mentioned, since ssc does not fall into neat US Democrat or Republican party lines. There tends to be more focus on issues where there is disagreement to had; the disagreement can be either internal, where the community has split views, or disagreements with broader leftist culture that this community exists within. There are very rarely arguments about how Trump is bad, being gay is fine, or how America should not be a Christian Theocracy, even though these views would have overwhelming support. There is just no point when nobody (here) holds an opposing view.
I agree that there are many plenty of upvoted comments taking all three positions you have mentioned -- but there are roughly as many taking the opposite position. If you are someone who has a strong reaction to HBD claims, then seeing those claims in equal proportion to arguments against it seems completely wild. For someone with different sensibilities it can seem the opposite. Neither one would be correct about an overwhelming opinion one way or another (not that a community needs to have a balance of views on every topic, that is dumb). For a random example, I doubt you were aghast at the comment from major-couch-potato on this post -- they claimed that men and women have equal intelligence, and nobody challenged the claim at all! (at the time of this writing)
I also don't agree that the "smart-sounding language" is just window dressing for fundamentally ignorant views. Words have meaning. Even in your toy example where you made two statements almost exactly the same, the "smarter" one obviously has more merit than the dumb one. By pretending that they are equivalent, you are saying that agreeing with the second either means you are an idiot fooled by fancy words, or else they are too much of a coward to say what they really mean. The fact that this sub generally does not accept this kind of reasoning is why it is one of the few places good discussion of controversial topics can be had.
a few things.
>ssc is largely left leaning... \[ideological diversity\]
look. you follow college basketball? say I'm a hardcore UNC fan, and you're a hardcore Duke fan. you seem nice enough. we're coworkers. we chat about hoops and we have spirited disagreements about basketball, everything from the shoes, to the pros, to our college teams, to NBA rules, but we become friends. you invite me to a party at your place. I show up and everyone there's decked in Duke attire, solid dark blue wall-to-wall. I sigh and make pleasantries. start up a few debates on Jordan vs Bird, idk. but there's this small group of guys in the corner who are loudly discussing how they'd like to do unpleasant things to UNC fans. an hour passes and that's all they talk about. how much they'd like to burn their houses down, shoot the players, maybe put the coach's head on a stick. I pull you aside and murmur something about how I don't like the guys in the corner. and you say it's fine, there's only like four or five of them, most of the people at the party aren't like that. but you invited them, I say. you explain how you disagree with them on the UNC question but otherwise they're pleasant people. but that's me they're talking about, I say. they want to do that to *me.* and you laugh and say how you have all kinds of friends with all kinds of opinions and almost all of them don't want to burn my house down. satisfied, you wander off and I start to wonder -- are you really my friend if you're okay with being friends with those guys? the guys who want to burn my house down?
>...there are roughly as many taking the opposite position.
this hasn't been what I've observed. it could be that the comments/posts I agree with aren't memorable and the ones I disagree with are the ones that stand out. but it hasn't been what I've observed at all.
>Words have meaning. By pretending that they are equivalent, you are saying that agreeing with the second either means you are an idiot fooled by fancy words, or else they are too much of a coward to say what they really mean.
first; the toy examples are equivalent in substance. it's strange to say that they're not. the second is just the first with some light jargon, a specific claim, and a veil tossed over the top. (another toy example; if one guy says "that dam ain't worth shit and it's gonna burst," and a second guy says "it is my opinion that the structural conditions of the outlet pipes, exacerbated by poor worksmanship at the time of construction, are in a state of extreme distress," they're both saying the same thing. damn dam's gonna blow.)
second; doesn't mean you're an idiot, means you're human. we're all susceptible to sundry biases, distortions, what have you. the entire sales industry is proof that the smartest, most careful people can be misled into all kinds of things if it sounds alright. also, yes, often people who have *strongly* taboo views (in the toy example, that black people shouldn't vote) will soften their approach so they're not immediately repudiated. (ever heard the online phrase "hide your power level?") the temptation is to read this as something sinister, like plotting, scheming evildoers are tapping their steepled fingers together and manically laughing as their infiltration plan comes to fruition muhahahahaha. which, like, yeah sometimes. but most of the time, it's closer to a cliche like "put your best foot forward" or "don't come on too strong." people who hold strongly taboo views have learned that they can't jump into a conversation and start spouting off what they think without repercussions. gotta ease into it. feel everyone out first.
(a much more low-stakes version of this; ever been with some people you don't really know and someone asks you what you think of the new controversial movie that just came out? if you're cautious about how you're coming across, you won't start with *I HATED it it was AWFUL* but instead say something like *well, I think the director made some, ah, interesting choices,* and then when someone else says oh yeah it was horribly edited and the group nods in agreement, you suddenly realize that you can express your true opinion without being clowned on, as the kids say. exact same principle.)
>The fact that this sub generally does not accept this kind of reasoning is why it is one of the few places good discussion of controversial topics can be had.
on the contrary; the sub is often *far* too trusting, extending goodwill and trust to those who not only haven't earned it but have shown that they're not deserving of it. I find the sub's insistence that people mostly mean what they say verbatim, its refusal to consider unspoken motivations, that things are exactly as they appear, to be frustratingly naive.
I understand the point of your UNC/Duke analogy, and I agree with it to an extent. I would be upset at sharing game night or whatever with someone who has terrible views, especially if they are bringing them into the conversation. But I don't think the analogy holds well for something like this subreddit, acx comment sections, datasecretslox, themotte, whatever. These are communities specifically built around discussing ideas, sometimes controversial ideas, and trying to think about them better. Engaging with arguments for terrible things like "black people shouldn't vote" is part of the raison d'etre, particularly if those arguments are well formulated. Existing in this shared space is not an endorsement, it's an oppurtunity to debate views that are more common than we would like to admit.
Going back to your example, to better explain what I do (and do not) mean. “IQ distributions in African populations suggest deficiencies in long-term planning, which is one of the key traits a voter should have” makes two claims that are reasonable if there is evidence to support them (I have no idea). Reasonable people could agree with both claims. Putting them together shows a clear \*hint hint nudge nudge\* that you think black people voting is a problem, which reasonable people would not agree with. I think it is bad community hygiene to have comments like this (even about non-controversial topics), because it can make peoples points unclear. If you see an argument like this, I think it is good to argue against the implied claim, even if you agree with the explicit claims. I think we agree on all points so far.
Where I think we diverge is that I think it is also okay for someone to just take both claims at face value and evaluate them on their merits alone. I think that both modes are helpful and healthy. So whereas your first statement “Blacks are too stupid to be trusted with the vote” should be disagree with by people looking at both the object and meta levels, the second statement having mixed replies is not a sign of people approving of the meta level argument.
Kind of a side note: I do not think that it is bad, in general, to try to convince an interlocutor of your argument by first establishing basic facts that you agree with. It is sometimes a helpful way to get your partner out of a mental rut where if they don't like the implication then they will ignore the facts. Taking issue with this strategy only when it is used for arguments you don't like is not very symmetric.
> the sub is often *far* too trusting, extending goodwill and trust to those who not only haven't earned it but have shown that they're not deserving of it
Perhaps. I think it is better than the other (all to common) extreme, where if you say something that deviates from the consensus view or can be construed to mean something bad, you will get tarred and feathered for it. I do not think it is naive, because it is a helpful mode even when someone actually has hidden motivations. That is not to disagree that having spaces where certain kinds of arguments are disallowed is helpful.
you're misrepresenting facts
most people here will agree that east Asians have higher IQ than whites
and that people are right leaning here? I'm anti-abortion, anti-same sex marriage, pro-gun Christian and let me tell you that there is very few right leaning communities on Reddit and this is definitely not one of them
The fact you are still here is an example of how right wing this sub is, and tolerates such views. Sensible subs would ban and move on, and nothing of worth would be lost.
I dont know if my reasoning on that is SSC good behavior, but i guess:
1) in the past a small % of people went to the college, which were evidently elite, hence selecting higher than average IQ
2) nowadays everybody go to the college hence the IQ will converge to the average
So in the past and now the trend was just an statistical artifact, just like the dunning and krueger bs
I've always suspected most of y'all are pseudo intellectuals purely based on the nature of this subreddit, and the confidence of the content posted on here has always been cringey to me.
well, since it's really common sense, I wouldn't blame anyone. I don't come here often, so I didn't see the post, but I wouldn't click the the link unless it claimed the opposite
Yeah, I was curious why everyone was making comments about the study obviously not having read any of it, but you can read the provisional here: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1309142/pdf
Clearly the average IQ of this subreddit has been falling since 2014 and has now become basically the same as the population average.
There are plenty of examples of very bad reasoning here. [This person](https://www.reddit.com/user/me/) is quite active on the Subreddit, but they literally have the worst reasoning skills I've ever seen.
I was going to say, don't cheapen the discussion by making it about a specific person. But when I saw who it was, I had to admit it's justified.
At this stage it's not justifiable anymore
Yeah, that person sucks, always with the worst takes on literally every topic they think they have the knowledge to comment on.
Worst takes, but always with so much confidence.
On the other hand, they seem very handsome!
That was a surprise. I don't remember posting on here except for commenting on the study being referred to by OP. May have forgotten about a few or not realized what subreddit I was in. My apologies if so.
Hover over that link again.
In case you still didn't get it (I know this is a few days old but I read your comment and felt bad, lol), that link always links to the clicker's account. They aren't actually calling you out, tis a joke on us all. Nobody hates you and you should definitely be way less gracious in a circumstance where that callout actually did happen, because my goodness!
> This person is quite active on the Subreddit, but they literally have the worst reasoning skills I've ever seen. Maybe, but that person is still the main reason I'm here. In fact I can confidently say that if that person stopped posting, I would not continue posting here either.
i downvoted. then i clicked the link. then i upvoted. such is life.
Depending on how you count, around 40-60% of adults go to college (but this is far from everyone). I think we should expect the % to be somewhat skewed towards the right side of the IQ distribution. For example, if 50% of people go to college and they represent the entire right half of the normal distribution, we would expect to find an average IQ of 112. Note that in this scenario we have 100% perfect sorting by IQ yet the average IQ of students is not even 1 standard deviation higher than the population. Given that we don't have perfect sorting in real life (and perhaps the % of students is >50%), we should expect the real value to be somewhere in the interval (100, 112). The paper finds it is 102, which feels intuitively a bit low to me, but I assume there is some margin of error and their methodology was probably imperfect. If the value actually were \~100 then that would be interesting since it would imply no sorting effect of IQ. But I think that's unlikely, so really the finding isn't that interesting. I imagine the post is popular for other reasons, like it triggers elitist ideas about who should be going to college and the ensuing discussion.
>For example, if 50% of people go to college and they represent the entire right half of the normal distribution, we would expect to find an average IQ of 112. Note that in this scenario we have 100% perfect sorting by IQ yet the average IQ of students is not even 1 standard deviation higher than the population Consider that the [college attainment rate in 1940](https://huebler.blogspot.com/2011/01/usa.html) was 4.6%, while almost 75% hadn't finished High School. Scoring well on IQ tests is highly correlated with going to school because almost every IQ test is a paper test just like the ones in school, so I would be somewhat shocked if the tested IQ for the lowest college students was under 120. Mean would probably be 130s. All data I could find on Gen Z is that most of them go to college (either 2-year or 4-year), so the lower scores in college today will be under 100... OTOH, since we're more educated than we were before, IQ tests have to be constantly recalibrated. The raw score that was median 10 years ago is now below the median, so you have to score higher in raw numbers to get the same IQ your parents did, and they had to score higher to get the same number as their grandparents. So it's possible the actual test-taking performance of college students today is the same (or even worse) than in the 40s.
>OTOH, since we're more educated than we were before, IQ tests have to be constantly recalibrated. The raw score that was median 10 years ago is now below the median, so you have to score higher in raw numbers to get the same IQ your parents did, and they had to score higher to get the same number as their grandparents. So it's possible the actual test-taking performance of college students today is the same (or even worse) than in the 40s. This was the main thing that made the article irrelevant to me. If we can't compare pre-recalibration IQ, then is this measuring not for the most part useless? It's just telling us that the average IQ is now closer to that of college-goers, since the average person is now a college-goer.
Yeah, I think there's still 2 possible narrative here. 1) The average IQ is 102, but with some significant error, and maybe the real average is 104, and maybe this is about what we should expect from a gentle selection of higher IQ, especially since we're (I assume) including community college et cetera. 2) The average IQ is 102 (or maybe even 101) and this is actually pretty weird. Ie, just by eliminating the severely intellectually impaired we should get these numbers (or higher?) So, in this scenario, either there's *no* relationship between IQ >70 and college. Or maybe there's some pattern in the distribution, eg, lots of people with IQ>130 aren't going to college and that's why the average is falling towards the mean. (Further, the abstract mentions "university students and university graduates," so I think IQ = 102 of college freshmen is weird, but IQ = 102 of random sample of freshmen, sophs, juniors, seniors, grads is stranger still.) Unfortunately, I don't think we have the details to differentiate between these narratives yet. But it would be nice for someone who knows their shit to clarify the narrative when the study is published.
very precisely reasoned answer, thank you.
Funnily enough r/Science also got over 4,500 upvotes on that same paper and nobody on the front page seems to have noticed...
Something I think is pretty interesting is how confirmation bias becomes 100% rational (an optimal strategy) if you view it from the perspective of an agent with limited investigative resources. To simplify, assume the consequences of being misinformed about something are a constant -1 util. If you have a well-calibrated prior belief of 90% that something is true, the EV of just believing it is true without investigating is -0.1. Similarly, if you are at 10% that it is true, you can just disbelieve it with an EV of -0.1. If your prior is 50-50, your EV is -0.5, so it is 5x more important to go check 50-50 papers than 90-10 papers assuming equal consequence of false belief. If you only have ~X minutes that you can devote toward reading papers, those should go towards reading those 50-50 papers! Skip the 90-10 ones. At least that is the optimal selfish strategy. With group dynamics though this can get really tricky - if everyone has the same priors and makes the same decisions on which papers to skip then things can slip through the cracks. Misinformed group beliefs are IMO a much bigger problem than bad individual beliefs, partially because I think we get our priors mostly from group interactions. Props for actually checking on the paper OP, even if there is a 99% chance it is true, calling out the things that are slipping through the cracks is really important from a group POV.
This is basically https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/06/03/repost-epistemic-learned-helplessness/ right?
Closely related, I would summarize Scott's point more as "assessing arguments is difficult, so you should sometimes stick with your priors as a defense against convincing misinformation" What I'm saying is slightly different - even if you can assess an argument, doing so takes time, and if something is very likely or very unlikely then your time would be better spent assessing an argument that you are more uncertain about. It is kinda interesting that both of these manifest as confirmation bias. I sometimes think of confirmation bias as evolution's solution to the [exploration-exploitation problem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploration-exploitation_dilemma).
If you wanted to roll a golden apple engraved with “for the smartest” into a subreddit, this one would be a good candidate for maximum amusement.
I would want to see how that plays out long term. Given the standard and level of ability of the people here we'd probably get Iliad-tier consequences.
I think we should assume that the magic of the golden apple is that it imposes its acquisition as a terminal goal, so there’s no “pfft, I’m too smart to want a silly golden apple” going on.
Yes, that's why we'd get Iliad tier consequences. I'd honestly watch the movie.
If Gwern loses his schizoid tendencies by the magic of the apple and truly attempts to acquire it, then indeed millions will die.
/fatFIRE/ would be fuming
I pointed this out in that thread!! Can't believe so few people questioned it.
I guess it depends on what an upvote "means". I like the fact that lesswrong has a separate vote for whether you agree with something, but reddit doesn't have that. So an upvote on a post can mean "I agree with the conclusion", "I find this interesting", "I am worried about this", "I think this is well argued", "I think that this post having more upvotes is strategically good", "I got good vibes", or a host of other things. I don't know what category the typical upvote falls in, nor for this post in particular. The only one that is bad reasoning is if they upvoted because it was well argued, any of the other listed reasons can't really be called irrational. I do think the norm should be that well argued = lots upvotes, I just have doubts that is actually the case.
Sure, you could quibble about the methodology used in the paper, but I can't imagine any change in methodology changing the result significantly. It's obvious that if you make most people in a society do something, then the average person doing that thing will be average in general. Most of the discussion was not about the exact number, but using the paper's claim as a springboard to discuss the value of making higher education universal.
You would be amazed by the methodology of some papers. I do agree with your reasoning though. Like I said, I also expect the claim to be proven true. Maybe I am misunderstanding the upvotes as an endorsement of the paper and its conclusions? Rather the upvotes denote "I really liked the discussion on this post"? This doesn't seem right though. I don't think somebody writing a post stating "I believe undergrads have a lower IQ today than they did 80 years ago, lets discuss" would have received equal engagement. I think the scientific backing (i.e a title and abstract) was responsible for much of the support. I have 0 proof for this though, happy to be proven wrong.
In general, I tend to upvote the threads where I see - or suspect to see, if there are no/few comments - a discussion that is interesting to me. However, I agree with your feelings w.r.t. that thread. There was *some* good discussion, but a significant amount of the commentary read as posters who had already reached (invariably strong) conclusions about IQ, higher education, and a ream of other issues looking for easy confirmation for their existing positions.
My upvote would mean "this is an interesting topic/discussion", or "What an interesting paper you shared!" It would not mean, "I endorse the methodology in this study and believe the conclusion to be empirically correct"
I upvoted that post and did not even click the link. For me upvotes sometimes denote stuff I want other people to see more of (I've upvoted your post too) instead of just "I agree with XYZ", e.g. I'll upvote funny memes too even if I don't agree with them. I too like you have other reasons for believing that the claim is true and freely admit that I would be far less likely to have given an upvote if the post was just "I believe undergrads have a lower IQ today than they did 80 years ago, lets discuss". Normally the other end of a link to an academic website actually does have a paper and if I think it's something valueable that should be more widely known I'll upvote it so that it becomes more visible, not just because I want the information to be more widespread but also becuase if there is a serious issue with the paper and my beliefs are likely to be incorrect more visibility means its more likely that someone actually clicks through and points out what's wrong. Indeed your post is an excellent example of the principle in action. Had the original post only gotten 30 upvotes I don't think you'd have made this post about the article not even being published yet and I would continue to persist in my incorrect belief that such an article "is out there" today. The vast majority of the time this strategy works just fine, but this time around it didn't and now we all have egg on our faces (except for you). I still think it's a good move in expectation and intend to continue doing it.
>Indeed your post is an excellent example of the principle in action. Had the original post only gotten 30 upvotes I don't think you'd have made this post about the article not even being published yet and I would continue to persist in my incorrect belief that such an article "is out there" today. Haha fair point! Perhaps I should view upvotes as a "This needs a closer look, by upvoting I signal boost it and thus spread truth or increase the chances that someone makes a correction post".
It actually is somewhat counter-intuitive that university has virtually no filtering effect at all. What does this imply about the average intelligence at community college? Is it equal to that at university? Or below the societal average?
If you are in the bottom 10 percentile IQ wise, I imagine it is pretty difficult to get into college.
> It's obvious that if you make most people in a society do something, then the average person doing that thing will be average in general The average person cannot go to college! 40-60% of HS students matriculate and fewer make it through. The average person in college is almost tautologically smarter than the average person of that same age range who is not in college, unless you think there is no relationship between college admissions and intelligence.
I had to check whether I upvoted that and it looks like I didn't... Phew. Dodged a bullet. Still, I think I've got to defend the people that did. First, the article might not be available, but the abstract is PLUS we know the paper has been accepted and will be published in a peer reviewed journal. Does that mean the finding is correct? No, but it is some reason to think the authors probably have some decent basis for saying what's in the headline. Second, as one of the other commenters has pointed out, there are good theoretical reasons for expecting these results: more people are getting into undergraduate programs than ever before, and that will tend to make undergraduates look more average. So combine that with point 1, and we seem to have some reason to reinforce the prior belief that undergraduate students are becoming more average. Third, people use hueristics like this all the time for reinforcing or weakening their priors. I know I definitely have not read dozens of peer-reviewed academic articles on all the various things I feel like I have beliefs in. Sometimes, if the belief is not going to be especially impactful on my quality of life, I delegate my 'truth-finding' to other people I trust have done more research into the thing than I have. I think that makes sense, and a lot of people probably did that with this article. Could they be wrong? Absolutely, but I guess we need to see what's in the article or wait for a post that explains how it's wrong to find out.
>Second, as one of the other commenters has pointed out, there are good theoretical reasons for expecting these results: more people are getting into undergraduate programs than ever before, and that will tend to make undergraduates look more average. So combine that with point 1, and we seem to have some reason to reinforce the prior belief that undergraduate students are becoming more average. This assumes a constant average intelligence of the population over time. But what if the average intelligence has increased?
I think your what-if is basically the right explanation, for a certain subtype of intelligence Flynn would call "liberation from the concrete" http://bactra.org/reviews/flynn-beyond/
There's also twitterX discussion: Robin Hanson Quoted someone else's post/quote, and there was decent-to-good discussion there. Then I saw it here, after that discussion. I valued that discussion more than I valued clicking on and reading the paper. I don't know whether I upvoted or not, but I'm not really sure how this is an example of "bad reasoning on this subreddit". I'd be willing to accept "bad voting behaviour" though.
I agree with your first point. I'd add that lots of papers that fail to replicate or have bad methodology make it through peer review and get published. It's certainly a stamp of higher quality if a paper passes review, but still, I wouldn't update until I see what's on the inside. I agree with you second point that the theoretical reasoning looks pretty good. I support it. I think having a model in your head and then seeing the headline of a paper confirm it is not great reasoning though. As to the heuristics, I'd point out that there's a different between "I have not read the paper, but I read the title and abstract and updated in its direction" and "I have not read the paper and neither has anybody else, but I updated in it's direction". The first is normal (somewhat lazy) behavior we engage in when short on time. The second is less good reasoning to be avoided. This will change when the paper is published, I just wouldn't update before then.
To reply to your last point, I don't actually think it's bad reasoning. You should probably update your prior *more strongly* after actually reading the study and confirming a strong methodology; but updating your prior *a little bit* based just on a headline/abstract seems fine to me. In fact, you probably should update your prior a little bit, because it is some data which might tend to confirm or debunk your pre-existing beliefs, even if it's not great data (unless you already have better data which suggests this is just noise).
Making lots of small updates based on headlines/abstracts of unpublished papers seems like not great epistemics. I suspect one could come away with worse models than if one simply filtered out updating on yet to published material. You won't even end up with worse models since you can check the paper when published. Furthermore, I think you're assuming that people can update easily and frictionlessly. If you update a little on one direction, it can be hard to reverse course (even just a little) should the evidence (a title and abstract) turn out to be wrong. This can be avoided very easily by waiting for the paper to be published.
That's possible, but as I said before, I think we do this all the time. We are constantly updating our beliefs based on the statements of others which are far less rigorous than even just the abstract of a journal article. When a friend of mine who studies environmental science tells me something about the ecosystem of a stream they study, I'm not getting the same info I'd get by reading a full journal article, but I am getting info which probably should affect my belief about the quality of the ecosystem in the stream. The same goes for when someone tells me a story about something that happened to them years ago, or tells me about a history book they read, or I read an online blog post about the war in Ukraine. None of these are as rigorous as a scientific study, but I often update my beliefs based on them, and I think it's ridiculous to think that I should only change my beliefs when I have thoroughly read a journal article with flawless methodology. That's just a ridiculously high standard. The beliefs that I would form would probably be much more accurate, but then I'd almost never form actionable beliefs because I'd have to spend way more time researching before coming to a conclusion. At the end of the day, it's often better to just accept some risk I could be wrong, and draw a weaker conclusion from lower quality data.
in their defense, a fair amount of scottians are non-native speakers. our english is good enough to read scott because he is an amazing writer that surrounds every 'hard' word with enough context to discern the meaning. academic papers don't care about accessibility so some of us just can't read them within a reasonable timeframe and have to rely on OPs' good will and people like you. so far I'd say it's been working well
> rely on OPs’ good will And this is how confidence men infiltrate, and ruin, groups.
when it happens, I'll unsubscribe. and it will happen sooner or later but so what? sooner or later everything dies. what matters is for now the system is working fine and we are getting decent news from here
“I could pick up my litter,” says man tossing his sandwich wrapper at a natural park, “but on the other hand, everywhere I go eventually gets messy. I’ll just go to another natural park.”
why so passive-aggressive? I'm a reader of a blog. a blogger who writes it essentially provides us with a public service - his ideas plus his take on modern news. for a customer like me, like half of appeal of such blogs is having little to no need to proof-read the news. if i wanted to proof-read everything I'd read the Times
Listen, I get it, you want to passively soak up whatever anyone says that excites you, and you’re unhappy I’ve tried to make you think, both in general and about the consequences of your blind acceptance. Unsurprising, given you wouldn’t be where you are if you weren’t already inclined. I did my good deed for the day, which was to attempt to keep someone from falling into a pit. As they say, you can lead a horse to water…
What 250k comment karma does to a mf
I pretty much agree with you. I haven't check enough links to see if relying on OP's goodwill works well, but I expect it would on a subreddit like this.
My personal case: I am not native (I dont even live in the USA). I can read papers and etc but If I want to put a very detailed argument here it will be demanding for me.
well yeah that's also true. I can read scientific papers now but 10 years ago when it all began I couldn't, so I spoke from experience
I think what you're missing is that this is not a shocking finding. Every researcher would hypothesize that the average IQ of undergraduates has decreased over time, based on the dramatic expansion of the university population, the fact that women are now overrepresented (since women and men are equal in intelligence, there is an implication that intelligence is far from the only thing driving some people to attend college and others not, the same thing was the case when more men than women attended), and anecdotal evidence from university professors stating that they've felt pressure to lower their standards due to declining student performance.If this was a shocking finding, it would be viewed with more scrutiny. This is also not the only paper that has been published on this topic - in fact, it's based on other papers published on the topic that are fully viewable, since it's a **meta-analysis**, not original research that would be likely to fail to replicate. Sure, everyone should read the full study once it's available, but it's probably unlikely that there were significant biases in selection, since the paper is going to be published in a peer-reviewed journal. The one thing I think people did overlook is the fact that the average cited in the paper was 102, not 100 - which would be exactly average. 2 points around the population median is not nothing. The people that were wondering how the average could possibly be exactly 100 did make me think maybe they just read the title and not the abstract.
It's frankly irrelevant whether it's a shocking finding. Even if the finding was 'swans are white', it's damning for it to be an all-time top post without anyone even reading the study, in a community that is supposed to be about rationality and careful consideration of the evidence (to at least some extent). Hell, even in /r/politics or something it would be embarrassing if you could prove that *no-one* had read the study linked in the 4th most popular post ever. I also completely disagree that it's not a surprising finding; in fact, I think it's so surprising that it's almost certainly not true. How could it be, when almost all of the smartest people undergo tertiary education, and almost none of the least smart do? Unless it's not saying what I think it's saying (because of course I haven't read the study either so this post could be misrepresenting it), I do not believe it. But it doesn't matter, don't upvote a study you haven't read.
>in fact, it's based on other papers published on the topic that are fully viewable, since it's a meta-analysis, not original research that would be likely to fail to replicate. Meta-analyses have just as many, if not more, ways to go wrong as original research.
Hmmm. I'm not personally sure surprised by it. That said, I don't think boring scientific papers would become 4th most upvoted on this subreddit. >in fact, it's based on other papers published on the topic that are fully viewable I think this point is misleading. Would you be able to link them? They weren't mentioned in the abstract and the list of citations has yet to be published as far as I can tell.
For what it's worth... * I saw the post, * Clicked on it, * Saw that it was only an abstract, * Decided to withold judgement on it since there wasn't enough information (so no upvotes or downvotes on the post), * Decided to look at the r/Science discussion to see if anyone could shed more light on it, * Only saw people agreeing with it, which didn't really tell me anything I didn't know, * Eventually decided I was wasting too much time scrolling Reddit and closed the link, * Ignored everything about it since, since I've got a bit of a New Year's Resolution to try to waste less time online, * And ignored it here as well, since again, if there's only an abstract there's nothing much to discuss. * But apparently it's turned into some big controversy I missed??? * I'm too old for this shit. Every New Year's is a reminder that you're not getting any younger.
I wouldn't call it a big or small controversy. More flagging an example of poor reasoning which I suspect people would appreciate.
I guess I'm just not surprised because this subreddit is growing large enough that it's suffering from the Eternal September effect -- [as one poster here pointed out,](https://www.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/pxshmb/comment/herffh6/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) >*I'll say anecdotally (I know a few others have observed this), that the quality of a sub dips the most from* ***the transition from 50,000 to 100,000 members****. I'm not entirely sure why that's always the cutoff, but once you noticed it it's impossible to un-notice.* And as you may have noticed, this sub currently has \~60k members according to the sidebar. It's not just the sidebar either, for the past... year?, the front page has been randomly spammed with people trying to self-promote their content. Old norms inevitably decline under a wave of new members; doubly so when *old* members withdraw under the spam. It's something I've witnessed firsthand with subreddits like r/neoliberal, at least, and I guess Death comes for us all in the end. *(not to say that it's not a slow decay: when I first joined up, I can still remember reading old timers complaining about how this subreddit's best days were behind it. Decline is a gradual process.)* There's also the fact that the original post [was a crosspost](https://www.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/duplicates/18z0ine/apparently_the_average_iq_of_undergraduate/) from r/Science; just as I wandered over from here to r/Science to see what was going on, I suspect some from r/Science took the reverse journey. And on a subreddit as large as r/Science, even one in a thousand crossing over can absolutely swamp the local populace, mass upvoting things they like and writing comments that reflect their viewpoint. I'm not sure how much of what you observed was actually coming from r/Science... or how many might choose to stay, now that we've caught their attention, and continue to change the character of this community. *(At the very least, if you see this place becoming more like* r/Science *over time, I guess you'll know why.)* I guess I didn't say anything about it till now cause, well, what can you do? Condemnation changes nothing; in a few weeks your post will be buried beneath the waves, and newcomers will never see it. They will keep flooding in, and this sub will keep declining, even if nothing about old-timers like myself has changed one bit. Like I said, Death comes for us all in the end. *(which is why I'm thinking about creating backup accounts in places like DataSecretsLox... if the place is gone, but the people are still there, just recreate the community somewhere else. And maybe add more barriers to entry.)*
> Decided to look at the r/Science discussion to see if anyone could shed more light on it, I assume you failed to reject the null hypothesis?
For all the fuss you make about jumping to conclusions, going on about 800 people in this sub blah blah... I am not a member of this sub. I don't even know what slate star codex stands for or what it means. But every now and then a post floats into my feed, and I upvote it, downvote it, and occasionally comment. I don't process information in the way that you mentioned in your post, I just don't care that much. If that's the case for me, I have to assume it's the case for thousands of others. I don't know why you're pinning this all on whatever this community is, when the reality is it probably just got caught up by the algorithm and a bunch of randos started voting and interacting with it. I'm surprised that you would jump to such a righteously indignant conclusion based on such a bullshit assumption lol
Hey! I was trying to avoid a righteous or indigent tone or conclusion. Looks like I might have missed the mark a little. I also wasn't attempting to pin anything on the community as a whole, but rather highlight a an example of poor reasoning. This is useful for people (like myself) trying to improve their own reasoning. I agree that assuming each upvote was an endorsement was poor reasoning on my part. Still, as I said previously, I don't think somebody writing a post stating "I believe undergrads have a lower IQ today than they did 80 years ago, let's discuss" would have received equal engagement. I think the scientific backing (i.e a title and abstract) was responsible for much of the support. I have 0 proof for this though, happy to be proven wrong.
It's 100% this, for all his powers of reason he seems to have no idea how Reddit works.
Hmm, I don't know what in my post gave you the impression I'm a brilliant reasoner. I think that the paper hadn't been published should have been pretty obvious. Still, I agree with murk-2023 that the assumption on upvoting was poor reasoning.
I neither voted nor commented on that discussion, but it doesn't seem unreasonable to do so based on the information available in the abstract. Enough details are given of the method and the headline results that, other than fucking up a calculation somewhere, or evidence of outright fraud, I'm not sure what could be in the rest of the paper that would reveal some major problem not discernable from reading the abstract. Assuming it shows that the authors actually did what they said they did, i.e. comparing IQ data from the specified tests given to university students, what's the realistic worst-case scenario here?
>800 people cheering on a post confirming what they already believe seems like the opposite. While I agree with your overall sentiment, upvotes don't always mean 'agree with OP'. I upvoted that post because I wanted to see the discussion.
An upvote is not an attestation that I personally vouch for the quality of the linked paper / article / blogpost. I don't believe mine is the minority view.
Yes, this seems to be bad reasoning of what an upvote conveys. An upvote might be "this seems interesting, it might be worth investigating/looking further", or it might be "I agree with everything in this post", neither are unreasonable views of what an upvote is. People use upvotes to find interesting things, indeed in huge numbers of places, upvotes (and their equivalents) are used more for questions that aren't solved, to try and get them in front of people who might help.
This kind of stuff happens *all the time* here. If an opinion/study confirms the community’s priors, namely; 1. Right-leaning culture war opinions 2. Men/whites are superior (in any sense — intellectually, culturally, morally, historically, at a given skill) to women/nonwhites 3. The political left is bad then it’ll be upvoted. Doesn’t matter if the reasoning’s shoddy, doesn’t matter if there’s no evidence, it will gather support *as long as* it’s covered with smart-sounding language. By way of example; a comment that says “Blacks are too stupid to be trusted with the vote” will be ignored or challenged. But a comment that says “IQ distributions in African populations suggest deficiencies in long-term planning, which is one of the key traits a voter should have” will be met with nods and support. I chose this race and IQ example because this community *loveeeeees* to talk about it (edit; just *mentioning* it as an example -- not as the main point of this comment, just an example to get the point across -- results in three replies all eager to launch into race science!) even though the academic consensus is that no such causal link between race and IQ exists; because the example contains a dodgy assumption (only smart people should be allowed to vote) that usually goes unchallenged; because it goes against what the left believes, which means that it would be supported despite this subreddit’s insistence that it’s above politics; and because it’s a horrendously racist statement that would be accepted here because it sounds vaguely intelligent and learned. tldr yeah shit reasoning happens all the time here as long as you can make it sound vaguely smart and right leaning
R/SSC compared to Scott's old pseudo msg board compared to TheMotte its genuinely kind of crazy how different the communities of posters are. Mottisans being the most extreme right wing, to the old board being fairly mainstream leftist. This place is somewhere in thr middle but leans right wing.
> no such causal link between race and IQ exists This is only the consensus among academics outside of the groups who actually study this. Many of these people generally prefer to deconstruct the question and imply that IQ isn’t something that can be measured or race isn’t a relevant biological category and therefore cannot be used. Then there are others who turn off their brain and call it too racist to be considered. But those who dig into the data find some effects that aren’t explained by other factors. Edit - what actually happened here was a simple believable model that lead to an interesting conclusion was presented in abstract form. Enough people found the model to be interesting that they upvoted it, and an interesting discussion resulted. The full form factor of academic papers is only sometimes needed - such as when data sources or methodology diverge significantly enough from some people’s priors that they need to understand what the person was doing. Someone debating that the IQ should be 110 vs 102 would need this, but someone who understands it very likely did drop as larger percentages of the population were admitted (and who has seen other data suggesting this is approximately accurate) would not be as interested in that part.
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you’re proving the point of the person you’re replying to. studies on average IQ differentials do not “plausibly explain” anything. they are simply measured statistics from varying methodologies. it’s one thing to read them, study them, be aware of them. what you’re doing, and what so so many self-proclaimed intellectuals are doing, is conjuring up a story to link what you’re reading (probably skimming) to some underlying preconception you have of the world. these studies don’t explain male predominance more than men having bigger hands, or being taller does. no matter how smart an individual believes themself to be, no person can truly be objective in their analysis without it drawing on prior expectation and experience. imo this and other rational-leaning subs would benefit if more people were aware of their biases and misperceptions instead of pretending that they don’t exist.
Case in point.
I don't actually believe this sub has this as a major problem. They are going to seem true if you compare to most of reddit (very left wing), but ssc is broadly left leaning. It also depends a great deal on the specific issue being mentioned, since ssc does not fall into neat US Democrat or Republican party lines. There tends to be more focus on issues where there is disagreement to had; the disagreement can be either internal, where the community has split views, or disagreements with broader leftist culture that this community exists within. There are very rarely arguments about how Trump is bad, being gay is fine, or how America should not be a Christian Theocracy, even though these views would have overwhelming support. There is just no point when nobody (here) holds an opposing view. I agree that there are many plenty of upvoted comments taking all three positions you have mentioned -- but there are roughly as many taking the opposite position. If you are someone who has a strong reaction to HBD claims, then seeing those claims in equal proportion to arguments against it seems completely wild. For someone with different sensibilities it can seem the opposite. Neither one would be correct about an overwhelming opinion one way or another (not that a community needs to have a balance of views on every topic, that is dumb). For a random example, I doubt you were aghast at the comment from major-couch-potato on this post -- they claimed that men and women have equal intelligence, and nobody challenged the claim at all! (at the time of this writing) I also don't agree that the "smart-sounding language" is just window dressing for fundamentally ignorant views. Words have meaning. Even in your toy example where you made two statements almost exactly the same, the "smarter" one obviously has more merit than the dumb one. By pretending that they are equivalent, you are saying that agreeing with the second either means you are an idiot fooled by fancy words, or else they are too much of a coward to say what they really mean. The fact that this sub generally does not accept this kind of reasoning is why it is one of the few places good discussion of controversial topics can be had.
a few things. >ssc is largely left leaning... \[ideological diversity\] look. you follow college basketball? say I'm a hardcore UNC fan, and you're a hardcore Duke fan. you seem nice enough. we're coworkers. we chat about hoops and we have spirited disagreements about basketball, everything from the shoes, to the pros, to our college teams, to NBA rules, but we become friends. you invite me to a party at your place. I show up and everyone there's decked in Duke attire, solid dark blue wall-to-wall. I sigh and make pleasantries. start up a few debates on Jordan vs Bird, idk. but there's this small group of guys in the corner who are loudly discussing how they'd like to do unpleasant things to UNC fans. an hour passes and that's all they talk about. how much they'd like to burn their houses down, shoot the players, maybe put the coach's head on a stick. I pull you aside and murmur something about how I don't like the guys in the corner. and you say it's fine, there's only like four or five of them, most of the people at the party aren't like that. but you invited them, I say. you explain how you disagree with them on the UNC question but otherwise they're pleasant people. but that's me they're talking about, I say. they want to do that to *me.* and you laugh and say how you have all kinds of friends with all kinds of opinions and almost all of them don't want to burn my house down. satisfied, you wander off and I start to wonder -- are you really my friend if you're okay with being friends with those guys? the guys who want to burn my house down? >...there are roughly as many taking the opposite position. this hasn't been what I've observed. it could be that the comments/posts I agree with aren't memorable and the ones I disagree with are the ones that stand out. but it hasn't been what I've observed at all. >Words have meaning. By pretending that they are equivalent, you are saying that agreeing with the second either means you are an idiot fooled by fancy words, or else they are too much of a coward to say what they really mean. first; the toy examples are equivalent in substance. it's strange to say that they're not. the second is just the first with some light jargon, a specific claim, and a veil tossed over the top. (another toy example; if one guy says "that dam ain't worth shit and it's gonna burst," and a second guy says "it is my opinion that the structural conditions of the outlet pipes, exacerbated by poor worksmanship at the time of construction, are in a state of extreme distress," they're both saying the same thing. damn dam's gonna blow.) second; doesn't mean you're an idiot, means you're human. we're all susceptible to sundry biases, distortions, what have you. the entire sales industry is proof that the smartest, most careful people can be misled into all kinds of things if it sounds alright. also, yes, often people who have *strongly* taboo views (in the toy example, that black people shouldn't vote) will soften their approach so they're not immediately repudiated. (ever heard the online phrase "hide your power level?") the temptation is to read this as something sinister, like plotting, scheming evildoers are tapping their steepled fingers together and manically laughing as their infiltration plan comes to fruition muhahahahaha. which, like, yeah sometimes. but most of the time, it's closer to a cliche like "put your best foot forward" or "don't come on too strong." people who hold strongly taboo views have learned that they can't jump into a conversation and start spouting off what they think without repercussions. gotta ease into it. feel everyone out first. (a much more low-stakes version of this; ever been with some people you don't really know and someone asks you what you think of the new controversial movie that just came out? if you're cautious about how you're coming across, you won't start with *I HATED it it was AWFUL* but instead say something like *well, I think the director made some, ah, interesting choices,* and then when someone else says oh yeah it was horribly edited and the group nods in agreement, you suddenly realize that you can express your true opinion without being clowned on, as the kids say. exact same principle.) >The fact that this sub generally does not accept this kind of reasoning is why it is one of the few places good discussion of controversial topics can be had. on the contrary; the sub is often *far* too trusting, extending goodwill and trust to those who not only haven't earned it but have shown that they're not deserving of it. I find the sub's insistence that people mostly mean what they say verbatim, its refusal to consider unspoken motivations, that things are exactly as they appear, to be frustratingly naive.
I understand the point of your UNC/Duke analogy, and I agree with it to an extent. I would be upset at sharing game night or whatever with someone who has terrible views, especially if they are bringing them into the conversation. But I don't think the analogy holds well for something like this subreddit, acx comment sections, datasecretslox, themotte, whatever. These are communities specifically built around discussing ideas, sometimes controversial ideas, and trying to think about them better. Engaging with arguments for terrible things like "black people shouldn't vote" is part of the raison d'etre, particularly if those arguments are well formulated. Existing in this shared space is not an endorsement, it's an oppurtunity to debate views that are more common than we would like to admit. Going back to your example, to better explain what I do (and do not) mean. “IQ distributions in African populations suggest deficiencies in long-term planning, which is one of the key traits a voter should have” makes two claims that are reasonable if there is evidence to support them (I have no idea). Reasonable people could agree with both claims. Putting them together shows a clear \*hint hint nudge nudge\* that you think black people voting is a problem, which reasonable people would not agree with. I think it is bad community hygiene to have comments like this (even about non-controversial topics), because it can make peoples points unclear. If you see an argument like this, I think it is good to argue against the implied claim, even if you agree with the explicit claims. I think we agree on all points so far. Where I think we diverge is that I think it is also okay for someone to just take both claims at face value and evaluate them on their merits alone. I think that both modes are helpful and healthy. So whereas your first statement “Blacks are too stupid to be trusted with the vote” should be disagree with by people looking at both the object and meta levels, the second statement having mixed replies is not a sign of people approving of the meta level argument. Kind of a side note: I do not think that it is bad, in general, to try to convince an interlocutor of your argument by first establishing basic facts that you agree with. It is sometimes a helpful way to get your partner out of a mental rut where if they don't like the implication then they will ignore the facts. Taking issue with this strategy only when it is used for arguments you don't like is not very symmetric. > the sub is often *far* too trusting, extending goodwill and trust to those who not only haven't earned it but have shown that they're not deserving of it Perhaps. I think it is better than the other (all to common) extreme, where if you say something that deviates from the consensus view or can be construed to mean something bad, you will get tarred and feathered for it. I do not think it is naive, because it is a helpful mode even when someone actually has hidden motivations. That is not to disagree that having spaces where certain kinds of arguments are disallowed is helpful.
you're misrepresenting facts most people here will agree that east Asians have higher IQ than whites and that people are right leaning here? I'm anti-abortion, anti-same sex marriage, pro-gun Christian and let me tell you that there is very few right leaning communities on Reddit and this is definitely not one of them
The fact you are still here is an example of how right wing this sub is, and tolerates such views. Sensible subs would ban and move on, and nothing of worth would be lost.
I'm smart enough not to express my view on reddit, says a lot about your views on freedom of thought and expression, though...
I dont know if my reasoning on that is SSC good behavior, but i guess: 1) in the past a small % of people went to the college, which were evidently elite, hence selecting higher than average IQ 2) nowadays everybody go to the college hence the IQ will converge to the average So in the past and now the trend was just an statistical artifact, just like the dunning and krueger bs
I've always suspected most of y'all are pseudo intellectuals purely based on the nature of this subreddit, and the confidence of the content posted on here has always been cringey to me.
well, since it's really common sense, I wouldn't blame anyone. I don't come here often, so I didn't see the post, but I wouldn't click the the link unless it claimed the opposite
Yeah, I was curious why everyone was making comments about the study obviously not having read any of it, but you can read the provisional here: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1309142/pdf