A thread through the archive
Essays tagged “IQ”. Follow an idea across the archive.
Daniel Böttger describes his experience after brain surgery for cancer removed his right amygdala, resulting in the complete elimination of visceral fear, depression, and most suffering, while also causing some social difficulties and autism-like symptoms.
Scott discusses how new schizophrenia genetics research confirms that psychiatric conditions combine both 'tradeoff' components (with compensating advantages) and 'failure' components (purely negative), then argues this pattern is common sense for any multifactorial problem.
Scott examines a new genetic study on missing heritability that both hereditarians and nurturists claim vindicates their position, concluding that despite the study's advances, the fundamental debate over how heritable traits like IQ actually are remains unresolved.
Scott analyzes the sudden emergence of commercial trait-based embryo selection services, discussing both the scientific validity and ethical implications of selecting embryos for health outcomes, intelligence, and physical traits.
Scott explores the 'missing heritability' problem in genetics, where twin studies show traits like IQ and educational attainment are highly heritable but newer genomic methods find much lower heritability, analyzing various potential explanations for this discrepancy.
Scott investigates the correlation between intelligence and neuron count, exploring various theories before suggesting that more neurons allow for less polysemantic (overlapping) representations of concepts.
Scott responds to comments about Lynn's IQ data, addressing how IQ testing might break down in under-educated populations and how this relates to the apparent disconnect between test scores and real-world capabilities.
Scott Alexander examines Richard Lynn's controversial national IQ estimates and argues they are actually consistent with environmental rather than genetic explanations of IQ differences, while explaining common misconceptions about what low IQ means.
Scott Alexander investigates why self-reported IQ scores in online surveys are implausibly high, identifying issues with conversion tools, reporting bias, and unreliable tests.
Scott Alexander analyzes results from a 2022 prediction contest, discussing top performers and methods for improving forecast accuracy.
Scott Alexander examines obscure pregnancy interventions that may improve child outcomes, rating them by evidence quality and potential impact.
Scott Alexander examines why certain families produce multiple generations of high achievers, exploring genetic, environmental, and psychological factors.
Scott Alexander discusses the birth of the first polygenically-screened baby and explores the current and potential future applications of this technology in IVF.
Scott Alexander examines the paradoxical relationship between autism and intelligence, discussing genetic and environmental factors, and proposing explanatory models for the observed lower IQ in autistic individuals despite genetic links to higher intelligence.
Scott analyzes a surprising age-related trend in responses to a parentheses riddle on the SSC survey, exploring possible explanations for why younger respondents were more likely to answer correctly.
Scott Alexander presents survey data showing a strong overrepresentation of oldest siblings among his blog readers, challenging the view that birth order effects are negligible.
Scott Alexander argues that while IQ is valuable for research, it's not reliable for predicting individual success and shouldn't be a major personal concern.
Scott Alexander explores Laszlo Polgar's successful educational methods that produced chess prodigies, analyzing possible explanations and lamenting the unavailability of Polgar's book on his techniques.
Scott Alexander discusses a study challenging the idea that childhood abuse lowers IQ, and explores its implications for understanding the effects of child abuse on various outcomes.
Scott Alexander examines his evolving view on scientific consensus, realizing it's more reliable and self-correcting than he previously thought.
Scott Alexander examines a failed replication of a study claiming analytical thinking promotes religious disbelief, and discusses the broader implications for understanding the relationship between thinking styles and religious belief.
A study on expert prediction of behavioral economics experiments finds that experts have only a slight advantage over non-experts, suggesting that a separate 'rationality' skill may be more important than specific expertise.
Scott Alexander refutes PZ Myers' race car analogy against genetic engineering for intelligence, showing that high IQ positively correlates with many beneficial traits.
Scott Alexander shares and comments on highlighted passages from Garrett Jones' 'Hive Mind', covering various aspects of IQ research and its societal implications.
Scott Alexander reviews 'Hive Mind' by Garett Jones, which argues that national IQ matters more for economic success than individual IQ, while raising several criticisms of the book's methodology and conclusions.