Garry Kasparov is arguably the best chess player in the World, and he’s an Ashkenazi Jew. Assuming there are about 10 million Ashkenazi Jews in the world, normalizing the distribution of chess skill makes Kasparov 5.2 standard deviations above the mean chess skill of his ethnic group. Given the 0.35 correlation between IQ and chess skill, Kasparov’s IQ should be 0.35(+5.2 SD) = 1.82 SD above the Jewish mean.
Assuming Ashkenazi Jews have a mean IQ of 110 (SD = 15?), this would mean an IQ of 1.82(15) + 110 = 137. Of course given the very imperfect correlation, there would be a huge amount of uncertainty around this prediction. Also, the correlation was based on chess club participants and can’t necessarily be generalized to entire ethnic groups, many members of which don’t even play chess.
Nonetheless, Kasparov was actually given an IQ test by a German magazine and he scored 135…remarkably close to the figure predicted from simple linear regression.
In this speech, Nikos Lygeros, a mathematician and an high IQ expert, says that Kasparov actually have an IQ of 137.
He also add that Kasparov have a phenomenal memory.
btw, the video is very interesting if you understand french.
But Kasparov is just half ashkenazi. His mother is pure armenian.
Good point. I don’t know whether IQ studies would consider him Ashkenazi or not.
http://www.thephora.net/forum/showthread.php?t=102845
Very interesting comments!!! =)
Clicked on that link, didn’t read most of the comments (just don’t have time to read thru all the mumbo jumbo from people claiming to be intelligence experts). But I thought the one post about IQ vs. working memory was very interesting. I’m starting to feel that working memory by itself may be just as important, if not more important, than full scale IQ. On my WAIS IV my full scale IQ was 120 (with a verbal 130) but my working memory was only 106. I feel this may explain my problems with attention and holding multiple variables in my mind at one time, which has held me back in mathematics and programming. Somewhat unfortunate, but I’m pretty sure that’s the reason.
I’ve read in the past that autistic savants have extremely high working memories as it relates to their particular field of interest. An autistic savant in music, for instance, can listen to 40 measures of music once and repeat it back perfectly, and then play improvisations based on that music. But their extraordinary working memory can’t be applied to anything else.
I wonder if chess players have some sort of extreme visual working memory that’s not captured by IQ tests.
On my WAIS IV my full scale IQ was 120 (with a verbal 130) but my working memory was only 106. I feel this may explain my problems with attention and holding multiple variables in my mind at one time, which has held me back in mathematics and programming. Somewhat unfortunate, but I’m pretty sure that’s the reason.
Could this also help explain your SAT > LSAT profile? I haven’t taken either test but my sense is that the LSAT loads more on working memory.
Most of self-called ”official expert” of intelligence are not smart enough to understand what intelligence’s is ( include some people here in this blog) . This comments in the link are very interesting for those who are concerned to improve the better understanding of intelligence.
I understand your thought as ”if is not a -expert- then is not important”. If the answer is yes, then i’m right again, Terman found a new ideology and a new niche of ideological monsters.
>”I’m starting to feel that working memory by itself may be just as important, if not more important, than full scale IQ.”<
Possible IMO. If not more important, atleast as equally important or maybe only 'marginally' less important.
What do you think PP?
it’s likely apocryphal, but it’s the sort of bullshit pp believes…
according to Guinness Bobby Fischer tested at 183.
No, I never believed that because I could never my find a source claiming he actually scored that on any IQ test, so I always assumed it was just an estimate. But I think there is evidence he has an incredibly good memory (and not just for chess).
what about ANAND, kramnik ,Karpov and others.
Your IQ, at best 110
Gregory Cochran’s IQ, 160+
You are exagerating a lot Cochran’s IQ.
@ mugabe: fischer’s biographer, frank brady, insists the 180 iq score is authentic. he writes:
“In previous writings I have cited Fischer’s I.Q. as in the range of 180, a very high genius. My source of information is impeccable: a highly regarded political scientist who coincidentally happened to be working in the grade adviser’s office at Erasmus Hall – Bobby Fischer’s high school in Brooklyn – at the time Fischer was a student there. He had the opportunity to study Fischer’s personal records and there is no reason to believe his figure is inaccurate. Some critics have claimed that other teachers at Erasmus Hall at that time remember the figure to be much lower; but who the teachers are and what figures they remember have never been made clear.
It is probably a reflection of the “chess-champion paradox” that the 180 figure is considered unrealistic. Fischer’s apparent lack of intellectual attainments, in contrast to the champions of the past, would seem to make a high I.Q. unbelievable. He is considered by many to be almost an idiot savant. Perhaps some of the following anecdotes will dispel the doubts of the unbelieving….”
more here: http://bobbyfischer.net/bobby02.html
even if fischer’s iq wasn’t 180, it probably was still very high. his father, paul nemenyi, was physicist who worked on the manhattan project. regina fischer was often indigent, but she could speak several languages and studied medicine at an elite university, i think.
btw, i recommend brady’s biography 🙂
mr. bokassa:
From brady’s biography:
“Eventually, she found a school that was an appropriate match for her problematic son. In the fall of 1952, when Bobby was nine, Regina secured scholarship enrollment for him in Brooklyn Community Woodward, a progressive grade school of approximately 150 children.”
after describing the school’s past and such, brady writes that bobby was accepted to the school “…with the understanding that he’d teach the other students to play, and also as a result of his astronomically high IQ test score of 180.”
so bobby was nine or younger when he took the test. the records at bobby’s high school were originally from his elementary school.
🙂
btw, bobby and jorge videla were blood brothers, apparently:
and both of bobby’s parents were ashkenazi.
Don’t agree working memory is the end all be all, just one factor. Scored 180 on Lsat and have a working memory that’s only slightly above average. So I work on abstract problems that require me to hold understanding (distributions) but not specifics in my head. If working memory is the key, how would I score 180?
Kasparov’s not an ashkenazi jew anymore than Obama is a kenyan fucktard.
the best chess player in the world is the NORWEGIAN Magnus Carlsen.
kasparov is a russification of kasparian, his mother’s ARMENIAN name.
pp is so UTTERLY UNINFORMED it’s pointless.
people like pp are natural born slaves.
Kasparov’s not an ashkenazi jew anymore than Obama is a kenyan fucktard.
Obama is considered the first black president.
Memory have more nuances than we think. I’m bad in short term memory but seems depend what is the matter i’m trying to memorizing. Then, i can be good or ‘normal’ in short therm memory, just depend the subject. People memorize well what they are naturally inclined to like. Savant ability is a end of a universal continuum that express a human intrinsecal motivation. Yes, the classical savant tend to have extreme brain conditions, but many non-classical savant’s have similar great natural talent without any degree of global severe deficiency.
My better memory is emotional, i internalize OR learn something by little post-traumatic events which are related with survivability.
I don’t know what the anniversary day of my ”parents”. It do not seems relevant for me to be memorized.
His positional mastery and endgame prowess have drawn comparisons to those of former world champions José Raúl Capablanca, Vasily Smyslov, and Anatoly Karpov.
all of them gentiles.
In this German article it’s described in some detail how Kasparov did on several tests administered by psychologists during a period of three days:
http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-13526693.html
His visualization ability is “extremely underdeveloped”. In the verbal parts he was “more often above than below average”. His numerical ability is “unique”. In logical thinking he’s “far ahead” of the other testees. He “failed completely” in visual creativity and was “moderate” in verbal creativity. His memory is “brilliant”.
In the Raven’s Matrices he got an IQ of 123 and in a test with mixed items by Eysenck he got an IQ of 135.