The Flynn effect is the trend where raw performance on IQ tests has been increasing in many countries at a rate of about 1 Standard Deviation (SD) per half-century. In 1990, scholar Richard Lynn published a brilliant paper claiming that the 1 SD per half-century gains in IQ scores were perfectly paralleled by 1 SD gains in height and head size (and by inference brain size) over the same period. Since the 1 SD gain in head size and height are thought to be entirely caused by nutrition (including disease reduction which affects the body’s ability to use nutrients), Lynn reasoned quite logically that the 1 SD gain in IQ was also entirely caused by nutrition.
I call this the parallel effects model, because it implies nutrition’s effect on IQ will be paralleled by its effect on brain size which will be paralleled by its effect on head size which will be paralleled by its effect on height. So if you see a population that has increased by 1 SD in height and head size via nutrition, it’s reasonable to conclude that they have also increased in brain size and IQ by 1 SD via nutrition since all four of these variables are just indirect proxies for nutrition and all reflect it to an equal degree.
Parallel effects model:
In 1998, Arthur Jensen revised Lynn’s theory (The g Factor, page 326). He agreed that nutrition had caused a 1 SD increase in height and head size and further agreed that this implied a parallel 1 SD increase in brain size, but he stopped short of believing that nutrition had also caused a parallel 1 SD gain in IQ. Instead he felt that nutrition’s impact on IQ was only a byproduct of its effect on brain size, and so the effect of nutrition on IQ was limited to only the effect of brain size on IQ. I call this the secondary effect model.
Secondary effect model:
Jensen probably preferred the secondary effect model because it saved him from believing that real biological intelligence had increased as much head size and height, which seemed counter-intuitive to him given that society did not seem that much smarter than it was 50 years earlier. By limiting nutrition’s effect on IQ to its effect on brain size, Jensen could cite the 0.4 correlation between IQ and brain size (probably an overestimate) to argue that nutrition could only increase IQ by 40% as much as it increased brain size as opposed to 100% in the parallel effects model. This put a ceiling on how much of the Flynn effect could be biological and thus “real”. Any observed Flynn effect exceeding 40% of brain size gains could be dismissed as fake gains caused by culture (i.e. schooling, media).
However with the release of a new paper by scholar Michael Woodley et al, showing brain size gains have only been a small fraction of an SD per half-century (much smaller than head size gains and height gains), it might be time to propose a third theory: The tertiary effect model. In this model, not only would rising IQ just be a byproduct of brain size, but rising brain size itself would just be a byproduct of rising height.
The tertiary effect model:
As a biological determinist, I personally prefer the parallel effects model and dislike the tertiary effect model because it reduces the biological component of the Flynn effect to just a byproduct of a byproduct, but I must admit it’s the model that seems to best fit the totality of the evidence. For example, Lynn 1990 claimed height was increasing by 1 SD per half-century (probably an overestimate) and the recent Woodley paper seemed to imply brain size has been increasing by only 0.21 SD per half-century (probably an underestimate). Nonetheless, a 0.21 SD increase in brain size is exactly what you’d expect if it were caused by a 1 SD increase in height, given that body size and brain size in adult humans correlate between +0.20 and +0.25 (Jensen, 1998; The g Factor, page 147) implying brain size gains should be only 20% to 25% as large as body size gains.
A tertiary effect model would imply that not only are biological IQ gains just a fraction of brain size gains, but brain size gains are just a fraction of height gains. In other words, very little of the Flynn effect is biological, and thus, almost all must be cultural. However this is hard to square with the fact that the Flynn effect has been sizeable on some tests that seem relatively culture fair such as Block Design, and for this reason, I have preferred the parallel effects model from the outset.
Future research must determine which of the above three models (if any) best illustrate the relationship between nutrition and the Flynn effect.
Pumpkin Person 
There is evidence the Flynn Effect has stalled or reversed in developed countries, suggesting that the gains were due to better test-taking abilities (due to various environmental factors) and less to do wit gains in biological intelligence.
The Flynn effect is definitely due to environmental factors. The question is whether it’s due to cultural environment (i.e. schooling, media) or biological environment (i.e. nutrition).
The fact that it has stalled does not really tell us it’s primarily cultural because gains in height have also stalled and that’s entirely biological.
>The question is whether it’s due to cultural environment (i.e. schooling, media) or biological environment (i.e. nutrition).
I’d say a bit of both, with nutrition really edging it on. The rise in height over the past century has coincided with our better nutrition (not today anyway), and that’s what caused it.
I have a problem with Lynn and his Italian IQ study, but other than that, he has solid work.
>The fact that it has stalled does not really tell us it’s primarily cultural because gains in height have also stalled and that’s entirely biological.
Good point. Though, genetics dictates your height ceiling, and nutrition dictates whether or not you will reach your genetic potential. So, with having worse nutrition 80 years ago (when the average IQ for whites in America was 85, the black average today), when it got better, it obviously coincided with a boost in height, as well as IQ and brain size, since all 3 are correlated.
Here is the citation for our heads getting bigger:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/06/120606-americans-heads-getting-bigger-science-health-skulls-evolution/
Here is the citation for our heads getting bigger:
Yes that’s a fascinating study that I’ve blogged about in the past. Heads are definitely getting much bigger but the results are not being replicated by direct measures of brain weight at autopsy, so right now it’s not clear how much brain size is really increasing
Your head circumference is only 18.5 inches? That’s adorable. Maybe you really are a kitty cat? 🙂
I did not really have a ruler to measure it.
My notepad has its measurement on its label.
So I guest the last inch by using my earphones cord.
You need to divide by half several times from the center of the notepad.
Really a foot is not that small when the ratio is pi times the diameter. 🙂
diameter = feet circumference / pi
some what a deviation of 0.31 from 1 / pi is 4 inches like a cat skull. or not – I do not know what deviation means when it comes to circles and bell curves.
I think you did something wrong. 18.5″ inches is very very very small. More than 6 SD below the mean for American men. Impossible. You need to use a tape measure:
Using the average head size 23″ I get 112. much closer.
These numbers are really sensitive.
it’s kinda amazing how little variance there is in head circumference
it’s kinda amazing how little variance there is in head circumference
Brain size tripled in the last 4 million years of evolution. That means virtually everyone who didn’t have a freakishly huge head died out. That’s why there’s so little variation left.
Ri-hanna have bigger head Pumpkin!!!
nutrition would explain IQs and height both eventually stalling
the question is whether brain size has increased when height is controlled for.
If the brain weight data is an accurate reflection of the brain size gains, then controlling for height either eliminates the brain size gains or almost does. As I wrote in the post:
For example, Lynn 1990 claimed height was increasing by 1 SD per half-century (probably an overestimate) and the recent Woodley paper seemed to imply brain size has been increasing by only 0.21 SD per half-century (probably an underestimate). Nonetheless, a 0.21 SD increase in brain size is exactly what you’d expect if it were caused by a 1 SD increase in height, given that body size and brain size in adult humans correlate between +0.20 and +0.25 (Jensen, 1998; The g Factor, page 147) implying brain size gains should be only 20% to 25% as large as body size gains.
But if the head size data is a more accurate reflection of brain size gains, then not even close.
it’s easy to square:
1. the very idea of a culture free or culture fair test is RETARDED. (those wechsler subtests requiring the most changes across cultures are the MOST heritable and the MOST g loaded. http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-minds/the-heritability-of-intelligence-not-what-you-think/)
2. the cultural changes have been of the kind which would affect block design or whatever more than digit span or arithmetic.
3. these changes inter alia: video games, television, less reading, and calculators.
the very idea of a culture free or culture fair test is RETARDED.
The very idea of a 100% culture fair test is silly, but does that mean one can’t create tests that minimize acquired knowledge and maximize novel problem solving?
(those wechsler subtests requiring the most changes across cultures are the MOST heritable and the MOST g loaded. http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-minds/the-heritability-of-intelligence-not-what-you-think/)
In my opinion that’s not conclusive, because there are are other differences between those two types of tests beyond culture loading. There’s also verbal vs spatial loading (the latter being more sensitive to prenatal insults which lower heritability for 100% non-cultural reasons) and there’s also the fact that culture loaded tests measure learning over an entire lifetime which is more accurate than measuring learning lability at a single point in time, which culture reduced tests are forced to do.
2. the cultural changes have been of the kind which would affect block design or whatever more than digit span or arithmetic.
3. these changes inter alia: video games, television, less reading, and calculators.
But this implies that practice on one type of visual game can transfer to a visual game that a person has never seen before. In order to believe that, you must think either:
1) intelligence can be taught
2) cognitive abilities are like muscles than can be exercised through psychological exercise
There is a large body of literature than opposes both assumptions, though a tiny bit of support for the second assumption
>the very idea of a culture free or culture fair test is RETARDED. (those wechsler subtests requiring the most changes across cultures are the MOST heritable and the MOST g loaded.
Good thing there is Raven’s Progressive Matrices:
Click to access RPMChangeAndStability.pdf
>>Several different research approaches have converged on the
conclusion that the Raven test measures processes that are central
to analytic intelligence. Individual differences in the Raven
test correlate highly with those found in other complex, cognitive
tests (see Jensen, 1987)
http://repository.cmu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1727&context=psychology
>the cultural changes have been of the kind which would affect block design or whatever more than digit span or arithmetic.
Right. As PP said, it’s implying that you can ‘practice’ for the test. Which we know that if you ‘practice’ for it, that the g loading goes away and it’s no longer testing actual g.
>these changes inter alia: video games, television, less reading, and calculators.
Sure, video games do raise intelligence slightly, it’s only visio spatial I’m assuming. Also, would those gains from video games really transfer over to actual g loadings on IQ tests?
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150519210303.htm
whitey bulger’s brother was the longest serving president of the massachusetts state senate and a president of the university of massachusetts.
must be genes…
genes for criminality…that is…
or just criminality…
no genes required.
no white gentile has ever been indicted for insider trading.
martha stewart was sent to prison for “obstruction of justice”.
she’s a lot like oprah…but class-ier.
What are you talking about and what does that have to do with what I posted? Criminality is heritable if you’re saying it’s not.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120125151841.htm
Not to mention lower IQ (IQ 85) being correlated with criminal activity as that’s the average IQ for a criminal in America (IQ 92 for juveniles [https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/publications/abstract.aspx?ID=183065]), but you’re talking about white collar crime which does take a higher intellect.
What do indictments have to do with what I posted, and what does Martha Stewart have to do with anything?
Martha Stewart classier than Oprah? That’s not what you said a year ago. On Dec 17, 2014 you wrote:
martha stewart is a prole extraordinaire.
much more prole than Oprah.
better to conclude that the human experiment reached an apex and since has been shit, than to prostrate oneself to this shit-queen, let alone Oprah.
her cunt smells like limburger.
martha, like Ralph Lifshitz, is especially sick-making, because she affects sophistication she doesn’t have and sells this faux-sophistication to proles.
Oprah, Martha, Ralph, whoever…it makes no difference.
the very idea that a former British colony should have any class at all or the the British should have any class at all is ridiculous.
ER II is a CHAV!
Martha & Oprah are opposites. Martha is a prole pretending to be high class and Oprah is high class pretending to be prole. Oprah might be the queen of prole TV but in real life she hates TV & only allows them in the guest room
Right. As PP said, it’s implying that you can ‘practice’ for the test. Which we know that if you ‘practice’ for it, that the g loading goes away and it’s no longer testing actual g.
And the g loadings have not much been going down, implying folks haven’t been practicing…0r the video games kids today practice don’t transfer to the novel secret problems on IQ tests
if i said that i didn’t contradict myself…
much more prole than oprah.
much classier than oprah.
it was the japanese of our four. he meant to say crassier.
except he didn’t…
exist.
oprah’s show is much crassier. martha’s is much classier. does either still have a show?
in the early days oprah was worse than geraldo. or so i’ve been told.
but like martha, oprah affects a posh accent, but it sounds very weird.
race guy,
the point is martha, a white gentile, was investigated for possible insider trading but was never prosecuted for it.
One example. You have picked out one person and are attempting to say it means something, not looking at trends and averages.
Hey pp,
Have you seen Steve Sailer’s post about Flynn effect where he speculates it parallels the Moore”s law trend? This basically goes with Jorge’s argument that increases in intelligence are due to the increased complexification of technology over the past century.
Also, there”s been high Flynn effects on one very g-loaded, culturally loaded test: Similarities.I wonder what makes this test different. I think James Flynn related it to an increase in scientific thinking among the general population.
Have you seen Steve Sailer’s post about Flynn effect where he speculates it parallels the Moore”s law trend?
I read part of that.
This basically goes with Jorge’s argument that increases in intelligence are due to the increased complexification of technology over the past century.
Why would learning complex technologies make you better at solving novel problems you’ve never seen before, unless one believes:
1) intelligence can be taught
2) intelligence is like a muscle that can be exercised through mental stimulation
There’s a large body of literature that debunks both claims, as I tried to argue on my other blog:
https://brainsize.wordpress.com/2014/09/06/why-knowledge-education-can-not-make-you-smarter/
On the other hand there’s some evidence that video games make you smarter, but it’s considered controversial:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidewalt/2011/09/12/do-video-games-make-you-smarter-perception-cognition/
Also, there”s been high Flynn effects on one very g-loaded, culturally loaded test: Similarities.I wonder what makes this test different. I think James Flynn related it to an increase in scientific thinking among the general population.
In my opinion Flynn overestimates the gains in Similarities because newer version of the test give lots of feedback on how to answer, so if someone takes the 21st century version (with lots of feedback) and then takes an old version (with less feedback), it will exaggerate the size of the Flynn effect. This is known as the Kaufman effect.
I personally don’t believe Flynn Effect represents increases in intelligence, just increased practice maybe in certain types of visual/abstract problem solving that people weren’t exposed to before. Like if one was never exposed to a language before, but successive generations had increasing exposure to it. Doesn’t mean the future generations got any smarter.
And I didn’t know about the Kaufmann effect, neat!
The Flynn Effect does not occur on g, it’s not a Jensen effect. Here’s an example. Back in 1945, the white IQ was 85, same as the black IQ today. That’s supposed to show that the differences between blacks and whites in IQ is environmentally caused. That’s a fallacy. Just because a change in one group over time is due to an environmental change, doesnt mean, or even make it probable that a difference between 2 groups is due to a biological change.
Each country you look at, this ‘effect’ had the same rate of increase. Even with this happening, there are still differences between blacks and whites in intelligence. It’s it like this effect is erasing them, they are still there even as a rise in IQ is happening, proving that the intelligence gap between blacks and whites is genetic.
Which means whatever counts for the gap is genetic and not environmental. The more and more similar the environment, the less and less of the difference can be due to the environment and the more and more it must be due to genes. So this 15 point gap surviving the these changes in environment, seems more and more likely to be genetic in origin.
g changes over time fucktard. that is, the principal component changes over time.
i’d wager densen overlooked this. and he overlooked it due to his very poor math ability and ugly shaped head.
the most flynned, the rpm, is also the most g loaded according to densen.
I’m inclined to agree with Lynn. We know that horrible nutrition impedes brain growth, as well as IQ. For instance, lack of B vitamins, iron, zinc as well as having protein deficiencies which leads to low IQ and then leads to antisocial behavior.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/11/041117005027.htm
I think I remember reading on your blog that Lynn says that the phenotypic IQ of Africans is 80, and with better nutrition they will get to that level.
Also, on the ‘Flynn Effect’.
Lets say Flynn is right. The average black now is as intelligent as the average white in 1945. That’s supposed to show that the race difference in IQ is environmentally caused, because there hasn’t been that much genetic change in the white population and the has allegedly gone up 15 points. So, you can have a 15 point difference created by just an environmental change, no one knows why. Some think better nutrition or malnourished brain, etc. That’s also a fallacy. Just because a change in one group over time is due to an environmental change, doesn’t mean, or even make it probable, that a difference between 2 groups at the same time is due to an environmental change. The Flynn Effect make’s that highly unlikely and here’s why.
The Flynn Effect, assuming it’s real, has been acting completely uniformly in every population. Any country you ask, the rate of increase is 3 per decade. That means it’s an environmental factor that effects whites and blacks the same way as well as the whole world. And as a result of this uniform environmental factor, you have a difference in IQ that’s being preserved. That would suggest that the response on the parts of blacks and whites is due to some non environment factors, a genetic factor, which is making the difference in IQ remain constant as the Flynn Effect goes into effect.
What makes it even more unlikely, in the last 60 years, their environments have become very similar since segregation. These differences don’t exist now, they go to the same schools by court order, same TV shows, same movies, basically same environment for both, and yet, that increasing similarity in environment, the Flynn Effect, the IQ gap has remained intact. Which means whatever counts for the gap is genetic and not environmental. The more and more similar the environment, the less and less of the difference can be due to the environment and the more and more it must be due to genes. So this 15 point gap surviving the these changes in environment, seems more and more likely to be genetic in origin.
So because this ‘Effect’ is the same across all populations and the gap didn’t close, that means it’s genetic. If the gap persisted even when IQs were rising 3 points per year, the B-W gap has still persisted, proving that it’s genetic.
Never mind the fact that the ‘Flynn Effect’ doesn’t occur on g, and is therefor not a Jensen Effect.
Also, here’s what Jensen says about it:
>”What appears counterproductive to me, however, is the extent to which Flynn’s argument is used to sidestep the real-world implications of race differences in IQ, particularly the black-white difference. This is even more so for less fair and technically unsophisticated commentators who invoke the Flynn Effect like a mantra in dismissing IQ. Flynn’s research on IQ gains, for example, is the centerpiece of his critique entitled Race and IQ: Jensen’s Case Refuted and the same argument is reiterated in most of his publications on secular gains. Flynn hypothesizes that whatever unknown factors are responsible for the intergenerational gain in IQ scores (and are not reflected in ‘real world problem-solving ability’) also operate within generations, causing IQ differences between certain contemporary subgroups in the population, in particular the average one standard deviation IQ difference between blacks and whites in the United States. Therefore, Flynn argues, the black-white IQ difference doesn’t represent a real functional difference in ability, that is, a difference in g, any more than does the IQ raw-score difference observed between successive generations of whites. Psychologist Robert C. Nichols characterized Flynn’s argument as a faulty syllogism:
>1. We do not know what causes the test score changes over time.
>2. We do not know what causes racial differences in intelligence.
>3. Since both causes are unknown, they must, therefore, be the same.
>4. Since the unknown cause of changes over time cannot be shown to be genetic, it must be environmental.
>5. Therefore. racial differences in intelligence are environmental in origin.
>If the Flynn effect is caused by environmental factors, it is most remarkable that a steady rise in the population’s average test scores over a period of fifty or sixty years has had no effect on the mean IQ difference between blacks and whites, which has remained at about 1SD since World War I. This era has been one of steadily diminishing disparities between blacks and whites in educational, social, and economic opportunities. Yet the general upward secular trend in the overall population level of mental test scores has not changed the standardized difference between the mean test scores of blacks and whites.”
Yes, I do agree that malnutrition negatively affects IQ in brain development, which in turn leads to lower IQ as well as a whole slew of other negative things, but it’s really a big deal over nothing.
What Flynn is really talking about with this ‘Effect’, is how it pertains to black Americans, which we all know here that Rushton and Jensen continued to respond to Flynn and Dickens. It was a good back and forth, but we know who won that.
“novelty” is itself a very vague concept, and psychology simply isn’t at a stage such that it can be made precise.
more on cultural change affecting non-verbal tests:
there has been a change in education in the us even in my lifetime. my brother was taking geometry at age 13, whereas algebra was the highest possible math class when i was 13. my dad graduated from a university high school, but it didn’t offer calculus, whereas i took ap calculus as a senior in hs.
a most telling anecdote:
in high school i was showing my granddad, stonyhurst, princeton phd (he even saw einstein at a play), my graphing calculator, a new requirement at my school.
“i don’t understand!” he said.
and yes intelligence can be taught (provided one can learn…is not an “organic” retardate), and all the putative evidence against this claim is for short-term or abandoned attempts to teach it.
that is, intelligence can be taught if, in a manner of speaking, one is never not in school.
cultural change affecting almost everyone can be such a never ending, never even interrupted school.
and sub-cultures, like the sub-culture of blacks in the us, can be the exact opposite.
You can’t force everyone to learn. Even under the threat of violence.
who said anything about force?
the point that no hereditist gets, including peepee is…
the alternative to genetic or biological determinism is NOT the blank slate…
there are many routes up the mountain…not to mention that the mountain itself is an arbitrary choice among all peaks.
that is between genetic/biological determinism and environmental determinism is a huge chasm…and reality.
the same story may be written on different slates, but it takes a different pen.
get it?
like most of contemporary american conservatism hereditism is defined by what it is against, even though what it is against is believed by NO ONE.
that is,
1. to be an hereditist is to rightly be opposed to environmental determinism. it is ridiculous.
and…
2. there are no environmental determinists…not any more.
it’s interesting that the bogeyman of the right, noam chomsky, is as arrant an anti environmental determinist as there is.
let me repeat that…
as arrant an anti environmental determinist as there is.
or rather …rightly to be opposed…
so i suffered through Pawn Sacrifice. it was just jewish propaganda, including the bit about the fillings. it was nauseatingly transparent…well…for those with eyes.
fischer never said anything in any of his interviews which suggested he was crazy…only that he hated jews.
yet the film portrays him as a total nut case and concludes with two LIES:
1. “his mental health continued to deteriorate.”
2. the 6th game of the reykjavik match is “still considerd the greatest ever”…it’s not even in the top 100.
this is how the jews work.
all of fischer’s interviews are online.
listen to them.
you may not like what he says, but he displays no symptoms of delusions or paranoia, none.
and so far as he is delusional his delusions are shared and have been shared by most gentiles from time immemorial. that is, they are not “bizarre”.
Pawn Sacrifice is just a hatchet job. its purpose wasn’t profit. it was propaganda.
evinced by the following from wikipedia:
Budget $19 million[2]
Box office $6 million[3]
…no symptoms of psychosis or paranoia, none…
and that isn’t to say fischer wasn’t eccentric or “weird”, but that’s not the same thing as being crazy…
or at least it shouldn’t be…
though in such highly “indoctrinated” societies as the anglo-prole-sphere this is becoming what it is.
the apa has even tried to make “introversion” a mental illness. my bet is “anti-semitism” gets in the dsm before introversion.
i still have the Guinness 1980 which claims fischer had scored 187 on some IQ test. it doesn’t say which. and the only way this would be possible is if he took an adult IQ test at an age far less than 18…as all tests for adults max at 160…maybe guinness was less careful about its IQ stats then…it removed the category “highest IQ” for example.
but if veridical…
imho…
it’s very hard for someone who is weird…in a good way…not to be judged weird or eccentric in other ways.
187?
especially if such a person is famous and his behavior is scrutinized by a horde of hangers-on.
if anyone had a team of psychiatrists following him around day and night…
they’d find something…
the movie also conveniently overlooks that fischer was beaten routinely by the best soviets prior to his world championship run.
and that spassky only became champion in ’69.
60-61 tal jew
61-63 botvinnik jew
63-69 petrosian armenian
69-72 spassky russian
72-75 fischer half jewish at least (maybe his father wasn’t german…his mom was a slut.)
75-85 karpov russian
rumors that spassky (or smyslov) was part jewish are like the rumors that fischer wanted his fillings removed. LIES.
the movie convicts itself.
at many points fischer is “listening to tapes”…and these “tapes” say everything which when fischer says the same in letters to his sister is deemed a “mental health” issue…by the movie…or the tone of the movie.
what this refers to is Grace Communion International https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grace_Communion_International
so the movie also gets in a “hate” at christian fundamentalism.
this is all obvious for those who know who makes movies and how movies get made…in the us.
then there’s the common wisdom…with an emphasis on the “common”…that fischer can only play so spectacularly, because he’s crazy.
genuine insanity is rare, no more than 1% of the population of the developed world at any one time, and it’s nothing to be made light of…
that is,
genuine insanity would make playing chess at the highest level ever seen…impossible.
the “mad scientist” is a similar trope which makes stupid people feel better about themselves. it doesn’t describe reality.
A six-year-old who performed like
an average 11.22 year old would get an IQ of 187 on the old ratio scales:
11.22/6 = 1.87
Ok chartreuse, it’s hard for me to read all your comments because they make my brain hurt, but
It’s pretty obvious Fischer had some mental health issues, given that he died homeless in Phillipines or some shithole like that.
Although mental illness is rare among the more intelligent, when it does pop up among this group, it’s quite frequently accompanied by rabid anti-Semitism.
And of course anti-Semitism among Jews/part-Jews is pretty a good sign of mental problems…
New theory: chartreuse isn’t a Bobby Jindal pretending Mayflower lineage…
He’s a self-hating Jew…
Nevermind Fischer died in Iceland….
It’s pretty obvious Fischer had some mental health issues, given that he died homeless in Phillipines or some shithole like that.
if p, then q.
even if p were true, which it isn’t, q does not follow for anyone who can tell the difference between ideology and reality.
my guess is that in the us 1/3 of the homeless are chronic psychotics. a lot of the rest will be abusers of some substance or substances, but one wonders which came first the substance abuse or the homelessness.
homelessness is a social problem. the fact that certain types of people are over-represented among the homeless doesn’t justify homelessness. homelessness as a possible consequence of certain vices is not a natural law, it’s just a consequence within american society.
in all his interviews fischer never seemed to be psychotic, manic, delusional, etc.
listen to them.
then there’s the rematch which fischer won handily even though spassky was still pretty good.
how could fischer have done this if he’d gone from partial nut case to total nut case?
just because you don’t like what someone says and you can’t imagine why he’d do what he does doesn’t mean he’s crazy.
the same applies to ted kaczynski. his “manifesto” is totally sane. i expected it would be a word salad from what i’d heard in the mass media, but a friend told me it was anything but. and he was right. i don’t agree with kaczynski on every point, but he’s the most famous of latter day…what in ancient greece would have been called Cynics. the capital C is important. he’s a modern day diogenes. tobias schneebaum was also a Cynic in this original sense. you might watch Keep the River on Your Right.
and this isn’t just me saying this.
those who knew fischer and kaczynski well, have said the same. that is, they weren’t crazy, they were just extremely unconventional.
if simply being so many SDs to the right or left is defined as pathological…then you know you’re dealing with ideology and pseudo-science…being really smart would be a pathology.
if any DSM category fits fischer or kaczynski, i don’t know what it would be. neither of them were ever even depressed afaik.
one author diagnosed fischer as an aspie. the problem with this is that fischer was well-coordinated and a good athlete, swimming and bowling in particular. and he didn’t speak in a monotone like a robot. but fischer never had a father. his family moved a lot and was fairly poor. he dropped out of high school. and chess was the world for him.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2015/09/16/pawn_sacrifice_movie_about_bobby_fischer_what_s_fact_and_what_s_fiction.html
one might call the following a word salad: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOJMbMWY-0c, but i wouldn’t. fischer makes an observation at the end which i have made myself. one must remember that whatever his childhood IQ fischer was “un-educated”. he still has a brooklyn accent. and for a long time he was part of a christian fundamentalist cult.
i think people expect a world chess champion to be more refined or posh and not to join cults.
his comments right after 9/11 sounded a little manic.
mental illness causes social exclusion, but social exclusion causes mental illness too. with few exceptions, like ergot poisoning, even the worst mental illness occurs in a social context. it’s not hard wired. so far as fischer bordered on manic at the end, he may have been driven there under duress, so to say. but he’s clearly not schizophrenic.
mel gibson also seems “hypomanic”. too intense. but gibson’s own father is a holocaust denier and pius xii catholic…in addition to being a jeopardy champion.
Pumpkin, I’m really looking forward to the analysis of Nabokov and Animekitty. I won’t reveal my reason for asking about Nabokov until you’ve posted about him.
Also I don’t want to rush you, so please don’t misinterpret my comment. If it took you 6+ months to come up with a proper analysis I’d be fine with that.
@chartreuse
Alexander was raised by Aristotle.
And Pumpkin person said statistically:
Blacks with IQ 140 have parents with 118
Jews with IQ 140 have parents with 128
Intelligence in the sense that working memory and processing speed allows for greater calculations means you can be aware of more items and interactions.
But with cultural heritability what happens is that you understand the purpose of those items.
Flynn said in a presentation that in the 1920s you ask how is a fish the same as a crow and the boy would say you eat a fish but not a crow. This is a fail to the intelligentsia because the “right” answer is that they are both animals. He also said that the kids in the 1960’s would asked their parents “what if you were Black, how would you feel” and the dad would say That’s stupid I am not Black, just look at my skin.
My mom was born in 1956. I was born in 1987. I am much smarter than my mom just like my grandmother (born 1917) can understand that a crow and a fish are both animals. What makes me much smarter than my mom is that I have more empathy even if I was abused by people even though our IQs are the same. This is why I believe Christianity lead to the enlightenment. The Romans could never induce a civilization where Crucifixion was the main source of punishment into science.
When I was 12 I read Load of the Flies, It sickened me to think kids would treat each other so horribly. When the only kid who believed in democracy was running away he meet the soldier who said I am here to rescue you. He said they they are dead they killed them. The soldier thought the kids were playing games. Piggy was killed by a bolder. This is why America won WW2 Roosevelt was empathetic and calm.
Empathy is a group selection strategy. It beats pure calculation hands down.
[pumpkin person: redacted image because it may contain personal information, Dec 28/2015]
my mom did not abuse me but she did not understand it was happening
she told me that when she took her test the psychologist said she was a genius.
Jeremiah (/dʒɛrɨˈmaɪ.ə/;[1] Hebrew: יִרְמְיָהוּ, Modern Hebrew: Yirməyāhū, IPA: jirməˈjaːhu, Tiberian: Yirmĭyahu, Greek: Ἰερεμίας, Arabic: إرميا Irmiya) meaning “Yah Exalts”, also called the “Weeping prophet”
God’s personal message to Jeremiah, “Attack you they will, overcome you they can’t,” was fulfilled many times in the Biblical narrative: Jeremiah was attacked by his own brothers, beaten and put into the stocks by a priest and false prophet, imprisoned by the king, threatened with death, thrown into a cistern by Judah’s officials, and opposed by a false prophet. When Nebuchadnezzar seized Jerusalem in 586 BC, he ordered that Jeremiah be freed from prison and treated well.
The story of Jeremiah is one of my favorite. I also like Job and Daniel.
Brain, seems, is relatively independent from height. Taller men obviously have ”greater” head than average and shorter ones without measure body and brain size ratio. Taller men are not consistently smarter than average and shorter, just relatively. Still is a magical thinking, by now is completely speculative Flynn Effect, nutrition and increasing of head size causalities. Of course very bad environment is logically expected that will depress the pre-natal conditions but not the common genetic combinations among human populations, just if ”acquired degeneration” were transmissible or heritable.
Ashkenazi jews and east asians are both shorter than europeans (mean), one of the two tallest of european people are the montenegrinians and the dutchmen. Montenegrinians are not known to having a higher iq. A lot of example of shorter among the brightest and psychopatic famous men in the modernity, just look for presidents, Putin, Sarkozy, Hollande… and in the past, Hitler, Stalin, Napoleon, Churchill…
height varies a lot during centuries. Poverty affect specially people with lower intelligence. Today, a lot of poor people, specially men, are taller but not smarter. Baseball teams are not composed by geniuses of intellect. Gigantism don’t make anyone smarter. Taller and muscular men really don’t look more intellectual.
People become artificially smarter because the progressive greater familiarity with technical and educational material, in secular societies (without enphasis on religious material), improvement of ”education efficiency” for ”right material” memorization, etc
Just look for technology. Young generation are masters in video games and other techno-stuff. People who are early exposed to certain activities based on idea of brain development and facility to learn among children, tend to become skilled than those who are not exposed early in the life, of course, should there is a critical potential and personal motivations but this gap between older and new generations in the use of technology is very strong. Now imagine the same with education. I can be wrong of course.
What happened with virtually no equalization of african and european americans since the first studies show us that Flynn Effect, if really exist, finished for african-americans and combined with strong dysgenic factors disrupted during second half of twentieth century. Possible future improvement of african-american intelligence is unlikely to be caused by ”biological factors”.
Fluid intelligence look more important than chrystallized in this context because is genotypical par excellence, the true definition of reasoning. Of course general knowledge improve fluid intelligence.
People become skilled in technological and educational (aka, cultural and technical memes) material but not to understand novel problems and solve them, immigration in Europe for example. A lot of novel ideas, situations and MOST people seems stupid to understand it. Fluid intelligence seems correlate with good judgment (solve paradigms) or wisdom.
Sorry, not baseball (also) but specially basketball.
And other correction, ”wisdom” is not just fluid intelligence of course but a very well functioning of fluid and chrystallized, even if fluid alone will be very important because is the first part of thoughts, ideas and internalizations. Mos people internalize factoids, the good judgment generally fail, like a domino effect. Internalize factoids and work them, in other words, nurture this ignorance.