TheSkudDestroyer

Colorado decriminalizes up to 1 oz., AFAIK...

Nothing wrong with that.

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Switchcraft

.000003% of what population? World? The test is adjusted to score people differently when more people take it so that the median can stay at 100. Without context that number seems meaningless. TG members are self-selected, so even if you were only talking about middle-class computer owners who like team-based tactical shooting games and arguing about politics, it still would be a meaningless statistic to apply. Maybe smart people prefer playing games that involve more "out-thinking" than "out-twitching." Maybe members of TG like logic puzzles more than the average person, or maybe since more people seem to take the test when they are in some kind of trouble, the sample is artifically trended down. But TG is not representative of anything other than someone wanting to "act purposefully, to think rationally, and to deal effectively with his/her environment," which was Wechsler's definition of intelligence, so I don't see why you wouldn't see a bunch of people with "above average" IQ.

sordavie

.000003% of the population. A 167 isn't just "above average" IQ. A 167 is off the charts for the most commonly given IQ tests, which have interpretable ceilings of around 150. Standardizing the IQ score does not involve setting the median at 100 and adjusting it for different populations. Scores from a representative sample are normalized to a bell curve.

I don't think anyone in this thread said or implied that they find it weird to see a bunch of people with above average IQ on this forum. Nobody said anything about what the average IQ was on this forum. Why do you think anyone said or implied anything about that?

What people did say was that they thought a 167 is off the charts, and they see that it's highly improbable that there would be two or three certified super geniuses on the TG forums. Again a 167 on the WAIS statistically puts you in the company of the top 1800 people in the world. Again, that's to set aside the fact that the test has a ceiling of around 150. Beyond that and the scores are highly inaccurate. IQ tests aren't meant to test extremes.

But, what you are suggesting is that nobody should find it weird that we have two or three cases of the extremes here. And by extreme I mean, .000003 of the general population. It doesn't matter if you think TG draws higher than average IQ members. It would be highly unlikely at a conference on theoretical physics to find even one with an IQ of 167.

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leejo

I don't understand where you're getting these statistics. I am certain of the score that I've seen, and I have been around many people who I've considered smarter than myself. It seems to me that there's some disconnect. Maybe there's some version of the test that was widely used several years ago that has a different scale or all you kids really are that stupid or something. But I know what I scored and I'm certain that either I've met at least a 4th of the world's smartest 2000 people or your numbers are incorrect.

Fenian420

Iunno, I actually do like that idea of just decriminalizing it instead which now Im kinda suprised thinking that they havent done that yet, govt would be able to cut taxes alot more, although would probably just take it in instead of cuttin taxes still...

Should just allow 1-1.5ozs. then criminalize anything higher IMO.. Some people like to enjoy their holidays a little more than others,

El_Gringo_Grande

The average for most IQ tests is 100. This means approximately 50% will score above and 50% below 100. A standard deviation is 15 points. A score above 160 is 4 standard deviations away from the average. That is a extremal small portion of the population. This assumes a normal distribution of the population, of course.

You may have not had a "real" IQ test. There are various ones around. All that I have seen use the same basic assumptions of a normal distribution but I don't know what the average they use is. If it was, say, 200, then you would be below average intelligence.

But if it was the common IQ test that sordavie speaks of then you are one of the most intelligent people in the world, according to the test. And, not to be rude, but I really doubt .

There are hundreds, even thousands, of psychological tests that measure all kinds of things. I would bet your memory is simply wrong. You can never trust your memory. Especially when you get as old and feeble as you are.

__________________
Sen. John McCain (AZ) For President '08
(subject to change without notice and the Fact Tom Coburn supports him makes me queasy. Coburn is a zealot.)
---
I’m not racists, I have republican friends.
---
"The essence of tyranny is the denial of complexity". -Jacob Burkhardt
---
"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" - emerson
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Ikariam.com Alpha Ciekyios[29:78] > Rock Lobster

Ikariam.org Epsilon Hicaios[44:39] > Rocktown |Sneivios[41:40] > New Atlanta|Asuios[41:39] > Sea Side Manor

El_Gringo_Grande

It is the mean, not median. And it is adjusted over time. But they have to adjust because the average is going up.

I agree that IQ is only one, not critical, measure of something. Seeing that we don't even know what intelligence actually is, and that some believe there are several kinds of intelligence, putting to much emphasis on IQ would be silly.

There is pretty good correlation between intelligence and "success", another nebulous term.

__________________
Sen. John McCain (AZ) For President '08
(subject to change without notice and the Fact Tom Coburn supports him makes me queasy. Coburn is a zealot.)
---
I’m not racists, I have republican friends.
---
"The essence of tyranny is the denial of complexity". -Jacob Burkhardt
---
"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" - emerson
----
Ikariam.com Alpha Ciekyios[29:78] > Rock Lobster

Ikariam.org Epsilon Hicaios[44:39] > Rocktown |Sneivios[41:40] > New Atlanta|Asuios[41:39] > Sea Side Manor

ScratchMonkey

I use a drug extracted from a plant from Columbia. The seeds are ground and then water is forced through them to extract the drug for better ingestion.


I like mine with sugar and cream.

I used to think MJ was an evil drug, as I was brought up in a social sector that thought that way. Then I discovered that technical people I highly respected (some with a PhD) used it. Turned me around.

A similar thing happened with my attitude towards guns. My parents were afraid of them. Then my mom married a gun owner, and he took us to the local gun club for safety training in case we went hunting. (Alas, never got around to that. A freak industrial-related medical condition got him.)

It shouldn't be a problem exposing kids to drug information, as long as it's accurate. Lose their trust by distorting the truth and expect abuse of all kinds of things.

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Sig

Switchcraft

The median, not the mean. Averages are neat, but the test is based around the idea that the scores will have a median of 100 and that approximately 68% of the people who take the test will have a score that falls within 10 points of that. The scores are not generated based on averages, the scores are based on how many people you outscore.

Which is why sordavie's description of "off the charts" is, well, wrong. Obviously there has to be a top scorer among people who have taken the test. But TG is a self-selected sample of people who already should be above the median on the scores, and while close to 70% of the people should still be around the 100 mark, there's no reason to believe that our self-selected sample of deep-thinkers couldn't have several people who score well above.

For every 10,000 people, there should be at least 10 that score above 145. Is there any reason to believe a self-selected sample of middle-class, strategic thinking computer owners wouldn't be well above the norm compared to general society, where people affecting the median include the indigent, criminals, the insane, etc?

Beatnik

I hope I'm not the only one who appreciates the irony of arguing about the validity and reliability of IQ in a thread about marijuana.

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El_Gringo_Grande

No, it is the mean or average. It is based on normal or Gaussian distribution.


From wikipedia (and it match my statistics book lying on my desk):

So sordavies description is correct. A score above 160 is pretty darn rare. Those falling within 4 standard deviations is 99.9936657516%. But remember there are two sides to the curve so you would have to increase that percentage so that you are only looking at outliers on the right side of the curve beyond 4 standard deviations.

(The numbers may be a little off depending on the skew and other factors of the distribution, of course. Things my old brain cannot remember right away.)

*Edit*

I agree that it is normal to see sub groups like TG forum users have a distribution that is not normal and I would not be suprised if there where more than one person with an IQ above 145. Or if the average was above 100, say 105.

__________________
Sen. John McCain (AZ) For President '08
(subject to change without notice and the Fact Tom Coburn supports him makes me queasy. Coburn is a zealot.)
---
I’m not racists, I have republican friends.
---
"The essence of tyranny is the denial of complexity". -Jacob Burkhardt
---
"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" - emerson
----
Ikariam.com Alpha Ciekyios[29:78] > Rock Lobster

Ikariam.org Epsilon Hicaios[44:39] > Rocktown |Sneivios[41:40] > New Atlanta|Asuios[41:39] > Sea Side Manor

El_Gringo_Grande

Most of the pot heads I have been around often had these types of discussions. Of course the quality of the discussion pre and post toke varied greatly.

__________________
Sen. John McCain (AZ) For President '08
(subject to change without notice and the Fact Tom Coburn supports him makes me queasy. Coburn is a zealot.)
---
I’m not racists, I have republican friends.
---
"The essence of tyranny is the denial of complexity". -Jacob Burkhardt
---
"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" - emerson
----
Ikariam.com Alpha Ciekyios[29:78] > Rock Lobster

Ikariam.org Epsilon Hicaios[44:39] > Rocktown |Sneivios[41:40] > New Atlanta|Asuios[41:39] > Sea Side Manor

leejo

That's not ironic!

Steeler

leejo's right. The situation is clearly chronic.

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leejo

It might actually be interesting for you to consider that it's at least possible that several of us who claim to have scored so high and to have seen our scores aren't lying or stupid. If you accept that, for argument's sake, then we might have an interesting discussion about what properties these games and you people have that might be attractive to people who score well on standardized IQ tests. For example, I think that it takes a pretty sophisticated abstract thinker to visualize a battlefield, to track friendly and enemy actual and possible locations through time.

Not to puff TG up, but I doubt anyone would be freaking out to learn that two employees at Nasa scored so high. Why? Because when most people think of NASA they think of a place and work that seeks and attracts some powerful minds. Isn't it at least possible that some of those people blow off steam playing little games they find challenging? Why wouldn't TG be as good a place as any for 160ers to find each other?

Instead of defending the model in the face of evidence that is outside the model's predictions, also consider the possibility that the evidence isn't the problem and look at the model. That's science!

I know it would probably chap several asses into thoughts of suicide to accept that I scored anywhere near this high, so I will admit that I was on quaaludes when I took the last test from a government nursing assistant and maybe misremember the score.