Post by PR's Old Account (DO NOT PM) on Sept 23, 2008 4:00:55 GMT -5
I spy, with my GoldenEye...
a society completely obsessed and infatuated with the notion of intelligence as a means of accurately rating and classifying an individual's ability to think, as well as "I.Q. Tests" as a valid means of conducting this "research".
Topic
I.Q. Tests
The Rant, in General
By their very nature, IQ tests are flawed. They are culturally and socially biased, corruptible, and, for lack of a better term. Their existence is, in and of itself, a complete contradiction.
Measuring I.Q.
Guess what people: your I.Q. is NOT a scientific discovery! It is a mad-made means of determining, essentially, who is "smarter" than someone else. And like most such things, this measurement is a crock.
First, lets look at the very nature of I.Q. To rate a person's I.Q. someone (A HUMAN, obviously) designs a test. Through this test, there are some answers which cause people to have higher ratings than others. This means that, in theory, the men who wrote this test, KNEW the right answers...meaning collectively, they were geniuses - by their own definition, since it cannot be possible to get a "perfect" IQ score without already knowing all the answers...and these folks know all the answers...amazing! So then here's the deal: you can NEVER score higher than the collective group of individuals creating the test, cause...well...they created it...you can't have more answers than the test itself and have it measure beyond its capacity as a test. That makes no sense.
Second: the test is made my humans to measure something that is (arguably) not created by humans - the way people think, and how capable they are of thinking effectively. Pretending I believe in God, its like Man designing a test to measure something God made. Make any sense? I'm gonna go with no.
Third: there is a huge rant I can make here about the test as a means of social control, and class struggle, but I might touch on that in "The Test" section below...if not, its probably okay, since its probably a bit complex for a simple hockey discussion board.
The Test
The test itself is socially and culturally biased. This means that IQ is NOT something that is universal, but it is something that is taught in schools, created in homes and families, and perpetuated throughout our day-to-day lives. It also means that people from other cultures are more likely to underachieve on these tests because of inherent cultural understandings that we, in North America, take for granted, and don't even realize exists - LONG discussion, so I will leave that idea there.
For this article, I re-took a readily-available online IQ test. Years ago, I didn;t put much stock into these, but one of my psychology professors later said they are ball-park accurate, so...yeah.
The Results
My results are posted below (which also links to the site I did the test at). Again, this is a North American test, done by a very North American individual, so of course I scored well. On THIS test. But a few years ago, I took part in a culturally-biased IQ test (meaning it was written for individuals who were NOT white, North-American males), and based on THAT test, it was a miracle I could evne breathe. But its all about expectations, language, assumptions and implications.
So I leave you with this: please go do the test, and feel free to share your results. They don't mean anything, and frankly I, personally, would think less of people who make fun of others for their results than I would anyone with "poor" results. So do the test, copy-and-paste the code (don't worry, I will correct the link/html for you), and lets all laugh at the lunacy of IQ tests together, in peace and harmony.
Coming Soon - "The Eighth One"
Possible topics include:
- who knows...still taking suggestions though
a society completely obsessed and infatuated with the notion of intelligence as a means of accurately rating and classifying an individual's ability to think, as well as "I.Q. Tests" as a valid means of conducting this "research".
Topic
I.Q. Tests
The Rant, in General
By their very nature, IQ tests are flawed. They are culturally and socially biased, corruptible, and, for lack of a better term. Their existence is, in and of itself, a complete contradiction.
Measuring I.Q.
Guess what people: your I.Q. is NOT a scientific discovery! It is a mad-made means of determining, essentially, who is "smarter" than someone else. And like most such things, this measurement is a crock.
First, lets look at the very nature of I.Q. To rate a person's I.Q. someone (A HUMAN, obviously) designs a test. Through this test, there are some answers which cause people to have higher ratings than others. This means that, in theory, the men who wrote this test, KNEW the right answers...meaning collectively, they were geniuses - by their own definition, since it cannot be possible to get a "perfect" IQ score without already knowing all the answers...and these folks know all the answers...amazing! So then here's the deal: you can NEVER score higher than the collective group of individuals creating the test, cause...well...they created it...you can't have more answers than the test itself and have it measure beyond its capacity as a test. That makes no sense.
Second: the test is made my humans to measure something that is (arguably) not created by humans - the way people think, and how capable they are of thinking effectively. Pretending I believe in God, its like Man designing a test to measure something God made. Make any sense? I'm gonna go with no.
Third: there is a huge rant I can make here about the test as a means of social control, and class struggle, but I might touch on that in "The Test" section below...if not, its probably okay, since its probably a bit complex for a simple hockey discussion board.
The Test
The test itself is socially and culturally biased. This means that IQ is NOT something that is universal, but it is something that is taught in schools, created in homes and families, and perpetuated throughout our day-to-day lives. It also means that people from other cultures are more likely to underachieve on these tests because of inherent cultural understandings that we, in North America, take for granted, and don't even realize exists - LONG discussion, so I will leave that idea there.
For this article, I re-took a readily-available online IQ test. Years ago, I didn;t put much stock into these, but one of my psychology professors later said they are ball-park accurate, so...yeah.
The Results
My results are posted below (which also links to the site I did the test at). Again, this is a North American test, done by a very North American individual, so of course I scored well. On THIS test. But a few years ago, I took part in a culturally-biased IQ test (meaning it was written for individuals who were NOT white, North-American males), and based on THAT test, it was a miracle I could evne breathe. But its all about expectations, language, assumptions and implications.
So I leave you with this: please go do the test, and feel free to share your results. They don't mean anything, and frankly I, personally, would think less of people who make fun of others for their results than I would anyone with "poor" results. So do the test, copy-and-paste the code (don't worry, I will correct the link/html for you), and lets all laugh at the lunacy of IQ tests together, in peace and harmony.
Coming Soon - "The Eighth One"
Possible topics include:
- who knows...still taking suggestions though
Joking, JOKING. If you want to see how I did it, just click in "Modify".
