Re: "IQ and Being Religious" thread. IQ Test included

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Pretty shoddy IQ test. Why should we think that spatial IQ has any relation to any held belief? I could see maybe that this would be the case for logical syllogisms or verbal IQ (in which case, a person who fares badly may believe also in palm readings, horoscopes, and magic potions), but even then, I think religion is more a function of tenacity than level of intelligence. The biggest imbecile may be the harshest critic of religion (albeit in very unconvincing terms) and the most staunch intellectual could be a believer. Studies have shown better relation between social components and religion than intellectual ones. Silly stuff.
 
kimmielittle said:
Many Atheists like to see themselves as some elitist group of intellectuals and actually use this as a tool to try to win over youth.
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Well if they’re actually swelling their ranks using an argument as feeble as that, I should think we would soon be able to prove that the majority of atheists was of below-average intelligence. Those of average intelligence and above wouldn’t change their toothpaste for an argument that lame, much less their religious convictions. 😃

Granted, young people are notoriously prone to falling for things that aren’t arguments but are instead appeals to emotion (at least I certainly remember doing so myself), but they grow out of it. (No, I am NOT saying that all young people are swayed by emotional appeals that have no basis in reason, but only that, if we are going to be swayed that way once in our lives, we will probably be swayed then. Some people are immune, so any young people reading this can put yourself in that group. 🙂 )

–Jen
 
chevalier said:
Mensa believes IQ is all about spatial stuff or at least spatial stuff is the only fair way to evaluate intelligence. I disagree with them not only because I hate all that spatial stuff and it wants me to bite my hands, but also because they are rather clearly attempting to evaluate only one aspect of bra(name removed by moderator)ower while still giving it a more total character. Even maths is not all about geometry, let alone intelligence itself! I’ll take the test after returning from church (I’m going soon)… or tomorrow. Oh, and I think I’ve seen that test already, but long ago.
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Really? Then that is what separates me from the intelligent. On Howard Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences, I rate lowest in Spatial. 😊

I may have just given a true confession, and I don’t even know. 🤷
 
To clarify a misconception, this is not a spatial IQ test. A spatial IQ test deals with 3 dimensional shapes (like questions where you have to fold cubes in your head and see which one matches, or rotate 3d shapes in your head to see which ones fit together to say form a cube).
 
revert_jen said:
Well if they’re actually swelling their ranks using an argument as feeble as that, I should think we would soon be able to prove that the majority of atheists was of below-average intelligence. Those of average intelligence and above wouldn’t change their toothpaste for an argument that lame, much less their religious convictions. 😃

Granted, young people are notoriously prone to falling for things that aren’t arguments but are instead appeals to emotion (at least I certainly remember doing so myself), but they grow out of it. (No, I am NOT saying that all young people are swayed by emotional appeals that have no basis in reason, but only that, if we are going to be swayed that way once in our lives, we will probably be swayed then. Some people are immune, so any young people reading this can put yourself in that group. 🙂 )

–Jen
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:clapping:
 
revert_jen said:
e) It really is quite difficult to measure long-term memory in the format of an IQ test, but many people would consider it to be one of the components of intelligence
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As long as you don’t try to test my short-term memory… 😃 (Not like you’d have any reason to. Just saying’. :D)
Magdalena09 said:
OMG that test made me start having to blink a lot and close my eyes for a bit and reopen them before trying to evaluate each question.
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I’m still preparing for the eyeache. 😃
This also reminds me of some flaws with standardized tests in general… some people for whatever reason read a bit more slowly then others, even though they make good or better grades than those who are faster readers. Since standardized tests are timed, it automatically puts fast readers are a considerable advantage. I always wondered about that and if speed you can read at is a reliable measure of how smart you are.🤷
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Or there are those tests that include time in the scoring. They’re absolutely unreliable for measuring tenacious individuals who won’t rest until they’ve answered all. On the other hand, providing just a handful of the most obvious answers in the shortest time physically possible breaks such a test.
revert_jen said:
Well if they’re actually swelling their ranks using an argument as feeble as that, I should think we would soon be able to prove that the majority of atheists was of below-average intelligence. Those of average intelligence and above wouldn’t change their toothpaste for an argument that lame, much less their religious convictions. 😃

Granted, young people are notoriously prone to falling for things that aren’t arguments but are instead appeals to emotion
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I mean no insult to atheists, but those arguments are lame if they’re meant to be intellectual and yeah, they’re emotional. “Scientifically proven” atheism makes me doubt people’s clarity of mind.
graceandglory said:
Really? Then that is what separates me from the intelligent. On Howard Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences, I rate lowest in Spatial. 😊
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Might try that one some time. I’m not even that bad with 3D. In fact, I can handle it. What I utterly hate is those silly flat arrangements of elements of which IQ tests are so full these days. Why do I always have the feeling that the logic behind them is somewhat arbitrary and that I’d like to debate some of the logic? Besides, I’m not sure to what extent guessing someone’s logic for arranging that stuff is a measure of intelligence independent of coincidence or lack of it. Errr… enough IQ-test-bashing. Time for a second coffee and a go, I guess. Been somewhat underslept these lasts days (work and all combined with an attempt to impose a more traditional sleeping schedule while working from home without fixed hours), which could impair the process for me, like spending more time and/or missing the clues in one or two pics I otherwise wouldn’t miss. Eh. Lame excuse, I know. 😛
 
Wow, I’ve got 110, the lowest score I’ve ever got on an IQ test. 😛 I spent too much time on early tasks and forgot to leave some time for the rest. The final ones weren’t as difficult as some of those in the middle of it. I got better even in the other test at that site several years ago. 😛 I felt like I just couldn’t figure out the patterns. :o
 
chevalier said:
Wow, I’ve got 110, the lowest score I’ve ever got on an IQ test. 😛 I spent too much time on early tasks and forgot to leave some time for the rest. The final ones weren’t as difficult as some of those in the middle of it. I got better even in the other test at that site several years ago. 😛 I felt like I just couldn’t figure out the patterns. :o
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I had the same problem–I scored pretty low on this in comparison to other tests I’ve taken.
 
Magdalena09 said:
I had the same problem–I scored pretty low on this in comparison to other tests I’ve taken.
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Maybe that’s the effect of one-after-one as opposed to seeing a sheet. I suppose the difficulty from midway on isn’t the same for everybody but corresponds with some make-up in the brain… or maybe exceptions just happen, but anyway, in a normal situation you have all of them before you and you tick off the easiest ones (to you) first and divide your time among the rest. Going one-by-one it’s easy to get lost. I’m having a third coffee with some alcohol in it this time and let’s see how I fare in the other one.
 
That’s really confusing. I never did decide if the exemplars went left to right, or up and down, or whether you were supposed to consider the picture as a whole. I scored my lowest ever – only 112. Sigh. Depressing.

IQ tests in general are annoying, though. Like when I was a kid, there was one where they asked you to draw a tree. They didn’t tell you that they were grading you on the elaborateness and realism of the tree. I wasn’t in the mood for coloring when I’d just been doing all these cool puzzles, so I just drew the quickest possible tree. I guess I should have known they wanted more, when the test person encouraged me to spend more time drawing… Sigh. I know these things shouldn’t bother me, but they do.

The thing to do with psych and IQ tests, or any other kind of test, is to figure out the rationale of the person who wrote the questions. If you can get the gist of that, you can always do better on a test, because you’ll understand the intent of the questions. Also, if you have to guess, you’ll be guessing in an informed way.
 
Mintaka said:
The thing to do with psych and IQ tests, or any other kind of test, is to figure out the rationale of the person who wrote the questions. If you can get the gist of that, you can always do better on a test, because you’ll understand the intent of the questions. Also, if you have to guess, you’ll be guessing in an informed way.
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Yeah and after a couple of months of training, you could probably score 10-20 points better on any given test, which wouldn’t mean your IQ had suddenly gone up (unless IQ is defined as the ability to score in IQ tests). IMHO what you say about it going left to right, up to down or diagonally, isn’t acceptable, nor is the excessive implicit reliance on guessing the rationale of the test-maker.

I suppose you had a problem because of the composition of the test as a one-by-one trip instead of having a sheet before you with all tasks in one place so you could tick off the easy before moving on to the hard.
 
Anytime a person goes for a “real” intelligence assessment, the psycologist does not give just one kind of test. He or she gives a variety that covers a wide variety of types ofmeasurments. Which tests are chosen will depend on things like age, and they should keep in mind things like social and educational background.

And the tester knows such tests aren’t perfect and looks at the whole package.

As far as the test here and the “direction” of the patterns, I thought that it varied and figuring it out was part of the test.
 
the irreligious people have only one IQ test–if you are a believer you are by definition, stupid.

the religious people on the other hand have a terrifice intelligence test–compare yourself to some of the most intellegent people in Christian life–who are also arguably among the most intellegent humans to ever walk the earth–such as Augustine of Hippo, his teacher Ambrose, Thomas Aquinas, Albert the Great, Boniface, and so forth. They, in their humility, compared themselves with Christ and admitted the enormity of their lack of intelligence of the only truths that matter.

I did belong to Mensa in their early days, at that time SAT test was one measure they accepted, but have long since outgrown the need for such ego stroking. Having kids reminds you daily of how dumb you really are, so you get over it fast. Something in one of their publications was blatantly anti-life so I wrote a scathing letter that was probably never read and left. I have no idea or not whether the organization as a whole has a position on life issues at this time so don’t take that as a blanket condemnation of an organization that at least prizes intelligence and rational thought–values rapidly eroding in this age.
 
puzzleannie said:
Having kids reminds you daily of how dumb you really are, so you get over it fast. .
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:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

I’ve often said that there’s no one like your kids to keep you humble! Though the questions they ask do often remind me of just how intelligent my hubby is!! I’m not completely uneducated, but I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said…“ummmm…I’m not sure, but I’ll bet Daddy knows!” 😃
 
108

It really did get quite abstract and difficult, if it was a 1.5 hour test, I’m pretty sure I could get it all correct. At about Question 32 I only had 1 minute left so I just started guessing the rest of it.
 
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