In recent days our Secretary of State hascalled the Presidenta fucking moron.
The President retorted that he believes hehas the higher IQ score.
But both are hiding behind faulty intelligence measures instead of saying how theyreallyfeel.
In the early 1900s, anybody with an IQ under 30, for example, was labeled an idiot.
If you had Downs syndrome, you were (I am not making this up) a Mongolian idiot.
These words are all obsolete as medical terms today, and they should probably be retired as insults too.
Is it fair to prove your intelligence by dueling with pencils and paper?
Yes, if you only care about intelligence in its definition as what intelligence tests measure.
Your IQ canchange over timeandwith education.
So in that sense it doesnt matter what your IQ really is.
Well, sometimes it does.
Heres why:
1.
They often determine when a child/adult is eligible to receive disability benefits or assistance.
(down syndrome and other cognitive disabilities)
2.
They can determine learning disorders to help children/adults get the assistance they need to function more effectively.
They determine who is able to be executed (in America)
4.
But, I am talking about real Wechsler IQ tests…not the crap you find on the internet.
Those are some very real results based on how we interpret the arguably fake quality of IQ.
A person who scores very low on a competently administered IQ test is likely to struggle in many domains.
However, an IQ score will miss the mark in many individuals, in both directions.
Should we be angry at the IQ test when it misses the mark?
All psychological measures are rubber rulers.
It is in their nature to miss the mark from time to time.
If the score was wrong because of incompetence, we should be angry at incompetent test administrators.
We should be angry at institutions that use IQ tests to justify oppression.
Maybe we shouldnt put blind trust into IQ scores for high-stakes decisions.
Like, perhaps, deciding who is the best person to negotiate us out of a nuclear war.
