Morons once again doing what morons do best

[solid7]

 
I'm glad you understood
 
It was not my intention to advocate or frame certain political ideologies, but rather to show that intelligent people are not a solution, possibly just a different problem. We need politicians that want to do their work because it's what they like to do, and not power-hungry egoists and narcissists, whatever their political denomination may be.

 
Conversely, I'm glad that you understood.
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It was the subtle introduction of "Democrazy" that led me to believe you were headed in a direction.
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One might argue that politicians are absolutely not what we need at all.  One could argue that egoists and narcissists - where they don't immediately present as such - start off as people who love their work, but lay claim to totalitarian tendencies, when they realize the inherent problems that arise from the clash of the intellectual elite, and the mediocracy.  I might just be honest, and say that at some point, we all revert to "might makes right", and we impose our own ideological basis.  Pretty sure there's a science term for this (division/collapse of functional societies due to glaring disparities) in the animal kingdom, but it eludes me now.

 

[Ashen]

 
As a mathematician, I love the notion of categorizing people statistically.  
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Let me point out, however, that the empirical rule states that 99.7% of a set falls within 3 standard deviations of the mean, 95% falls within 2 standard deviations of the mean, and 68% fall within one standard deviation of the mean.  This is a standard bell (normally distributed) curve.
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Intelligence, as I understand it, fits this rule, as well.  The average IQ being 100, and 1 standard deviation being ~15 points.

Yes, everything i have read about IQ says that ~95% of the population falls between 85 to 115 IQ. 1 standard deviation below 100 to 1 above, the difference between the ends of spectrum being 2 .

 

[solid7]

Yes, everything i have read about IQ says that ~95% of the population falls between 85 to 115 IQ. 1 standard deviation below 100 to 1 above, the difference between the ends of spectrum being 2 .

 
So obviously, I'm not one to advocate giving the masses the benefit of the doubt with regards to their mental horsepower...  But I haven't seen these types of numbers, for this kind of analysis, myself. It would warrant further context.  Typically, if 95% of your data fell within one standard deviation of the mean, it would be time to re-evaluate the data.
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I can see the 85-115 IQ range being fairly authoritative.  However, in what sample is the standard deviation 15 IQ points?  Canada?  The US?  Sweden?  The World?  And is the 95% a comparison of one population, to data taken against some other group?
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So many questions.  And in the end, I still believe that they're as dumb as the questionable numbers suggest.

 

[Crazy Monkey]

IQ score is not the best measure of a man. Doesn't guarantee how successful a life an individual will have or how good of a person they'll be. Its like a person's height. Successful basketball players are taller than the average person. However, being taller than the average person doesn't guarantee you'll be a successful basketball player. 

 

[Demented]

IQ means nothing when the education system is below world average. Can't expect dumb dumb monkey brain to do logical thinking things when they're taught to be dumb dumbs. Kids and adults alike, at least around this area, cannot even do basic math.

 

[solid7]

IQ score is not the best measure of a man. Doesn't guarantee how successful a life an individual will have or how good of a person they'll be. Its like a person's height. Successful basketball players are taller than the average person. However, being taller than the average person doesn't guarantee you'll be a successful basketball player. 

 
That's undoubtedly true, and as the Nazi article that was previously linked points out, there are no flags or commonalities for people with higher IQs.  They can be as different as night and day.
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However...
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I hope that we would never debate what constitutes the essence of a person, based on a standardized testing format.  IQ should, at best, be precursory data.  I think that some inferences can be drawn, on a limited basis, from IQ data.  Lower IQ (in a specific band) is authoritatively indicative of what we may formerly have called, "retardation", but higher IQ is not necessarily indicative of anything, other than one's propensity to acquire knowledge.  It separates the person from the personality, and that is a fundamental shortcoming.
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Ultimately, IQ is presently one of the only tools that we have to begin to qualify certain data on people, at a glance.  We know that serial killers tend to be higher, IQ, for example.  That clearly doesn't mean that all high IQ people are serial killers, or have a propensity towards such.  How one utilizes the data that is presented to them, is also indicative of intelligence. (formulating lies based on statistics is not the domain of the cretin, whereas absorbing and regurgitating them without understanding is, for example)
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IQ takes all sorts of winding paths; it doesn't delineate the savant from the well-rounded genius types.  On paper, they are exactly the same.
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We should be able to speak in generalities, to breach a subject, but we also have an obligation not to navigate full-time from the poop deck.  Just like you don't write a composition by going launching straight into the dilemma section of the plot - you ease into the subject by way of the summary and thesis statement, and build a case.  So we start with the more abstract, and steadily increase in specificity...

 

[solid7]

IQ means nothing when the education system is below world average. Can't expect dumb dumb monkey brain to do logical thinking things when they're taught to be dumb dumbs. Kids and adults alike, at least around this area, cannot even do basic math.

 
A true IQ test doesn't care about subjects, in particular.  It looks at your problem solving ability, abstractly, at a given point in time.  IQ tests are age based.  You could literally have a bush dweller, who has never been introduced to the subject of mathematics, who outscores you in an IQ test, based on cognition, and rational ability.

 

[Ashen]

The average iq in North America falls slightly below standard 100 average of most tests from the aggregate data i have seen comparing countries. 98 USA 99 Canada.

The real point i am trying to make is the vast majority of people fall within a narrow band as far as tested intelligence goes.

Very small percentages are truly intellectually challenged or gifted.

The kinds of behaviours we are seeing are more closely linked to changing social values than intelligence imo.

Lack of learned empathy, degrading sense of social reponsibility ,when what is good for the community, comes into conflict with what is convenient for an individual.

 

[ahayastani]

 
A true IQ test doesn't care about subjects, in particular.  It looks at your problem solving ability, abstractly, at a given point in time.  IQ tests are age based.  You could literally have a bush dweller, who has never been introduced to the subject of mathematics, who outscores you in an IQ test, based on cognition, and rational ability.

 
Yes, but Demented touches a complementary subject: ignorance. Stupidity and ignorance are not synonymous. Especially people that are not too gifted will reap benefit from a decent education system.

 

[solid7]

 
Yes, but Demented touches a complementary subject: ignorance. Stupidity and ignorance are not synonymous. Especially people that are not too gifted will reap benefit from a decent education system.

 
Are you suggesting that public school systems are BETTER for stupid people?
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I might argue that they're only useful for advancing the agenda of whatever idiots/geniuses are running the show.  Which I'm pretty certain is what stettoman was saying.  There is always a natural progression/decline in the cycle of nations.  We just happen to be on the entropy slope.
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The idea that education is better for everyone, at all times, is overly simplistic.  In our country, we have decided that vocations don't matter anymore.  We try to force everyone into an academic educational mold, and that just doesn't work for all people.  You're clearly an academic.  I don't fault you for that.  But I think that academics tend to be a bit myopic, in their overly zealous appeal for education and national concensus.  Nothing personal, just my belief.  I think that all people have a place - and most people today, seem to have forgotten theirs.
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Everyone today thinks they're special, entitled, exempt, etc.  A lot of people - stupid or otherwise - just really need the occasional, obligatory, reminder of who they are, and where they REALLY fit into a society.  We aren't all queen bees.

 

[Ruid]

This was a thread about toilet paper and greed. It feels like my ADHD is contagious and I spread it to the forum. lol

 

[solid7]

This was a thread about toilet paper and greed. It feels like my ADHD is contagious and I spread it to the forum. lol

 
Nothing is ever really about toilet paper and greed.  And ADHD is an imaginary catch-all container - for both idiots and geniuses - who can't be controlled by those who thrive on groupthink. (see what I did there?)
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There are problems, there are symptoms, and then there are symptoms of problems.  The over-arching theme, is that when we think we're looking at an absolute problem, we're often just seeing the symptoms being manifested.

 

[ahayastani]

 
Are you suggesting that public school systems are BETTER for stupid people?
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I might argue that they're only useful for advancing the agenda of whatever idiots/geniuses are running the show.  Which I'm pretty certain is what stettoman was saying.  There is always a natural progression/decline in the cycle of nations.  We just happen to be on the entropy slope.
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The idea that education is better for everyone, at all times, is overly simplistic.  In our country, we have decided that vocations don't matter anymore.  We try to force everyone into an academic educational mold, and that just doesn't work for all people.  You're clearly an academic.  I don't fault you for that.  But I think that academics tend to be a bit myopic, in their overly zealous appeal for education and national concensus.  Nothing personal, just my belief.  I think that all people have a place - and most people today, seem to have forgotten theirs.
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Everyone today thinks they're special, entitled, exempt, etc.  A lot of people - stupid or otherwise - just really need the occasional, obligatory, reminder of who they are, and where they REALLY fit into a society.  We aren't all queen bees.

 
Perhaps I should have been more careful about my phrasing, since I could know beforehand that my experience of a decent educational system would be very different from yours, and that we both would be looking at the same "name" from different perspectives and expectations. Where I originally come from, the educational system is highly categorized and very different from the US system, and certainly is not an "academic educational mold".
 
Consensus is an ideal. I don't see how that is to be realized on a national level, whatever the country may be (except North Korea, where everyone agrees by default ). Compromise, however, ...
 
Anyway, I have been thinking a lot about a quote I read many years ago, about donkeys and grass, and post a screen capture below.
 
 

 

 
I have no-one specifically in mind, before I'm digitally quartered and have my remains thrown in a kettle of boiling water

 

[solid7]

I have no-one specifically in mind, before I'm digitally quartered and have my remains thrown in a kettle of boiling water

 
Hahaha...  You're alright, man...  I'm really not the sensitive type
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There's a lot of truth in what you write, but also a lot of contradiction.  It reminds me of the old phrase, "if you stand for nothing, you'll fall for anything".  I've always believed that's just a way to justify bad ideas to the marionettes, who would otherwise cut their strings.  And at the same time, what good is a life without basis?
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Confession: I can't be a Buddhist, because at some point, I refuse to put the world before myself.  I do not feel connected, and I have no desire to keep riding this train, if there's a connector at the next station.  Interesting philosophy, but it makes a lot of assumptions that I'm not willing to indulge.
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I will probably forever be of the opinion, that nature has an inviolable hierarchy, and we're just pretending to be above it.  We've tried to educate all of the "alpha" and "beta" out of our population - but while proving some favorable results, it simultaneously appears to be plunging societies further into conflict.  Not to discount anything you have said - your opinions are educated enough to warrant being treated as informed.  I simply see the world differently.

 

[solid7]

For what it's worth...  I spent part of my education in a private school.  It's not that I don't recognize the value of a "good education".  I just question what is considered "good", by whom, and for what reason.  Education isn't a single thing.  And in a somewhat homogeneous collective, it certainly holds a different value.

 

[solid7]

Lack of learned empathy, degrading sense of social reponsibility ,when what is good for the community, comes into conflict with what is convenient for an individual.

 
Empathy is an interesting subject.  I keep hearing people talk about "emotional intelligence" - which, on paper, sounds great.  The concept is right, I think.  But, the simple fact is, a clever psychopath would outscore the average person on an "Emotional IQ Test".  Why?  Because they know how to manipulate.  They know how to elicit a response.  That, in itself, is a type of intelligence. (it's either a defect, or an evolutionary advantage)  And that's another problematic facet of "intelligence".
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You can't prove to me that empathy exists.  You can prove to me that you (or anyone) can, to some degree, manipulate emotions to create a favorable situation.  Is that something that comes from the "god-seat" of our psyche?  Or is that just what Nietzsche spoke of, when he suggested that even altruism is just an attempt to make ourselves feel good, and therefore, inherently selfish?
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Again, I wish the scientist in our discussion would come to my rescue on the subject of scientific terms...  There is a phenomenon in nature, where when a population of organisms reaches its critical threshold, they instinctively separate themselves (or kill each other).  As we know, humans think they are superior to every other species, and have almost entirely thwarted the natural selection process.  We are definitely social, community creatures.  But are we meant to coexist?  Or are we meant to be wild, and tribal? What good does the community do, if we aren't aligned in communities, based on our natural inclinations - rather than our philosophical machinations? (I mean, I really don't have a hard time understanding why modern societies are such a mess - do you?)
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We're back to hoarding toilet paper.   What chief moron told his subjects to do this?  And why?

 

[Demented]

 
Are you suggesting that public school systems are BETTER for stupid people?
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I might argue that they're only useful for advancing the agenda of whatever idiots/geniuses are running the show.  Which I'm pretty certain is what stettoman was saying.  There is always a natural progression/decline in the cycle of nations.  We just happen to be on the entropy slope.
.
The idea that education is better for everyone, at all times, is overly simplistic.  In our country, we have decided that vocations don't matter anymore.  We try to force everyone into an academic educational mold, and that just doesn't work for all people.  You're clearly an academic.  I don't fault you for that.  But I think that academics tend to be a bit myopic, in their overly zealous appeal for education and national concensus.  Nothing personal, just my belief.  I think that all people have a place - and most people today, seem to have forgotten theirs.
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Everyone today thinks they're special, entitled, exempt, etc.  A lot of people - stupid or otherwise - just really need the occasional, obligatory, reminder of who they are, and where they REALLY fit into a society.  We aren't all queen bees.

IMO, Public schools are the problem. They're not for the stupid, but to creae the stupid and ignorant. Though not really create, but dumb dumbs teaching dumb dumbs no make smart smarts. Not all teachers in public education in the USA are bad. Just basing this off of my own experience, going from private magnet schools all through my life, and then finishing my last few hign school years in public education. I couldn't be placed properly in classes, as I was already on "college" level by high school.

I'm in the same work force as people I went to public school with, as all the I.B. program kids went off to college because dirty hands are yucky. These people I work with, although successful, and some intelligent, lack a fundamental understanding of the world and how it works, don't have the skills to do simple 7th grade math (like 12-14 year old kids can) without the assistance of a calculator. These sample people are the panick buyers and seem ignorant to just, everything but sports, TV, and social media.

 

[solid7]

and then finishing my last few hign school years in public education. I couldn't be placed properly in classes, as I was already on "college" level by high school.

 
I had this very same problem, myself...  My education up to 8th grade carried me all the way through to graduation.  Sad, really.

 

[The_NorthEast_ChileMan]

I buy a pack of paper towels and toilet paper every week. Whatever I dont use I throw away and just buy more next week.

 

 

[Ragnar]

 
Are you suggesting that public school systems are BETTER for stupid people?
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I might argue that they're only useful for advancing the agenda of whatever idiots/geniuses are running the show.  Which I'm pretty certain is what stettoman was saying.  There is always a natural progression/decline in the cycle of nations.  We just happen to be on the entropy slope.
.
The idea that education is better for everyone, at all times, is overly simplistic.  In our country, we have decided that vocations don't matter anymore.  We try to force everyone into an academic educational mold, and that just doesn't work for all people.  You're clearly an academic.  I don't fault you for that.  But I think that academics tend to be a bit myopic, in their overly zealous appeal for education and national concensus.  Nothing personal, just my belief.  I think that all people have a place - and most people today, seem to have forgotten theirs.
.
Everyone today thinks they're special, entitled, exempt, etc.  A lot of people - stupid or otherwise - just really need the occasional, obligatory, reminder of who they are, and where they REALLY fit into a society.  We aren't all queen bees.

public schooling is equal schooling. education is better for all people at all times.
 
vocations arent indefinite. farming > industrial > services > ???    
 
problem is, with mechanization, the wealthy cannot support their indentured, purposely poorly-educated population, and the market shall remove its nose despite the grinning gob and canabalize.
 
sadly, many onlookers (the not 1%), are fooled to believe 'the they' are the enemy rather than the family.
 
sigh. all people have a place, side by side, at the same table, with duty to one another as much as to the table itself.
 
 
 
equal education is a duty of humanity as stewards of this planet. the lack thereof is our greatest failing. 
 
im part of everyone. im not special. but i am the same as you and everyone else.
 
empathy feels good. dont tell your gym teacher.