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So just a couple of thoughts I have.
There are many different methods of measuring IQ and intelligence, and IQ tests can break intelligence between crystallized and fluid. Are the people of the Ivory Coast averaging 70 IQ due to a lack of nutrition and education, or because they are genetically inferior and the 70 IQ is their genetically average potential? Or to put it another way, if we take a baby born to the average person in the Ivory Coast and raise them in a Western nation with Western nutrition and education, would they on average have 70 IQ?
Based on observations of the Flynn effect and the increase in average IQ over time for all populations, I'd say that they would likely have a much average IQ than 70 if they were raised in better conditions. In other words, I'm arguing that IQ scores between countries are not exactly the same and that a 70 IQ person from the Ivory Coast is not equivalent to a 70 IQ person in the USA. To Flynn's credit, I believe he does try to account for multi-country analysis by using the progressive Raven Matrixes version of the IQ test, which doesn't require reading, writing, or speaking, but it also means the range of intelligence being tested is limited. As highly correlated intelligence is across different types, it's not equivalent. Also, from what I recall from Flynn's work the data in Africa is quite limited and had to be extrapolated across various countries, Ivory Coast included. (Note that I am not arguing there aren't any genetical differences in average IQ, just that all the races have not had a chance to reach say their 90% potential in IQ distribution.).
IQ has much stronger predictive powers of income in the lower brackets than in the higher brackets. I find this to be strong evidence in support of my notion that IQ is a barrier to entry for being able to perform specific tasks. One Swedish study on intelligence and income finds that above 60,000 the predictive ability of intelligence drops and that the top 1% of earners score worse in cognitive ability than the bracket right below them. Once you reach an adequate amount of IQ, other factors about a person matter more.
I will concede that you could likely find a job for a 70-IQ person, but would they be able to keep that job, and would they be offered that job in lieu of a higher-IQ person? I argue most jobs have an "optimal" IQ where after a certain point having additional points of IQ would offer very little benefit. I will even go as far as to say that having a higher IQ could actually be a detriment since the job would be too simple for an extremely intelligent person and they would likely quit out of boredom and find a better job. I don't think there is a single job where 70 IQ is the optimal amount of intelligence for that job.
Hauser's Meritocracy, Cognitive Ability, and the Sources of Occupational Success" found that iq distribution of various jobs finds that only that "janitors and sextons", "construction laborers", "unpaid family workers", and "farmers and farm laborers" had at least someone with a less than 70iq in the 90th iq percentile distribution in people that work in those job categories between 1975-1977. The data from 1992-1994 shows there is not a single person in the 90th distribution of IQ that falls below 70 IQ. Most of this is explained by the Flynn effect, but as tools have become more complex it's more and more difficult for a low IQ person to be able to even do the lowest paying jobs. As I said, a 70 IQ person can not be trusted with something like a dishwasher because operating a dishwasher is actually quite a complex task compared to a task such as hammering an object in the same spot over and over. The economic output of workers in a modern nation must surpass the minimum wage, otherwise no business will hire such people except out of charity.
Gottfredson has a description of the ability of people at various IQ ranges in her paper Social Consequences of Group Differences in Cognitive Ability. There are descriptions for 2 cut off points of IQ I want to highlight - 75 IQ and 85 IQ:
The intellectual capability of the 70 IQ, or even 85 IQ population is made clear in these descriptions. These are significant ability barriers to entry to most jobs or functions and have a greater impact on a person than the additional gain in ability at the higher IQ tiers. To go back to my original point, a 100 iq racist arguing that an 85 iq population are 'animals' can construct a stronger argument than a 115 iq racist arguing that a 100 iq population are animals Both would be incorrect for reasons you already stated previously, but if they were trying to refine the definition of animal you get better arguments the lower the IQ goes.
We have seen IQ rise to match the jobs available, but I say that we are nearing our natural genetic potential in IQ for well-developed nations. Actually, we are seeing IQ points drop in developed nations due to the implementation of ludicrous and inane policies. Unless something like eugenics or gene editing becomes a reality I doubt the average level of intelligence will rise more than 5-10 IQ points for the developed nations.
We have no idea what a hypothetical society of a world where the average person's IQ is 130 will look like, but I still argue a 70 IQ person would struggle more in a society of 100 IQ individuals than a 100 IQ person in a world of people with 130 median IQ. There are almost no jobs for a 70 IQ person in a modern nation. Even if the hypothetical 130 iq society is able to automate away many existing job categories with robots and AI as @aardvark2 suggests, I doubt it would actually remove all all jobs where the barrier to be able to do the work requires a minimum level of IQ above 100. It's likely such a society could easily provide a luxurious peaceful life to the 100 IQ person and they wouldn't need to even work and could spend a life pursuing the arts or leisure.
Based on historical trends a lot of people would argue job availability will keep up but we actually don't know that! Historical trends don't always predict the future. @aardvark2 uses an example of a smartphone, and I'd like to point out Moore's law is no longer being met (the pace of development has slowed down). You can't assume past trends continue infinitely and there are good reasons to believe that there won't be enough new industries and jobs that are created where human labor is preferable to robot/AI labor, especially if robots and AI reach the point where it makes most current jobs obsolete.
How is it relevant in the context?
agree! (and one of ways to present it might be to assign IQ values to animals.
How is it relevant in the context? The hypothetical is other society that is +2SD shifted to us.
I'm dreaming of seeing programmers having to actually optimize software! But I talked about older smartphones with 128 megabytes of RAM being nearly useless now. This is irrelevant if pace development stalls in near future.
Just as programmers constantly add more layers of indirection and shitty memory usage, the higher IQ society will invent more paperwork and qualifications even for simpler jobs.
Read my next paragraph and read it in context of it being a response to 2rafa's post. I argue 70 IQ in Ivory coast != 70 IQ in the US so whether or not 2rafa can employ people they met in the Ivory coast (and there are so many things to address here are such as are the people they met actually 70 IQ) was in my opinion not a good response to the economic value of a 70 IQ person.
I prefaced the comment by saying these are just my thoughts. I don't even think a society of 130 IQ can exist naturally. We already know what a society of 70 IQ and 100 IQ looks like. Sure is fun to think about though!
I'm not so sure, maybe 130 IQ society will do that, or maybe they can progress past the notion that everyone has to work because if such a society can create robots to make most jobs absolute then we would probably be at the point where AI and robots could do almost anything better than a human can. So even the 130 IQ person could be made obsolete in their own society. My point is that you cannot extrapolate past patterns to the future without adequate reasoning. For example, if you look at a child's growth, one could incorrectly assume human beings continue to grow taller and taller until they die. When we were talking about success in society, it usually refers to the ability to have a job, although there are other factors. My point is that a 130 IQ society may make the concept of jobs in relationship to humans obsolete, and just because we have previously seen the growth of new industries replace old ones does not mean the pattern will continue.
We have seen humanity move from agriculture > industry > services > IT/Data to put it simply. The type of skills needed transform from manual labor to mental labor and human relationships. If robots and AI make those obsolete, what next? You seem to think more mental labor, but I think if AI makes mental labor obsolete it can just as easily replace new mental labor that is required. Jobs exist to solve problems, in the era where robots and AI replace most existing jobs, will there be enough problems to require most of the human population to tackle? High IQ people tend to not have kids anyways, so I don't think overpopulation will be an issue.
I did
is your point that only genotypic IQ affects employability, but not phenotypic? or that non-IQ factors matter too, when your statement that 70 IQs not employable needs updating
this highly depends on society. Because genotypic IQ grew over time, this doesn't have to be
The 70 IQ person in the US is more likely to be at the peak of their genetic potential due to the availability of resources. I think if you take the supposed average 70 IQ person from the Ivory Coast and give them a Western country-level education, their IQ could still rise 10-15 points. There is some evidence to support that for every additional year of education, IQ rises 1-5 points. Maybe not because children benefit much more from education than adults.
Also, I'm not sure if IQ measurements of the Sub-Saharan African countries do follow a true bell curve since IQ level is adjusted for a mostly Western country. I think the IQ distribution would likely skew right in these countries. We may see a drop-off point above 100 IQ because smart Africans typically migrate to better countries to make a better living. Fun fact, did you know Nigerian-Americans are one of the most educated groups of people in the United States?
IQ plays a more significant role in the lower bracket in terms of job success and ability than at the higher levels. Since the studies are based in the US I think it would be fair to assume most people reached their genetic potential. So IQ matters significantly sub 85, but around 100 and higher it no longer becomes as strong of a predictive tool of job success.
In terms of phenotypic vs genotypic IQ we don't know for sure but based on Gottfredson's description of IQ ability I'd say it applies mostly to genotypic IQ. According to Gottfredson
It seems extremely unlikely you take an Ivory Coast child and give them US-level nutrition and education that a majority of them would be unable to pass an elementary school education. Wikipedia indicates that while the Ivory Coast is behind educational availability for its population, the literacy rate rose from 48.7% in 2000 to 89.9% as of 2019. And by 2012 94.2% of children attended secondary school. To me, it doesn't make sense 70 IQ people are able to graduate primary school if Gottfredson indicates people below 75 IQ cannot master elementary school education unless that IQ description only applies to the US population where the study was done, or the IQ measurement in Ivory coast is inaccurate or outdated, or primary school education in the Ivory Coast is incredibly simple relative to that of the US.
Good point, I didn't really consider the cultural aspect properly.
I was going to write just same 10-15 points, but then didn't because didn't see the point in the context. Also, this increase would require better medicine and food etc, not only better education. I didn't read the link beyond abstract, I think they're making typical sociologist's fallacy.
I did. Nigeria certainly has much lower threshold for getting a university degree.
So would IQ decrease from FAS or cerebral palsy (phenotypic) have mostly no effect on whether individual could function well in modern society?
While I more agree with your argument than not, your argument is lacking something important.
Some points to consider: lower IQ than population average is often associated with personality deficits and mental disease, which average member of low IQ population does not have. There might a component to IQ results ("familiarity with IQ testing culture") which has very little effect on mundane tasks.
probably much simplier
This is such an odd point to argue. Consider 2nd generation Nigerian-Americans: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/23780231211001971
Is it so hard to believe a self-selected group that is allowed to immigrate to the United States could just so happen to be more educated than the average US population? They're not going to Nigeria to get their education. They're getting their education in American Universities just like any other 2nd generation American migrant group.
This is the exception. Not everyone in Ivory Coast or other sub-saharan African country has FAS or cerebral palsy or other non-nutrition defective diseases driving the IQ down.
This personality IQ correlation is done in the US and thus it cannot be appropriately extrapolated to Africa. Unless you know any specific studies/research to suggest otherwise, I don't know any.
On the Flynn Effect:
So, there is a wide range of literature to support the idea the increase in IQ is not because Western nations somehow genetically got more intelligent, but instead that improvements in education, nutrition, and health resulted in the increase of IQ. Once these educational and health-related factors allow populations to reach their maximum potential, we see that IQ is no longer rising (Norway and Denmark for example). Most African nations have not yet caught up in terms of education, nutrition, and health.
Okay, now let's look at what Flynn used for his IQ estimates of Sub-Saharan Africa. Look at the dates of when the IQ studies he uses in his meta-analysis. 1998, 1988, 1965, 1960, 1993, 1995, 1981, 1937, 1964, 1975, 1965, 1954, 2004, 1950, 2007, 1961, 1994, 1976... you get my point. Most of these studies are looking at IQ over a period when African countries has yet to see the benefit of improvements in education, nutrition, and health to the degree that Western and Asian countries have.
Flynn rejects several studies of IQ in trying to estimate the IQ of African countries for various reasons. One study he rejected because it was tested on high school-educated Africans, because the average African did not study in high school at the time the study was conducted. If your goal is to find the median IQ of the country that's fine but then you have to be very nuanced about how you interpret that IQ, because you're comparing a country where the average citizen graduated from high school to one where the average citizen doesn't even have the opportunity to go to high school. When it comes to IQ people assume that IQ is static and doesn't change and then racists use IQ to justify their stances. I'm not so naive as to argue that IQ would be equivalent if all races got equal amounts of education and nutrition and are raised in an equivalent culture, but I am arguing that IQ gap would be not as large.
I don't know how you can reject the notion that education has an impact on IQ. I'm just going to quote Scott here
Any argument or data point I bring up that might suggest the IQ of Africans could be higher you seem to challenge. What's your angle here? What's your belief? I'm honestly confused about what your intention is. What are you looking to get out of this conversation? Do you believe if we take the average baby from the Ivory Coast and raise them in the US they're going to fail elementary school?
No it's not.
They get education in USA universities, meaning they enjoy massive (de facto) SAT bonus in enrollment, mainly intended for AADOS. While education is a proxy for IQ, it is a poor proxy in case when comparing between universities/degrees having different standards or affirmative action.
I agree that African countries IQ might went up by 10-15 points if they get higher standards of living.
I am not sure whether education increases IQ scores or hidden things that we want to measure when we do IQ tests.
I'm just discussing what sprung from claim '70 iq not employable'. And what's your angle?
Did I say something which made think you so? If most US Blacks finish elementary school, why wouldn't I think average Ivorian immigrant wouldn't?
Then why do you respond with "Nigeria certainly has much lower threshold for getting a university degree"? I don't see what education in Nigeria has to do with the education of Nigerian Americans in the US.
Yes, because when presented with 3 possible explanations for how children from Ivory Coast are now graduating elementary school with data from 2012 in conjunction with Gottfredson's description of those with 75 IQ you chose "probably much simpler" as the most likely option. Meanwhile, your opinion on IQ for people in Ivory Coast is likely based on Flynn's paper which I point out has some issues to take into consideration.
The reason the 70 IQ person from USA is going to fail at work is because they are actually incapable of mastering elementary school-level concepts, and most jobs in the US today require some level of intelligence. If you acknowledge that a baby from the Ivory Coast growing up in the US would be able to pass elementary school, it goes to reason that how you should interpret that 70 IQ average value from the Ivory Coast is not equivalent to 70 IQ person in the US. Maybe it makes sense in your world where you deny the effect education has on IQ, but I have reasons to believe education does have an impact on IQ, and your casual dismissal of "you're not sure" or you think it is a "sociologist's fallacy" does little to convince me otherwise.
This seems to be where our disagreement largely stems from and if we can't agree on this then our conclusions will just have to be different.
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