The limits of human achievement

[JonnyBGood]

So today on my daily excursion across the vast internet wildnerness of random news articles I encountered this. Obviously this is not scientific fact, for the simple reason that it was written to challenge another paper and so there's clearly a debate in this area. However it does raise some important questions about biological limits. While obviously I don't give two shits if man can't run the 100m in under nine seconds because it's rather unlikely for that particular skill to come in useful, unless the dinosaurs return to ravage the earth and all our technology fails simultaneously that is.

What I'm concerned about is whether or not there are limits on intelligence. I imagine if there are we are fairly far away from them but even so I find it a cause for concern. That said I'm running into obvious difficulties because I'm not quite sure what I mean when I say "intelligence". I usually define it as some sort of creative/adaptable/lateral thinking ability. That said I definitely find that the more examples (that'd be knowledge) of similar circumstances I have the better my lateral thinking ability. Maybe that means it's changing from lateral thinking into something else though, not that I personally see much wrong with that. So what I'd like to see is lots of drugs and genetic manipulation in advance of birth and cool cyborg implants in our bodies so we can all be walking encyclopaedias.

Rather marvellous wouldn't it be? Human intelligence surpasses the limits of human intelligence. Jolly good stuff.

[Alessio]

I do believe theirs a limit to our intelligence*.
But the cool thing about humans is that they can pass on information to eachother (teaching).
Meaning that the next generation can continue thinking about stuff from the point where the others ended with.

So the actuall limit to our intelligence can be 'cheated' for quite a while.






* We both may have some other definition for intelligence tho

[Ste]

s|k thread...?

[Marilyn Manson]

You can't make cheese with a wine press.

[Yahwe]

have you been accepting sweets from deepflow again jonny?

[JC]

They are arguing against 2 papers in Nature, which must have had some pretty good results to get published there. There is no mention of any real reason they have to conclude this other than that records dont seem to be being broken at the same rate anymore compared to a time when drug use wasnt so tighly controlled.

[Deepflow]

On a side note, im all for using drugs to push humans further. Whether they be steroids affecting the body or some kind of drug for making people smarter/think differently. It certainly seems to be an avenue worth exploring.

[dda]

This brings up the question, are there areas where memebers of GD are reaching the limits of human abilities?

Has Dante reached the outer limits of the human ability to rant?

Has Nodrog achieved the maximum level of gingerness?

What about Yahwe"s sarcasam?

Will it be possible for someone to go beyond s|k's ability to devise the near-psychotic thread without succumbing to a complete break with reality?

Has JBJ perfected the drunken Irishman to the edge of human (or even Irish) ability to do so?

What other heights have GD members reached?

[s|k]

There is no such thing as intelligence, it's a culturally loaded concept.

[s|k]

Some other suprises learned from a cross cultural comparison of western ideas:

1. Gender and Sex are separate things.

3. People do not fall into one of two different, separate categories of gender in western culture, instead it is a connected continuum with masculine on one end and feminine on the other and everyone is somewhere in that continuum.

56. People do not fall into one of two different, separate categories of sex, instead it is a connected continuum with male on one end and female on the other and everyone is somewhere in that continuum.

39. Race is a social phenomenon, not a biological one. (although of cours
e there are shared physiological traits, but they do not a race create ).

482. Creole's such as Hawaiian pidgin, African American Ebonics, and other 'deviant' forms are as far as linguists are concerned complete and syntactically complete languages.

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Rather marvellous wouldn't it be? Human intelligence surpasses the limits of human intelligence. Jolly good stuff.

As has been said by others before, a five year old kid with a calculator is probably quicker at working out sums than the greatest mind of the middle ages working unaided. And a mediocre college student can probably work things out faster using the Arabic numbering system than the greatest Roman thinker (using Roman numerals).

Obvious those are speed issues, but you can see it would apply more generally.

Although genetic manipulation and "cyborg" implants are probably inevitable they are by no means necessary to extend the "limits" of human intelligence (if such a term makes sense).

[s|k]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

Although genetic manipulation and "cyborg" implants are probably inevitable they are by no means necessary to extend the "limits" of human intelligence (if such a term makes sense).

I would hesitate to call anything with genetic manipulation or synthetic implants as "human."

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by s|k

I would hesitate to call anything with genetic manipulation or synthetic implants as "human."

I don't really like the idea of either, but where is the line drawn? Is someone with a hearing aid non human? What about a hearing aid which is surgeically inserted inside the head? What about a pacemaker? Etc...

[Yahwe]

Originally Posted by s|k

I would hesitate to call anything with genetic manipulation or synthetic implants as "human."

racist.

[s|k]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

I don't really like the idea of either, but where is the line drawn? Is someone with a hearing aid non human? What about a hearing aid which is surgeically inserted inside the head? What about a pacemaker? Etc...

I'll not call it human whenever I have to compete with it and it's "enhancements" for a job.

[s|k]

Seriously though, if the extra stuff was engineered in such a way to drastically alter the attributes of a human to perform with superhuman efficiency or ability, then I would say not human. It's not a clear line, and I'm sure we'll have to do things like in South African apartheid where a pencil was put in a dark-skinned person's hair and if it fell out then they would be considered 'half black and half white' and if it didn't then they would be classified as 'black.' We humans have a long history of creating lines between different types of people, we'll manage I'm sure.

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by Alessio

* We both may have some other definition for intelligence tho

Please explain yours.

Originally Posted by s|k

There is no such thing as intelligence, it's a culturally loaded concept.

I just explained what I was defining as intelligence. You can call it quanza-quanza-quonzo if it makes you feel better though.

Also I culturally loaded your mother last night (cos yoghurt looks like cum lol geddit?)

Originally Posted by s|k

Seriously though, if the extra stuff was engineered in such a way to drastically alter the attributes of a human to perform with superhuman efficiency or ability, then I would say not human. It's not a clear line, and I'm sure we'll have to do things like in South African apartheid where a pencil was put in a dark-skinned person's hair and if it fell out then they would be considered 'half black and half white' and if it didn't then they would be classified as 'black.' We humans have a long history of creating lines between different types of people, we'll manage I'm sure.

I'm not particularly pro-human. I'm more pro-intelligent life. I'm insanely cosmpolitan in that way.

[s|k]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Please explain yours.


I just explained what I was defining as intelligence. You can call it quanza-quanza-quonzo if it makes you feel better though.

Also I culturally loaded your mother last night (cos yoghurt looks like cum lol geddit?)

I'm not particularly pro-human. I'm more pro-intelligent life. I'm insanely cosmpolitan in that way.

You didn't define shit paddy, you losely slapped us with some vague combination of words that are just about meaningless out of context.

[Dead_Meat]

Originally Posted by s|k

You didn't define shit paddy, you losely slapped us with some vague combination of words that are just about meaningless out of context.

YOU LOOSE

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by s|k

You didn't define shit paddy, you losely slapped us with some vague combination of words that are just about meaningless out of context.

Presented with the same amount of data the first person to come up with a solution is more intelligent. Sum for all problems and rate by objective value and insert into the function for the win. There you go.


Edit: Actually presuming you don't "accept" the word intelligence (by the way I don't accept the word "eyesight") what is your opinion on the phrase "intelligent life"?

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Sum for all problems and rate by objective value and insert into the function for the win.

All problems? What if the first five hundred million in the list of all problems are stuff involving opening particularly troublesome pickle jars? Surely for ages it's going to make the weedy but clever people look shit?

Also; I don't see why speed should necessarily be valued so highly anyway.

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

All problems? What if the first five hundred million in the list of all problems are stuff involving opening particularly troublesome pickle jars? Surely for ages it's going to make the weedy but clever people look shit?

Also; I don't see why speed should necessarily be valued so highly anyway.

I didn't say I was going to do it. That's why I just vaguely defined it. Anyways words representing non-material objects (or even material ones if you look at things from a certain perspective) can't be defined (in something other than words), they just recognise concepts we have in common. Speed's pretty much the only thing once you presume that the correct solution is a necessity. After all it's only another 10^11 million years until the end of the universe!

[All Systems Go]

Originally Posted by horn

do you just apply this knowledge tooknew dillemas or does it make you geuninely more intelligent so that when faced with a completely alien problem you are more likely too overcome it, simply because you are now "more intelligent", by which i mean more than just an ever increasing encyclopaedia that applys old ..... blah blah, i can't seem too word this :/

. All i remember is one man being interviewed (a scientist/psychologist/academic of some sort) and him saying something about once brain mass increases too a certain point (the current size we have now incidentally) intelligence increases are small/next to nothing. However i remember being thoroughly unconvinced by this. I don't think he mentioned how he came too this conclusion or what his evidence was.

Well i say no value, that isn;t quite right. I mean i don't hold humanity too be an absaloute.
Why is natural selection any more a valid path too follow than eugenics ?

Firsty, I would like to apolgise for being so picky but this is now starting to do my head in.

In that entire post you only managed to use the word 'to' once. Nowhere in that post should 'too' be used anywhere.

'too' is genreally used at the end of sentences or follwed by a comma. In a thesaurus it would be another word for 'as well'.

Sorry, but it's really doing my head in.

[s|k]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Presented with the same amount of data the first person to come up with a solution is more intelligent. Sum for all problems and rate by objective value and insert into the function for the win. There you go.

Objectivity is as elusive as intelligence. People aren't raised in a sterile lab. There are a myriad of factors influencing everything people do. Let me shatter some of your assumptions:

Identities aren't static.
A person this minute is not the same the next minute. People can, and do, have conflicting identities and make choices differently throughout the day, and I wont get into how much people change throughout their lives. There are physicists, astronomers, and evolutionary biologist who hold onto their religious beliefs. There are people who have moral issues with pornography but when the lust hits them have no problem with spending money on anal intrusive DVD's of busty babes. People will make different choices and think differently based on the food they ate that day, the amount of sleep they had, the temperature in the room, what people are in their presence (an angry father, a bossy manager, a close set of friends, an audience of 40,000 fans?), I can go on all day. Some people are cocky during the day and scared at night. Then there's the whole, what are the billions of cells in your body doing today? You cannot put people in a lab and subject them to controlled experiments, this is not physics.

Individual cognition isn't shared.
People do not perceive things the same. This true from one person to another of the same culture, as it is from people of one culture to those of another culture. The motive forces that actuate our will and our thought have different sources of inspiration. Our understanding of the world around us is imprinted onto us by the unique timestamp of our individual development experience. JammyJim looks at a parking lot and sees a 1997 Toyota Forrestor with an extended cab, an all wheel drive Outback Subaru, a 2000 Mustang LX, and various other imports and domestic vehicles and madi will see a bunch of cars. Yahwe will look at a wine cellar and be able to tell the difference between wine bottled from new French oak barrels and refer to the Sauvignon Blanc as Fume Blanc while MM fancies how goth it is to be surrounded by all the spiderwebs in the dank cellar.

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Edit: Actually presuming you don't "accept" the word intelligence (by the way I don't accept the word "eyesight") what is your opinion on the phrase "intelligent life"?

My opinion is that I prefer the term 'culturally capable life' over 'intelligent life.'

[dda]

Count me in for there and their.

[dda]

Originally Posted by s|k

My opinion is that I prefer the term 'culturally capable life' over 'intelligent life.'

I prefer the term non-Flavian over either of the above.

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by s|k

Objectivity is as elusive as intelligence. People aren't raised in a sterile lab. There are a myriad of factors influencing everything people do. Let me shatter some of your assumptions:

Identities aren't static.
A person this minute is not the same the next minute. People can, and do, have conflicting identities and make choices differently throughout the day, and I wont get into how much people change throughout their lives. There are physicists, astronomers, and evolutionary biologist who hold onto their religious beliefs. There are people who have moral issues with pornography but when the lust hits them have no problem with spending money on anal intrusive DVD's of busty babes. People will make different choices and think differently based on the food they ate that day, the amount of sleep they had, the temperature in the room, what people are in their presence (an angry father, a bossy manager, a close set of friends, an audience of 40,000 fans?), I can go on all day. Some people are cocky during the day and scared at night. Then there's the whole, what are the billions of cells in your body doing today? You cannot put people in a lab and subject them to controlled experiments, this is not physics.

Individual cognition isn't shared.
People do not perceive things the same. This true from one person to another of the same culture, as it is from people of one culture to those of another culture. The motive forces that actuate our will and our thought have different sources of inspiration. Our understanding of the world around us is imprinted onto us by the unique timestamp of our individual development experience. JammyJim looks at a parking lot and sees a 1997 Toyota Forrestor with an extended cab, an all wheel drive Outback Subaru, a 2000 Mustang LX, and various other imports and domestic vehicles and madi will see a bunch of cars. Yahwe will look at a wine cellar and be able to tell the difference between wine bottled from new French oak barrels and refer to the Sauvignon Blanc as Fume Blanc while MM fancies how goth it is to be surrounded by all the spiderwebs in the dank cellar.

Objectively?

Originally Posted by s|k

My opinion is that I prefer the term 'culturally capable life' over 'intelligent life.'

Can you elaborate on culturally capable please?

PS The fact that people have different opinions and identity changes does not mean objectivity is nonsensical. We just have a better series of theories approximating to reality. Reality is objective, our theories just approach it and get pretty damn close in some cases. It's empiricism and fallibilism and great.

[s|k]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Objectively?

What?

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Can you elaborate on culturally capable please?

Organisms capable of culture. Capable of learned behavior, which includes belief systems and languages, social relationships, institutions and organizations, and use of material goods - food, clothing, buildings, tools, and machines.

A tree full of chipmunks are less capable of these things than a pack of Bonobo Chimpanzees.

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

PS The fact that people have different opinions and identity changes does not mean objectivity is nonsensical. We just have a better series of theories approximating to reality. Reality is objective, our theories just approach it and get pretty damn close in some cases. It's empiricism and fallibilism and great.

Objectivity is nonsensical. Everything is perceived by a human, there is no observation without an observer and there is no observer without subjectivity. A camera does not observe, it's a machine that records data. Your idea of 'objectivity' would make absolute zero sense if you tried to explain it to an Australian Aborigine, an Andean llama herder, a !kung san, etc. It's a western concept. What do you know about dreamtime? I bet you think it's a bunch of animism malarkey. Aborigines don't.

[pyirt]

Originally Posted by horn

i just don't know the difference between too and to.
i can sympathize as it gets on my nerves when people misuse "your", and "you're".
Just remember i'm not doing it to piss you of

It`s my understanding, in English over here in the UK, that "to" refers "to something"; whereas "too" something refers to something too much, as in "Too much beer."; and "Too much generally" etc. I could be wrong.

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by s|k

Organisms capable of culture. Capable of learned behavior, which includes belief systems and languages, social relationships, institutions and organizations, and use of material goods - food, clothing, buildings, tools, and machines.

Thank you.

Would you consider that to be an objective definition?

Objectivity is nonsensical. Everything is perceived by a human, there is no observation without an observer and there is no observer without subjectivity. A camera does not observe, it's a machine that records data. Your idea of 'objectivity' would make absolute zero sense if you tried to explain it to an Australian Aborigine, an Andean llama herder, a !kung san, etc. It's a western concept. What do you know about dreamtime? I bet you think it's a bunch of animism malarkey. Aborigines don't.

The fact you used the word everything implies there is something objective. Of course we would be unaware of reality if we didn't observe it but that doesn't mean anything. What are we perceiving differently? No doubt my idea of objective reality would be different to an austrlian aborigine, but there would still be an idea of objective reality. It might be that he's a turtle floating on his back in a pond dreaming about being human or a brain in a vat or random disembodied thoughts floating around nowhere in particular but there's always going to be something.

[s|k]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Thank you.

Would you consider that to be an objective definition?

The fact you used the word everything implies there is something objective. Of course we would be unaware of reality if we didn't observe it but that doesn't mean anything. What are we perceiving differently? No doubt my idea of objective reality would be different to an austrlian aborigine, but there would still be an idea of objective reality. It might be that he's a turtle floating on his back in a pond dreaming about being human or a brain in a vat or random disembodied thoughts floating around nowhere in particular but there's always going to be something.

I am a product of my culture. I use the ideas and terms available to me. A lot of what I say is contradictory, and I believe that is part and parcel of being human, as I'm sure you no doubt have experienced in your own day to day living. As we talk about cross cultural phenomena we will stumble over our own language and cultural concepts because we are trying to explain something outside of the things that our language was built around.

[Alessio]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Please explain yours.

The ability to apply the knowledge collected and put it in the right context.
When you try to solve a problem or puzzle you relate objects by putting it in the proper context.

When people have more knowledge they also have more comparison material in their mind.
Which makes it easier to apply it and put it in the right context, which makes people more intelligent.
That would directly relate wisdom with intelligence.

And IF that would be the case intelligence would be limited by memory size and the speed on which people proces information.
And that is likely to have its limits.

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by s|k

I am a product of my culture. I use the ideas and terms available to me. A lot of what I say is contradictory, and I believe that is part and parcel of being human, as I'm sure you no doubt have experienced in your own day to day living. As we talk about cross cultural phenomena we will stumble over our own language and cultural concepts because we are trying to explain something outside of things of what our language was built around.

Are you certain you stumble over your language and cultural concepts when trying to describe cross-cultural phenomena? Are you saying you have difficulty describing something objective?



PS We can invent new languages dude

[Dace]

I really cant be arsed with this kinda discussion but i wanna pick up on this point:

Originally Posted by horn

I remember a few months ago watching a documentary that i can't even remember the subject of. All i remember is one man being interviewed (a scientist/psychologist/academic of some sort) and him saying something about once brain mass increases too a certain point (the current size we have now incidentally) intelligence increases are small/next to nothing. However i remember being thoroughly unconvinced by this. I don't think he mentioned how he came too this conclusion or what his evidence was.

Intelligence increases as brain size to body mass/size increases.

It's not a matter of "how big" a brain you've got (a dinosaur brain was rather large but they were "dumb" creatures in relation to eg a magpie).

The number/level of connections is also an important factor (if i remember correctly ... ie smarter humans have more neuron connections or something ... don't quote me on that one tho).

[Yahwe]

s|k keeps repeating that "objectivity is impossible".

sometimes he says it and uses lots of words to say it, sometimes he uses fewer words to say it.

nevertheless, objectively I can see that there is little value in saying "objectivity is impossible"

[Alessio]

Originally Posted by Yahwe

s|k keeps repeating that "objectivity is impossible".

sometimes he says it and uses lots of words to say it, sometimes he uses fewer words to say it.

nevertheless, objectively I can see that there is little value in saying "objectivity is impossible"

You might want to consider that what we call objective might not be objective to him due to his own interpretation of the English language.

With that in mind, it is possible that he might never understand your post due to his own interpretation of it.
Meaning he will keep saying it forever and ever, regardless of what you say.

(s|k logic)

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Speed's pretty much the only thing once you presume that the correct solution is a necessity.

I don't know if in mathematics / logic you can reduce every problem down to a binary state but in real world problems there are often multiple solutions to a given problem. It would seem strange to say someone who can work things out quicker is "more intelligent" than someone who is slower but develops alternate (possibly more elegant/superior) solutions.

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

I don't know if in mathematics / logic you can reduce every problem down to a binary state but in real world problems there are often multiple solutions to a given problem. It would seem strange to say someone who can work things out quicker is "more intelligent" than someone who is slower but develops alternate (possibly more elegant/superior) solutions.

I honestly meant to say something about multiple correct solutions there. While you would have to approach each scenario individually there is something to be said for the value of the overall solution. Perhaps you could say that the more intelligent person would be able to come up with the solutions quicker. If the superior (I assume this means leads to fewer problems further down the line) solution does not lead to more problems in the meantime while it is being thought up I'd have that one as the "better" solution.

[s|k]

This is one of the reasons I decided not to pursue a graduate degree in anthropology. Few people outside of social science academia ever understands or is willing to believe what it is your saying, they discount it, or dismiss it all together.

[JonnyBGood]

Maybe you should go have a fight with the philosophy department.

[s|k]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Maybe you should go have a fight with the philosophy department.

Interestingly enough there are two anthropology departments at the University of Stanford (and other institutions) because of a similiar disagreement between anthropologists - those who believe you can study humans 'objectively' and those that believe that you can't. It was a big public fight, Marshall Salins, a great anthropologist of modern times, had to go in and help settle the dispute. The result was two different departments. At mine own school there was only really one professor who fell into the postmodernist camp, and as you can see I was greatly influenced by him.

The postmodernist dept:
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/anthroCASA/

The 'science' anthropology department:
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/anthsci/

Here's a history of the debate:

http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/m...es/anthro.html

[Yahwe]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

I don't know if in mathematics / logic you can reduce every problem down to a binary state but in real world problems there are often multiple solutions to a given problem. It would seem strange to say someone who can work things out quicker is "more intelligent" than someone who is slower but develops alternate (possibly more elegant/superior) solutions.

but speed might be indicitive of intelligence where person A and person B both come up with the same selection of solutions to a problem, but person A determines those solutions far faster.

by saying "someone who is slower but develops alternate (possibly more elegant/superior) solution" you're just perverting the comparison.

when you compare identical then speed of determination becomes relevant.

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by Yahwe

when you compare identical then speed of determination becomes relevant.

Of course, but that doesn't actually change anything I've said : some people might be quicker, others might be more imaginative (if we can put it in those terms). Jonny's original question only really looked at speed, which is only really relevent for certain types of problems (imho). If I am faster than Einstein at solving 90% of "all problems" but he can solve another 10% which are beyond me forever, who "wins"?

We can say intelligence is purely related to how quick someone solves problems, but that doesn't capture the richness of the word in everyday usage. Indeed, I have no idea how mentally quick great minds were - I'm sure some were, but that's not exactly something that's particularly relevent when we consider a book written hundreds of years ago or whatever.

[Yahwe]

or we could just say that any definition of inteligence require a series of factors to be looked at and not just one.

then we can have complexity of problem solving ability
and
speed of determination

as combined factors in our understanding of what intelligence is.

[queball]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

It's empiricism and fallibilism and great.

An interesting aspect of the claim is that sport science is charged with giving not just limits on speed, but limits that be be approached. We already knew that it is impossible to run 100m in less than 300 nanoseconds (to an outside observer) but the approachable limit is more like 9.7 seconds.

Assume sport science predicts bounds on physical ability. The analogue for intelligence is then that some form of cognitive sport science would provide bounds on mental ability.

A generalised fallibilistic sport science might consist of claims of the form:
"It is impossible to do X in much less than an hour. X can be realistically achieved in little over an hour."
Memory science might predict that you can't memorise 2000 digits in less than an hour even though people can memorise 2000 digits in a little over an hour.


Creativity is not suitable to scientific claims as far as I can see. For lateral thinking I'm going to go for IQ-test style questions. "Adaptable thinking" is way too vague for me. (Quote from my neighbour: "Why do they call it 'thinking outside the box'? Isn't that just 'thinking'?")

One difference between IQ tests and sport is that intelligence tests are often things that can be solved easily once you have seen the answer. Mensa employ professional test setters who know a bunch of clever tricks, and think you're clever if you know those tricks too. Some of those "Gestalt" experiments in psychology are similar - you need scientists in the know testing the ignorant masses, adversarially.

Perhaps we can design a parameterised family of test - a computer program generates the tests based on random numbers. A combination lock can be opened easily once you've got the code, but opening a combination lock is a delicate process when you don't know the key, even if you've studied the general lock in detail. Similarly, it is hard to solve arbitrary trigonometric problems however experienced you are in geometry. Unfortunately this sounds like it would be so far from any kind of holistic intelligence it's useless.

A better approach might be for your team of scientists to research a new trick, some new way of looking at things, then keep their cancer-curing heuristics secret while testing how long it takes people to rediscover them independently. This doesn't give falsifiable claims unless you could somehow measure how "hard" a problem is and claim some relationship between difficulty and time required.

In a way this kind of phenomenon is at work in day-to-day life: you know things other people don't (like that however hard you try, you just can't leave GD), and use this to judge people as stupid when they disagree.

Summary: intelligence is adversial whereas sport isn't, which presents a problem for any science of intelligence. In effect, the limits might exist but we can't know about them.

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by queball

Summary: intelligence is adversial whereas sport isn't, which presents a problem for any science of intelligence. In effect, the limits might exist but we can't know about them.

As far as I know, no-one is going around claiming to have found some sort of 'general fitness value' in sport which seems to blight studies of intelligence. We accept that the best sprinter may not necessarily be the best hurdler and almost certainly won't be the best sumo wrestler or heavyweight boxer. Yet we still seem to want to find out who is "the smartest" as if some sort of single ranking was possible.

[Yahwe]

I prefer the oxford entry system.

Ignore academic grades.

Always interview.

It can be a hell of an effort to do 2 1 hour interviews of 120 candidates for 8 places but it does seem to work.

[Boogster]

Originally Posted by s|k

What?

Objectivity is nonsensical. Everything is perceived by a human, there is no observation without an observer and there is no observer without subjectivity. A camera does not observe, it's a machine that records data. Your idea of 'objectivity' would make absolute zero sense if you tried to explain it to an Australian Aborigine, an Andean llama herder, a !kung san, etc. It's a western concept. What do you know about dreamtime? I bet you think it's a bunch of animism malarkey. Aborigines don't.

1+1=2

Is that not objective fact? Or is there some weird quantum rule that I'm too stupid to comprehend?

[Knight Theamion]

If there is no limit to constitution you might be able to drink all potions without needing a saving throw vs. paralysation, death or other 'bad things'

Same for dexterity, then you could suck your own cock.

Or even charisma, then you could even make Yahwe humble

[queball]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

As far as I know, no-one is going around claiming to have found some sort of 'general fitness value' in sport which seems to blight studies of intelligence. We accept that the best sprinter may not necessarily be the best hurdler and almost certainly won't be the best sumo wrestler or heavyweight boxer. Yet we still seem to want to find out who is "the smartest" as if some sort of single ranking was possible.

Yeah, intelligence is all-encompassing.

When I was watching Fight Club for the first time and Marla calls Ed Norton "Tyler", my eyebrows raised and my mate who'd seen it before thought I must have worked out what was going on. Actually I wasn't thinking "WOAH WTF" but more like "woah is she blind?".

Hey:
A woman is at her mother's funeral and sees an extremely attractive man but doesn't talk to him. Later that week she kills her sister. Why?