IQ Tests, Human Intelligence and Group Differences - Critical remarks on the Lex Fridman Podcast episode with Richard J. Haier
As I listened to Lex Fridman’s podcasts episode “IQ Tests, Human Intelligence and Group Differences” with guest psychologist Richard J. Haier I felt I need to write this post, because I think many things were left out of the discussion which are important. I would like first to write about three points which are not discussed or neglected in the discussion. I will refer back to these during the post.
The Pioneer Fund: the Pioneer Fund is never mentioned in the discussion, and this was probably intentional, because it would have presented many people who were referenced in a different light. The Pioneer Fund is a non-profit organization founded in 1937 by Wickliffe Draper. From the start the Pioneer Fund supported race science and eugenics, still it is considered as racist and white supremacist. About the dark history of the origins of intelligence testing in the USA and the Pioneer Fund I recommend Robert Sussman’s book The Myth of Race.
IQ is a relative measure of intelligence: I would like to note that IQ is relative measure of intelligence and not an absolute measure. When an IQ test is normed for a given country for example then they take a sample of the population which is representative of the given country and ask them to fill out the test. Then the results are statistically adjusted and normed to fit a bell curve (normal distribution) with a mean of 100 and a standard deviation of 15. So as I see it, it makes no sense for example to ask do Germans have higher or lower IQ on average than Koreans, since the tests are normed for each country so the results are going to be the same: 100 mean with a standard deviation of 15.
The Flynn effect: Although they discuss the Flynn effect in the podcast I think they neglected its importance. James Flynn found that the average IQ score is increasing by roughly 3 points per decade, but this increase is lost, since from time to time IQ test developers renorm the tests so it’s mean would be 100 and standard deviation 15. This increase in not in the lifetime of a single individual but people as a whole. So just as an example let’s say that in 2010 we measure the IQs of all 20 year-olds in a country. Then in 2020 we measure the IQs of those people who are 20 years old in 2020 with the same test. What we would see is that those who are 20 years old in 2020 on average have a higher IQ by 3 point than those who were 20 years old in 2010. The Flynn effect is generally accepted and empirically verified, but it is still unknown what causes it.
I must admit I was unhappy with Lex Fridman as a host. He emphasized many times how “controversial” these topics are, yet he never took on a critical attitude, he mostly just accepted his guests claims, and made it seem like the topic is only controversial because it is hard to accept, and not because there might be disagreeing voices, which might have a point.
About Richard J. Haier I would like to say that I read his chapter in the Cambridge Handbook of Intelligence, and I think based on that that his professional work is legitimate. His main interest is using brain imaging technics to determine what kind of structural and functional differences people have in their brain who score high or low on IQ tests. To me this seems a reasonable research project, but what I am mainly against is Haier’s reductionist tendency to see everything in the light of IQ scores. During the discussion it seems to me Haier tends to reduce complex social issues to the difference of people’s IQ scores which is a harmful oversimplification, I will discuss in what follow where I see this tendency to manifest.
Now I would like to present my remarks according to the sections of the podcast. I am not going to have remarks on all sections only where I have an issue.
Just a small remark, Haier says that about the Scottish Mental Survey of 1932 that the mortality rate was found to be higher in low scorers, although everyone had access to healthcare, since Scotland has universal healthcare. It is clearly true that universal healthcare will increase the average life expectancy of people in a country but obviously this is not the only factor. Some might have worse health simply genetically or because they are poorer and have a worse diets or are exposed to an environment which has a negative effect on their health. I think it would be also plausible to claim that actually good health causes higher IQ and not the other way around, but I am not an expert on this issue, so this is just my personal impression.
I am puzzled by Firdman’s remarks such as “reducing yourself to numbers, but it’s still true”. This just does not follow from the discussion, and at this part they were actually discussing that since other factors such as being nervous to take the test can affect the score college admission is not based just on the score itself. No one was talking about reducing anyone to numbers.
Haier says that it is sometimes said “life is one long intelligence test”. Of course he partly meant this as a joke but this is the reductionist tendency I am talking about. If someone has rich parents who help him or her all through his or her life is life really a test of intelligence for this person? But I don’t want to put too much weight on this remarks because as I said he said it half-jokingly.
Haier says that the US Army only admits applicants above an IQ of 83. They could have discussed the Flynn effect here already, since due to that effect setting a static limit on IQ is not necessarily meaningful. The Flynn effect means that in every 10 years there is an increase in IQ by 3 points. So if the army did not update the tests they were using more and more people would qualify. The question to my mind is do jobs have an absolute criteria for qualification? For example if the tasks one needs to perform on a job would not really change, then if you set up a standard for qualifying that specific job you would never need to update it. One could argue that the update of the IQ tests is needed because for example jobs are getting more and more complex. Maybe so, but we did not get an explanation why the army uses a static value for cut-off.
Haier says that if we could “shift” the bell curve with just a few points that would really be something. Again I don’t understand why the Flynn effect is not discussed since the Flynn effect just IS a shift of the bell curves with 3 points/decade. Also maybe Haier only wanted to express himself simply but he should have known that due to renorming of the tests you cannot shift the bell curve, renorming cancels out that effect.
Haier’s claims are puzzling here; he says that after Jensen nobody was willing to do any research on intelligence. That is simply not true; a lot of research was done after Jensen. This whole section presents the authors of the Bell Curve as some kind of heroes who dare to go where others won’t and this presentation is misleading.
I would like to note about Haier that he is one of the signers of a public statement appearing in the Wall Steer Journal titled “Mainstream Science on Intelligence”. This statement defends the Bell Curve against criticism and what is interesting about it is that 131 researchers were asked to sign and from these only 52 signed the statement, and from the 52 who did sing 20 were recipients of research grants from the Pioneer Fund. As I know Haier is not a recipient but he is not in good company here.
It is also worth noting that the infamous chapter in the Bell Curve for which it is mainly criticised references works extensively which were conducted by people who were involved with the Pioneer Fund, such as Richard Lynn. Shaun made a very detailed video criticising the Bell Curve where he goes after these cited works, which you can see here.
I also find Haier’s logic puzzling where he says that if intelligence is genetic then it is biological so it is fixable. I naively would have thought that if it’s mainly environmental then it would be easier to change people’s environment.
Haier himself mentions some environmental effects which should be changed such as led from gasoline, from the atmosphere, led in paint, led in water etc. If we know that there are harmful environmental effects which cause low IQ why isn’t the main message that people should be living in a more healthy environment?
In this section Haier talks about Arthur Jensen. To him it seems Jensen is the ideal scientist who does not compromise scientific rigour. I would just like to note that what he omits is that Jensen is one of the recipients of a grant from the above mentioned Pioneer Fund.
Haier quotes Jensen when he was asked by a reporter if he was racist. According to Haier, Jensen reply was: “I thought about that a lot and concluded it doesn’t matter”. Lex Fridman’s reaction to this is that this takes “guts”. So insinuating that one might be racist is somehow brave now? I was appalled by this. I find it very alarming that human equality nowadays is seen as a “dogma” against which it is brave to rebel, and point out aspects in which people are not equal. Human equality is a moral concept; nobody ever believed that everybody has the same capabilities. What equality means is that everyone should be treated with respect and given the same chances in life.
Fridman explains Jensen’s remark by saying “the scientific method cannot be racist from his perspective” and if I understood Fridman he agrees with this. I would like to bring in a philosophical point here that we always talk about “the scientific method” as if this would be clear as day to everyone, but it’s not. Nobody ever really succeeded in explicating what this method should exactly be, and the remark is just plain rhetorical: I am following the scientific method so I cannot be racist. How does one know if he or she is really following the scientific method not just thinking that he or she does? Finally I would like to say that what we see here is a very naïve understanding on how science works. Wilfrid Sellars was right in saying the “science is a self-correcting enterprise”, but he could have added it only does its job correctly if it is free from interference. In our day there are many organizations trying to influence science: tobacco companies wanted to convince you that smoking is not harmful, oil companies would like to convince you that climate change is not real or is not a result of human activity. They do this by supporting research which fits their agenda. For intelligence research this interfering influence comes from the Pioneer Fund.
Haier thinks that it is a great social problem that 16% of the population has an IQ below 85, because he claims it is really hard to find a job with this score. Jordan Peterson has made similar comments as well. Haier is probably right that it is a disadvantage to have low IQ but I think presenting this as a social problem is misleading and harmful. It seems to say that 16 % of the US population is almost unemployable and are a burden on the rest of society. Since we are talking about social problems let’s see this from a sociological/economical aspect. Currently the unemployment rate of the USA is 4.2 percent (see here). This doesn’t add up, if people with an IQ below 85 were not employable than the unemployment rate should be around 16 % even when the economy is thriving. It seems the unemployment rate has more to do with the state of the economy than the IQ of the population.
Poverty is a real social problem. According to this article in 2022 the poverty rate in the US was 11.5 %, so less than 16 % which is the percentage of people with IQ below 85. Also do we really believe that low IQ is the main reason these people are living in poverty? People can find themselves in poverty for countless reasons, and I highly doubt that for most people IQ would be the explanation. Also there are countries with much lower or much higher poverty rates than 16%, but since IQ tests are designed to be this way the percentage of people with IQ below 85 is going to be 16% everywhere (this is just part of the process of norming an IQ test). So it seems the way society is organized has much more to do with how many people are in poverty than their IQ.
Now let me take one step back: I know Haier did not make these specific claims about unemployment and poverty, but what I am trying to say is that these social problems can be addressed on a social level and this seems to me to be much more helpful than the reductionist claim that low IQ is a social problem.
At this section they talk about Stepehen J. Gould’s book “The Mismeasure of Man”. I did not read that book and I admit I did not read “The Bell Curve” either. My problem here is that Haier dismisses Gould’s book as “overtly political”. I think this is a double standard: as I said I did not read the Bell Curve only looked into it, but it is clear that the Bell Curve if anything is also an “overtly political” book, it proposes policy based on its supposed findings. Quite frankly I don’t mind if authors express their political views, but again if Gould is overly political so are Herrnstein and Murray.
Haier also talks about Murray’s other book “Human Diversity”. Now I am just puzzled why he is such a supporter of Murray’s work. He says in Human Diversity Murray argues for the reality of races for example. My view on this topic was shaped by reading “Race? Debunking a Scientific Myth” by Ian Tattersall and Rob DeSalle. In this book Tattersall and DeSalle argue that “race” is not a well-defined biological term, since it is just not possible when we go down to the level of genes to find gene patters which could be used to group people into races. So when people say “Races don’t exist.” they are not saying that there aren’t any people with dark skin, or brown skin etc. The point is that there is no clear genetic marker or markers which differentiate these “races”. If this seems counter intuitive, this is not an argument against it: science is sometimes counterintuitive. Now Ian Tattersall is a paleo-anthropologist, who specializes in human evolution. I think the questions of human races are a question for the science of genetics, so I tend to believe someone like Tattersall over Murray who is a political scientist.
Intelligence and life success
Haier here notes that higher IQ usually translates to higher pay. This might be true but the question is: is this inequality in income just? My worry here is that this argument could be used to justify sometimes extreme levels of inequalities. Haier does not explicitly make this argument, but later in the section “nature vs nurture” he will have a remark which I think hints at this.
Just read the title of this article: “CEO pay has skyrocketed 1,460% since 1978, CEOs were paid 399 times as much as a typical worker in 2021”. Or look at how much the top 1% of the United States population gained since roughly the 80’s compared to the other 99% here. Some people argue that this is just how free market economy works, but do we really believe that CEOs now are so much more productive than CEOs in the 60’s? In some cases I agree a more intelligent person might get a job with higher pay than a less intelligent person, and I would even say this might be for the benefit of all. We would all agree I think that more intelligent people should become physicians and we would give them higher pay to motivate them to choose this career. But not all inequalities are just and extreme inequality is not some kind of “natural” outcome of the free market which can be explained with high IQ.
Haier says that it is a mistake to believe that “If you work hard you can be anything you want to be.” He is right about this, but I think a more interesting perspective is given by Michael J. Sandel in his book “The Tyranny of Merits”. There he writes that the Democratic Party has given up on representing the working class and instead embraced what he calls “the rhetoric of rising”. This says that if you work hard you can get a college degree which will enable you to get a decent salary. But obviously it’s not realistic to think that everyone can get a degree and why would we even want a world where your only chance for a decent life is if you get one? Haier is only half right: yes, some people are not cut out to get a degree. But he is wrong in assuming that the solution is to somehow increase people’s IQ. What we should strive for is to ensure that workers even without a college degree would get a salary high enough to support their family without any problem. Somehow it seems to him more feasible to change biology than to change our society.
At this point they discuss the Flynn effect, but I am unhappy about the discussion since it seems to me they don’t bring out its relevance and importance to the topics which were discussed earlier. Haier says the cause of the Flynn effect is still a mystery but it seems evidence is coming together that it is caused by advances in nutrition and healthcare. At this point I my puzzlement with the discussion is at its high point. If this is the explanation of the Flynn effect and the Flynn effect is a shift of the bell curve which Haier would like so much to achieve why isn’t the moral of the podcast: provide better nutrition, healthier environment and better healthcare for all?
For this last section I have two closing points. Haier is convinced that compensatory education failed since the IQs of the participating children did not increase. My question to his is, is increase in IQ the only measure of compensatory education? Couldn’t it be that this type of education is worthwhile for other reasons? I think it is a very impoverished view on education that its only aim is IQ increase or scholarly achievements. This article for example argues for other beneficial effects of Head Start programs.
Haier says that the SAT scores were dropped because it was observed that results correlated with social and economic status, so rich parents tended to have children who scored higher. I must admit I am very annoyed when Haier rhetorically asks at this point “why are the parents rich?” clearly hinting that they are rich because they have probably higher IQs which was inherited by their children. At this point I wanted to ask professor Haier: “Ok, but then why not just base college entrance on the paychecks of the applicant parents?” No test required, the higher salary a parent has the higher score we give to the child. Does anybody seriously believe that people have higher salaries because it’s in their genes? To me this seems an awkward attempt to justify inequality. Many believe that the current rise in inequality is because the salary difference between skilled and unskilled workers increased. In their book “Winner-Take-All Politics” Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson argue that this cannot be the reason since although there is a difference between the salaries of skilled and unskilled workers in Europe as well it is far from the inequalities in the US. They propose that the increase in inequality is due to political decisions, which benefited the wealthy disproportionately. What I want to say with this is that being in a high economics status is not just the doing of the individual; it is strongly dependent on the political and social climate, so to me it seems much more plausible that if the SAT scores reflect social and economic status of the parents than the SAT is not a good measure of potential. Or even if it is it is still not just, which might seem an irrelevant argument but let me refer to Michael J. Sandel again at this point, this time his book “Justice”. In that book he tells us that it is up to us to decide what the purpose of our institutions should be. We must ask for example, what the purpose of our universities is. Is it only to promote scholarly excellence? Or maybe universities can serve other social functions as well, like providing a chance for disadvantaged groups who did not get a change at education earlier. I think Sandel has a point, obviously talent should be supported, but we must weigh the needs of society as well.