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Over 50% of Esperanto speakers are above average intelligence

af Alkanadi, 22. feb. 2015

Meddelelser: 27

Sprog: English

Alkanadi (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 08.26.48

This is a true fact. Did you know that out of all the Esperanto speakers, slightly more than 50% have above average intelligence. Speaking two languages really does make you smarter.

fcovitor (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 10.38.25

Do studies state that?

sudanglo (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 10.53.50

You will have to set the bar a little higher than that Alkanadi.

By definition at least 50% of the population of the UK have a higher than average intelligence.

evanamd (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 13.12.12

One of the reasons someone can throw around stats like this is that "average" in colloquial use refers to all of mode(Most repeated value), mean(Sum of all values divided by the count of values), and median(Value that splits the set in half). Thus, when people start using "average", they end up switching between definitions and conflating them.

The strongest example is George Carlin's "Think about how stupid the average person is, and then realize that half of them are stupider than that."

Since you or I can't measure the "stupidity" of everyone and the first part refers to an arbitrary but representative "stupid person", it must refer to the mode. The second half is talking about a value of stupidity, not attached to any person, which causes the whole thing to break down.

Scratch (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 13.50.50

sudanglo:You will have to set the bar a little higher than that Alkanadi.

By definition at least 50% of the population of the UK have a higher than average intelligence.
Not quite, it depends on how the IQ values are distributed. It could be there are more people with below average intelligence, or there could be more with above average intelligence.

But then, of course, there's a whole mess of problems in trying to box up the various types of intelligences into one tidy number like IQ tests attempt to do.

AxelMajere (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 14.19.50

Fact: Most humans have an above average number of legs.

Alkanadi (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 14.29.08

sudanglo:By definition at least 50% of the population of the UK have a higher than average intelligence.
Bingo. Very smart. I was just testing people's math skills. By definition, half must be below and half must be above, unless the percentage is a comparison to another demographic.

I bet that you could go on the street and tell people that 45% of people in their state are above the national average. Say it with a smile and in a positive tone and people will eat it up as a compliment.

By the way, we are all easily fooled (including me). It is easy to trick people because our brains don't have the processing power to analyse everything. As a result, our brains take short cuts. When we hear "above average", we assume it is a good thing.

Alkanadi (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 14.31.51

AxelMajere:Fact: Most humans have an above average number of legs.
So true. I had to think about this one for a few seconds. The average is less than 2 (unfortunately), and most people have more legs than that.

I guess this is a lesson in gratefulness. We are above average in so many categories.

Scratch (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 15.24.35

Alkanadi:
sudanglo:By definition at least 50% of the population of the UK have a higher than average intelligence.
Bingo. Very smart. I was just testing people's math skills. By definition, half must be below and half must be above, unless the percentage is a comparison to another demographic.
That's not correct. It all depends on the distribution. Let's say for example we have 5 people with IQ values of 3, 4, 5, 5, 6, 10. Their average IQ would be 33/6 or 5.5. Only 2 of the 5 has above-average intelligence. Everyone else is below average.

I would be willing to guess that if there were some tidy number which could represent intelligence, then we would probably see that somewhere above 50% of individuals in the human population are below average intelligence. I could be wrong about that, but that's based upon my guess of what the bell curve would probably look like. But like I said that's just a guess and I can see problems with my instincts and assumptions with how intelligence might be distributed.

nornen (Vise profilen) 22. feb. 2015 15.45.37

Scratch:Their average IQ would be 33/6 or 5.5.
Wrong again. The median IQ of a given set is by definition 100. Its standard deviation is 15. By definition. It is "standardized" and "normalized".

What you are saying is like: "Let's say we have a set of 5 red balls, out of which 3 are blue." Contradiction in terms.

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