Talk:High IQ society/Archive1

Help Wanted
Want: help with the unreffed societies. On WP they had articles, so I need refs to their respective sites like the ones that aren't linked at WP. See WP:High IQ Society.

Also wanted, deleting all the pointless "accessed (date)" from the refs, they are pointless. Thanks RA if you turn up. 05:32, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

Actually, since this ain't WP, should we just link all the brain cults in line instead of having 57 footnotes? 08:11, 16 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Footnotes are fine IMHO, although I do see your point. Also, the "accessed date" is one of the most standard practices for citing web information, we need to get into that as a good habit. Anyway, this is interesting stuff, I didn't realise there were groups that went off into the 0.000000000000000001 percentile and stuff. Surely by that point they'll all be properly on the autism spectrum? 08:18, 16 May 2010 (UTC)
 * My only thing with the "accessed date" thing here is the sites aren't being quoted. If you quote a site, the date matters a lot.  If you're just linking to some lame shit, who cares.  And I'm glad you're amused by my bringing my pet WP project home to RW so I/we can write about it without worrying about WP rules. Not sure about autism, but at the very least incredibly self-indulgent.  08:50, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

RA reporting for duty! What can I do to help? 21:15, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Hi! Any help with this would be great.  One thing we need is the website link for all the socs that don't have them.  These are all ones that have their own WP article.  Also I need help deciding whether to link in-line or using refs (I think in this case in-line would be better).  Then we go to their websites and say snarky or nice things about them.  It would be awesome to add rough membership stats when we can find them, too.  Thanks!  21:57, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
 * That was fun! I hope what I've done so far meets your approval?   01:32, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, I am tired now, and shall continue later.  01:32, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Excellent indeed, that's just the sort of thing I was hoping for. Although, once we link the website inline, we can delete the "ref", right?  Or not?  I'm not sure.  All I know is when I was RWifying the WP version, some of what I was suffering through was the sort of thing I know, or at least think, you enjoy doing.  This article could end up completely refuting Hi-iQ on the internets beginning with G if we keep this up.  Ole!  Ole!  Ole! And once again, thanks!  02:28, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Whenever I've linked them in-line, I always deleted the refs.  02:30, 18 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, I saw that. Makes sense to me.  As each one is improved/edited, it gets fixed.  I noticed you started on the loony end, boredom might kick in as you go to the smaller sigmas.  Anyway, yeah, thanks, I really appreciate your help here.  03:22, 18 May 2010 (UTC)

Exelunt
Damn fine article. I moved the important bits of the Mensa article (i.e., the snark) here. There isn't really anything special to say about Mensa that doesn't apply to any such organisation, so I've redirected it here. Mensans are the most relatively normal humans to be found in high IQ societies, IME.

ps: I am extremely smart and spent most of my life until the internet being the smartest guy in any given room. However, I am also thoroughly in touch with my inner dumb - David Gerard (talk) 12:49, 16 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Glad u liek. I got sick of arguing etc over at wikipedia and decided to port this over here so I could get all snarky on those other people in the other room. So many shitty websites for geniuses, so little time...  13:16, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

Meeting
I disagree with the Mensa meeting statement. The one (and only one) I went to involved a lot of very odd over 40-year olds sitting in almost silence with a pint until someone sparked off a very dull conversation about their caravan. I think that was the first time I went out for a drinking session and only had one pint.

I'd also like to see some mention of the psychosis people develop when you mention that you are in Mensa. They transform from rational, intelligent people into raving loonies, spouting stories which usually invole them taking an IQ test (of unspecified origin) years ago and got a stupidly high score (usually over 200) and then a random excuse for why they won't join Mensa (along the lines of already having proved themselves / too intelligent for Mensa / don't like the kind of people in Mensa or the organisation). Bizzare. 14:48, 17 May 2010 (UTC)


 * The meeting bit was added by User:Alain.


 * You appear able to describe it, there's a link called "edit" at the top of the article page ;-p - David Gerard (talk) 14:52, 17 May 2010 (UTC)
 * A link called what? I don't know how to use this wiki-thing 15:04, 17 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm a gonna join!
I'm smert. I'm a gonna join lotsa these places. If only I can find proof of my SAT scores when I was young and smert and not old and drunk. 08:37, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * They had the SATs back then?  09:17, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Yupper. And the brainz boxen only count the old ones.  09:24, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Does the US Mensa accept SAT scores? Over here they will only accept the results of a Mensa-supervised test consisting of the Cattell B test and one of the Culture Fair tests. 09:26, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, but only old ones from before some year. 09:31, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Do it! You know you want to :) 09:37, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Yeah, so I could be the stupidest person in the room. At least I can count to four. 10:04, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Is that a requirement here? If so then I think I'm screwed. 10:22, 19 May 2010 (UTC)


 * To be able to add one and type four thingies, yup, 10:25, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * My mum says that I'm clever and that's good enough for me. -- ConcernedResident ninja, for the ladies 10:31, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

Bronzing, so there
I have given this brainy article a brain 'cos I think it's brainy and bronzey. Is there any more procedure, forms to fill out, etc. than whacking on the template and mentioning it here on the talk page? - David Gerard (talk) 10:38, 19 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Ah, apparently I should nominate it here before bronzing. OK, if anyone objects, do feel free to remove the brain and say how it fails :-) - David Gerard (talk) 10:39, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think nomination and discussion is essential for bronze. However, that was just a caveat while we set up the system - anything being given a rating should have been so uncontroversial as to not require discussion. Now that we have a good stock of rated articles, I think that we can start discussing them prior. Nothing too complex, of course. But I'd agree this is worth bronze in its current state. 10:51, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

Classifieds
Christ on a stick. The classified ads in the latest UK Mensa magazine has an advert for this pile of shit. 15:15, 21 May 2010 (UTC)


 * * Accepting an ad doesn't imply they endorse the product, especially for classified ads.
 * * On the other paw, being intelligent doesn't mean you can put it to good use. MDB (talk) 15:20, 21 May 2010 (UTC)

Joke
My spouse has informed me that my incredibly incisive attempts at humour are too intellectually challenging for the cognitively limited denizens of Rationalwiki. So I forcibly inseminated her. 11:14, 27 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Take that, bitch! Quaru (talk) 01:09, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Short An Bloody History
This is hilarious. Also explains the Giga Society: it's intra-IQ-society-subculture snark - David Gerard (talk) 20:29, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Top 0.000000000001%

 * 99.999999999999th percentile; 1/1,000,000,000,000; IQ ??? σ=15 / ??? σ=16; +??σ
 * Tera Society -- Using new google sites cloud computing, Tera Society creates a genetic potential IQ from all the H.s.s. (humans) who have ever been conceived. The number of one trillion conceptions of H.s.s. ever conceived is derived from the ratio of conceptions to live births which is around 7-9 conception for ever live birth. The number of people who have ever lived is estimated between 80 to 120 billion people. These two number multiplied together gives a product of the order of magnitude of one trillion ( 10^12). It is a genetic potential IQ (compared with a phenotypical IQ that is listed above. All IQ tests look at phenotype of the individual. Tera Society looks to the genotype for the seat of IQ and the name of that Tera Society member who is one in a Trillion IQ of all H.s.s. conceptions who were ever conceived will be a DNA code made up of gene loci and alleles. Perhaps in the next 39 years to 2050 when the expected next 2.3 billion people are born or 20 billion H.s.s. are conceived that Tera Society member number one may be conceived if that member has not already been conceived. Tera Society will run over the next 500,000 years of H.s.s. history and will cater for up to 9 member slots until 10 Trillion conceptions of H.s.s. are reached. Tera Society is seen as the limit IQ societies and is contrasted with pico society that is looking at the left hand of the bell curve for IQ for one in a trillion conceptions. The Tera Society was founded in 2009/2010, with some discussion between members of high IQ groups that have a majority of members between 150 IQ to 180 IQ +. The dyslexic polymath who founded it has a B.Sc in materials processing engineering with a minor in advance genetics, a B.Soc.Sc (Hons) in demography (birth rates, death rates, migration rates of H.s.s.) and a Post Grad. Dip in Public Policy. Worked in Local Government and Public Health. He live is the Southern Hemisphere on earth and enjoys the reverse spin of water, from the Northern Hemisphere, going down the drain or (Coriolis effect) on this creativity. He has worked with masters students, PhD students, Professors and Dean's across 7 faculties. The tipping point from phenotypical IQ measure to genotypical IQ measure could be one of the transition stages some see in the Mayan calendar. Others see BE 167.


 * The above was donated to the article by some generous BON. I thought it amusing enough to save here for posterity and analysis.  18:19, 11 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Edited to top level header to make more sense in TOC here. 02:12, 12 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I like the idea of a society so exclusive there is only a probability someone will be born to join. 01:01, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Yeah, me too. I just couldn't torture myself to edit the above into readable English.  01:25, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I'll have a go at it later. It contains a lot of unnecessary wank about the guy that created the society. He thinks he is clever. 01:29, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
 * It would be pretty funny if the "member" was born, lived, and died unnoticed 80,000 years ago... 01:55, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Some say this has already happened. Turns out intelligence doesn't have that much in the way of practical applications - David Gerard (talk) 11:02, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
 * (Though Wikipedia does say "bollocks".) - David Gerard (talk) 22:19, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Silver?
What's this needto make silver? - David Gerard (talk) 23:37, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * A brief blurb on each of the societies listed, and getting all their website links placed into footnotes. At a minimum.  00:39, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

TV IQs
Has anyone noticed that on TV IQs are quoted that are statistically unlikely? Sam Beckett from Quantum Leap had an IQ of 267 and his daughter was 196 or something. Sheldon and Leonard on the Big Bang Theory are a more modest 187 and 173, but they are still ridiculous. 12:21, 27 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Mr. 314 is even more unlikely. An IQ like that allows an 8-year-old to construct inter-planetary spaceships. He's even next door to another high-IQ neighbour as well! What a coincidence! --Sigma 7 (talk) 23:12, 27 June 2010 (UTC)


 * People suffering from MDITP also boast IQs in the range you specify. Speaking of which, did I show you this thread on a gardening forum where I first encountered MDITP online? Some choice quotes:

I tested donkeys ago at 167 as well but couldn't see the point in joining especially since His Lordship is a member tested at 170 - I didn't like being beaten I tested at 148 but knew I was really just a dummy - so not interested at all I don't think I.Q. tests demonstrate anything beyond an ability to do I.Q. tests ... I think my 1st-class honours degree is better evidence of intelligence, to be honest Personally I think the world we live in right nowis going to change and EQ (emotional intelligence) will become far more important than IQ A few years back I did the BBC IQ test (I think it was the first televised one) ... To the annoyance and frustration of OH and (adult) kids my score worked out to IQ 169
 * Note: The last one is interesting, because the BBC said their "test" (which includes general knowledge??) only tests up to 135. 15:15, 29 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Apparently, I got a 300 in an allegedly formal IQ test (i.e. Kindergarten). Of course, they were splitting the IQ test sections into different categories, and the 300 appeared in the "Spacial Relationships" category.  But that's relies on second hand information (i.e. I was told that I got that amount, and that I also said "spaghetti sauce" smelled worse than a "six-month old fish", and not special since it's only one section of said test.  I also think there wasn't a large population on that test, since maxing out that section should have been performed by at least one other person. --Sigma 7 (talk) 19:37, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Am I the only one that gets this feeling?
Hi guys, new here as you can probably tell. I'm doing a touch of original research into the effect of re-testing cognitive ability and have consequently dived headfirst into the literature around the topic, esp. IQ testing, and the concepts of what intelligence is. Prior to this I was pretty well unaware of the existence of High-IQ societies, with the notable exception of MENSA, which almost everyone knows about (probably because of the presence of porn stars in their ranks). Now I have looked around at a couple of their websites from the obvious fakes (eg., Giga society) to the hard to tells (eg., Chorium) to the definitely for reals (eg., MENSA or Mega society) and the feeling that I can't shake is that they are all scams. You must pay to sit tests, often online tests, that would involve almost no overhead costs to administer.

Take the Titan test for example, one of the tests available for acceptance into the Mega Society the Top One Percent Society, the One-in-a-Thousand Society, the Epimetheus Society, the Omega Society IQuadrivium Society, the Glia Society and the Prometheus Society (maybe more). The number of arcane societies which accept the test is the first tip-off that something is shady, many of these clubs have been started by the same group of guys. Clearly they want to cast the net wide. Nevertheless let us press on; the test itself is untimed and unsupervised, and allegedly a raw score of 1 question right is enough to earn a 120 IQ score. How in the hell they have managed to norm an untimed unsupervised test escapes me (clearly I'm not smart enough to understand their methods), considering that a retarded monkey is probably going to get 1 question out of 48 right purely by chance I have to question the norming of their scores and -unsurprisingly- even eye-balling the distribution of the norm group makes it obvious that the test is not normally distributed. Obviously they havn't used a normal population for the norming (IQ 135 is their mean) but they make no mention of any previous 'cut-off' testing that they used to identify the test-taking population as above average and consequently have no justification for the percentiles they present.

In other words it is clear they have just arbitrarily assigned an IQ figure to various scores in their test, rather than used IQ as a DESCRIPTOR of the actual (presumably [hopefully] normal) distribution of scores. How in the fuck can they know that the top end of the test discriminates to the one millionth level when in their own testing it only discriminates to about the 1 in 100 level?

A final analogy, here is Cameron's IQ test:

Q1 - What is the solution to Goldbachs Conjecture?

Q2 - 1 + 1 = ?

Norming:

Raw score 1 = 180 IQ; Raw Score 2 = 220 IQ

The Titan test is just one example but they all seem like scams. Serious scams that cloak themselves in complicated pseduscientific language without any substance and sell nonsensical products to gullible people.

I forgot to login when I wrote this. Tielec01 (talk) 06:44, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
 * You are not alone. Not at all. Having known some Mensa members in the past, and knowing the exact personality type that joins high IQ societies, I've come to the realization that high IQ societies exist only so that people can make themselves feel "smart." And in the process, these societies play upon these peoples' wishes to feel "smart" by selling them "smart people things." Not particularly a scam de jure, but certainly something that needs to maintain a certain clientele regardless of whether or not that clientele "fits" a certain membership standard (such as a high IQ) in order to give the group what it wants "money, or prestige for example). 06:49, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Question about entrance requirements
"High IQ societies typically accept a variety of standardized multiple guess tests. IQ is measured by taking a person's score on the test, working out the average (normalized as IQ=100), assuming a normal distribution and calling each standard deviation (σ) 15 points. (A few use σ=16.) At least two differently designed standardized tests, at least one supervised, should be performed."

Really? The societies I've looked at don't have this stipulation and typical testing procedure for IQ usually doesn't require more than one test as far as I know. In fact testing for IQ with more than one test will probably give you inflated scores as I have pointed out in the article, to the extent that a person who scores in the 50th percentile the first time they take a test, will be near the 80th by the third time. So I'm not sure why this statement is in the article.
 * Mensa require you to do a home test first, and then you get an invite to do a supervised test where they make you do both the Cattell B and Culture Fair tests. It actually makes it easier because they take the higher mark of the two as your IQ, so you could be totally shit at one but storm the other and still get in. Crundy Talk nerdy to me 12:57, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Sarcasm?
What sarcasm? Tielec01 (talk) 04:40, 4 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Overall, I get the impression of butthurt from the people who associate themselves with these groups, which I kind of like. To you people: If you're so smart, then tell me a group which is less cool to join than a high-IQ society. Occasionaluse (talk) 21:25, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * NAMBLA. Crundy Talk nerdy to me 21:37, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I really could be wrong, but i suspect the people I've encountered (live, or via a book i've read of theirs, or their scholarship, etc) who i would say "fuck, you're smart" would never be in one of these groups. Not cause they are anti-social aspergers (though several of the mega math minds I'm thinking from the 80's-2000 would count as such), but cause they have better things to do. Course, I belong to many of these, can't you tell. hehe.[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 21:35, 19 September 2011 (UTC)  (I won't even get into my bitch about iq tests, and how utterly useless they are in telling you a person's intelligence potential.
 * I have been offered membership in a couple. They were as bad as the jocks. Robothead.svg dot.svg 21:41, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Of course they would be. When you boil off most superfluous differences, all groups are the same. Take the "alternative" music crowd for a second; they bill themselves and open and accepting ("Hey, we're alternative, we'll accept you for who you want to be not what the mainstream tells you to be!") but really, because I don't do tattoos and body piercings and dared to express a like for Limp Bizkit (yeah, because you totally didn't head bang to Rollin' back in 2000, I'm sure) and Metallica's last two albums, I'm a complete social pariah with that crowd. And, of course, the geeks vs sports fans thing is well known and quantified and one of the best skits you can even do whenever someone tries to label you as a nerd. But you know, whatever tricks people into thinking they're unique and individual. ADK ...I'll advocate your kite! 10:13, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Worse is going to a "gifted" school. Your social standing is based on what math you are taking. Robothead.svg dot.svg 10:55, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I feel as if my school life was mundane, now. ADK ...I'll sink your Pac-Man! 11:01, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * My childhood was weird. Robothead.svg dot.svg 11:13, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Recent BON changes
Hi BON, I appreciate the effort to make the article a little less 'snarky' but I actually enjoyed the peurile adolescent humour. If you see this comment; is there any chance you could give us a reson why you cleaned up the Mensa section and made the article a little more serious? Admittedly I didn't make those entries myself so I'm not going to break down into tears if you insist on keeping the changes but I did prefer the previous versions. Cheers. Tielec01 (talk) 05:24, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Measuring IQ
Early humans, members of tribal/hunter gather societies, 'persons who travelled in the past', 'persons trained to survive in the wild' can/could all get sufficient to feed, clothe and provide shelter for themselves (and probably entertainment etc).

What propotion on members of High IQ societies can claim the same?

People in the 'modern industrial world' can learn how to use maps, timetables, understand odds, do complicated research etc.

Do the High IQ tests measure for such abilities which are much more useful than 'adding one letter to each of several pairs of words and producing a word from the common letters' and similar tests? 82.44.143.26 (talk) 15:50, 18 December 2012 (UTC)
 * You'd have to ask a more succinct question to get an answer, but I suspect this is rhetorical? Yes High IQ Societies are a little silly, but it's the human condition to attribute unwarranted importance to things we enjoy/are good at. Being able to survive in the wilderness is not really a useful skill for most people but dealing with abstract concepts and problems is a daily occurrence. However, if wilderness survival was important, people with High IQ would probably be better at it than an analogous person with Low IQ. At least, theoretically as I'm sure there haven't been any studies into such an esoteric topic. Tielec01 (talk) 04:09, 20 December 2012 (UTC)
 * We all have a good laugh at high IQ clubs over at the BP club. 16:58, 27 December 2012 (UTC) C ® ackeЯ
 * ...British Petroleum?  17:00, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

Survival in particular circumstances requires a certain minimum level of intelligence/'native wit'/ability to cooperate etc. Those with more 'intelligence etc' will be able to survive better/have to expend less energy in getting the necessities.

Insofar as IQ tests measure 'useful pattern solving skills' they measure certain aspects of 'intelligence' - but there is also 'practical ability' and more to intelligence than being able to pass these tests. Is the person of average intelligence who has studied the topic in sufficient depth likely to get a higher mark in an exam on a practical subject (georgraphy rather than Just-a-Minute type textual production) than the Mensa-level IQ who has only skimmed the topic? 171.33.222.26 (talk) 16:25, 12 March 2013 (UTC)