Science Memes

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submitted 1 day ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 67 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Contrary to popular belief, we're all profoundly stupid. Even the smartest among us spend enormous effort in their struggle to comprehend our surroundings.

[–] esc27 31 points 1 day ago (3 children)

At least half of us are below average.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 day ago

If we're talking about IQ, than no. An IQ between 85 and 115 is considered average. This entails 68% of the population. So, only 32% of people are not average and only 16% are below average.

[–] Eheran 29 points 1 day ago

You mean the median? :3

[–] FinalRemix 12 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It can't be that many.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 day ago (2 children)

It's not. I assure you there are far more outliers on the low end.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I endeavour to be as stupid as possible so more people can be above average.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 23 hours ago

America thanks you for your service.

[–] Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

But I'm sure there are more people with 200+ IQ than with <0.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago) (1 children)

I understand that you're saying there are more incredible geniuses than full on retards.

However, IQ scores are a normal distribution with an arbitrarily defined mean of 100 and a standard deviation of 15.

So, IQ scores of 0 or 200 are both 6.6 standard deviations from the mean. If IQ is truly a normal distribution, you'd expect the number of people with IQ scores <= 0 and the number with scores >= 200 to be exactly the same, simply because this is how the scores are defined.

If you try to look up what proportion of the population falls outside 6.6 standard deviations, the z-tables don't go out this far. It's essentially 0% (0/100) but how many is it out of 8 billion?

[–] Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In 2 points 2 hours ago

If IQ is truly a normal distribution

It's not. Here's a list containing a number of people above 200.

However, no-one has a negative IQ.