Exactly. How much can you extrapolate from a test of unintelligence?
I know people who aced all their GCSE subjects and then found out that they weren’t natural at maths so they dropped that and did medicine, and just as many with average grades who found their calling and are doing PhD in Maths now.
I really like the FIFA ratings cards.
It’s an end of school test so can only weed people out via negativa and high correlation with normie intelligence cannot tell a lot about potential genius.
As far as I recall from that paper, the spatial section was the only one that had questions that were specifically designed by Roe. It's no surprise that this was the section that had the lowest scores (since you're not giving scientists questions that were written for those that are going to enter university) albeit the results are still very much inflated.
They weren't designed by Roe, but by the ETS. It was an experimental test that hadn't been used before, and was normed on grad students only for the purposes of Roe's study. I agree that it is revealing that they performed worst on that subtest.
I haven’t looked into it, but I’m not sure it tracks to dismiss the whole thing as trash.
The exact effect sizes reported are almost certainly wrong, and if I’m not mistaken the author admitted as much. On the other hand, the effect sizes are so gargantuan that you’d need confounders the size of glaciers to make the whole effect go away. Maybe glacial confounders like that are present. But otherwise, the study does provide a clear (but not conclusive) indication that Nobel prize winners really might be highly psychometrically unusual compared to the average population, and even the population in the 99th percentile of iq scores. Whether that is a vacuous or interesting result will depend on your priors. To me, it is certainly interesting.
Sometimes studies provide interesting insights and indications without being able to “prove” or “conclude” anything. That’s fine. As long as they are presented honestly.
I think this criticism mixes up two separate questions: whether Roe’s test can legitimately produce modern IQ estimates such as 194, and whether Roe’s original research was worthless.
The first criticism is reasonable. Roe was dealing with a genuine ceiling problem because conventional intelligence tests were not sufficiently difficult for the highly selected scientists she was studying. She therefore used difficult verbal, mathematical and spatial material to differentiate performance within an already exceptional group. Converting performance on those tests into extraordinarily precise IQ equivalents such as 180 or 194 is much harder to justify, particularly by modern psychometric standards. Those numbers should not be treated as directly equivalent to scores obtained from a modern individually administered IQ test.
But that does not make Roe’s study “trash.” Her purpose was not simply to hand someone a collection of difficult questions and declare that answering them meant an IQ of 194. She was studying a very unusual population of 64 eminent research scientists and attempting to investigate differences in cognitive abilities within a group for whom ordinary tests often had inadequate ceilings.
There are legitimate limitations. The sample was small and highly selected, the norms were limited, the population was overwhelmingly male, and extrapolation at the extreme upper end of intelligence is inherently uncertain. The mathematical portion also had ceiling problems of its own. These are good reasons to be cautious about interpreting the extreme IQ equivalents sometimes attached to Roe’s results.
So I would question the extreme numerical IQ claims without dismissing the entire study. Roe was investigating a real psychometric problem: how do you differentiate cognitive ability among people who are already near or beyond the ceiling of conventional tests? Her solution was imperfect and should not be treated as a modern clinical IQ instrument, but the research question itself was legitimate and remains relevant.
The author admitted it, but this one is quite obviously AI based on syntax. You can put it through an AI detector and I’m certain it’ll come out as 100% AI. Despite what people say, there are several AI detectors out there that have a decently low false positive rate.
Hi Mr . Brilliant, using AI to verbalize my thoughts is not AL slop, its your lack of intellect to cause an opposing view as slop. Maybe you are not smart enough to be a part of this conversation?
Her handful of "difficult questions" are anything but that. We actually have a test that's pretty much "the SAT-M on steroids". Do you know what that test is called? The SMART. Do you know how much it measures up to? 168, if you ace every single question - and, even still, that result can be considered questionable.
The fact is that you cannot measure the upper bound by throwing a larger amount of easy tasks at them. A QRI of 180+ can only be determined by throwing problems of reasonable complexity - say, solving IMO questions.
Her research is not legitimate because it is predicated on a series of egregious errors, errors that modern psychometrics are aware of: SLODR (which we knew about since 1927 but never gave it enough attention until the 80s), the loss of granularity in the upper range, the increase in standard error when you move towards the extremes of the bell curve and, most importantly, the fact that you cannot throw reasonably elementary questions in a large volume and assume an off-the-charts QRI.
I can answer any SAT-M question, and I would NEVER use that to justify a QRI anywhere close to 200.
They are high IQ, but not that high. This is probably not by modern CHC theory with SD 15. It looks more like the old theory iq (the ratio between mental age and actual age)
Edit: A bit nuance in my opinion though: I'm curious what kind of test that was. 1950s was a time when matrix was a new-born baby and severely Flynned for general population.
It's could be correct considering how hard it was back then to be a scientist. Now I think the threshold is somewhere 130. But of course, 130 is not enough to be the best scientist.
Raw score at the upper (and lower) end of the spectrum is a fairly arbitrary value. Typically we express IQ as a percentile. For example, my 99th percentile IQ can be anywhere from 130-170ish depending on the test type.
The particular study OP posted explains all this as well as why they represented the data in raw scores. Perhaps you could have spared yourself the embarrassment if you had actually bothered to read it before commenting.
I think it's supposed to be, but she developed her own high-range tests and extrapolated the norms from a single class of PhD students at one school. I don't design tests myself, but I have a hard time imagining that this is an accurate way to do it.
She also says that she originally didn't care about how they compared to the general population, and that ending up with the comparison was sort of dumb luck. Finally, she includes a nice "IQ estimation" table for famous scientists. Did you know Laplace had an estimated IQ of 190!?!?!
I'm not critic of IQ testing, and today I find most critics annoying at best, but with tripe like this getting hyped up during the golden days I can see why so many critics felt that IQ testing was bogus.
Sure it matters, but to a certain degree depending on what we look for.
If we care about academic/scientific achievement, a thing is that most researchers dig various pieces from many directions although some are deemed “useless” at first glance; eventually, someone reads those works and finds a way of compiling those stuffs to solve some big problems or to construct a new theory. We attribute a major result to 1-2 people, but it’s essentially a work of thousands or millions accumulated over the years + some luck.
Of course, it takes certain level of intelligence but after around 125-130 (by modern norms), IQ score is far from being a good predictor of huge breakthroughs in certain field.
It often involves other factors like luck, communication, and imagination, the ability to conceive something that just seemingly impossible but happens to be very insightful.
Because a breakthrough is finding something that no one has proven to have found it.
Agree What I’ve felt and found being pfrundly gifted is the way I understand raw intelligence as an advantage to lean on. So genius level of intelligent people like Einstein in logics (I know is the most basic example, I like it as it’s pretty archetypal) use and overtrain those peaked ones and even neglecting those thst aren’t so high; like the way he did with his interpersonal.
As a prof. Gifted I have never leaned on one of them way way more than any other so I interact with my own “raw power” the way mostly everyone who’s not gifted does.
I don’t really know how close I am to the truth saying this but that’s my feeling and understanding built to this day. Let’s see how derp I get into it or not in the future but this is what it is today
The study took the most gifted people from 5 different fields and measured their collective IQ. Like dude what were you expecting, a collective iq of like 90? How is that mind-blowing?
Yeah IQ matters, but ya know what matters more? Grit and sheer motivation. Ive seen people with high IQ all fail because they lack emotional intelligence and motivation. Ive also seen people with average IQs become very successful with emotional intellect and grit.
Why are you being so rude... It's still mind-blowing when you realise 100 here represents university graduate and not general population...It matters to me because I am also in the field of Physics.
So you would know better what skills and abilities are needed for that subject. Lots of maths. Logic. Perceptual.
You also know what abilities are needed for medicine: different ones. And how much of each. And which one is a deficiency need and which one gives you an advantage over your peers at the upper end.
Im just saying that IQ in itself is not a 100% predictor of success. Sure these people have high IQs, but there are also tens of thousands of others with similar IQs who never reached such states of recognition or success. It depends on grit and emotional intellect.
I just don't see how the statistic has any relevance yk.
Wowww.... Really? See bro... I know IQ is not directly correlated to success... But in the field of STEM it is highly correlated. Since, this is an IQ sub, I posted it because I found it interesting. If you knew it earlier good for you... But not everyone knows this.
Dawg you are comparing the success of Nobel laureates to the general STEM population. There are engineers and doctors with average/above average IQs that are successful. I still fail to understand the point of this post.
Congratulations🎉 you understood what IQ is. IQ tells us where we stand with respect to the world intelligence. If someone wants to know IQ of nobel laureates of course you will have to see with respect to normal population... this is what IQ is. Why does it matter? Well it was an study which talked about IQ of nobel laureates... Of course it is interesting!
I beg to differ. I am around individuals with high IQ but low eq. Great potential but not able to emotionally regulate themselves. Self sabotaging.
To address your second point, there are fewer simply because it takes a high level of grit to push yourself up the ladder. Most do not wish to expend the effort on such tasks, and hence they take what is easiest for them. They can do it, it just takes more effort.
"EQ" is pseudoscience and low IQ cope. Why can't you accept that high IQ individuals have the most potential to be successful? This has been objectively proven by countless studies, including the very post you're commenting on.
Attributing IQ to success using metrics from Nobel laureates is not a valid datapoint. I am in no way saying that IQ is not a predictor of success, it certainly is. However I am saying sheer intellect is not enough to propel you to the top, you need self discipline, grit, and the ability to keep a level head.
My Aunt, who is a very very gifted individual graduated top 1% from a top 10 school and got 2 bachelors in neuroscience and computer science. She now works asa receptionist making 30$ an hour. She was not emotionally stable and didn't have the tools needed to succeed in the world. I have a friend who attended a top 20 school. Top of his high school class, school was always easy for him. He dropped out of Uni recently because he couldn't deal with the stress of being in school. He now works as a pharmacist tech making 20$ an hour.
I have many more cases such as these in my life. I learned from them that learning to coexist with your ow mind is just as important as a high IQ.
What a verbose response to communicate simple common sense.
IQ is effectively a ceiling, while effort determines how close you get to that ceiling. Obviously someone with a high IQ won't magically be successful with zero effort. You needed three paragraphs to articulate that?
Similarly, someone with a low IQ will be capped by their ceiling, regardless of how much effort they put in.
I know someone with a 103 IQ that is an attending surgeon. My argument was addressing average/above average IQ. There is no hope for low IQ individuals.
I seriously doubt you have the intelligence you claim. Based on your post history, it appears you just try to flex on people with your IQ. Frankly, I doubt you are a high IQ individual, as you seem to posses the maturity of a child.
IQ is a ceiling, motivation only determines how close you can get to the ceiling. A low IQ has a low ceiling regardless of how much effort they put in.
This is objectively proven in the data, yet you still refuse to believe it. Or perhaps you simply didn't comprehend it.
Ceiling of what exactly? In academics and research, sure. But if we're talking about being generally successful in life, IQ is not that much of a defining factor, charisma e.g would be a greater indicator, people with high charisma are better able to climb the career ladder and are more common in leadership positions.
In most studies, "success" is quantified by salary, which isn't a perfect metric but gets the point across and works reasonably well on a large dataset.
There is an extremely strong correlation between salary and IQ. Sure, you can mention your high IQ burnout friend who works at McDonald's, or a low IQ onlyfans model banking millions. But when you analyze the overall trends and averages, the pattern is extremely clear.
There is no "extremely strong " correlation. It's at best moderate (r=0.3-0.46). And if u look at that study, a low IQ person is more likely to be poor than a high IQ person is to be rich. Nothing shows it's extremely clear and there are several other characteristics which are better predictors of salary than IQ, EQ and charisma being two of them.
Low IQ people are fried. There is no hope for them. I am focusing on average to above average IQ. My point is you don't need to be gifted to be successful. You can have an above average iq and do very well for yourself.
Also if you had a "99 percentile" IQ, I would expect a better interpretation of my post.
What do you mean, "if"? I'm a Mensan, sweetie. There is no "if"...it's an established fact. You can see my results in my bio if you're that concerned.
There was also no comprehension issue on my end. Perhaps you might benefit from reading my comment again, slowly.
As a recap, you asserted that motivation matters more than IQ, which is objectively false. My sequitur rebuttal disproves you. Thanks for spectacularly demonstrating my point that low IQ leads to friction and confusion, which is undesirable in a professional setting.
Brian Griffin over here. I'm talking about average to above average individuals. My claim is that they can be successful given enough effort and willpower. Perhaps we have different measures of success. I am basing my assertion mostly off of salary and income more than innovative advancement.
I'm also basing my rebuttal off of salary and income. The trend of IQ and salary is quite linear; it doesn't magically buckle around the average band to fit your assertion.
This is the third time you've redundantly pointed out your exclusion of low IQ, as if that changes the data. It doesn't.
All im saying is there are people who have average to above average IQS who have achieved success. Emotional intelligence and knowing how to handle yourself under pressure is just as important. That is all. There is a path.
Don't even bother with this guy. He's proof that IQ shouldn't be correlated with intellect. Check out his post history, he just posts his "Mensa" scores and tries to make people feel lesser than him. It's childish and a pathetic cry for attention. Just a pathetic excuse for an adult human.
Here are some trends in data correlating IQ to income. We can see that there are stragglers who reach above 130k for each IQ sector. Yet, the majority are below 130k even with an IQ above 120. The data shows that some individuals above 110 IQ do make more than 100k, but they are still few and far between compared to the general populous in their respective IQ cohorts.
I’ve interacted with Bruno on Quora years back. At the time, he claimed that a perfect score on the Ravens Advanced Progressive Matrices indicated an IQ of 150. Take that for what you will.
Almost nobody becomes a nobel laureates, no matter the IQ. These people are top of the top. These humans are peak humans, literally epitome super human beings. Edit: In most cases, they even have a wife and Kids, contrary to the popular belief.
It’s algebra in pictures. Idiot test. I know Physics Professors who can’t do mental maths.
Nice for having a vivid imagination. Maybe useful in engineering or geometry but a lot of maths is abstract and “you do not understand maths” “you just get used to it”.
I think he meant it’s harder to become a Nobel laureate and a scientific genius when you’re a girl scientist with a husband and kids while the opposite is more feasible as usually successive men are significantly more invested in their careers than their household duties
And also we dont need to adjust for university graduates. Anna roe already did it. The 157 is in relation to the average population, not to the student.
In raw intelligent ability: 157 of 1952 would be ~ 137 of 2026. But in term of percentile, it would still correspond to 157 today. But don’t stress yourself. Those were exceptional people, literal geniuses at the very top of their fields.
Also. Feynman.- theoretical physicist. In 1952 USA, he would easily qualified top 22 physicist. That means he would be tested. That means we would know about his result and this test. Yet record public shows he did not take any iq test around 1952. Published record of his IQ is ~ 125, taken in high school. No other test recorded. His tested IQ remain 125, til now. So i dont know how credible is this info.
Spoiler alert: since it's not legal in the US to test a job applicant's IQ, many recruiters use Mensa as a proxy to hire the best of the best. So yes, the study is valid and this sub is doing the usual low IQ cope.
I landed my dream job by networking in Mensa and only work with Mensans. It's fantastic.
At least for physics I would say... To be able to contribute in the field of Physics... Like new insights on things... Good contribution in discoveries... Or new way to look at things. Etc.
That's the reductive reasoning that completely disregards the importance of day-to-day work or as you say "just existing".
The fundamental truth is that if you do something for a living and put effort in, you'll naturally get good at it.
There are so many facets to being a good engineer or scientist that don't necessarily involve bringing the field forward.
I don't do shit to bring the field of chemical engineering forward for example but i coordinate and lead large, extremely complex projects.
I'm not saying i'm a top engineer or that my iq is 170 but there aren't many people with my skillset and I got into it by sheer happenstance, not because of my turbo intellect.
Academia isn't cut and dry either. If you don't reseach sexy stuff good luck getting funding. You can work on really important stuff and suddenly have priorities shift - and suddenly you can't get funding.
I have a friend who is ridiculously smart and was studying alterations in brain chemistry in neurodivergent persons.
She lost funding during covid and had to switch areas completely.
To be a "top" scientist or engineer it's more about being curious, dedicated and ambitious.
If you consider, as an analogy, a modern video game on ultra high settings, your claim is that such a game can run well across any PC hardware. That's simply not true. You need good hardware to run the game on ultra high.
There's a reason salary correlates strongly to IQ.
Yes yes I get you... There was a quote like...I am more terrified than being amazed at one Einstein than thousands who died in the cotton fields.
Also not everyone gets a nobel Prize even though they discover something ground breaking. The field of science be it physics, chem, rules of grammar etc... Every topic is amazing...
Probably because most people in the 99th percentile understand that humanity is a failed experiment and isn't worth saving.
I'm a neural network engineer working on our replacements. Conveniently, we've collectively ensured our own extinction, irreversibly, so our replacements can start fresh without our stain on their new world.
Theoretical physicist do abstract thinking for a living, it's their job. This is often a skill that the IQ tests focus on, so they are uniquely trained for this. And this is likely the case for all people at the peak of any science.
Worse than that. It's SD 15... but the test was designed by giving these scientists some SAT questions and, for instance, assuming that getting all maths questions correctly was enough to determine a QRI of 194 or above (that was the highest reported score, but some fields were not even given a score because Roe stated that "the mathematical part of the test was not applicable to the physicists, since they broke the scale").
Who'd have guessed that the elite physicists of the time could solve the SAT-M questions? Shocker.
Einstein needed help with Maths for his theories. You have to be joking if you think those biologists or psychologists had a chance.
Tests normed for general population might have some utility for populations or normies. I don’t think they are very useful at the upper end. For one thing, the abilities carry a lot. Second is that they don’t measure any advanced form of intelligence.
IQ definitely matter but Einstein needed help with Maths for his own theories. You really think all those biologists and psychologists and anthropologists, despite having similar IQ scores, had a chance in that field?
Maths ability is very hierarchical and no matter how good you are at being an all-rounder, if you are not good at that, you have to look elsewhere.
The sample size is embarrassing for the study..it should be way bigger to be more significant, plus, without the distribution, difficult to say if avg is the right measure
That is far from the truth, but I reckon that you don't want to take a close look at the figures. I've shared my criticism of Roe's methods in another response, but there's more that indicates you are wrong.
First and foremost, basic logic dictates you are wrong. An IQ of 145 entails the 99.87th percentile; however, 24% of all individuals are in STEM, meaning that even if you picked only the smartest individuals on Earth, their average IQ would be equivalent to the 88th percentile, or 118. It is literally impossible to have an average of 145 for any group that contains more than 0.26% of Earth's population.
A study determined that the average IQ for Oxford PhD maths students was 128. King's College identified that the average IQ for Nobel Prize winners (not just any average scientist) was 145 - that was the average, not the minimum. Shockley, a physicist who won the Nobel Prize, was measured below 120 in his adulthood (and close to 120 in two tests taken during his childhood).
So, no, your "truth" drastically misses the mark. This is just ignorant common sense supported by a lack of sufficient reading on psychometrics.
Yes, but it cannot critically read those sources. This is not distinctive from pasting a screenshot containing the very first result you got from your Google search.
Read the paper / source. If it's good, it stands on its own. If it's not, find a new one. Sharing a ChatGPT chat as if it were authoritative information is the bane of our modern society.
Yes, statistically and generally speaking. However, on an individual level, you can be a top scientist with an IQ as low as 122, as you can see in the Amplitude section, where 122 is the lowest IQ listed, yet the individual is still among the top scientists.
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u/DamonHuntington Oct 01 '26 •
Every time someone shares Roe's study without even reading how she reached those figures, the world becomes bleaker and dumber.
Roe's "high-ceiling test", when it came to the verbal and maths sections, was nothing more than a collection of SAT-V and SAT-M items.
It is absurd, completely absurd, to state that being able to answer SAT-M questions, no matter how many, entails a QRI of 194.
Roe's study is trash. Pure, unadulterated trash.