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Dunning-Kruger in graphical form

AlaskaBushPilot

Illuminator
Joined
Nov 6, 2010
Messages
4,341
The Dunning-Kruger effect is that the stupider you are, the more you over-estimate your intelligence.

It's stark seeing it in graphical form, and numerical equivalents, so here goes:

http://www.unz.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Stumm-figure.png

That figure is from an Unz Review piece on the original article here:

http://www.unz.com/jthompson/folie-a-deux/

In this graph, we compare actual IQ scores to self-estimates of our IQ, by IQ Quartile. Use the "Distal" SEI (Self Estimate of Intelligence) vs. IQ line.

The bottom quartile IQ, having an average of 83, estimates their own IQ to be 103. Their IQ is two standard deviations lower than they think. Incredible.

The next quartile IQ, coming in at 95, also over-estimates their IQ, but only one standard deviation: thinking it 106.

The third quartile IQ averages 105 in measured IQ, and likes to think of themselves as 109.

Finally, the highest IQ quartile, coming in at 117 IQ, thinks it only 116. They are the only group that underestimates their own intelligence, and only slightly so.

Suppression of IQ differences seems extremely important in PC culture. Because racial differences in IQ strikes at the heart of the phony white privilege narrative. The Asians do better than caucasians, who in turn do better than blacks and crime statistics follow logically in tandem as well.

But for the individual, regardless of your race, gender, whatever - it is vitally important to have self-awareness. We have an "everyone gets a ribbon" psychology towards education, everyone can get a high school diploma; everyone can get a college diploma...

Which promotes Dunning-Kruger. If you have an IQ of 83, you are below the Army enlistment standard. And you think you are above average IQ. Logically, you can make medical school with a 106 IQ, but the Army knows you are not even smart enough to march in a straight line.

An IQ = 83 is fine for welding two pieces of steel together. Even with an IQ of 83 it is something you can do as an adolescent, no problem. Journeyman welder by 16. Six figure income, retire with an Island in the Pacific.

What you need is a trade. Fortunately, trade schools have almost vanished, and it is illegal to work at trades like construction until you are 18 anyway so apprenticeships, nope.

Anyway, this has more general application, like to the forum. The stupider someone is, the less self-awareness they have about exactly how stupid they are.
 
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The Dunning-Kruger effect is that the stupider you are, the more you over-estimate your intelligence.
No it isn't. Try again.

In the field of psychology, the Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people of low ability have illusory superiority and mistakenly assess their cognitive ability as greater than it is. The cognitive bias of illusory superiority comes from the inability of low-ability people to recognize their lack of ability. Without the self-awareness of metacognition, low-ability people cannot objectively evaluate their competence or incompetence.

As described by social psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger, the cognitive bias of illusory superiority results from an internal illusion in people of low ability and from an external misperception in people of high ability; that is, "the miscalibration of the incompetent stems from an error about the self, whereas the miscalibration of the highly competent stems from an error about others."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning–Kruger_effect
 
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Err wot?

From the Wikipedia article you linked... with interpretations in red..

In the field of psychology, the Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people of low ability (in other words, "the stupider they are") have illusory superiority and mistakenly assess their cognitive ability as greater than it is (in other words, "the more they over-estimate their intelligence").

In fact, when I Google the phrase used by ABP - the stupider you are, the more you overestimate your intelligence - without quotes, the first result I get back is

https://www.verywellmind.com/an-overview-of-the-dunning-kruger-effect-4160740


What am I missing?
 
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What am I missing?

It's not about stupidity.

The Dunning-Kruger effect is about one's ability to estimate how well one has done on a task, specifically a test. Those who do poorly on the test tend to over-estimate their ability, while those who do very well tend to have a more self-doubting attitude. More generally, it's the tendency to over-estimate or under-estimate your ability relative to that ability. It's not about intelligence.
 
Err wot?

From the Wikipedia article you linked... with interpretations in red..

In the field of psychology, the Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people of low ability (in other words, "the stupider they are") have illusory superiority and mistakenly assess their cognitive ability as greater than it is (in other words, "the more they over-estimate their intelligence").

In fact, when I Google the phrase used by ABP - the stupider you are, the more you overestimate your intelligence - without quotes, the first result I get back is

https://www.verywellmind.com/an-overview-of-the-dunning-kruger-effect-4160740


What am I missing?

Ability is not the same as intelligence. Being good at IQ tests arguably is an ability but that's just one example.
 
It's not about stupidity.



The Dunning-Kruger effect is about one's ability to estimate how well one has done on a task, specifically a test. Those who do poorly on the test tend to over-estimate their ability, while those who do very well tend to have a more self-doubting attitude. More generally, it's the tendency to over-estimate or under-estimate your ability relative to that ability. It's not about intelligence.
What is an IQ if not the score of an IQ test?
 
My understanding of the Dunning-Kruger effect is that it more about expertise than intelligence. IE, really smart people who are infact experts in field A will over estimate their expertise in field B if they don't know much about Field B.

Also, sure, IQ isn't a measure of intelligence but it does correlate strongly with just about every other way we rate intelligence. Things like academic and socio economic success.
 
My understanding of the Dunning-Kruger effect is that it more about expertise than intelligence. IE, really smart people who are infact experts in field A will over estimate their expertise in field B if they don't know much about Field B.

Agreed. People of average intelligence tend to know they aren't brilliant, but people who have done really well in one field tend to think they are brilliant in all fields. That is when D-K really comes into its most glorious form.

See: Engineers and conspiracy theories. Doctors and investing. Lawyers and management.
 
Agreed. People of average intelligence tend to know they aren't brilliant, but people who have done really well in one field tend to think they are brilliant in all fields. That is when D-K really comes into its most glorious form.

See: Engineers and conspiracy theories. Doctors and investing. Lawyers and management.
Skeptics and politics.
 
It's become fairly obvious which members of the ISF don't consider themselves to be skeptics.
 
It's become fairly obvious which members of the ISF don't consider themselves to be skeptics.

Not really. I'm an engineer and a lawyer and I have found myself trying to manage large conspiracy theories even though I know I shouldn't.
 
Agreed. People of average intelligence tend to know they aren't brilliant, but people who have done really well in one field tend to think they are brilliant in all fields. That is when D-K really comes into its most glorious form.

OK so when we see a conspiracy theorist (such as manifesto in the JFK threads), who was pretty damned stupid, but seemed to claim that he had tremendous expertise in ballistics, acoustics, interpreting X-rays, medical science, autopsy, forensics, historical documentation, photogrammetry, photography, 1960's vehicles, image manipulation, video editing, etc etc... this is not a an example of DK?
 
OK so when we see a conspiracy theorist (such as manifesto in the JFK threads), who was pretty damned stupid, but seemed to claim that he had tremendous expertise in ballistics, acoustics, interpreting X-rays, medical science, autopsy, forensics, historical documentation, photogrammetry, photography, 1960's vehicles, image manipulation, video editing, etc etc... this is not a an example of DK?

Dude, you are not tricking me into reading the JFK threads around here. Not today, Satan! Not Today!

(More seriously, it probably is, but not the most glorious representation of D-K in my mind.)
 
I am a towering genius! My IQ must be over 300! I make Einstein and Hawking look like blithering idiots!
 
OK so when we see a conspiracy theorist (such as manifesto in the JFK threads), who was pretty damned stupid, but seemed to claim that he had tremendous expertise in ballistics, acoustics, interpreting X-rays, medical science, autopsy, forensics, historical documentation, photogrammetry, photography, 1960's vehicles, image manipulation, video editing, etc etc... this is not a an example of DK?
Probably not, actually. DK is something that happens to normal people in normal situations.
What you describe sounds a bit like a psycho-pathology
 
Can't really answer that one, can we, unless we first devise an SQ? How might that work, I wonder, should someone attempt something like that?
 
What is an IQ if not the score of an IQ test?
It isn't the raw score in an IQ test that measures a person's IQ but rather how well a test subject does compared to the others.

Each person's score in an IQ test is ranked in ascending order. The median score is assigned an IQ of 100 and each standard deviation above or below the median adds +15 IQ points to the person's IQ.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_quotient
 
So the trick to get a high IQ is to belong to a generation that's extremely bad at doing IQ tests! :) See Flynn effect. When a Danish TV network launched an IQ test of the entire population, i.e. of those who wanted to participate, I could add 6 points to my score due to my age. So even though you're much better at IQ tests than your grandfather, you may get a lower score than him because his generation wasn't very good at it unlike yours.
 
I would have thought that, although the Dunning-Kruger effect can apply to a specific incompetence when a person is otherwise not stupid, a person who is overall stupid might well be a member of a subset, and also that because language is a little bit sloppy at times, the term "stupid" could be applied to a localized inability without necessarily applying to an entire character. A person of high intelligence in one area can still act stupidly in another. I wonder if the furor over the fine points of the definition here might itself be revealing of an over-eagerness to demonstrate one's relative competence.
 
What is not talked about enough, in my view, is the flipside of the Dunnin-Kruger: when applied to experts in the field.
The pay-off might be much better if instead of insisting that amateurs are more careful about coming to conclusions, we train experts to be more bold in affirming results, even if they "only" come with a 90% probability.
We need to understand better why Experts are wrong sometimes, and that when wrong, their mistakes are more educational than any anti-science fake skeptic's rant could ever be.
 
What is not talked about enough, in my view, is the flipside of the Dunnin-Kruger: when applied to experts in the field.
The pay-off might be much better if instead of insisting that amateurs are more careful about coming to conclusions, we train experts to be more bold in affirming results, even if they "only" come with a 90% probability.
We need to understand better why Experts are wrong sometimes, and that when wrong, their mistakes are more educational than any anti-science fake skeptic's rant could ever be.
It's not a "flip side", it is part of the definition.
 
Which makes the quote an ironic example of the DK effect.

Err wot?

From the Wikipedia article you linked... with interpretations in red..

In the field of psychology, the Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people of low ability (in other words, "the stupider they are") have illusory superiority and mistakenly assess their cognitive ability as greater than it is (in other words, "the more they over-estimate their intelligence").

In fact, when I Google the phrase used by ABP - the stupider you are, the more you overestimate your intelligence - without quotes, the first result I get back is

https://www.verywellmind.com/an-overview-of-the-dunning-kruger-effect-4160740


What am I missing?

It would have been best to not post this, but now that you have, you should probably re-read for comprehension and then come back.

There's two parts to DK. So I quoted it in full. The stupid -> overestimate is only one part. And the idea is to do with self-perception, not necessarily action. A subtle but important difference.
 
The Dunning-Kruger effect is that the stupider you are, the more you over-estimate your intelligence.

It's stark seeing it in graphical form, and numerical equivalents, so here goes:

http://www.unz.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Stumm-figure.png

That figure is from an Unz Review piece on the original article here:

http://www.unz.com/jthompson/folie-a-deux/

In this graph, we compare actual IQ scores to self-estimates of our IQ, by IQ Quartile. Use the "Distal" SEI (Self Estimate of Intelligence) vs. IQ line.

The bottom quartile IQ, having an average of 83, estimates their own IQ to be 103. Their IQ is two standard deviations lower than they think. Incredible.

The next quartile IQ, coming in at 95, also over-estimates their IQ, but only one standard deviation: thinking it 106.

The third quartile IQ averages 105 in measured IQ, and likes to think of themselves as 109.

Finally, the highest IQ quartile, coming in at 117 IQ, thinks it only 116. They are the only group that underestimates their own intelligence, and only slightly so.

Suppression of IQ differences seems extremely important in PC culture. Because racial differences in IQ strikes at the heart of the phony white privilege narrative. The Asians do better than caucasians, who in turn do better than blacks and crime statistics follow logically in tandem as well.

But for the individual, regardless of your race, gender, whatever - it is vitally important to have self-awareness. We have an "everyone gets a ribbon" psychology towards education, everyone can get a high school diploma; everyone can get a college diploma...

Which promotes Dunning-Kruger. If you have an IQ of 83, you are below the Army enlistment standard. And you think you are above average IQ. Logically, you can make medical school with a 106 IQ, but the Army knows you are not even smart enough to march in a straight line.

An IQ = 83 is fine for welding two pieces of steel together. Even with an IQ of 83 it is something you can do as an adolescent, no problem. Journeyman welder by 16. Six figure income, retire with an Island in the Pacific.

What you need is a trade. Fortunately, trade schools have almost vanished, and it is illegal to work at trades like construction until you are 18 anyway so apprenticeships, nope.

Anyway, this has more general application, like to the forum. The stupider someone is, the less self-awareness they have about exactly how stupid they are.

I didn't understand that graph. Clearly, that graph is wrong.
 
I think you've been Poe'd: 'It must be wrong since I don't understand it!'
 
I’m wondering now whether or not there is a correlation between considering oneself to be a skeptic and being one.

Many skeptics outright encourage people to ignore the opinion of legitimate experts if favor of the half a**ed “analysis” you do yourself. In fact in many places you’ll see this presented as *the* fundamental principle of skepticism.

Those who view skepticism this way can be among the people most susceptible to the consequences of Dunning-Kruger.
 
Many skeptics outright encourage people to ignore the opinion of legitimate experts if favor of the half a**ed “analysis” you do yourself. In fact in many places you’ll see this presented as *the* fundamental principle of skepticism.

Those who view skepticism this way can be among the people most susceptible to the consequences of Dunning-Kruger.

It's interesting. I generally agree that we should defer to the understanding of experts. On the other hand, the experts are wrong about some things, and the way that our knowledge will progress is through those things being questioned by, generally, people will less knowledge, experience, and prestige.

It usually happens from within a particular field and by the next generation of experts, though, rather than from without.
 
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