Figuring out a non-eugenics technology to raise IQ’s would go a long way towards solving other problems. Nick Bostrom in one of this talks argues that raising everyone’s IQ by ten points would revolutionize the world for the better, not by making the smartest people marginally smarter, but my “uplifting” billions of dullards above a threshold where they became more educable, more employable, more law abiding, more likely to save money and plan for the future and so forth.
Psychologist Linda Gottfredson of the University of Delaware would probably agree with this outcome:
Interesting argument. But though the “demand” for this is there in some sense (it seems it would be extremely useful to have this) the demand isn’t there in another sense (lots of people or rich organisations willing to put up money for this).
the demand isn’t there in another sense (lots of people or rich organisations willing to put up money for this).
This pretty much describes most of the innovations I’m personally interested in, where the fruit hangs low enough that twelve-year-olds can pick them, but nothing ever comes of them, presumably because of lack of sufficient market pressures / sufficiently rich and motivated investors.
The concept generalizes, it seems. Are there other (successful) innovations that overcame such hurtles in the past? I don’t know where the Rite Brothers got there funding/supplies, for example; I don’t know what the astronomy market thought of Galileo’s telescope at first / how his spat with the Pope impacted its development; etc. People do seem to be interested in the logistics of spreading useful innovations, at least more so than in my pet game-changers; what sorts of efforts are being made on that front? Givewell’s identifying the most efficient charities seems like a good component (why haven’t we tiled whole African countries in mosquito nets, yet?), but teleportation would obviously be much better.
Note: I’m not sure if I have a core point, but I did find this thought provoking and wanted to post what I had worked out so far.
Based on the Wikipedia page about Iodine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iodine_deficiency , it sounds like figuring out a way to distribute Iodine to everyone better so that noone experiences an Iodine deficiency in childhood would be an example of a non eugenics method to raise IQ. Although I suppose that implies the problem is not “The technology to solve this problem doesn’t exist.” but “The technology to solve this problem isn’t getting to everyone who would benefit from it.” And that can be the case with other transformative technologies that Stuart_Armstrong mentioned. Some areas don’t have access to vaccines, some areas do have access to vaccines but are opposed to them, some people do not let women in their area use some contraceptive methods...etc.
I guess a way to describe the problem is that “How do we get everyone in the world access to the technological developments that we have already generated?” has several cases which are not a low hanging fruit. Even If I came up with a new nanopill that provided intellectual benefits similar to resolving an childhood Iodine deficiency, that could be stacked on top of it for even more gains, I’d still have to find a way of getting that nanopill to everyone, but that would be the same kind of problem I would face getting Iodine tablets, Iodine rich food, or even Iodized salt to everyone.
Good news. A recent study into incentives and IQ scores has shown that a monetary incentive of more than $10 can raise someone’s IQ score by 20 points. Looks like we can revolutionize the world pretty cheaply.
Figuring out a non-eugenics technology to raise IQ’s would go a long way towards solving other problems. Nick Bostrom in one of this talks argues that raising everyone’s IQ by ten points would revolutionize the world for the better, not by making the smartest people marginally smarter, but my “uplifting” billions of dullards above a threshold where they became more educable, more employable, more law abiding, more likely to save money and plan for the future and so forth.
Psychologist Linda Gottfredson of the University of Delaware would probably agree with this outcome:
http://www.udel.edu/educ/gottfredson/reprints/1997whygmatters.pdf
Interesting argument. But though the “demand” for this is there in some sense (it seems it would be extremely useful to have this) the demand isn’t there in another sense (lots of people or rich organisations willing to put up money for this).
This pretty much describes most of the innovations I’m personally interested in, where the fruit hangs low enough that twelve-year-olds can pick them, but nothing ever comes of them, presumably because of lack of sufficient market pressures / sufficiently rich and motivated investors.
The concept generalizes, it seems. Are there other (successful) innovations that overcame such hurtles in the past? I don’t know where the Rite Brothers got there funding/supplies, for example; I don’t know what the astronomy market thought of Galileo’s telescope at first / how his spat with the Pope impacted its development; etc. People do seem to be interested in the logistics of spreading useful innovations, at least more so than in my pet game-changers; what sorts of efforts are being made on that front? Givewell’s identifying the most efficient charities seems like a good component (why haven’t we tiled whole African countries in mosquito nets, yet?), but teleportation would obviously be much better.
Nitpicks:
1) Galileo didn’t invent the telescope.
2) What “astronomy market”?
Note: I’m not sure if I have a core point, but I did find this thought provoking and wanted to post what I had worked out so far.
Based on the Wikipedia page about Iodine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iodine_deficiency , it sounds like figuring out a way to distribute Iodine to everyone better so that noone experiences an Iodine deficiency in childhood would be an example of a non eugenics method to raise IQ. Although I suppose that implies the problem is not “The technology to solve this problem doesn’t exist.” but “The technology to solve this problem isn’t getting to everyone who would benefit from it.” And that can be the case with other transformative technologies that Stuart_Armstrong mentioned. Some areas don’t have access to vaccines, some areas do have access to vaccines but are opposed to them, some people do not let women in their area use some contraceptive methods...etc.
I guess a way to describe the problem is that “How do we get everyone in the world access to the technological developments that we have already generated?” has several cases which are not a low hanging fruit. Even If I came up with a new nanopill that provided intellectual benefits similar to resolving an childhood Iodine deficiency, that could be stacked on top of it for even more gains, I’d still have to find a way of getting that nanopill to everyone, but that would be the same kind of problem I would face getting Iodine tablets, Iodine rich food, or even Iodized salt to everyone.
Good news. A recent study into incentives and IQ scores has shown that a monetary incentive of more than $10 can raise someone’s IQ score by 20 points. Looks like we can revolutionize the world pretty cheaply.
http://news.sciencemag.org/2011/04/what-does-iq-really-measure
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3093513/pdf/pnas.201018601.pdf
Good news. (Which isn’t to say that IQ-boosting tech to hurry things along wouldn’t be useful.)