h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

..If so, what was your score? How did you play, using the internet? Digital TV? or pen and paper? What did you think of the programme?

It was suppossed to be a landmark project for the BBC, and will probably become a yearly event...

I took part using pen and paper. I quite enjoyed taking part and as for the programme itself, I liked the way they built up the "friendly rivalry" between the various groups in the audience. As someone who has studied and worked in psychometrics in a previous life, I thought the test was flawed quite fundamentally. However, once I scored it, it did give me the same IQ score as I have gotten on two previous occasions on other academically recognised IQ tests so maybe it wasn't as flawed as I thought it was. I got 126 by the way. But then I am an aquarius and we are now officially the brainiest star sign in the country!

I didn't know about it, although I would've been interested.

As an 8-year old, I had an IQ of 148.5, but that has largely dropped off with age and beer.

To quote Scott Adams in Dilbert "IQ has much less practical application than you'd think"

Never a truer word...

B

Pah. I took it, but I refuse to announce the result, as it's a hell of a lot lower than the Mensa test that I did before my son was born.
I think it was due to the timer, as on the written test I did all the ones I could do easily, then went back to the more difficult ones. With this test I was twiddling my thumbs waiting for the timer, on other questions I was struggling for time. And it didn't let me unclick when my mouse played up and I clicked the wrong answer. (Although I doubt that made any difference, as it was only one question.)

So is there somewhere you can go to find the questions / your iq etc?

As long as it wasn't the question asking you your age bracket...

B

How does the age weighting thing work, and what's the reasoning behind that.

I thought the show was pretty good but the groups were a bit odd? Why were twins there - are they supposed to be clever or stupid?

What were the flaws that you spotted?

Pen and paper.

I am got an IQ of 118 but that was for a 16-17 year old which means that technically, since I'm 14, I have a higher IQ. POssibly. In theory.

The twins were there to acertain whether the saying that the older twin is the more intelligent is true. Personally, as I've said countless times, I think that IQ tests just tell you how good you are at doing IQ tests. And that's not just bitterness. Honest.

I did it on the computer, but I had a few (pretty major) quibbles with the way it was set up:

1) The computer and TV versions were not the same in the way they were administered. Using the written scorecard, you could write down the answer after the actual question was over. With the computer, after 30 seconds - whoosh! Gone. A couple of people said they found this a problem on answers where they took about 28 seconds to work out the answer and then didn't have time to press the button.

2) You couldn't divide your time according to how you needed it; ie. if you were good at verbal reasoning, you took three seconds to do the puzzle, leaving you with 27 seconds to twiddle you thumbs, but couldn't then use this extra time on ones you found harder.

3) The results that the Beeb is hawking as having gained from this exercise are decidedly skewed. Given that they were calculated from internet entries, they were automatically biased towards the affluent and well-educated, the white middle-class, as it were (I'm not white, but I'm well educated and middle class). Only if this were census-like in scale could we actually learn anything (of even spurious value) from this exercise.

I know, it's all a bit of fun, but you did ask.

For the record, I got 123. So, Mr. Roberto, what did you get? You didn't share with the rest of the class...

Hmmm.... I got 126 at 1:30 in the morning (by 'puter)... I don't know if there's some multiplier you can claim for taking it when you really should be in bed

The timer was darn annoying, though... I found myself reading bits on h2g2 while waiting for it to move onto the next question

(that and feeling stupid... er... what button do I press to skip the timer again? Click again? Er... no... wait... *surely* I don't have to sit here? Um... alright... I'll sit here... I can read h2g2, I'm fine...)

Well, I think if you were doing the scorecard version you WERE suppossed to do it within 30 (or whatever) seconds. Besides, the question was removed after that time.

I see what you mean about the inherent bias though.

With the twins, they seemed to treat the twins as a whole group rather than testing the differences between twins...

OK, now, please correct me if I'm wrong but was there not a wrong answer on the show?

question- if x=3 and y=7, what is the answer?

x(x+y)=?

A= 30
B=something
C=not important
D=24

am i wrong, or is the answer 30?

because they said it was 24!!

am i very much mistaken?

Hmm... er... from what I can remember of the online one... there was a question like that... hrm... I think the answer was 24... perhaps the question was slightly different to that?

That's probably what you were supposed to do, but with the TV version there was a degree of leniency that wasn't there with the internet one.

As for the twins, they recorded all the scores, but were comparing those between sets of twins to see which twin, older or younger, tended to score better.

I think it's 30 too, by the way... it's BODMAS, innit? Brackets Of Divide Multiply Add Subtract.

Yus, the answer to what's two posts up is 30... but I seem to remember working it out as 24... couldn't swear to it...

Does anyone want to sit through the online test to find out?

(just to be pedantic... isn't that, brackets, orders, divide, etc...? Orders as in squaring, etc... )

Hey - I only learned it as a ten year old. They probably thought orders were a bit over my head...

Yeah but did they announce the results of the comparing twins thing?

I only tuned in half way through so couldn't do the test...

It was:

x=3 and y=7
x + (x*y)
in which case it's 24.

And I got 126, but I wouldn't take it as a serious result. Far too many factors for it to be of any scientific worth, both affecting it to the higher (I was in my own home, so far more comfortable) to the lower (I've spent the weeken and today ill).

That's a cop out, my friend! You can still do it... only now we've told you half the answers...