CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re American (2017)

Re:CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re Ame... by yorwba on Friday November 27, 2020 @05:44AM (#25227462)

Not in 1971 when the lawsuit was filed. Now they use picture-based tests because those are supposedly less dependent on learned knowledge. (Though I find that many Raven's progressive matrices-type questions are a lot easier if you know about symmetry groups and XOR.)

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Re:CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re Ame... by DarkWiiPlayer on Friday November 27, 2020 @07:17AM (#25228063)

> Though I find that many Raven's progressive matrices-type questions are a lot easier if you know about symmetry groups and XOR.

Yes, at that point people who have already developed certain mindware have an advantage, but arguably that's the point of an IQ test. You're not testing the potential of a person to eventually be really smart, you're testing for the current problem-solving potential.

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Re:CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re Ame... by sudosysgen on Friday November 27, 2020 @10:28AM (#25229391)

Well, it is problem, because the assumption is that you're measuring a proxy for g that supposedly doesn't change. So if it can change, by something as simple as learning some boolean algebra, the IQ test isn't measuring what it is assumed to be measuring.

That being said, you're right that it would still be useful for measuring problem solving potential, but that's explicitly not what IQ tests are supposed to measure.

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Re:CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re Ame... by andromeduck on Friday November 27, 2020 @11:26AM (#25229979)

??? who assumes g can't change?

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Re:CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re Ame... by sudosysgen on Friday November 27, 2020 @11:46AM (#25230210)

It's generally accepted in psychometrics that general intelligence does not change in adulthood : https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3950413/

I personally think it's not something that's really true, but it's how I learned it in university and seems to be the default position of experts in the field.

This is of course assuming no traumatic brain injuries or the use of psychoactive substances.

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Re:CAPTCHAs don’t prove you’re human – they prove you’re Ame... by philshem on Friday November 27, 2020 @06:22AM (#25227728)

thanks for pointing out the year. I've updated my grandparent comment to include 1971

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