2011 Geek IQ Test 161
snydeq writes "Active Directory object catalogs, quad-core processors, Debian default configurations, Star Trek TNG guest appearances — find out how much you know where it really counts by taking InfoWorld's 2011 Geek IQ Test."
Trick Question (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Trick Question (Score:5, Funny)
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Anyone who would slog through all those one question per page pages has a two digit IQ, disqualifying them for either term "nerd" or "geek".
One of my recent journals asked what is a nerd? [slashdot.org] I don't think anyone at InfoWorld qualifies for the title.
Worth it...just to see how wrong Q15 is (Score:2)
15. Related to quantum mechanics, what is the term for the observation that some physical quantities can be changed only by discrete amounts, or quanta?
The answer IS quantum mechanics (or quantum physics) and not, as they suggest, "multiples of planck's constant".
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Mine's two digit...in hex. The first digit is a letter, and so's the second one
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Anyone who would slog through all those one question per page pages has a two digit IQ, disqualifying them for either term "nerd" or "geek".
The only winning move is not to play. How about a nice game of chess?
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What geek willingly goes to InfoWorld?
20 years ago I had a free subscription to it. It was fun to read Notes From The Field. Quite a lot of the rest was just technology companies tooting their own horn and InfoWorld only too happy to print it and accept the advertising $.
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My god. Were the early 90's really 20 years ago?
Not all of them.
Re:Trick Question (Score:5, Insightful)
What website doesn't know how to implement working radio buttons?
Seriously, I look at the first question, and it's like they expect me to remember the answer or something. How am I supposed to take the test and then share the results on Facebook?
Also, this seems to be less a "Geek IQ" quiz and more a "IT terminology quiz with the occasional splash of science-fiction knowledge questions" quiz.
Re:Trick Question (Score:4, Insightful)
You could have five fingers and count in binary the number you get right. There are only twenty questions.
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You could have five fingers and count in binary the number you get right. There are only twenty questions.
Great idea until your co-worker punches you at correct answer number 4.
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Is see FOUR fingers!
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Only because you know you're going back to the fish in your office.
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How am I supposed to take the test and then share the results on Facebook?
You're on Facebook? Turn in your geekcard now.
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You're on Facebook? Turn in your geekcard now.
How else are we supposed to meet girls? We can't talk to them IN PERSON!
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Yes, it's a useful social tool. The age of geeks being socially awkward recluses is long over.
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No, I could tell just from the slashticle it was a complete waste of time.
WTF does that have to do with IQ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Ookaaay... exactly what does knowing obscure trivia about shows from 50 years ago have to do with IQ? I could see it as a geek score for bragging rights, or a hint if you might want to have a professional look into whether you've got Asperger's, but IQ? Seriously?
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"Geek IQ," not regular.
Re:WTF does that have to do with IQ? (Score:5, Informative)
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Actually I reasoned few of the correct answers by elimination (the GUID one for instance), so I got a bit of pleasure from the test. Overall score not impressive, of course, I am lame Windows user. One of the older quizzes (2008 or 2009, can't remember) was pretty interesting though...Also noted that reading /. helped by providing few answers from "popular" subjects like different OS's and their revisions, geek jokes and folklore etc.
Re:WTF does that have to do with IQ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Incorrect as it is, "IQ test" has come to mean a test of knowledge and fact rather than one of ability.
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Even worse, I'm sure this is not going to show up as a bell curve with the median being a 100 score.
So, rather than testing intelligence, its testing trivia, and rather than being a bell curved test its basically a "top 50 list" or whatever.
I would assume, not being to load the quiz, that its not going to be actual geeky questions, its going to be all about mass media references to geeks, which is a population that generally doesn't care very much about the mass media or its vapid opinions.
It would be inter
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That's a trick question as it depends on what he has been eating recently. Bazinga!
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"Sample some extra-class ham radio exams, some CCNP cert BGP questions, some organic chemistry questions, some "end of chapter" questions from Knuth and Feynman's Lectures, mostly selected because I'd ace those, but they're not a bad start."
That would still be a knowledge and not aptitude test. You've simply changed the trivia topics.
An aptitude test would require deriving the answer with the prerequisite knowledge and data provided in the question.
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So it should be about not putting the round peg in the square hole? Damn you geography! Damn you all to heck!
Not really (Score:4, Insightful)
Not really. Or not outside of the bizarro world of Internet marketing.
Actual IQ tests still at least try to measure certain kinds of mental aptitude. While some degree of knowledge are unfortunately inherent in being able to even ask the questions, much less answer them (e.g., someone has to be familiar with rectangular blocks before you can ask them to count blocks in a picture), that was never the focus of actual IQ tests. How much you know about some obscure subject -- be it Star Trek or Victorian novels -- is just not part of the definition of IQ.
However the notion is increasingly MISUSED to basically mean "whatever way we can play on your insecurities and need to reassure yourself, to get a click out of you". This can mean knowledge of trivial things, or even things completely unrelated to intelligence, like optical illusions, deliberately ambiguous pictures, paraeidolia, or whatever.
When you see stuff like "93% of people can't tell whether the ballerina rotates to the left or right" on some "IQ Test" ad (you know the kind I'm talking about), it doesn't really mean that the definition of IQ or of IQ Tests has changed. It just means that some dishonest marketers are aiming exactly for the kind of idiot who'd (A) not realize it's a stupid scam, and (B) is insecure enough to actually want some website to pat him on the head and tell him that he's so smart after all.
It's not really all that different from preying on some people's sexual insecurities to sell them penis enlargement pills.
Don't get me wrong, I'll be the first to say that IQ is pretty meaningless for anything except taking an IQ test. But still, it at least means that. Memorizing trivia that's fully useless to anyone and for anything else than a trivia contest, is just not the same thing as high IQ.
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I'll be the first to say that IQ is pretty meaningless for anything except taking an IQ test.
Why all the hating on symbolic manipulation, logical reasoning, and pattern recognition? That seems to be the backbone of trash talking the concept of IQ tests, I've always wondered why. I find symbolic manipulation, logical reasoning, and pattern recognition very useful, profitable even. I would predict that the loss of those skills would be a pretty severe blow to my lifestyle and intellect. I know there are many more categories in Cattell-Horn-Carroll theory but those three are usually by far the lea
It's not about that though (Score:2)
Actually, I've yet to see anyone who says that logical reasoning flat-out is unimportant. (Except when you apply it to their Bible or Quran, I guess.)
What is the actual objection is that the ways used to measure it, actually measure more whether you trained the application of that exact measuring method, than a more general ability to use logic in the real world or in a real world job. It's, if you will, like I were to measure your mental abilities by your gear-score in WoW. Sure, it can be argued that you
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It's just being measured badly.
Yes a good indication of measurement failure is poor correlation in predictive studies. Except that doesn't happen. If it were not so effective, it wouldn't be used so much, wouldn't be so interesting...
I will credit you that my Flynn effect theory was pretty lame. The alternative is even more bizarre. Instead of getting smarter, people are magically getting better at tests... hmmm. Whatever it is the tests are measuring, people are getting better at it at a rate not seen in other non-IQ tests and does
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There are definitely gimme internet tests but they aren't all that way. I received the same score when tested online as I received when tested in high school.
And why memorize a copyrighted TV show? (Score:3)
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They should just call it GQ, "Geek Quotient".
I could live with that (Score:2)
Yeah, I could live with it being just GQ. Even Geek EQ, I suppose. It's just "IQ" that seems horribly misused IMHO.
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Yeah, I could live with it being just GQ. Even Geek EQ, I suppose. It's just "IQ" that seems horribly misused IMHO.
Of course, that quiz needs to be a *lot* larger if they're going to claim a general "geek score".
Take the Bozeman question, for instance - as written, 5% of your mark boils down to "are you a Next Gen Trek geek?". (I happen to be one, but such is.). You could easily be a SW fan. Or BSG or Firefly or B5. Heck, you might be a Trek fan and prefer DS9. (Or be young enough to grow up with Voyager and not know how badly you have it).
If you're not detailed up to at least "geek code" standards, I'd say you're not t
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I guess it should be the "Geek Quotient" rather than the "Geek intelligence quotient"... but then again, you really expect a lot from infoworld writers if you expect them to know what words IQ actually stand for.
alternate life pursuits not entirely like living (Score:2)
"Geek IQ" is a polite synonym for mastering alternate life pursuits not entirely like living. However, such a test ought to know the difference between nerd IQ and geek IQ.
The question about "Heroes" is the moral equivalent of the birthstone questions in the science category of the original Trivial Pursuit.
Every category had some bird food. In Sports, you just keep picking Bath Ruth or Mohamed Ali whenever they come up, you'll get one eventually. For a science ignoramus, the closest surrogate to low-han
Interpreting the Results (Score:5, Funny)
If you get to the results page, you failed the test. No one sits through a painfully slow survey that requires a complete page reload (including new ads) every time you answer a question. I got to 2 questions before I bailed, so I figure I am middle of the pack. If you didn't click the link in the first place, you are a genius. 3-5 questions and you are slow but employable. 6-10 and you should probably stick with help desk duties. 11-19 and you should seek professional help. Go all the way, you should post out for the management opening.
Re:complete page reload (including new ads) (Score:5, Informative)
How do we rate your Geek IQ if you didn't find the Print Page?
http://www.infoworld.com/print/178807 [infoworld.com]
1 Page and not an ad in sight!
Print pages are a beautiful thing.
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Plus it has all the answers right there, so you've no excuse for not scoring 20.
NB When I tried the print page two hours ago, I got the answers to the first question (but not the question) with radio boxes by three out of four, followed by a button with no text, and some header and footer guff. I think it was quite reasonable to assume that they'd bodged the print page completely, although now it seems that it was merely slashdotted.
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How many points do I get for knowing how bad InfoWorld usually is, and coming to the comments section to find someone who'd posted the print page?
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You win one Schrodinger's Cat. Maybe.
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If you didn't click the link in the first place, you are a genius.
Sweet! I saw that the link went to InfoWorld and had questions about Windows shit and said "fuck that, I don't need you to validate my geekiness with your 3-paragraph ad-laden web pages."
KNEEL BEFORE MY AWESOME BRAIN POWER!
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No one sits through a painfully slow survey that requires a complete page reload (including new ads) every time you answer a question.
Yes they do, but they're not geeks, they're idiots.
90% geek (Score:5, Informative)
Question 8: In the TV series "Heroes," Hiro flashes forward
doesn't seem to fit in the realm of truly geekworthy
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Never even heard of the series (do I fail because I don't watch television?), but if it's related to Hiro Protagonist from Snow Crash I'd say it's fair game. If you can count zero experience with cyberpunk, then you don't really qualify in my book. (You pass if you caught the pun, or play on words, in the last sentence). You don't have to like it, but you should at least have tried it. After all, Gibson could give anyone a migraine at first inoculation, but Stephenson is a pretty good initial choice.
ps -
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ps - Did anything of Stephenson's make it to the screen?
Fiction? No, or, not yet. Nothing even close. I don't mind, I don't really want to see crytonomicon turned into a hollywood action movie. I'm not sure if Snow Crash could even be turned into an action movie, and the era of "the internet user interface is like a drug trip" has kind of passed out of style since '98 or so.
Non-fiction, well, yeah, if you count closely derivative works, or basically ripoffs of his stories. No, if you are strict about requiring him listed by name in the credits or him having
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and the era of "the internet user interface is like a drug trip" has kind of passed out of style since '98 or so.
Hmm let me rephrase that, even trying to convince people they will interact on the internet using the Second Life interface has gone out of style. Not just the interface itself, but even trying to convince people its an area worthy of consideration.
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I think you're supposed to take points off if you know this one.
I used my massive geek intellect to figure it out, though. Using such subtle clues as vague knowledge of when the show ran, the word "forward", and guessing that it probably wasn't Valentine's Day.
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The observables don't even have to be multiples of some fundamental unit. Supposing energy were in multiples of Planck's constant, if I were interested in the square root of the energy instead of the energy itself, the resulting levels would not be so distributed. Using particularly convoluted functions, I could map the multiples of Planck's constant to the rational numbers and in fact allow arbitrarily small gradations between states. The question is wrong on several levels, and the answers are terrible. T
DDNS got nothing on /. (Score:2)
Hmm ... Interesting. (Score:2)
Segmentation fault
(core dumped)
Got the technical stuff easily, but the contemporary stuff of media creating - meh.
A geek test that can't survive the Slashdot effect (Score:2)
Is that ironic, or just sad?
Can't add up its own score? (Score:3)
Geek test fails the Geek test.
Not much of a geek (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not much of a geek (Score:5, Insightful)
This. Seeing that I had to keep track of my own answers made me close the page.
This is 2011, come up with something better.
Wow... only 45/100 (Score:3)
I don't even make it onto their scoring chart, and yet somehow I doubt you'd find anyone who knows me that doesn't think I'm a geek.
The problem with being "geeky" is that geekiness involves specialization, and let's face it, I don't know anyone who specializes in the Infoworld direction.
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But, where in all of that "non-specialization" did you learn about DNS records, whatever the hell Active Directory does, and TV trivia?
Consider TV shows: There are sci-fi geeks that are into Trek, geeks that are into Babylon 5, geeks that are into Doctor Who, geeks that are into Battlestar Galactica, geeks that are into Firefly, etc. If you draw a Venn diagram of all these, I think you'd find significant regions of non-overlap, which implies a certain amount of specialization. (Actually, I'm not sure you
Opposite of IQ test (Score:2)
Isn't this pretty much the opposite of an Geek IQ test? This tests knowledge (to be nice) or trivia (to not be nice), whereas an IQ test would test reason, logic, problem-solving.
Strategy... (Score:2)
I'll just come back in a while, when there are more comments bitching about the answer choices. Then I can go over there and ace the thing :D
I took the test. (Score:2)
I took the test and scored 3.14159265
I'd say InfoWorld failed the test. (Score:2)
The InfoWorld site is currently undergoing scheduled maintenance. Please try again later and thank you for your understanding.
Hehe.
Nits (Score:3)
15. Related to quantum mechanics, what is the term for the observation that some physical quantities can be changed only by discrete amounts, or quanta?
The answers are just stupid. None of them (even the "correct" one) is a technical term. The actual correct answer would have been "quantisation" (or "realizing that quantisation is necessary").
18. When Kelsey Grammer appeared on "Star Trek NG"...
It's Star Trek TNG, not NG. Wikipedia and Memory Alpha agree with me (eg. there's a redirect on Memory Alpha to the correct page from "TNG" but not "NG"), though NG appears to be used sometimes by a few people.
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Bunch of random questions about ancient technology, old TV programmes, Nicknames for old versions of OS's and some new tech ...
but everything the real Geeks either never knew, or have forgotten ...
Not a Geek text ... a Geek wannabe text ...
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Yeah, I found the question selection to be pretty silly, too. It was pretty much just a bunch of obscure things you'd google nowadays. Even the TNG reference I mentioned was obscure--that captain had about 12 seconds of air time at the very end of that episode.
I got 12 of the last 15 correct after missing 4 of the first 5. I'm not sure if that meant the author got lazier or I got better at spotting the wrong answers.
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well, obviously they were just trolling.
or they're just being infoworld as infoworld is. you know, because it's so fucking hard to hire geeks.
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Actually, the correct term would have been "normalization of probability measures on a Hilbert space" (the sum of all probabilities has to add up to one).
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One question (Score:2)
GED/J d-- s:++>: a-- C++(++++) ULU++ P+ L++ E---- W+(-) N+++ o+ K+++ w--- O- M+ V-- PS++>$ PE++>$ Y++ PGP++ t- 5+++ X++ R+++>$ tv+ b+ DI+++ D+++ G++++ e++ h r-- y++**
Yes, and I can interpret it without the guide: 5 points
Yeah- I remember that/ Oh, God, I thought we were done with that nonsense: 3 points
What?: 0 points
Is that HTML?: Go away
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Strange Game (Score:2)
.. the only winning move is to choose not to play.
So that's where all the articles are coming from.. (Score:2)
meta test? (Score:2)
I tired of flipping through the questions and keeping track on my own of my score, while laughing at the auto-text that said I picked this or that when clearly I could not pick a damn thing without a frakkin radio button to poke, so I wrote a script to take the test for me, consulting wikipedia and (proud of this one!) the RFC library for answers. Eventually, I edited the script to filter out all future references to infoworld from my slashdot feed, and to extend a robot arm and hand from my monitor and sla
about a thousand better geek tests (Score:2)
[google.com]http://www.google.com/search?rls=en&q=nerd+test&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8 [google.com]
seriously though, I haven't bothered to fill any of them up since I was 18 and.. well too white and nerdy, obviously.
Tip for taking the IQ test (Score:2)
Start on page 25 and answer the questions in reverse order.
For reasons that cannot be fully explained you may end up with a much higher score using this method.
Ah! Thanks! (Score:2)
Thanks for mentioning Infoworld in the summary. Otherwise, I might have actually visited the link.
NOTE TO WEBSITES (Score:2)
My time is valuable.
I won't click 10 times to read something that could have been put on a single page.
Not photo essays, top 10 lists, bottom 10 lists, quizzes, nada.
If it's not all on one page I just click the big X.
For fucks sake (Score:2)
Sheesh slashdots collective panties really are in a bunch today.
So much nerdrage over a lame quiz - don't you all have something better to complain about? (obviously I don't)
I stopped taking the test ... (Score:2)
When they started asking windows related questions. No geek with any kind of self-respect would answer those.
Also, not an IQ test, just a stupid quiz.
Re:Cant' take it (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, but you failed the /. quiz by trying to read the article.
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I keep getting "There was a problem loading the quiz. Please try again later". Does that mean I pass?
No, because you actually went to the page in the first place...
A link to "Geek IQ test" is no different from one of those "Find out who's been reading your Facebook profile" links. If you clicked it, you fail.
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Maybe the real quiz is whether you're geeky enough to figure out how to load the quiz.
-- 77IM
Re:Slashdotted (Score:4, Interesting)
I found the print view [infoworld.com]
I scored 6 out of 20. I don't care, it's a test of random facts, not a test of skill.
According to someone who gave me and my housemate a ride home (and some confused looks) after clubbing on Saturday night, we're geeks since we were trying to work out something physicsy from first principles (I don't remember the details) while dressed, essentially, as humanoid robots from the future [google.com].
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Umm, it's a test of a: obscure geeky stuff and b: up to date technology issues and questions, with a twist of geeky humor as expected. It's a test of random facts if you're googling this stuff or just simply don't work with technology or fit in as a typical "IT guy". (even though by default a slashdotter is inundated with technology).
I got a 16/20, and feel like I should have known about VINES (though I know about other network stuff).
Re:Slashdotted (Score:5, Interesting)
It's still just little random facts and trivia. That's not an IQ test. Change the subject from obscure scientists to footballers, from the mechanics of Windows and Linux to bits of cars, and from Heroes to some soap, and you've got exactly the kind of quiz that I would avoid at the local pub.
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IQ is just a term being referred to incredibly loosely here. Why are you getting so hung up on this? Do you hate quizzes? Are you fearful of knowledge questions? Doing horribly on this "geek IQ test" (also known as quiz) doesn't mean "you're stupid", but it could mean "you're not keeping up with current technology". Pop quizzes of sports reflect on your knowledge of sports. This isn't difficult. Lastly you have the fact that some people just aren't good at tests.
Meanwhile, guess what? Your reply nothing to
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Actually, if you know who sells D&D books right now, you are playing recent versions of D&D, which means you are NOT a geek.
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Actually, if you know who sells D&D books right now, you are playing recent versions of D&D, which means you are NOT a geek.
I know who sells the current books due to /. articles about how Wizards of the Coast screwed up D&D with the latest revisions.
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The original Dungeons & Dragons, now referred to as OD&D,[74] was a small box set of three booklets published in 1974.
I was 22 in 1974, never heard of D&D until some time in the 90s when I got internet access. However, I used a slide rule to cheat in math class in the 5th grade, made a working computer out of two potentiometers, a battery, and a voltmeter in 7th grade, and turned $10 transistor radios into $150 guitar fuzzboxes as a teenager.
The idiots at infoworld can't even make a web page wor
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On related note, I would be really worried if a technician working on my server suddenly started mumbling something about patch Tuesday. That would either mean that someone installed Windows on my server without my knowledge, or that the technician cannot recognize Linux. Hard to say what would be worse.