I mean, if IQ is real then SES and education are plausibly strongly caused by it. In that case, controlling for SES and education and then saying "there's not much signal left, thus IQ is bunk" just means that you've basically renamed IQ into "the implicit thing that determines SES and education, which I will not calculate directly." With such related properties it becomes hard to determine causation in general. The obvious test would be to improve education and see if IQ shifts. I don't have a study for this on hand, but I expect (just to register my prediction, not to make an argument) that if I look I'll find that the signal is weak that direction.
Or if IQ is less real than IQ-ists think it is, then it is plausibly strongly caused by SES and education. See?
I'm not even saying you're wrong (I think you are, but I don't have to defend that argument). I'm just saying the level of epistemic certainty you kicked this subthread off with was unwarranted. You know, "most reliable metrics in psychology" and all that.
I don't see how your argument puts my initial argument into doubt, tbh. If IQ isn't real but SES-and-education are, well then SES-and-education is the thing that you pick up at a glance. I'm not sure that the specific construction of causation here matters.
But also sure, I tend to assert my opinions pretty strongly in part to invite pushback.
All I'm saying is that "most reliable metrics in psychology" is less a mic drop than that sentence would make it sound. The arrows of causality here are extremely controversial --- not politically, but scientifically.
Sure, that's fair. I kinda wish the topic wasn't politicized so we could just get scientists to hash it out without having to ask "is that a scientific conclusion or do you think it would be politically disadvantageous to come to another answer".
My own view is "IQ is real and massively impactful", because of the people I've read on the topic, my understanding of biology, sociology and history, and my experience in general, but I haven't kept a list of citations to document my trajectory there.
