Requisite IQ for a 170+ LSAT Score? Forum

[WinterComing]

yeah, the vast majority don't

this is actually probably because of where you went to undergrad

in my undergrad no one walked into the LSAT and did really well cold, but I know a lot of people who went to an "elite" undergrad (barf), who did very well there in difficult subjects. those people are, in fact, smarter than 99% of people (probably more like 99.9%).

or, perhaps, the right combo of smart and privileged, but that's another topic

People who will naturally be smart enough to ace the LSAT without much studying probably tend to go to good undergrad schools. But I don't think an education from a good undergrad school is at all a prerequisite for acing the LSAT without much studying.

I don't know. We've gone pretty far afield from the OP's question. OP, don't worry about any of this and just do the best you can. You can't change how smart you are but you can change how hard you work.

[KissMyAxe]

yeah, the vast majority don't

this is actually probably because of where you went to undergrad

in my undergrad no one walked into the LSAT and did really well cold, but I know a lot of people who went to an "elite" undergrad (barf), who did very well there in difficult subjects. those people are, in fact, smarter than 99% of people (probably more like 99.9%).

or, perhaps, the right combo of smart and privileged, but that's another topic

People who will naturally be smart enough to ace the LSAT without much studying probably tend to go to good undergrad schools. But I don't think an education from a good undergrad school is at all a prerequisite for acing the LSAT without much studying.

I don't know. We've gone pretty far afield from the OP's question. OP, don't worry about any of this and just do the best you can. You can't change how smart you are but you can change how hard you work.

I don't know about your first sentence. I think it's highly an individual thing. I went to a state school (correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't you as well?) and while I did study for a couple months to get my 178, my cold diagnostic was 172. Meanwhile, the average LSAT scores for HYP are in the mid-160s, most of whom would have had high IQs and very high SATs. Many of them likely would not have taken the LSAT seriously, and scored around a 165, not a bad score but definitely not acing it. I have a difficult time believing there are many people (I'd say single digits) who can walk into the room and get a 177+ with no study. In fact, I'd say I know the majority of our classmates next year, and I don't think I've met one who would have just not studied at all and gone into the LSAT cold. They all are high-achievers and work super-hard on their goals. I'm not saying there aren't people out there who have the skillset necessary to ace the LSAT with very little prep, but that they're incredibly rare, that there are so few of them that their undergrad quality has very little bearing on it, and neither does their IQ (to bring this back to the OP).

I've never understood the fascination with IQ. There have been hundreds of studies showing that the IQ test is nowhere near an accurate reflection of innate intelligence. I had to take one of the official IQ tests once, and yes, while I did very well on it, it doesn't mean I'm some kind of genius (I'm not). It just means that I can quickly recognize patterns from all my time playing logic games (the actual game ones, not the LSAT one). It also had nothing to do with my LSAT score.

But I do agree with every sentence but your first one.

[WinterComing]

yeah, the vast majority don't

this is actually probably because of where you went to undergrad

in my undergrad no one walked into the LSAT and did really well cold, but I know a lot of people who went to an "elite" undergrad (barf), who did very well there in difficult subjects. those people are, in fact, smarter than 99% of people (probably more like 99.9%).

or, perhaps, the right combo of smart and privileged, but that's another topic

People who will naturally be smart enough to ace the LSAT without much studying probably tend to go to good undergrad schools. But I don't think an education from a good undergrad school is at all a prerequisite for acing the LSAT without much studying.

I don't know. We've gone pretty far afield from the OP's question. OP, don't worry about any of this and just do the best you can. You can't change how smart you are but you can change how hard you work.

I don't know about your first sentence. I think it's highly an individual thing. I went to a state school (correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't you as well?) and while I did study for a couple months to get my 178, my cold diagnostic was 172. Meanwhile, the average LSAT scores for HYP are in the mid-160s, most of whom would have had high IQs and very high SATs. Many of them likely would not have taken the LSAT seriously, and scored around a 165, not a bad score but definitely not acing it. I have a difficult time believing there are many people (I'd say single digits) who can walk into the room and get a 177+ with no study. In fact, I'd say I know the majority of our classmates next year, and I don't think I've met one who would have just not studied at all and gone into the LSAT cold. They all are high-achievers and work super-hard on their goals. I'm not saying there aren't people out there who have the skillset necessary to ace the LSAT with very little prep, but that they're incredibly rare, that there are so few of them that their undergrad quality has very little bearing on it, and neither does their IQ (to bring this back to the OP).

I've never understood the fascination with IQ. There have been hundreds of studies showing that the IQ test is nowhere near an accurate reflection of innate intelligence. I had to take one of the official IQ tests once, and yes, while I did very well on it, it doesn't mean I'm some kind of genius (I'm not). It just means that I can quickly recognize patterns from all my time playing logic games (the actual game ones, not the LSAT one). It also had nothing to do with my LSAT score.

But I do agree with every sentence but your first one.

Yeah, I suppose I intended for the first sentence to be read in the context of the second sentence. The reason I decided to respond to Land Shoes at all was precisely because I thought what they said didn't match my own experience as a state-school grad who scored well. I probably should have preceded my comment with a topic sentence that said, "Honestly, I think it's unfair to correlate cold LSAT performance with undergraduate institution." That said, and honestly it's a guess because I don't have data on this, I'd think that of the small number of people who can ace the test cold, you'd find many of them at top undergrads. Our friend QC went to a top undergrad, I know.

Also, it seems to me we're lumping two separate things together in this discussion. I was talking about scoring a 170+ on a first practice test, maybe taking a couple of other practice tests to familiarize themselves with the format and patterns but not paying for a class or putting in weeks of intense self-study, and then hitting maybe 173-ish or something on test day. I'd argue that's somewhat more common than some people in this thread would acknowledge. I mean, I did that, and I'm a smart guy but not a supermegagenius.

Walking into the actual test completely cold, having no idea what will be presented, and scoring a 180 (or a 178 or 179) would be much, much rarer, and I agree 100 percent that there would be very, very few people who could do that. QC is absolutely one of them, but he's rare.

(And I agree with you on your criticisms of IQ as an indicator for any of this, which I also mentioned upthread.)

[WinterComing]

I should also say, I first piped up in this thread because I felt like posters were unfairly questioning and attacking QC, a TLSer I respect. But to the extent that this has become a humblebragging dick-measuring contest that would lead someone to view me as an "internet bro," I regret everything.

[KissMyAxe]

Post Deleted

[RZ5646]

To be fair, Winter, I think your background prepared you for the LR and RC sections, regardless of which college you attended and what your IQ is.

You can't untangle nature and nurture, so these threads are useless.

[cantorb]

Let me try to specify. Here are the facts- 97.5% of test takers who take the LSAT don't score above a 170. In 2015 there were 101,689 people who took the lsat. That means there were roughly 2,542 people who scored a 170+ out of 101,689 people. In my opinion, that alone is relatively impressive if you think about it like that. Your score beat out some 99,000 other people. As we all know, not all of those takers, are um, the most articulate individuals ever but at the very least they are all in college or have a college degree (side note- only 40% of all Americans even have a college degree). Now, we can probably assume some of those 2,542 are probably retakers and some are people from test prep companies. Let's say 2000 people are taking it for the first time. Now breaking that down even further, how many of those people do you think took it completely blind with that score? 200, 100? 200/101689= .19%?

Who knows what the answer is. My point is, statistically, if you did do that you are really a statistical outlier compared to other people who took the LSAT. I am sure it can be done, I don't think you have any reason to lie, and I am sure some people do it. It's just everyone on the internet has a 17 inch dick, a 180 LSAT score, and is an Olympic gold medalist.

From my personal experience, I have gone to relatively good schools since I was young-except for my college that is-, had peers who went on to top schools, and have family members in Biglaw. I don't think I have ever heard of someone just blind taking a 170+ in real life other than on the internet. Then again, the college I went to could hinder that a bit.

Haha alright, point well taken. I can agree that the probability might be around 0.2% as you stated; I just wanted to clear up that it certainly wasn't impossible and also not one-in-a-billion as I said earlier. 0.2% would give a figure of 1 in 500, which I am perfectly ok with. I don't really care whether you believe that I am one of those 0.2% as long as we are in agreement that this isn't some impossible feat. I have enjoyed talking through this with you and wish you the best.

I came here bcuz of QC and Winter and didn't read this entire thread, but I still don't see how asdf's calculations prove anything about IQ - they just show how unique it is to be that good at the LSAT, which is pretty obvious (did this thread give up on the IQ part?).

One point I haven't seen made is that even if only a tiny percentage can ace LG cold and have a 170+ diagnostic, it is extremely likely that those people are on TLS, as evidenced by the very large percentage of HYS' incoming and classes that are TLSers. I also know QC well enough to totally believe him about not needing prep. I went to a no-name community-based school with an extremely high number of 170+ scorers - according to LSAC 24% of my school scored in the 95th percentile or higher (their top band) - and virtually all of them at least lurk here.

[asdfdfdfadfas]

Let me try to specify. Here are the facts- 97.5% of test takers who take the LSAT don't score above a 170. In 2015 there were 101,689 people who took the lsat. That means there were roughly 2,542 people who scored a 170+ out of 101,689 people. In my opinion, that alone is relatively impressive if you think about it like that. Your score beat out some 99,000 other people. As we all know, not all of those takers, are um, the most articulate individuals ever but at the very least they are all in college or have a college degree (side note- only 40% of all Americans even have a college degree). Now, we can probably assume some of those 2,542 are probably retakers and some are people from test prep companies. Let's say 2000 people are taking it for the first time. Now breaking that down even further, how many of those people do you think took it completely blind with that score? 200, 100? 200/101689= .19%?

Who knows what the answer is. My point is, statistically, if you did do that you are really a statistical outlier compared to other people who took the LSAT. I am sure it can be done, I don't think you have any reason to lie, and I am sure some people do it. It's just everyone on the internet has a 17 inch dick, a 180 LSAT score, and is an Olympic gold medalist.

From my personal experience, I have gone to relatively good schools since I was young-except for my college that is-, had peers who went on to top schools, and have family members in Biglaw. I don't think I have ever heard of someone just blind taking a 170+ in real life other than on the internet. Then again, the college I went to could hinder that a bit.

Haha alright, point well taken. I can agree that the probability might be around 0.2% as you stated; I just wanted to clear up that it certainly wasn't impossible and also not one-in-a-billion as I said earlier. 0.2% would give a figure of 1 in 500, which I am perfectly ok with. I don't really care whether you believe that I am one of those 0.2% as long as we are in agreement that this isn't some impossible feat. I have enjoyed talking through this with you and wish you the best.

I came here bcuz of QC and Winter and didn't read this entire thread, but I still don't see how asdf's calculations prove anything about IQ - they just show how unique it is to be that good at the LSAT, which is pretty obvious (did this thread give up on the IQ part?).

One point I haven't seen made is that even if only a tiny percentage can ace LG cold and have a 170+ diagnostic, it is extremely likely that those people are on TLS, as evidenced by the very large percentage of HYS' incoming and classes that are TLSers. I also know QC well enough to totally believe him about not needing prep. I went to a no-name community-based school with an extremely high number of 170+ scorers - according to LSAC 24% of my school scored in the 95th percentile or higher (their top band) - and virtually all of them at least lurk here.

They don't. If you follow the thread the conversation progressed into talking about taking the test cold and scoring above a 170. I think we all came to the conclusion that of course IQ and LSAT scores are somewhat correlated. However, ultimately it comes down to the individual, that person's motivation, the time they have to prep, the resources available to them, and that individual's innate ability. Also, I don't think your LSAT score is the end all be all of whether or not you are intelligent.

At the end of the day, these debates don't matter as your score is your score is your score. You got what you got and it is what it is.

At least, that is my opinion.

[RZ5646]

did this thread give up on the IQ part?

When presented with a question that is impossible to answer, TLS will bounce from one meaningless, unanswerable question to another. Inevitably, the debate devolves into humblebraggy anecdata, ad hominems, and claims that none of this matters because law school isn't worth it anyway. This is the law of TLS.

[WinterComing]

did this thread give up on the IQ part?

When presented with a question that is impossible to answer, TLS will bounce from one meaningless, unanswerable question to another. Inevitably, the debate devolves into humblebraggy anecdata, ad hominems, and claims that none of this matters because law school isn't worth it anyway. This is the law of TLS.

Even if partially intended as a criticism of me, this is a reasonably accurate summary, though you should have added gratuitous use of Latin phrases to your list.

[cantorb]

did this thread give up on the IQ part?

When presented with a question that is impossible to answer, TLS will bounce from one meaningless, unanswerable question to another. Inevitably, the debate devolves into humblebraggy anecdata, ad hominems, and claims that none of this matters because law school isn't worth it anyway. This is the law of TLS.

Even if partially intended as a criticism of me, this is a reasonably accurate summary, though you should have added gratuitous use of Latin phrases to your list.

That is definitely not an accurate criticism of you, neither in this thread or irl.

RZ you forgot to list stating the obvious as if it was a brilliant insight. There is a very fine skill to that, which certain people ITT lack.

[RZ5646]

did this thread give up on the IQ part?

When presented with a question that is impossible to answer, TLS will bounce from one meaningless, unanswerable question to another. Inevitably, the debate devolves into humblebraggy anecdata, ad hominems, and claims that none of this matters because law school isn't worth it anyway. This is the law of TLS.

Even if partially intended as a criticism of me, this is a reasonably accurate summary, though you should have added gratuitous use of Latin phrases to your list.

I wasn't trying to criticize anyone in particular, just this general pattern of posting. Threads about the LSAT and IQ / SAT / innate ability pop up not infrequently, and they always end up the same way.

In the past, I've been one of the humblebraggy anecdata people, so I'm not immune to it.

[landshoes]

yeah, the vast majority don't

this is actually probably because of where you went to undergrad

in my undergrad no one walked into the LSAT and did really well cold, but I know a lot of people who went to an "elite" undergrad (barf), who did very well there in difficult subjects. those people are, in fact, smarter than 99% of people (probably more like 99.9%).

or, perhaps, the right combo of smart and privileged, but that's another topic

People who will naturally be smart enough to ace the LSAT without much studying probably tend to go to good undergrad schools. But I don't think an education from a good undergrad school is at all a prerequisite for acing the LSAT without much studying.

I don't know. We've gone pretty far afield from the OP's question. OP, don't worry about any of this and just do the best you can. You can't change how smart you are but you can change how hard you work.

Yeah, nothing I said necessarily implied that the elite education was functional in terms of LSAT.

I thought including my distaste for the term "elite" would keep people from assuming that I think they are better colleges qua colleges...

[appind]

Here is the thing though, you don't need "specific knowledge in [your] head" for the LSAT. Strong reading and critical thinking skills are sufficient for RC and LR, and I am thoroughly puzzled as to why you seem to think that the logic games section is so impossible without having prior knowledge as to how it works. It is a group of interconnected word puzzles. I'm pretty certain that almost anyone, if given 3 hours for the section instead of 30 minutes, could ace the logic games section. If that is the case then why is it so extraordinary that some people can simply process the information faster than others? As Hikikomorist said earlier, for people who are naturally good standardized-test takers, time is almost never the issue.
Given the bolded part of your post, you seem to be saying that you doubt people can ace the LSAT without study simply because there are a lot of people out there who have to study for 2 to 3 months before being able to do it, and that simply does not follow.
If you really want to believe that it is impossible (or very nearly so) to score highly on the LSAT with no exposure, feel free, but I can tell you with certainty that is not the case, and while you can believe that I'm lying if you want (though I don't stand to gain from doing so), other posters have had similar experiences/know people who have and there does not seem to be any logical reason that would preclude people from acing the LSAT cold.

Feel free to pm me if you want some more personal details that might explain/provide corroborating evidence for my LSAT experience. It just puzzles me that you think I must either be a liar or some incredible anomaly. I would say that I am an anomaly when it comes to standardized testing, but not some sort of once-in-a-lifetime one, and Hikikomorist seems to vouch for that as well.

it's usually hard to know how much of one's performance is due to nature and how much due to background, particularly at the top of the spectrum. perhaps someone had a highly academic family or upbringing so while they didn't exactly solve the actual lsat questions before taking the test, they were commonly exposed to the kind of thinking lsat tests. either way it wouldn't be unreasonable to say that acing the lsat cold isn't ordinary. if you can say relevant background details if possible that can be useful.

[yenisey]

What would you estimate it to be? At least 130?

I got an IQ of 133 but a 160- LSAT

[smaug]

What would you estimate it to be? At least 130?

I got an IQ of 133 but a 160- LSAT

lol u think iq is real

[asdfdfdfadfas]

What would you estimate it to be? At least 130?

I got an IQ of 133 but a 160- LSAT

lol u think iq is real

You should change your name to Smug.

I am kind of surprised this thread is still going.

[smaug]

What would you estimate it to be? At least 130?

I got an IQ of 133 but a 160- LSAT

lol u think iq is real

You should change your name to Smug.

I am kind of surprised this thread is still going.

i'm surprised you're still fighting at this point too

embrace defeat

[asdfdfdfadfas]

What would you estimate it to be? At least 130?

I got an IQ of 133 but a 160- LSAT

lol u think iq is real

You should change your name to Smug.

I am kind of surprised this thread is still going.

i'm surprised you're still fighting at this point too

embrace defeat

I already won, you maniacal Ego maniac.

[moorelsat]

Most people here haven't taken an IQ test (and no, that one you took online in 20 minutes doesn't count). I think a more interesting question would be whether there's a requisite SAT/ACT score for 170+, since pretty much everyone has taken one of those. I had a client who told me in confidence she scored a 25 on her ACT. She pulled a 170 on test day! The LSAT is a very learnable test, period.