No Deal, Paul
Kevin Langdon, 1997
Paul Maxim has made a clumsy attempt to blackmail me into certifying that his childhood test scores qualify him for admission to the Prometheus and Mega Societies. The deal he proposed in his letter to Bob Kopp in this issue of Vidya shows the hypocrisy underlying his vendetta against me.
I tried to entice Mr. Maxim into going farther out on a limb by asking him, through Bob Kopp, if he would be willing to agree to the following statement (without giving any indication that I was willing to agree to Mr. Maxim's statement):
I have recently been made aware of the soundness of the norming of the Langdon Adult Intelligence Test and of Kevin Langdon's work in psychometrics generally. I am willing to acknowledge the correctness of Mr. Langdon's business practices and the absence of any fraudulent acts or intentions in his dealings with members of the high-I.Q. societies.
Mr. Maxim often does stupid things, but he didn't bite on this one.
I have a few comments on Mr. Maxim's letter:
As I mentioned to you over the phone, Kevin Langdon has recently complained that I have made ``personal attacks'' against him, and has demanded that they cease. He has also threatened to sue the Editor of NOESIS, Rick Rosner, if NOESIS publishes any more material critical of Mr. Langdon. This threat could have a damaging and inhibitory effect on the operation of NOESIS, which up until now has been a free press. I believe Mr. Langdon has also threatened legal action in his conversations with Dale Adams, our Ombudsman (just as he did in his conversations with you last year), since Adams recently indicated to me that the ``possibility of a lawsuit'' was inhibiting him from performing his duties as Ombudsman (please see his letter to me of October 9, enclosed).
I have mentioned legal action only with regard to Mr. Maxim's unsubstantiated accusations of fraud, which are libelous.
Of course, Mr. Langdon ventures to object only when he is the target of attack, and finds it perfectly acceptable when he (and his henchman, Bob Dick) use their own organ to attack me, without allowing me right of response, as they have done consistently and repeatedly since 1995.
Mr. Maxim's complaint to Harold Nickel, the Ombudsman of Prometheus, was published along with Mr. Nickel's conclusion that it was without merit, which did not include any personal attack on Mr. Maxim. He is not entitled to claim personal privilege on the basis of Mr. Nickel's disagreement with his opinions. Furthermore, I am not aware of a response of any kind being submitted by Mr. Maxim for publication in Gift of Fire.
HOWEVER, in the interest of promoting greater harmony within the high-IQ groups, and because our paramount objective is the pursuit of intellectual attainment, not polemical dispute, I am willing to make a conciliatory gesture toward Mr. Langdon, as long as he is willing to make one toward me in return.
Mr. Maxim is willing to be intellectually dishonest if I will do likewise.
I am willing to suspend all personal attacks against Mr. Langdon, so long as he is willing to rectify his unfair and prejudicial appraisal of my IQ credentials, and accept them at the value as placed upon them by the professional psychometricians responsible for their generation.
The ``professional psychometricians'' responsible for creation of tests such as those to which Mr. Maxim refers very carefully avoid any claim that the tests are capable of measuring intelligence at the four sigma level, let alone at 4.75 sigma.
In other words, Mr. Langdon must stop attempting to impose on me and my credentials his own ``personal'' psychometric theories, which are aimed at derogating all standard tests, in favor of the products that he and Dr. Hoeflin produce.
The better standard tests do an adequate job of assessing intellectual ability up to about 3.5 sigma. Above that point, they don't discriminate reliably. I have nothing against standard tests when they are used for the purpose for which they were designed.
If you are willing to act as ``go-between'' or negotiator in this matter, I believe you may be able thereby to play an instrumental role in its resolution. Personally, I cannot think of anyone better qualified than you to do this, because of your reputation as a responsible officer of the TNS Society, as an ``honest broker,'' and as a nice guy. Here is the statement I am presenting to you for transmittal to Mr. Langdon. If he is willing to endorse it and return it to you, I believe this conflict can be fairly and satisfactorily resolved: DRAFT STATEMENT BY KEVIN LANGDON: ``I have recently been made aware of certain IQ credentials pertaining to PAUL MAXIM, which I was not aware of when I debarred his entry into the Prometheus Society in early 1995. In view of this new information, I am willing to acknowledge that Mr. Maxim's aggregate IQ score on three standard tests qualifies him for admission to the Prometheus and Mega Societies. These tests cannot be characterized as `midrange' at the point that Mr. Maxim took them, since at that point they each had a ceiling high enough to accommodate a 4.75 sigma score, as is attested (in part) by the data published by Dr. Hoeflin in connectiion with his Mega Test norming.''
Let's recall what ``this conflict'' consists of: Mr. Maxim wrote to me inquiring as to my opinion of the adequacy of the CTMM for measuring intelligence at the four sigma level, without revealing why he was asking. I replied that the CTMM is a poor test in general and that it lacks sufficient ceiling to discriminate at that level (I subsequently discovered that the ceiling for adults is 158).
Mr. Maxim then proceeded to apply for admission to the Prometheus Society and the Mega Society on the basis of his score on the CTMM. I advised the officers of the Prometheus Society that, as Prometheus does not accept scores on the CTMM, Mr. Maxim's application should be denied. After Prometheus declined to accept him as a member on the basis of his CTMM score, Mr. Maxim began a yearlong campaign of derogation of my work in psychometrics and personal attacks on me, including repeated accusations of fraud.
I had no power to ``debar'' Mr. Maxim's admission to the Prometheus Society. I am a member of Prometheus, but I am not an officer of that society. I did consult with the officers of Prometheus and urged them not to give in to Mr. Maxim's pressure to admit him despite his lack of the credentials required according to the society's admission standards.
His groundless accusations of fraud and his blackmail attempt show unmistakably that he is a man without principles willing to sell his soul to gain the object of his ambition.
I hope that members of TNS have recognized Mr. Maxim's true colors and will give no credence to his wild accusations in the future.