What is Intelligence?

[couch-potato]

What is intelligence, anyway? When I was in the army, I received the kind of aptitude test that all soldiers took and, against a normal of 100, scored 160. No one at the base had ever seen a figure like that, and for two hours they made a big fuss over me. (It didn't mean anything. The next day I was still a buck private with KP - kitchen police - as my highest duty.)
All my life I've been registering scores like that, so that I have the complacent feeling that I'm highly intelligent, and I expect other people to think so too. Actually, though, don't such scores simply mean that I am very good at answering the type of academic questions that are considered worthy of answers by people who make up the intelligence tests - people with intellectual bents similar to mine?

For instance, I had an auto-repair man once, who, on these intelligence tests, could not possibly have scored more than 80, by my estimate. I always took it for granted that I was far more intelligent than he was. Yet, when anything went wrong with my car I hastened to him with it, watched him anxiously as he explored its vitals, and listened to his pronouncements as though they were divine oracles - and he always fixed my car.

Well, then, suppose my auto-repair man devised questions for an intelligence test. Or suppose a carpenter did, or a farmer, or, indeed, almost anyone but an academician. By every one of those tests, I'd prove myself a moron, and I'd be a moron, too. In a world where I could not use my academic training and my verbal talents but had to do something intricate or hard, working with my hands, I would do poorly. My intelligence, then, is not absolute but is a function of the society I live in and of the fact that a small subsection of that society has managed to foist itself on the rest as an arbiter of such matters.

Consider my auto-repair man, again. He had a habit of telling me jokes whenever he saw me. One time he raised his head from under the automobile hood to say: "Doc, a deaf-and-mute guy went into a hardware store to ask for some nails. He put two fingers together on the counter and made hammering motions with the other hand. The clerk brought him a hammer. He shook his head and pointed to the two fingers he was hammering. The clerk brought him nails. He picked out the sizes he wanted, and left. Well, doc, the next guy who came in was a blind man. He wanted scissors. How do you suppose he asked for them?"

Indulgently, I lifted by right hand and made scissoring motions with my first two fingers. Whereupon my auto-repair man laughed raucously and said, "Why, you dumb jerk, He used his voice and asked for them." Then he said smugly, "I've been trying that on all my customers today." "Did you catch many?" I asked. "Quite a few," he said, "but I knew for sure I'd catch you." "Why is that?" I asked. "Because you're so goddamned educated, doc, I knew you couldn't be very smart."

And I have an uneasy feeling he had something there.

From: Asimov, "What is Intelligence?"

couch-potato Reviewed by couch-potato on 04-03-2008. What is Intelligence? What is intelligence, anyway? When I was in the army, I received the kind of aptitude test that all soldiers took and, against a normal of 100, scored 160. No one at the base had ever seen a figure like that, and for two hours they made a big fuss over me. (It didn't mean anything. The next day I was still a buck private with KP - kitchen police - as my highest duty.) All my life I've been registering scores like that, so that I have the complacent feeling that Rating: 5

[iStaaHi]

yeh,, i know what your sayin,, people are on diffeeertn planes of education,, klike, they might be as smart at knowing shit, they know different things tho,, i dono, im pretty stonde,, i know whta your sayin tho

[samostalan]

In my eyes, as long as you don't posses ignorance, you have intelligence. But intelligence differs from person to person; everyone specializes in their subject of choice. I agree with that entry though, pretty interesting way of looking at it.

[Breukelen advocaat]

The only requirement to join MENSA is a high IQ. Many of it's members are just regular people.

From their website:

There is simply no one prevailing characteristic of Mensa members other than high IQ...........Mensans range in age from 4 to 94, but most are between 20 and 60. In education they range from preschoolers to high school dropouts to people with multiple doctorates. There are Mensans on welfare and Mensans who are millionaires. As far as occupations, the range is staggering. Mensa has professors and truck drivers, scientists and firefighters, computer programmers and farmers, artists, military people, musicians, laborers, police officers, glassblowers--the diverse list goes on and on. There are famous Mensans and prize-winning Mensans, but there are many whose names you wouldn't know.Mensa Information

[Coelho]

"Because you're so goddamned educated, doc, I knew you couldn't be very smart."

Man... thats true indeed... most people who are too educated ends being lost in their own knowledge, and simply cant think in simple ways. Ive noticed it with my teachers. As more highly educated they were (Several PhDs, etc), harder they were to understand. Yet as less educated, easier they were to understand. Both could teach the same subjects, but the more educated ones would complicate it more.
The only ones who are not this way are the true geniuses, who can solve the hardest problems thinking in the simplest ways.

[organick]

Asimov, Rodale, this place gives me hope for the human race yet, peace out growers.

[psychocat]

IMO Intelligence isn't worth a thing if it isn't coupled with common sense.
I have often been told in my life that I am very intelligent but it hasn't prevented me making some very stupid mistakes.

[eggrole1]

Last time I took one of those tests I was so baked and got 142 I think lol. Ever since I was a little kid I scored high in stuff like SAT test etc.

I agree that your IQ generally doens't make you a smart or dumb person, and that the higher/lower it is the more difficulty you have "connecting" with people simply because after about 30 points difference there is a large enough gap in the way people think it is hard for them to relate.

I for example possess litle to no "common sense". I don't remember birthdays, phone numbers, hell I get lost all the time minutes from my house on commonly traveled roads. At the same time I can rattle off facts that pertain to things I deem fit to remember and are generally more acedemic in nature.

The point I wanted to make it that IQ is a rating that (i think) is more about your potential to learn. In your mechanic example, you have the potential to learn to do the same work as they do but they may not have the potential to be a physicist for example.

These tests generally looks at the approach you take to problem solving, more than the solution itself.

[twitch]

the ability to learn from ur mistakes

[psychocat]

the ability to learn from ur mistakes

Very intelligent answer. :thumbsup: