A debate this evening with my wife, after she proclaimed one of her directors at work to be the most intelligent person she had ever physically met/ spoken with.
Lots of debate on the criteria for intelligent, but roughly defined as:
-high IQ
-exceptional depth of knowledge on specialist subjects
-range of interests/ knowledge e.g. not just chemistry, but music, history culture as well.
-an ability to articulate their knowledge to others
-a willingness/ desire to learn more in all areas.
Best I could come up with was my dissertation tutor at uni, but I feel that’s not a very satisfying answer, so maybe need to meet some more intelligent people!
Who have you met that blew your mind with theirs?
I know a few rocket scientists (and engineers)....
My girlfriend at university. Got a first and then a PhD and is now very high up in some large pharmaceutical company.
Rarely ever saw her study but instantly understood complex stuff.
Apparently, according to one of my daughter’s boyfriend’s after a holiday away, I was described as “surprisingly knowledgeable”! I know this doesn’t directly address the post but in the Fire Service we had at a certain period lots of miners (retained) and ex miners. They used what they called “pit logic”, solutions to the problems we faced at times came from that source. Qualification’s are not always the solution, some people can appear to be intelligent and be quite stupid and some people can appear to be stupid and be very intelligent!
Most of them attended Grassmoor University…
My mother. Hard science degree from Cambridge in the 50s and a masters ( from a very modest background so extra difficult) Extremely knowledgeable and well read both in her subjects and in general
common sense of a tree stump unfortunately and not much more emotional intelligence
One of the consultants I worked with always struck me as extremely intelligent as well and had emotional intelligence to go with it. I didn't know her well enough to be sure but I saw her take cocky male junior doctors down a peg or two effortlessly a couple of times with arcane knowledge and I never saw her stumped for an answer on anything. Brilliant woman. the best I have ever worked with.
Intelligence is rather more than the narrow definition you gave but thats going with your definition
I work in a lab surrounded by geniuses, one behind every door!
For sure, some of them would burn their house down trying to boil an egg, but others have huge intellect as well as deep subject knowledge.
I couldn't really pick any of them out and certainly won't name them but if forced I have one in mind - Prof of Quantum engineering and also a Doctor of Music and just an incredible warm, caring human being.
mcmoonter is one of the most intelligent blokes i have met.
the heart surgeon who mended my ticker, Steve Hunter was also pretty clued up.
My wife
Example one, we went trekking in Nepal. She might a phrase book. In under a week she sat buy the fire every night swapping life stories in Nepali and I’m reading a book
Example two, when the the kids were young she learnt and Latin Greek to stay keep her mind busy. Putting in about a third of the recommended time a week she’s was getting over 90% on every assignment
Example three, she went Oxford to do Geography. In one of her A level exams she wrote an essay on a topic she hasn’t been taught to make it more interesting
Oh and I taught called Shaun. Came back from his practice oxbridge interview saying that the guy who interviewed him said “I’ve been sat here doing an interview every 20 minutes but there weeks. Your the best I’ve seen by far”.
Oh and I taught Conor Travers the lad who one countdown at 14. He was clever
A girl in the neighbouring flat at uni. She was studying astrophysics (she got a 1st) but in moments of boredom she'd just casually learn Klingon or Latin, solve Rubiks Cube in 12 seconds, do a few watercolour paintings (that would gave earned her a 1st in art class...) and so on. She even attended lectures with her best friend in an entirely different subject and did insanely well at that too. She literally went to lectures that had no relevance to her own course just for fun, just for something else to learn!
Incredibly bright. Very very introverted though, really not a social person at all.
Makes me think of the laws of stupidity and the definition of stupidity (I think it was on this forum a few weeks ago?)
1. Bandits: people who gain at others expense
2. Helpless: people who benefit others at their own expense
3. Intelligent: people who provide gains for both themselves and others
4. Stupid: people who cost others without gaining, or even losing, something themselves.
For me a intelligent person can't just be very knowledgeable in one area. Could be the best mathematician in the world but if you have no common sense and can't cope with real life problems you are smart but not intelligent.
For me you need to be widely knowledgeable, have a specialist subject, be able to apply your knowledge, to solve a problem. Capable of learning outside your field quickly with humility.
I struggle with best but have met some very good people all with their own way of being.
My child, he knows everything
Apparently
A couple spring to find.
One is now a surgeon, but falls into the category of very, very clever but no common sense.
The other had no qualifications and learnt accountancy on the job, not a huge amount of knowledge about anything but his ability to work stuff out given any problem, not just work, but anything really, was impressive
Long time ago at my Uni.
One friend who is a physicist did not attend any lectures, not even once, at all at the Uni and graduated with high 2(1) and later worked at Lloyd. Another one from Birmingham was drinking a lot and hardly studied at all and graduated with 1st. Same for another few of them who got high 2(1) while spending times playing guitars. The way I see it, it's either you are born with it or you don't. i.e. high IQ and probably EQ too. Those were the days.
At work now I have know several colleagues with high IQ but also with high ego, but never both high IQ and EQ.
Depends on what you are meaning by intelligent, most amazing one was akin to a beautiful mind, where he was doing the maths in his head for each question with multiple steps and providing the answer way ahead of those with calculators. I've met others who are quiet and try to make the complicated simple, being foremost experts in their field (rocket science and aerospace), and i've met others where you are just left behind due to how vast their knowledge is and how quickly they are running through their solutions.
Same with mechanically minded folk i've worked with, they can tell what an issue is by sound, or feel, and be as accurate as any diagnostic kit.
A classmate in my A-level Biology and Chemistry classes at 6th form. I genuinely believe he could have been one of those "graduates from Oxbridge at 9 years old" types but he stuck around with the rest of us for the social side I guess. I remember him as a really funny and modest guy with unreal powers of comprehension; he simply "got" everything he was presented with in class and then some. Just googled him and it looks like he studied at both Oxford and Cambridge is now a consultant neurologist, lecturer and post-doc research fellow.
“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.”
Pfffffffff sigh, I don't really have much to offer intelligent people.
I used to work with a polymath.
Pick a subject, he'd know it in depth. Academic subjects like Physics, knowledge subjects like History, you name it. He took it upon himself to learn Russian for no other reason than it looked interesting.
He was also a practising Christian, an obligate carnivore, and a (mostly) recovering alcoholic.
Strange chap but very, very interesting.
In 2002, I worked for an opto-elctronic start up. 50 PhDs out of around 150 staff. Two PhDs in my team of seven. Some very smart people (I got thrown off my degree🤣). But some of them struggled to put their shoes on!
A life long friend is a head teacher, member of mensa with an iq of 148. I don't think he's that clever, but...he has an absolutely incredible memory. Not saying it's photographic, but he can recall in detail things from school, etc.
So my point here is, is he actually smart or because of his recall, he can remember stuff?
I was at school up to O levels with a lad who was really clever. He was bored in the run-up to O levels so he taught himself to speak Welsh from a book; later drank nearly half a bottle of whisky on the way into a chemistry exam (top grade but couldn't really remember being in there). Ended up doing natural sciences at some Oxbridge college and I heard he dropped out because everyone was so bloody pleased with themselves just for being clever. Bit chippy, then; maybe that was his flaw !
My wife's a doctor and when they were juniors one of the girls from her uni year told me about a lad who was on the training rotation with her "his brain works so much better than mine - totally different". Was a genuinely high-performing sportsman too (at least 2 - unrelated), but ded modest about it. Oh, and a nice bloke. Git
(On "photo-recall", give her the subject matter and I reckon my wife could probably still describe in detail pretty much any text book page, including her added notes, from her medical degree - terrifying. Married me though, so she's oot)
I once spent the afternoon in the company of Heinz Wolff showing round us round his lab @ Brunel
So my point here is, is he actually smart or because of his recall, he can remember stuff?
The issue is there's no empirical indicator of intelligence... for example, my old step father, very nice guy, dumb as a rock by acedemic standards.
But, he could drink ten pints, put a blindfold on, and strip, clean the valves and refit a cylinder head. Okay that's a slight exaggeration, but the guy could fix anything on a car without thinking about it or reading a manual. Put a Mensa test in front of him and the result would not be good.
Totally agree! My father was the same. Could fix anything. But when we got him his first computer, you could see the fear in his face.
A couple of people stand out, I was on a tour at the cancer research facility in Cambridge, after the tour we were given an informal talk by one of the research scientists. Very clever man with the ability to explain clever things to idiots 😀
I was a UKAS lab manager for a few years, a couple of the calibration services we supplied were unique within the uk so when it came time for us to be assessed another clever man would be dispatched from the national physical laboratory. Very knowledgeable chap about a wide range of subjects and some very interesting conversations were had, a mentally exhausting couple of days each visit for me though 😀
My sister, a clever woman herself was quite taken with Brian Cox when she met him at a works function, to the point she confessed to being a bit star struck. I think she'd have probably kidnapped him given half a chance.
By a long way my old boss who was also the owner of the business and someone quite famous and very wealthy.
The only problem being that his EQ was very low so he was often very difficult to deal with and is universally known as the rudest man in his industry, which he still dominates in the UK despite/because of that, mostly through sheer vision, obsession for detail, intimate knowledge of what people want and at what price, the quickest mind you can imagine, which all combine to make near perfect execution of his visionary and genius ideas.
I always admired him yet I am so happy I don't work for him and feel sorry for those who still do. I speak to some and they keep using the same expletives about him that they were using 25 years ago.
Alan Sugar? 🤣🤣
I agree that defining intelligence is impossible, but I think the variety of cases above shows that we all think about it differently, admire different aspects of it and know people who exhibit it in different ways.
To be honest I hadn’t really considered emotional intelligence- maybe because mine is lacking!?
To be honest I hadn’t really considered emotional intelligence- maybe because mine is lacking!?
A good point, I've met some technical genuises in my time, but have the social and life skills of gherkin.
One guy I used to work with springs to mind, an IT engineer... you could give him any problem, and I mean any problem and it would be fixed. Just could never get an explanation of what he did, or how he did it.... probably an astute M.O. on his behalf hahah!
Work in science/medicine and while I have never met a Nobel prize winner I have worked with/for many profs with well over 500 publications in cancer/haematology/genetics. Most intelligent or has the biggest impact with their work is hard to separate.
One died recently who was part of the initial classification which all leukaemia was based on for many years.
A good friend was a team leader at the Sanger in Cambridge, took a break from science only to come back to it and is an assoc prof at 36 in probably the worlds top cancer research hospital and is putting out about 20+ articles a year in Nature, Cell New England Journal of Medicine etc She is changing global practise in leukaemia with her work.
The one that most took me most by surprise was at a dinner surrounded by illustrious professors and I was sat next to someone and I got chatting to him. Turns out he is THE global expert in radiation and its impact and has been brought in by every government to consult on nuclear accidents from Chernobyl to Fukushima. Turned out he also won an Emmy!
Felt pretty in awe that evening
The spelling on this thread is some of the worst I have ever seen - and for me to notice it must be bad!
Trying to work out the correlation! 😀
-high IQ
-exceptional depth of knowledge on specialist subjects
-range of interests/ knowledge e.g. not just chemistry, but music, history culture as well.
-an ability to articulate their knowledge to others
-a willingness/ desire to learn more in all areas.
MCJnr probably. For someone not yet 20, his ability in all those areas is ridiculous. I've met friends of his at Cambridge who maybe have the specialist knowledge in their subjects, but they are proper nerds with a narrow range of skills.
This apple seems to have fallen a long way from the tree 🤔
Interesting that most of the above posts associate intelligence with formal qualifications and distinguished universities. Intelligence can be so much more (but I'm not in that club).
Interesting that most of the above posts associate intelligence with formal qualifications and distinguished universities. Intelligence can be so much more (but I’m not in that club).
It needs to be quantifiable with evidence otherwise not justifiable.
As one of my colleague used to say to me "I am a Chartered Engineer ..."
My wife's dad got a scholarship to Oxford a year early, then after that got another degree, chemistry I think from somewhere else. Or maybe chemistry was from Oxford.....**** all common sense though!
As an all rounder, my mate Pete. Just gets stuff. He works in insolvency.
I agree that a PHD etc is not the only market of being intelligent, but I imagine a lot of people with “huge brains” will have incidentally picked up some certificates along the way.
Sometimes those without formal qualifications are much more interesting and have less niche knowledge though.
I've gone out on the ale with a few Nobel prize winners and plenty of other scientists at that level - all are obviously very bright at the minimum, but it's not all brain-that-can-boil water stuff. They come in different shapes and sizes like anything else - great communicators, towering intellects, inspirational research Leaders etc - rarely all of these in one person. The most distinguishing thing is a sort of intellectual fearlessness to challenge the rules of science, backed up with an absolutely relentless work ethic to make it happen. They often have huge knowledge (some do not) but it is incidental - you don't change the course of science by knowing a lot of stuff.
Personally find genuine clinician scientists to be extremely impressive. Most are not as they're spread way too thin, often masked with comedy levels of arrogance (I mean you need huge self-belief to do anything in science, so arrogance is not unheard of, but medicine is just in a different league here). Worked with a couple of guys, though, would do their consultant rounds of the wards in the morning and then could sit in on research project meetings with complete command of the overall scientific picture. Not at the absolute technical level but still with insight and could problem solve - this takes big intellectual firepower.
There's a theme here.
For me, the most intelligent famous people I've met would be either Hannah Fry, or Jon Snow (the former CH4 news presenter). Both very smart people!
Outside of famous people...? Well my 1st serious GF was a bit smart... English literature graduate from Oxford, she was like a walking talking dictionary! She would use words that she genuinely knew the meanings of just to confuse me at times, and my vocabulary is far greater than most...
My sister though! Christ... 9 A*'s and 2 A's at GCSE level, 4 A's at A level, a 1st in History from Oxford... No common sense whatsoever though! But then she tells me she feels thick compared to her boyfriend who is an off the chart geek computer programmer! 🤷🏻♂️
My youngest step brother is another one... Not seen him in a few years (2 sides of the family drifted apart when my Dad divorced his mum), but recently found out he's the brains behind an alternative energy company specialising in Hydrogen which didn't surprise me at all. Doctorate in some sort of advanced geology, one of few people in the world at a certain level of qualification as he is apparently... Not surprising when you consider his dad was a Nuclear power station designer, and one of only about a dozen in the world qualified to do so! He was always a very humble young man (he'll be 35 soon) too, all he wanted to be when he was a kid was a footballer (because he was mad about football, not interested in the money). The irony is that the company he is the brains behind is valued at about £600m, and though he only owns 1/8th of it as he had to get the funding sourced to get it off the ground, that still means he's worth about £70m which is far more than he could have earnt as a footballer! 😂
A life long friend is a head teacher, member of mensa with an iq of 148.
I always thought MENSA entry was a minimum 150 IQ...? 🤷🏻♂️ Either way, I'm 144 here and know many, many people smarter than myself... I'm "the thick one" from my family after all! 😂
I don’t think he’s that clever, but…he has an absolutely incredible memory. Not saying it’s photographic, but he can recall in detail things from school, etc.
He's good at remembering stuff... I can recall incredible details about things that happened in my childhood, remember the registration numbers of my fathers' cars when growing up (as well as their models, specs, engine power etc.), but I can't remember somebody's name 30 seconds after being introduced to them! Damned if I can remember some of my riding mates' names sometimes even!!! It's quite embarrassing at times...
The only problem being that his EQ was very low so he was often very difficult to deal with
It's quite rare that IQ and EQ go hand in hand for sure... Which makes it all the more impressive when they do!
The clever kids had BBC micros?
The clever rich kids had BBC micros
A good point, I’ve met some technical genuises in my time, but have the social and life skills of gherkin.
The first chemical labs I worked at, the CEO rather reluctantly gave a job to a guy who had aced every part of the technical interview. He knew every part of every reaction you could think of and most that you couldn't. His technical chemistry knowledge was off the scale.
But he had absolutely zero social skills (hence the reluctance to employ him). Partly this was because he had a stammer so he'd spent uni holed up in his bedsit studying cos he was too embarrassed to go out and talk to anyone. He simply could not interact with anyone.
And while his theory knowledge was beyond question, his actual competence in putting the reaction into practice left a lot to be desired too. Kind of felt sorry for the guy but he was just not a good fit for the organisation.
I know some very intelligent people who are also extremely toxic.
Also ones that aren't.
I would much rather work with people of mediocre intellect who can work with other people, than those with towering in intellect that can't.
More productive.
Ive said this before on here
there are many different forms of intelligence. Psychologists debate the number and the definitions but all agree there is not one measure
Book learning, exam results and IQ tests only measure a very narrow range of this hence you get the folk who have multiple degrees but can't pour sand out of their shoes even if the instructions are written on the heel
I can't remember the definitions properly and can't be arsed to look them up but
Mathematical / analytical
Linguistic
Emotional
Kinasthetic ( thats movement and body control - so carpenters who can cut a straight line or footballers or rock climbers - those folk who can do things with their bodies that most folk cannot no matter how much they practice)
Synthesis is another aspect being able to see correlations in seemingly unrelated things
Musical is another.
There are more and these may not be quite right definitions but you get the idea its usually seen as 7-9 qualities IIRC
Its a very rare person who gets all of them Leonardo da Vinci would have scored highly on most if not all but these folk are one in a billion billion
This is why i am quite content with calling Johnson stupid 'cos while he has book learning and cunning he is an utter dunce scoring sub zero on most measures.
Lol at the Wikipedia entry in Ampthill’s post earlier
This is why i am quite content with calling Johnson stupid ‘cos while he has book learning and cunning he is an utter dunce scoring sub zero on most measures.
And yet he is a positive ****ing genius compared to his two current successors! 🤦🏻
Its a very rare person who gets all of them Leonardo da Vinci
Measured by their impact on humanity, Da Vinci would have to be the most intelligent person to have walked the earth, ever I would argue... Of course this is far easier to judge centuries after someone existed than it is in the here and now.
I always thought MENSA entry was a minimum 150 IQ…? 🤷🏻♂️ Either way, I’m 144 here and know many, many people smarter than myself… I’m “the thick one” from my family after all! 😂
I don't think that MENSA entry is based on IQ, although there is a test.
Apparently 0.13% of the population has an IQ above 145.
An opinion poll a few years back found that 65% of Americans thought they were above average intelligence, which I think is interesting. I wonder what a poll of STWers would reveal?
Personally I think the human brain has far too many complex functions to preform to make a sweeping generalisation of one individual's intelligence, it's impossible to measure in a meaningful way imo. Is creating a beautiful work of art a measure of someone's intelligence?
I wouldn't dismiss it as totally unimportant but I think that I attach far less importance to intelligence than many if not most people. It simply provides me with so little information about a person compared to other stuff.
For example knowing someone's IQ provides me no information concerning what they are capable of or anything about their character.
Da vinci could do theory, practical, synthesis and artistic ( which I missed in my list above) I don't know if he could dance tho ( kinaesthetic)
Is creating a beautiful work of art a measure of someone’s intelligence?
IIRC generally yes given as artistic intelligence is usually seen as one type of intelligence.
I wonder what what a poll of STWers would reveal?
I have never taken any IQ test but the result is probably embarrassing and they might want to investigate if my skull is empty.
Oh ya ... friend who never attended a lecture told me his MENSA was 145. He was quiet proud of his IQ test achievement and I congratulated him then proceed to search for pub nearby.
I don’t know if he could dance tho
How the **** is dancing a measure of intelligence?
Are you suggesting that people with no rhythm are less intelligent?
met a few nobel prize winners. My PhD supervisor is someone I would consider very intelligent.
I'm of average intelligence.
kinaesthetic intelligence. its generally accepted as a form of intelligence. If you are any good as a carpenter you will have high kinaesthetic intelligence being able to cut accurate lines in wood. I can't. same as a dancer or a rock climber of a footballer. Kinaesthetic intelligence
its a generally accepted form of intelligence
Intelligence is about far more than book learning and IQ test
As above - psychologists debate exactly how to define this and come up with differnt numbers of types but almost all would agree there are multiple types. this is the harvard definitions 8 types
I think Ernie is rattled by the dance comment. He's fell off his perch on the fence.
"allmost all psychologists" actually may be pushing it for all of these definitions but its certainly accepted that no one measure can measure intelligence
At school in the 70s I was tested for two different aspects. IQ test( mathmatical / analytical) and VRQ ( verbal reasoning quotient)
Few folk would doubt emotional intelligence is real
Interesting 8 types of definitions.
I think I am screwed in this life. Oh well, I guess I have to do better in my next reincarnation.
Kinaesthetic intelligence
it's a generally accepted form of intelligence
It's bad news for white people then.
I think Ernie is rattled by the dance
Well yeah although I did Argentine Tango lessons. And I am relieved to hear TJ mention 'artistic intelligence'....O level art is one of two O levels that I managed to get. It's good to know that you are not entirely thick.
Ernie - from what I have seen over the years on here you would score highly ion some measures especially emotional intelligence. I've read the posts you make when folk are in distress.
Where you any good at dancing the tango?
My niece would, I think, do well.
First in bio-chemistry; reasearch in cystic fibrosis at John Radcliffe in Oxford; currently PhD student at Cambridge.
Socially adept, personable, funny.
Where you any good at dancing the tango?
No not very good. I don't think Tango is difficult other than it only looks good when danced with passion. TBH Tango can move me to tears.
I can honestly say that I once danced the Tango on New Year's Eve in Argentina on a dance floor watched by an embarrassingly large crowd. I was rubbish. I used to be much better at lindy hop/jive type stuff.
Tango can move me to tears.
It's probably the bubbles getting up your nose.
It’s probably the bubbles getting up your nose.
👏🏼
My father. He moved from New Zealand to Oxford on a Rhodes scholarship, stayed there and ended up as the principal of a college. I knew he was clever, he was a linguist and learnt new languages for fun, he taught himself Welsh as a hobby because we holidayed in Snowdonia every Easter, he said it was the hardest language to learn that used the Roman alphabet. He also spoke French, Spanish, Portuguese, Greek, Russian and Arabic. The shame is that I never really knew just how clever he was until after he died, at his memorial service many of his old friends who were pretty serious academics themselves, told me that he was the most intelligent person they'd ever met.
He was also very emotionally intelligent, very sociable, and something of a polymath as well as a polyglot, in my first year at Cambridge he used to discuss maths and physics with me and showed an advanced knowledge of the subject.
My Mother decided when she married him and moved to Oxford, that she needed to acquire a skill to give her kudos in Oxford academic circles, so worked in a contemporary art gallery, ending up as Managing Director, pretty impressive for someone born into a very wealthy "country squire" family. She was expected to marry the Lord Right (not just a plain Mr .Right). She comprehensively rejected her wealthy background by marrying an impoverished colonial academic, which shows a real strength of character.
I was very lucky to have two wonderful kind parents, the down side being that I am clearly a combination of all the worst aspects of my parents while my sister is a brilliant linguist and really lovely as well.
Professor John Roswell, edited all the five Volumes of British Plant Communities must have taken 25 years. He is also a Reverend and an extremely approachable and kind hearted man, taught me a lot and it was him who first sparked my interest in hay meadows.
It’s quite rare that IQ and EQ go hand in hand for sure… Which makes it all the more impressive when they do!
Yes, unbeatable combo. Unless you can also do it in different languages.
Relatively low EQ with high IQ on the other hand is unbearable and the stuff of dictators while the reverse normally makes for very nice people.
Few folk would doubt emotional intelligence is real
Is it learnable / teachable though? And is it measurable? Ditto 'common sense'.
Neither can mathematical or linguistic intelligence
You can teach skills on top but you cannot teach intelligence imo
Really fascinating interview with the guy who made the Senna film and recent Bernie Ecclestone biopic. Gave the view that Bernie for all his faults was incredibly sharp and intelligent
Wasn’t someone I would have thought of!
Murray Gell Mann. He gave a lecture in the London that was pretty good many years ago
Neither can mathematical or linguistic intelligence
You can teach skills on top but you cannot teach intelligence imo
But how much of what's termed 'emotional intelligence' comes down to learning experiences and how much is genetic? If you took identical twins and subjected them to entirely different upbringings, would they have the same level of emotional intelligence? What about 'IQ'?
I know none of this is remotely straightforward, but you draw broad brushstrokes with more conventional intelligence - there's a difference between being 'intelligent' and 'academic' for example. Fwiw, in academia at least, what seemed to me to separate bright lecturers from extraordinary ones was the ability to explain really complex ideas simply. Or maybe that's just what makes for a good lecturer.
Anyway, huge, futile, rabbit-hole to go down.
Sergey Brin, understands and gets to the core of a problem about 20 times faster than anyone I've ever met, it's surreal.
Neither can mathematical or linguistic intelligence
You can teach skills on top but you cannot teach intelligence imo
ps: how do you (think) you know this? I genuinely have no idea and am happy to admit that.
Reading and education
An opinion poll a few years back found that 65% of Americans thought they were above average intelligence, which I think is interesting. I wonder what a poll of STWers would reveal?
I reckon i'd be in the top half ;o)
I think the most intelligent person I know is a professor of structural Engineering at a University in Delft.
I've worked with him a few times over the last 10-12 years - his subject knowledge is off the scale, however he's also interesting, empathetic and good company.
Reading and education
No, I meant how do you know that emotional intelligence cannot be taught or stem from environmental factors, which I think is what you said earlier.
When I was younger I used to rent a little upper floor flat in the house of a couple in their late 70s for about a year. She was lovely, he really didn't talk much, shuffled around the house in slippers with papers and books and was in the study most of the time. Gave him the peace and space he seemed to want and tried not to be annoying when I'd come back muddy from rides or creep out at 1-2am to drive me and a mate to N Wales when there was any snow + ice about.
He was into maths and cosmology and had been influential in his field. Name was Penrose, said to be one of the greatest living physicists. I only realised this a few years after I moved out. At the time I thought he was a retired professor maybe.
One regret in life is not realising who he was and that I didn't make more effort to get to know him a little.
Noel Edmonds.
RM.
You can teach skills on top but you cannot teach intelligence imo
The definition of Intelligence is the ability to acquire and apply knowledge or skill, so yes, it can be taught.
Ah
Ermmm. Im not smart enough to explain. You can teach someone social skills but is that the same?
You can learn to score highly on IQ tests. Does that mean you are getting more intelligent?
I did so many IQ tests in my teens my score went up 15 pts. IQ tests measure how good you are at doing IQ tests not intelligence
No amount of training could make me into something I do not have the inate ability in.
Nickc. Thats not teaching intelligence. Thats teaching how to apply it.
How would you teach me to be a genius?
Im degree level amart just about. Im not phd in hard science smart. Hiw would you teach me to be phd level smart
