Do you know a Genius?

[Nico III]

I've not taken an IQ test or anything similar, so I don't know if I'm "technically" a genius. I'm pretty confident that I'm not.
The sheer amount of people here claiming to be is making me doubtful of the requirements to be labelled as one. That's not meant to insult the intelligence of those who are, but in my opinion geniuses should be few and far between and outstanding in their mental capacity. It seems that the tests people here are taking are throwing the term around a bit too loosely.

 

[FuktLogik]

Yep. He's a good friend of mine, but my response to 30% of our conversations is just "Oh yeah", "Right", "I see". Sometimes he just losses me entirely and I just nod to keep up my end of it.

 

[Bullfrog1983]

If you are talking about an IQ test, then yes - it's me. Although I know many people who are smarter than I am in ways unmeasured by the IQ test.

 

[Kryzantine]

I am deathly curious as to whether I know this person IRL, and it would be impressive if I did, to compare intelligence.

So, not mentioning names, I actually do know this person. This has been considerably useful in coming to the conclusion that genius is a more subjective term than most of us make it out to be, and it makes me doubt the IQ tests more. And I'm not sure if we can objectify it, or if we should objectify it. There are many ways of thinking, some of them with strong areas and some with weaker areas.

I think a problem with genius is that we're dealing with a very limited set here. As it is useless to determine the "smartest person", so it is to do so with our current definition of genius. A better way of posing the original question would be asking if we feel we know anyone who may belong to an intellectual elite - the top 5% of the population. I feel that is a suitable range for whom a wide span of people may consider genius.