Poll: What do you judge intelligence by?

[KeithA45]

Inspired by a recent thread, and an old girlfriend.

At one point my girlfriend (when I was dating her) told me that she thought she was smarter than me because she's read more books than I have. To be blunt and honest, this infuriates me. I thought I was pretty smart because I'm in advanced math and science courses but I realize even that is biased.

So I'll ask the general public: What do you judge intelligence by?

EDIT: New choice - Perspective/Awareness of self and others

 

[Arsen]

Perspective, morality, knowledge, common sense, tolerance, understanding, wisdom, and the soul.

No numbers or grades attached.
All that tells me is that you studied facts. It has nothing to do with intelligence, just the amount of facts.

 

[Erana]

I know its from an unsuspecting source, but, "Just because you're a genius, doesn't mean you're a smart guy."
Yes, the Powerpuff girls. Their father was extremely intelligent, but kinda dim in some situations.

Intelligence to me is generally just book smarts.
Or an RPG stat.

 

[ace_of_something]

If you laugh at my jokes it shows intelligence.

Watching a lot of VH-1 Reality shows displays a lack of intelligence.

 

[Hunde Des Krieg]

Grades don't mean shit.
They are an indicator of work ethic, not intelligence.
I know a lot of idiots from High school that got good grades.

 

[EeveeElectro]

I've never really thought about this before...
I'd say a mixture of all of them.

 

[Sewblon]

I chose logic. I have been studying for the SAT for months and I have concluded that it is all bunk, bollocks and moonshine.

 

[countrysteaksauce]

Wouldn't intelligence really be the sum of all things?

They might as well rename the SAT the "basic competence test" though.
You can usually forget about one half of it once you've chosen a major.

 

[Abedeus]

I know its from an unsuspecting source, but, "Just because you're a genius, doesn't mean you're a smart guy."
Yes, the Powerpuff girls. Their father was extremely intelligent, but kinda dim in some situations.

Intelligence to me is generally just book smarts.
Or an RPG stat.

Actually, I think that if D20 did one thing right, it's separating Wisdom from Intelligence. That's why you can create a crazy (that is, mad) but intelligent Wizard, or a very wise Cleric with little knowledge per se.


When it comes to me, few things define intelligence:

- Reading books. Intelligent people read books that are challenging and witty. Reading Forgotten Realms is not really high-brow, neither is J.K. Rowling. Or Twilight...

- Logic. The more intelligent person, the more logical it is.

- Common sense. I know, it contradicts with the Wisdom and Intelligence stats I've just mentioned, but someone intelligent has a lot of common sense. More than an idiot, at least.

Things that do not define intelligence.

- Math/Science doesn't mean a lot. Just learning useless things...

- Number of facts/dates/so on, while can indicate if someone is smart or not, doesn't show intelligence. It just means a person has a good memory.

- Classes, grades and so on don't mean a shit.

Wouldn't intelligence really be the sum of all things?

No, not all things. But few of them, yes.

 

[countrysteaksauce]

Wouldn't intelligence really be the sum of all things?

No, not all things. But few of them, yes.

What things are to be excluded?

 

[Susano]

I don't think that you can judge intelligence by one single thing.
It is a compiling of things, it's like saying that because I know absoloutly everything there is to know on the subject of how sand is formed[/example] that I am a complete geinius, I'm nnot, I just happen to have a weird obsession with sand

 

[Abedeus]

Wouldn't intelligence really be the sum of all things?

No, not all things. But few of them, yes.

What things are to be excluded?

Grades. Being good at Math and Science, because for example Einstein was a bit worse at school in those subjects than I am, yet he's one of the greatest minds in the history of mankind. Also, memory. While I know people with great memory, they are hardly intelligent. Maybe because they usually use that memory to remember useless things from school, I don't know. The fact is, it doesn't make them more intelligent.

 

[goater24]

I judge peoples intellegence on a number of variables. Not nescassarily academia because although it demonstrates their ability to learn in a scholastic way. I have a friend who is in a very well paid IT job with barely a GCSE to his name. School teaching did not work for him, but instead he taught himself and found work based on the skills he aquired himself.

I think intellegent people should also understand psychology, human nature and the world around them. You would be suprised at how clever you are if you do master these disciplines. To be able to hold a persons attention, to read peoples body language and understand how your actions affect the world around you. I have friends who are doctors with moire awards than you can shake a stick at. But at the same time can barely hold a conversation, have no idea how to talk to people and don't understand why others find it so hard to learn from them. They can write a thesis but cannot hold a dinner party or interact with the world around them.

There are many other fascets of what makes a person intelligent but I choose my friends based on who they are not how much they know. It makes it easier for me to manipulate them. I jest, but this debate intrests me. I'll book mark this one!

 

[Pseudonym2]

Wouldn't intelligence really be the sum of all things?

No, not all things. But few of them, yes.

What things are to be excluded?

Grades. Being good at Math and Science, because for example Einstein was a bit worse at school in those subjects than I am, yet he's one of the greatest minds in the history of mankind. Also, memory. While I know people with great memory, they are hardly intelligent. Maybe because they usually use that memory to remember useless things from school, I don't know. The fact is, it doesn't make them more intelligent.

Einstein being bad a math is a myth. What happened was he switched school systems from one school that 6 as the highest to another that had 1 as the highest. By the time he was twelve, he was helping teach the class and taking advanced calculus on his own time.

Most of the things the OP listed only measure education not intelligence.

 

[scape]

Perspective

 

[countrysteaksauce]

Wouldn't intelligence really be the sum of all things?

No, not all things. But few of them, yes.

What things are to be excluded?

Grades. Being good at Math and Science, because for example Einstein was a bit worse at school in those subjects than I am, yet he's one of the greatest minds in the history of mankind. Also, memory. While I know people with great memory, they are hardly intelligent. Maybe because they usually use that memory to remember useless things from school, I don't know. The fact is, it doesn't make them more intelligent.

Sure grades can be skewed or perhaps attributed to just who has a greater work ethic. Though such willpower is an intelligence in and of itself. You can't just throw those out the window.
Still, Einstein did exceptionally well at mathematics and relatively poorly in the languages. According to your thinking, all his grades would have to be invalidated, though he clearly had a mastery of mathematics.


You still have to know facts to analyze the consequences and ascertain the possibilities, hence intelligence. Is there another way to attain these facts than through memorization? Certainly, you need one to have to other. Just think if memorization did not exist; do you think the modern world would be possible? Perhaps rote memorization is useless if not applied, but it certainly contributes to intelligence.

It's not like Einstein's ideas came to him in a dream; he had to know the facts prior to analyzing them and such.

Edit:

Einstein being bad a math is a myth. What happened was he switched school systems from one school that 6 as the highest to another that had 1 as the highest. By the time he was twelve, he was helping teach the class and taking advanced calculus on his own time.

Most of the things the OP listed only measure education not intelligence.

Pseudonym2 is right about this, you can check it yourself.

 

[Abedeus]

Wouldn't intelligence really be the sum of all things?

No, not all things. But few of them, yes.

What things are to be excluded?

Grades. Being good at Math and Science, because for example Einstein was a bit worse at school in those subjects than I am, yet he's one of the greatest minds in the history of mankind. Also, memory. While I know people with great memory, they are hardly intelligent. Maybe because they usually use that memory to remember useless things from school, I don't know. The fact is, it doesn't make them more intelligent.

Sure grades can be skewed or perhaps attributed to just who has a greater work ethic. Though such willpower is an intelligence in and of itself. You can't just throw those out the window.
Still, Einstein did exceptionally well at mathematics and relatively poorly in the languages. According to your thinking, all his grades would have to be invalidated, though he clearly had a mastery of mathematics.


You still have to know facts to analyze the consequences and ascertain the possibilities, hence intelligence. Is there another way to attain these facts than through memorization? Certainly, you need one to have to other. Just think if memorization did not exist; do you think the modern world would be possible? Perhaps rote memorization is useless if not applied, but it certainly contributes to intelligence.

It's not like Einstein's ideas came to him in a dream; he had to know the facts prior to analyzing them and such.

You got it wrong.

It's one thing to have the informations. Another thing is analyzing them and processing.

That's why your computer can have a 1TB HDD, but if it's a single-cored Pentium 600 with a GeForce 2 MX, it's going to suck anyway. As it won't be able to process all those informations as fast as a new Intel Core i7 and a triple SLI GeForce 280.

 

[TheMonkeySlayer]

I judge intelligence by knowledge about internet memes.

 

[kawligia]

I judge intelligence by knowledge about internet memes.

O RLY?

 

[_Janny_]

Grades don't mean shit.
They are an indicator of work ethic, not intelligence.
I know a lot of idiots from High school that got good grades.

Amen to that... Some geniuses get bored in class and can get low grades. So from the school's point of view they're retards.

I think that a person is intelligent if he/she can hold a proper conversation, if he/she can get involved in a debate and things like that.