Althouse: "Is an IQ of 135 considered high? Is an IQ of 135 as 'genius' as everyone says it is?"

March 27, 2018

"Is an IQ of 135 considered high? Is an IQ of 135 as 'genius' as everyone says it is?"

"If so, why do I feel so incompetent and unintelligent if I'm statistically the smartest guy in the room? I'm 16 years old."

A Quora question with a great answer from "Ted Galpin, Astrophysicist cheerleader turned professional strategist."

116 comments:

Expat(ish) said...: I was friends, generally, with the smartest people in the room when I was in high school. I didn't notice that it made them happier, just that it was easier for them to get good grades.

-XC

PS - I was definitely under no illusions that I was the smartest. Or the hardest working. Or the happiest, though I think I enjoyed h/s more than average because I had a bit of a "this too shall pass" viewpoint.; 3/27/18, 9:46 AM
traditionalguy said...: 135 is standard issue intelligence. You need to add social intelligence.; 3/27/18, 9:46 AM
rhhardin said...: Vicki Hearne said IQ test word questions test how quickly you can believe things.; 3/27/18, 9:53 AM
Etienne said...: When I took the Armed Forces Entrance Exam, I was shocked to see that I scored a 30 in Admin. I believe the max was 95, but my memory has faded. I remember the low score though. I score 80 in General, and 85 in electronics and mechanics.

The recruiter said it was probably a fluke of some kind, or I was deliberately trying to fail, because no one scores that low in Admin unless they drag their knuckles when they walk.

I straightened myself up and got on the bus back home.

I've only taken one IQ test. I don't remember the score, but it was not high. I didn't place any value on it, as I had marketable skills at the time.; 3/27/18, 9:54 AM
Fernandinande said...: "Anybody could have figured out general relativity or the photo electric effect"

No, that's not true.

"Which means you probably never had to "struggle" and "Build Character" on a day to day basis like most kids."

LOL. Because the only struggles kids have are based on their relative intelligence. /sarc

Kind of a dorky article.

IQ 135 = top 1%, and no, that's not genius level.; 3/27/18, 9:54 AM
Leland said...: I never had my IQ tested, at least to my knowledge, but what Ted Galpin states is my own experience. I was the kid in school that could turn in math tests, with all questions answered at near 100% accuracy before the teacher could finish handing out the test and sit back down. It was easy stuff, but not everything was easy. Complex items could be done fairly fast, but it was easy to skip steps too, which did not always result in a good outcome. And the ability to skip steps and find an answer to things was awkward in social settings. I'd be talking about step 5 while everyone else in a group was talking about step 2.

College changed that for me, because most people there were equally intelligent, and I went through ROTC, which enforced discipline. I was forced to work through steps whether easy or hard.

But I wouldn't consider myself genius. Just really good at math and a few things similarly related. And I have to be very careful with my diet (I can barely have any caffeine) and knowledge input, because it is very difficult to shutdown my mind at night and have a relaxing sleep.

At work, we now talk about EQ, emotional quotient, and looking for personnel with high EQ.; 3/27/18, 9:56 AM
Matt Sablan said...: Eh, I've never felt like the smartest person in a room. I kind of prefer it that way.; 3/27/18, 10:00 AM
mockturtle said...: Years ago, I received an invitation to join Mensa [which I tossed] but have no idea where they would have obtained information on my IQ.; 3/27/18, 10:00 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: I'm certainly not an expert at IQ, but a lot of this does not ring true to me. Maybe my parents made me do things that built my character in other ways.; 3/27/18, 10:01 AM
Henry said...: That is a great response.

One thing that is implied, if not called out strongly, is the impact of life skills. You can have a great IQ and make really bad life decisions. And that would be dumb.; 3/27/18, 10:02 AM
mockturtle said...: Having known several geniuses, I know I'm not in their class.; 3/27/18, 10:02 AM
roesch/voltaire said...: 96%of folks fall between 70 and 130 so 135 is hardly standard issue; in my own experience taking IQ tests over a sixty year time span I have seen fluctuations by as much as 20pts and view these as approximations-- the few genus that I know have revealed their IQs to be well above 135 and based on their accomplishments I can believe them. In any case you don't need a high IQ to be a decent person, or a moral person capable of living a rich and meaningful life.; 3/27/18, 10:03 AM
Saint Croix said...: that's interesting

I got a fast brain; 3/27/18, 10:03 AM
mockturtle said...: True, R/V. Intelligence ≠ wisdom.; 3/27/18, 10:05 AM
Henry said...: There's another answer, not covered by Ted Galpin's answer. High IQ does not necessarily mean glibness. There are many people with superior verbal skills who can talk rings around a person who is actually much smarter.

Good verbal skills combined with good intelligence may help you win arguments. It does not necessarily lead you to correct conclusions. This enters thinking fast and slow territory, wherein the talent of the verbally adroit and reasonably smart person is to turn their hunches into convincing verbal expressions faster than the other guy.; 3/27/18, 10:07 AM
Fernandinande said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 3/27/18, 10:10 AM
Fernandinande said...: That "cheerleader" sounded funny. I get the impression the guy is running some kind of scam.

Ted S Galpin SPP, CCP
Management Consultant
Strategic Science
Commerce City, CO

SPP = ? = "Socialist People's Party"

CCP = ? = "Certified Cheese Professional" ?; 3/27/18, 10:11 AM
readering said...: Hmm. He's, like, really smart. A stable genius.; 3/27/18, 10:11 AM
Fritz said...: How smart are the people who write IQ tests. Can they test the intelligence of people who are smarter than they are?; 3/27/18, 10:13 AM
Brian said...: The principal experience, for me, was loneliness. Fortunately this is just another problem that can be solved if you think about it intensely enough.; 3/27/18, 10:15 AM
Freeman Hunt said...: That really is a great answer.; 3/27/18, 10:15 AM
Sebastian said...: "Is an IQ of 135 considered high? Is an IQ of 135 as 'genius' as everyone says it is?"

This genius couldn't take five minutes to scan the century worth of research on the subject?

This genius puts any stock in what "everyone says"?; 3/27/18, 10:16 AM
Rumpletweezer said...: How does someone design a test to test the IQ of someone smarter?; 3/27/18, 10:16 AM
JPS said...: Two issues I think are broadly conflated in assessing intelligence:

- How fast are you at figuring out puzzles others have devised for you, reaching the answer known to be correct
- What insight, what intuitive leap or analytic advance, do you bring to problems to which the answer is still unknown?

There's some correlation, but not a great one. Some people get branded prodigies or geniuses because they're whizzes at the first, but lack the imagination to succeed at the second.

I know a guy who was thumping his chest over his four-line proof of Marcus theory - more concise than the original. Someone finally took him aside and said, not unkindly, Yes - but Marcus still came up with it.; 3/27/18, 10:21 AM
Freeman Hunt said...: "How does someone design a test to test the IQ of someone smarter?"

The test designer isn't time limited in coming up with questions.; 3/27/18, 10:21 AM
Nonapod said...: Having a high IQ is like winning the genetic lottery: you didn't earn it, and it can be both a boon and a curse. Being able to pick up on things more quickly than others, seeing patterns that other people miss, is obviously a considerable advantage in our ostensibly merit based society. But it certainly doesn't mean you're more likely to be happy than anyone else, or that you won't ever struggle, feel inferior, or feel ashamed. You can easily become arrogant and egotistical and frustrated with others. You can engender feelings of confusion, resentment, or misunderstanding in others. You can bore people to death with your interests and easily be bored with things that most other people find interesting. It's a mixed bag.; 3/27/18, 10:21 AM
stevew said...: IQ does not = Knowledge.

-sw; 3/27/18, 10:22 AM
tcrosse said...: The Notional IQ quantifies how intelligent a person thinks he is. In some cases this number becomes astronomical.; 3/27/18, 10:24 AM
Sebastian said...: IQ does not equal performance, which also requires some conscientiousness.

IQ does not equal genius. Even genius does not equal genius, considering the Bethe distinction between the regulars and the magicians.; 3/27/18, 10:27 AM
Francisco D said...: The most commonly used IQ test is the WAIS-IV. I have used it hundreds of times and its predecessors as well.

135 out of a possible 150 puts someone in the 99th percentile for their age group. That is pretty smart. You would expect a person with that ability (assuming they find the right career niche) to be very successful. Of course, there are other skills, aside from cognitive skills, that are important for success. We are not that good at measuring those skills from a large scale testing perspective.

The test is not meant to measure genius. A perfect 150 is not likely to be a genius.

Most tests of cognitive ability correlate very highly (e.g., GRE, SAT, MCAT).

The IQ tests we use today were developed with a lot of help from the US Armed Services. Imagine a research psychologist with a huge pool of subjects, especially during WWII.; 3/27/18, 10:32 AM
Fernandinande said...: Rumpletweezer said...
How does someone design a test to test the IQ of someone smarter?

That is a problem - the smarter guy might come up with a different answer which is either as good or better than the one the test-maker came up with.

What is next in this sequence?
1,3,5,7,?
Answer: 42
The answer could be 9 or 42 or 12,393,089 because any finite sequence can be fit by multiple polynomials or other functions.

Which is why "Most IQ tests are not good indicators of true high level ability (e.g., beyond +3 SD or so)." (135 is lower than that).; 3/27/18, 10:37 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: I'm not sure what my actual I.Q. is. A census taker once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.; 3/27/18, 10:38 AM
Fernandinande said...: "Here's a famous story about the physicist and mathematician John von Neumann":

Two trains, 20 miles apart, approach each other going 10 mph relative to ground.

A fly travels back-and-forth between them at 15 mph, before getting smooshed[sic] by the trains when they collide.

Question: How far does the fly fly before meeting his ultimate demise?

Another mathematician knew the quick solution to the Fly problem and wanted to see von Neumann struggle with it. He posed the question and von Neumann responded with the right answer in a few seconds.

"Interesting," said the first mathematician. "Most people try to sum the infinite series."

"What do you mean?" von Neumann replied. "That's how I did it."

Summing the series:
(7) Dftotal = (3/5)*20*(1+(1/5)+(1/5)^2+(1/5)^3+ ...)
This is a "geometric series." When r<1, 1+r+r^2+r^3+ ... = 1/(1-r). (If you aren't familiar with this fact, multiply both sides by (1-r) and you'll get 1=1.) Thus,
(8) Dftotal = (3/5)*20*(1/(1-1/5)) = (3/5)*20*(5/4) = 15.

"Trick" answer: It takes one hour for the trains to hit, so the fly going 15mph travels 15 miles.; 3/27/18, 10:47 AM
buwaya said...: The point of tracking in education is precisely to prevent the intelligent child from boredom or "coasting", because the competition and material will be much more challenging in a society of his peers. The kid is going to have to work to keep up with the similarly talented.

One of the worst effects of the US educational system is a failure to develop high level talent.; 3/27/18, 10:49 AM
Mike (MJB Wolf) said...: What is next in this sequence?
1,3,5,7,?

11 (prime numbers); 3/27/18, 10:52 AM
exhelodrvr1 said...: High IQ does not mean above average common sense; 3/27/18, 10:53 AM
Etienne said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 3/27/18, 10:55 AM
Sebastian said...: "What do you mean?" von Neumann replied. "That's how I did it."

Yes. He was one of the magicians.

Honest question: have there been any female magicians?; 3/27/18, 11:09 AM
Fernandinande said...: Mike said...
"What is next in this sequence?
1,3,5,7,?"
11 (prime numbers)

Exactly! That's a more high-IQ-y answer than 9.

"How does someone design a test to test the IQ of someone smarter?"

Rereading that old link I posted, it's hard to estimate the IQ of physicists because they're too smart:

"It is hard to estimate the M scores of the physicists since when Roe tried the test on a few of them they more or less solved every problem modulo some careless mistakes.

Note the top raw scores (27 out of 30 problems solved) among the non-physicists (obtained by 2 geneticists and a psychologist), are quite high but short of a full score. The corresponding normed score is 194! [for the people who couldn't solve all the problems]"; 3/27/18, 11:09 AM
Big Mike said...: Back in the day 140 was the cutoff for genius. For all I know they’ve dumbed down the IQ tests the way they dumbed down the modern SAT and LSAT.

In grad school a friend put me onto MENSA and I took the tests. Difference between the highest score I got and the lowest was something like 15 points, which has left me dubious about the precision of IQ measurements ever since. Since my lowest score was north of 140 they invited me to join and I went to my first meeting. I’ve never been among more boring people before or since. I’d rather pal around at. a neighborhood barbecue drinking Bud or even PBR and debating why Dale Earnhardt, Jr. really retired and when will the Steelers get back to the Super Bowl.; 3/27/18, 11:13 AM
tcrosse said...: "What is next in this sequence?
1,3,5,7,?"

All good children go to heaven.; 3/27/18, 11:13 AM
Rumpletweezer said...: Freeman Hunt,

"The test designer isn't time limited in coming up with questions."

So you're saying that, given enough time, I can design a test to figure out how much smarter my wife is than I am?; 3/27/18, 11:16 AM
Fernandinande said...: Sebastian said...
This genius couldn't take five minutes to scan the century worth of research on the subject?

That's why I thought it was a fake question. And I also think the guy who answered it so poorly is a fake expert.; 3/27/18, 11:22 AM
Achilles said...: "What is next in this sequence?
1,3,5,7,?"

“42.”

“How did you come up with that?”

“I thought you guys were smart.”; 3/27/18, 11:25 AM
AllenS said...: I started to take this test Mensa today, and after 6 questions, decided that it was a big waste of my time. If a person got all of the answers correct, could they change a tire on their vehicle, or bicycle?; 3/27/18, 11:26 AM
AllenS said...: Oops, I'm smart enough to see that -- test should go on the other side of Mensa.; 3/27/18, 11:28 AM
Mike (MJB Wolf) said...: "What is next in this sequence?
1,3,5,7,?"

“One .357 in my hand beats an AR-15 in the hands of someone who’s practice consisted of video games.”; 3/27/18, 11:31 AM
MikeR said...: I didn't like Galpin's answer. It was far too glib, full of confident statements about things that are way more complex than anything we understand today.
The second-rated answer stayed closer to what we actually know, which is a good thing.; 3/27/18, 11:40 AM
Skippy Tisdale said...: My IQ tests consistently at 135 and I do not consider myself a genius because I know that genius is 140 and above, not 135.; 3/27/18, 11:41 AM
Pianoman said...: Because in Life, there's always someone smarter than you.

Get some humlility son, it'll do you a world of good.

Luke 14:11; 3/27/18, 11:44 AM
Ralph L said...: most high IQ are prone to laziness, anxiety, easily distracted, day dreaming, chronic procrastination of hard tasks, easily bored by repetitive tasks,

Isn't nearly everyone prone to these? I'm just better at them that most people.; 3/27/18, 11:45 AM
DKWalser said...: I'd tell any young person who'd just been informed that they had a high IQ to only assume that they were the smartest person in the room when they are alone. It's the only safe way to go through life. If you assume you're the smartest person in the room, often you'll be right. But almost everyone will correctly conclude you're a jerk. And, you'll humiliate yourself those few times when you talk down to someone who truly is smarter than you. Or, those many more times when what counts is not how smart you are in general but how much you know about the matter at hand.; 3/27/18, 11:45 AM
Ralph L said...: IQ does not equal self-confidence, either.; 3/27/18, 11:51 AM
DKWalser said...: I feel for the kid. I wonder if we should tell such youngsters that they have a high IQ. When I was told my estimated IQ (several points higher than 135), I went into a depression. The burden I felt to invent my own 'light bulb', and the guilt for not having done so already, as almost overwhelming.; 3/27/18, 11:51 AM
Sigivald said...: "Because you're 16, and intelligence alone isn't all that useful."

Intelligence combined with knowledge and wisdom is potent.; 3/27/18, 11:52 AM
Brian said...: Also: I think it's fun to read his original post as a single question (albeit preceded by significant throat-clearing) followed by a succinctly-stated correct answer.; 3/27/18, 11:52 AM
Robert Cook said...: What's more important is the size of one's D.I.Q.; 3/27/18, 12:05 PM
Hagar said...: We all do stupid things, but it takes a very smart person to do really, really stupid things.; 3/27/18, 12:09 PM
Ornithophobe said...: I realized when I was very young that stupid people tend to be happier than smart people. I presume that is because they don't see all the ways that things could be better, or that systems are not working. Whereas the bright look around and see a world full of stuff that needs fixing, and can see how much work it's going to take to do any of it. But my answer to this kid would be, "You're sixteen. Of course you don't feel bright- you've got aptitude, but you haven't lived long enough to really know anything yet."; 3/27/18, 12:13 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Mike said...

What is next in this sequence?
1,3,5,7,?

11 (prime numbers)

Except for the fact that 1 is not a prime, and 2 is.

As far as a reasonable answer to what is next in that sequence, I have not a clue. ( I could make a guess were it not for the last element of the sequence being a question mark, which throws off any assumptions about this being a sequence of numbers...); 3/27/18, 12:14 PM
Bad Lieutenant said...: Francisco D said...
The most commonly used IQ test is the WAIS-IV. I have used it hundreds of times and its predecessors as well.

135 out of a possible 150 puts someone in the 99th percentile for their age group...

The test is not meant to measure genius. A perfect 150 is not likely to be a genius.

What what what? I was given both the Stanford-Binet and the Wechsler. I believe I pegged 150-something at the age of 6, with a big motor deficit, and 30 years later, 162, better rounded. (Can't remember the details, I think I was probably noncooperative at 6 so could have done better.) Anyway, I thought 200 was top measurable.

(Yes, yes, if I'm so smart, why ain't I rich?); 3/27/18, 12:58 PM
Yancey Ward said...: How does someone design a test to test the IQ of someone smarter?

The designer isn't time limited as someone has already pointed out, nor is he limited to the problems of his own creation.

However, the key thing to understand is this- IQ tests simply rank us and determine where on a distribution we fall with respect to everyone else who has taken the test.; 3/27/18, 12:59 PM
Francisco D said...: Bad Lt.

The Stanford-Binet is rarely used these days, except for children. It correlates highly with the WAIS, but the WAIS is considered a better tool for a variety of reasons.

You are correct about the scale. The S-B goes up to 200.

Getting rich takes luck. Being smart helps, but luck (and family connections) probably pay a bigger role.; 3/27/18, 1:04 PM
Yancey Ward said...: I took Weschler (unsure of which version) in 1982 when I was a sophomore in high school and scored 144. However, when I think of what a genius is, I don't think of it as being able to solve posed problems, but to solve problems no one has thought of needing to be solved. I am pretty certain I am not a genius based on that definition, but I have been privileged to work with people who are, and I can tell the difference.; 3/27/18, 1:17 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: "What is next in this sequence?
1,3,5,7,?"

“42.”

“How did you come up with that?”>

Because 42 is the answer to life, the universe and everything. DUH~; 3/27/18, 1:19 PM
Trumpit said...: Donald Trump is stupid compared to what?

A kumquat. I've never figured out how you eat one. The internet is handy.

https://www.wikihow.com/Eat-a-Kumquat; 3/27/18, 1:29 PM
Birkel said...: IQ tests are meaningless more than three standard deviations above the mean.

Or at least that's what I told myself when my sister scored 10 points higher than my 155.

In all seriousness, IQ means fuck-all if not combined with a lot of other important factors.; 3/27/18, 1:36 PM
Robert Cook said...: (Shhhhh! I see a lot of humble-bragging going on!); 3/27/18, 1:40 PM
Yancey Ward said...: In all seriousness, IQ means fuck-all if not combined with a lot of other important factors.

Exactly. I am a lazy fuck, for example.; 3/27/18, 1:40 PM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: A 135 IQ is pretty much at the same place on the bell curve as 6' 3" in height for men. Don't expect the NBA to beat a path to your door, kid.; 3/27/18, 1:41 PM
David53 said...: I scored a 140 on the DLAB test back in the 70s. The Air Force told me I was a linguistic genius and shipped me off to the Defense Language Institute in beautiful Monterey, California where I spent 47 weeks learning Russian. I was not a linguistic genius, I was not a genius of any type. They tried to cut me but I would not quit, I studied my ass off and graduated. Next to quitting smoking that was the hardest thing I ever did. My roommate, who never cracked a book, got drunk almost every night and had only scored a 110 on his DLAB, graduated second in class. He was a natural. Three decades later I was a Test Psychologist helping develop all types of tests. It was an interesting profession filled with some brilliant individuals, some crazies, dueling theories, and doubtful statistics. If you can score 135 on an IQ test, good for you, you might be a good test taker.; 3/27/18, 1:47 PM
Francisco D said...: Yancey Ward said ... "However, when I think of what a genius is, I don't think of it as being able to solve posed problems, but to solve problems no one has thought of needing to be solved."

I completely agree. That's why we cannot measure genius very well. We can only discern it from the product of one's cognitive efforts.

Some people have skills that make therm seem like geniuses, like having a photographic memory. I have known a few people like that. They sounded smart, but their reasoning skills did not match up.; 3/27/18, 1:59 PM
Fernandinande said...: Ignorance is Bliss said...
Except for the fact that 1 is not a prime, and 2 is.

Ack!- I thought of the "2" part while walking the dogs ("well, OK, the sequence is odd primes") but completely spaced the "1". I don't think the concept of prime numbers should be used on regular IQ tests because it's too knowledge-based, but I have a math degree and shoulda known better.

Dust Bunny Queen said...
Because 42 is the answer to life, the universe and everything.

Exactly. A psychic guessed 43.; 3/27/18, 1:59 PM
Robert Cook said...: "A 135 IQ is pretty much at the same place on the bell curve as 6' 3" in height for men. Don't expect the NBA to beat a path to your door, kid."

How about that? I'm 6'3"!; 3/27/18, 2:17 PM
tcrosse said...: Then let the beatings begin.; 3/27/18, 2:27 PM
Birkel said...: "Humble brag " defined:
Saying true things that other people don't want to hear.

Truth exists.
And it doesn't give one wet shit what Robert Cook thinks.; 3/27/18, 2:29 PM
Robert Cook said...: (b)Urkel: You're always so angry, always on a downer!

Why so glum?; 3/27/18, 2:41 PM
Francisco D said...: Fernandistein said: "Dust Bunny Queen said...
Because 42 is the answer to life, the universe and everything.

Exactly. A psychic guessed 43."

Douglas Adams thought it was 42.

The white rats we use in psychology experiments actually run the universe.; 3/27/18, 2:57 PM
Birkel said...: Angry? Why would I be angry at you, who espouses a view that has been used to murder over 100,000,000 these last 100 years?

If you renounce your worldview and repent your murderous ideology I promise to live up to your standard of online happiness.

P.S. I don't care about the emotion you read into my comments. HINT: Facts don't have emotional content.; 3/27/18, 2:58 PM
Jim at said...: I'll take street smarts and common sense over an IQ test result each and every time.; 3/27/18, 3:08 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Birkel said...

Facts don't have emotional content.

This statement makes my facts feel sad.; 3/27/18, 3:09 PM
Birkel said...: As your name implies, ignorance does have emotional content.
;-); 3/27/18, 3:13 PM
gilbar said...: proof that high IQ isn't Wisdom

There was this guy,
he was always the smartest guy in the room.
he had the highest IQ of any man to ever fill the position he did.
he was a better speechwriter than his speechwriters.
knew more about policies on any particular issue than his policy directors.
And he said he was gonna be a better political director than his political director.; 3/27/18, 3:22 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: What is next in this sequence?

1,3,5,7,?

Obviously, it is 12.

The sequence is the winning CT Lottery numbers from 6/23/17.

Obviously.

I don't know why you people didn't get that.; 3/27/18, 4:09 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: My IQ is at least 135. I was never tested. Only a sub-genius needs to take a test to know his or her IQ.; 3/27/18, 4:21 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: Gilbar - I think that I know who you are talking about. Was he the guy who said Hillary Clinton was the most qualified person to ever run for the presidency?; 3/27/18, 4:23 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: what's the next number in this sequence: 3.14 . . .
It's '2'. You thought it was '1' because the sequence was pi, didn't you? Wrong, it's 22/7.; 3/27/18, 4:28 PM
Jeff said...: Having a high IQ means that you can learn more stuff, and learn it faster, than someone with a lower IQ. It doesn't mean you will learn, only that you can. If you make only minimal efforts to learn something, you'll learn more than an equally lazy person of lesser IQ, but someone who works harder may surpass your learning even with lesser intelligence.

Bragging about your IQ is dumb. Tell me what you've accomplished, who you've taken care of, how well you raised your children. Those are the kinds of things you can take pride in.

It is interesting to see so many commenters claiming to have a high IQ. There's no way for any of the rest of us to verify these claims, so why bother making them?

Like in so many other comment threads, there's only one thing I really want to know: What does Laslo Spatula think?; 3/27/18, 4:35 PM
Bad Lieutenant said...: Like in so many other comment threads,

As; 3/27/18, 4:44 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: Back in high school I took the PSAT and as a result the school psychiatrist came and gave me an IQ test. I did pretty well on the test, as I recall. Up until then I was a good student and got mostly A's & B's and didn't need to put too much effort into it. I just went along to get along. Basically a fairly normal 'good' student but nothing spectacular. No one thought I was a genius or anything. More like an annoying smart ass.

Because I did so much out of the ordinary on that test, they figured they should give me an IQ test. which I took and got pretty bored with when they started asking me to calculate in my head how many boxes are inside a box that has boxes etc. I told them that I didn't care to answer anymore dumb questions about boxes because who cared? So...the moved on to other types of questions and tests.

Afterwards they never would tell me or my parents what the result was.

I figure it was great, I'm a genius!, and they didn't want me to get a swelled head...OR....I really flunked the IQ test, the PSAT was a fluke and they didn't want to tell my parents that I was basically normal to abby-normal or something :-D They tested me again, after I took the Military readiness test (Vietnam war times and I wanted to join the Air Force like my family did. After the test the Air Force was recruiting me to be a navigator. Spacial recognition stuff, plus I knew all the tools and mechanical items, because I used to help my father tear down and rebuild MGs. They stopped recruiting when they found out that I am a girl. Then they weren't so interested.

Either way. Who cared. What difference does it make as long as you get along in life and aren't living in a ditch.

IQ doesn't necessarily equal smart.; 3/27/18, 4:49 PM
eddie willers said...: That is a problem - the smarter guy might come up with a different answer which is either as good or better than the one the test-maker came up with.

I read about a clever little fellow once. The question on a test was "How can you determine the height of a building with a barometer?"

Clever fellow answers: "I would find the owner of the building and say, 'If you tell me how tall your building is, I'll give you this nice barometer'".

I'd have given Clever fellow an "A".; 3/27/18, 5:02 PM
Jaq said...: in my own experience taking IQ tests over a sixty year time span I have seen fluctuations by as much as 20pts

So how ofen do you measure your 'D.I.Q' as Robert called it. It speaks of insecurity, trust me, if you had a high IQ, you would know it with certainty and think about other things. You wouldn't wonder what you are missing or agonize over it.

In any case you don't need a high IQ to be a decent person, or a moral person capable of living a rich and meaningful life.

I think that's a good affirmation for you, R/V.

The above comment is probably mean, however; he comes on here so often doing his feeble best to insult many of us, but I don't worry too much about it being mean. He just won't believe it because he has confidence.

There are people here who claim a high IQ, or at least constantly brag about working at universities, but I just don't see it in their comments, and there are other people that it is apparent that they are not super geniuses, but they still write interesting stuff because they are honest and reflective and share hard-earned insights. And there are people here who clearly are extremely intelligent. It's a great mix, and it wouldn't be the same without the clowns.

High IQ people can avoid many of the traps in life, but often they fall into others, many times of their own devising.

135 is a good IQ, if he really has one, he will be fine.; 3/27/18, 5:13 PM
Jaq said...: One of the reasons that High IQ doesn't mean "great employee" is that unless you give the person with the genuinely high IQ stuff that is both in your interest and his or her interest, he or she is not going to straight up rent you the use of his or her IQ.

High IQ people have choices, they can entertain themselves. You can't necessarily predict what will be important to them. So they are not the best employees.; 3/27/18, 5:22 PM
Jaq said...: One of the main reasons for the failure of communism is that it proved impossible to exploit the smarter individuals the way capitalism does. This is because if you give a smart guy the choice of working with his brain on problems not of his own devising, or sweeping the street, and tell him the pay is pretty much the same, he is going to choose to sweep the streets, because it leaves him time to think, and he can talk about art or whatever in cafes at night.

I didn't think up the above on my own. The guy who used to do the show Exquisite Corpse made the above observation on NPR. He didn't link it to systematic collapse of communism, I did.; 3/27/18, 5:27 PM
Howard said...: Jordan Peterson explains why Red State Morons are Doomed; 3/27/18, 5:31 PM
Francisco D said...: Tim said ... "One of the reasons that High IQ doesn't mean "great employee" is that unless you give the person with the genuinely high IQ stuff that is both in your interest and his or her interest, he or she is not going to straight up rent you the use of his or her IQ."

A CEO told me how he evaluated employees and how to manage them. He developed a 2x2 matrix with Hi/Low Intelligence and Hi/Low motivation as the factors.

For Hi IQ/Hi Motivation employees, get out of their way;

For Hi IQ/Low Motivation employees, that's where leadership comes in;

For Low IQ/Low Motivation Employees, create a lot of structure and;

For Low IQ/High Motivation Employees, make every effort to get them out of your organization because they are running at 100 MPH in the wrong direction.

I wonder where Inga, Ritmo, Cookie, ARM and the other usual suspects fit?; 3/27/18, 5:33 PM
Jaq said...: There's lots of morons in blue states too. Maybe more than in red states. But tell me again Howard, because I just don't understand it yet, how is bringing in shitloads of unskilled peasants from Mexico and elsewhere going to make the problem better?

Are you saying Trump is right, and the immigrants we need are from places like Norway?; 3/27/18, 5:48 PM
Jaq said...: One of the most interesting things I ever read was an article about this study, which, for some reason, does not summarize the results in the abstract.

https://experts.umich.edu/en/publications/a-day-at-the-races-a-study-of-iq-expertise-and-cognitive-complexi

Anyway, IIRC, it . turned out that IQ did not give a handicapper an edge over other handicappers, provided both groups had 10 years of immersive experience at the track, daily betting, basically. In fact a not very bright in other respects handicapper with 10 yrs experience will be taking money from Mr Super Genius with less experience and expertise all day long.; 3/27/18, 6:16 PM
Robert Cook said...: "Only a sub-genius needs to take a test to know his or her IQ."

Hey...I'm a Sub-Genius! I was ordained as a Sub-G minister over 30 years ago...eternal salvation guaranteed or triple my money back!; 3/27/18, 7:22 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: The highest human IQ is about 180.
If I was a scifi writer, I would write a story about an alien with an IQ of 250. He comes to Earth and tells us we've got to nuke ourselves. He is smarter than we are, smart enough to figure out that if we continue, as a species, we will destroy the universe. So humanity starts the process of nuking ourselves, but before they press the button, another alien shows up. He has an IQ of 300. He tells us that the first alien, with an IQ of just 250, was wrong, and that it is imperative that humanity survive, the fate of the universe depends on it!
So humanity steps back from the brink just in time for a third alien to show up. This one has an IQ of 350, and he tells us that by dumb luck, the first alien with an IQ of 250 was correct. We all must die. So humanity hooks up the nuke button again. But then an alien with an IQ of 400 shows up . . .; 3/27/18, 8:01 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: "Hey...I'm a Sub-Genius! I was ordained as a Sub-G minister over 30 years ago...eternal salvation guaranteed or triple my money back!"
Why didn't they offer quadruple your money back? Lack of faith?; 3/27/18, 8:05 PM
Ken Mitchell said...: "Intelligence has much less practical application than you might think."
http://dilbert.com/strip/1992-02-03; 3/27/18, 8:20 PM
Robert Cook said...: "Why didn't they offer quadruple your money back? Lack of faith?"

Hey, they're sub-geniuses, not stupid!; 3/27/18, 8:40 PM
Jaq said...: He comes to Earth and tells us we've got to nuke ourselves. He is smarter than we are, smart enough to figure out that if we continue, as a species, we will destroy the universe. So humanity starts the process of nuking ourselves,

So you are assuming that Democrats are in charge? Who else would listen to this guy?; 3/27/18, 8:43 PM
Guildofcannonballs said...: "Vicki Hearne said IQ test word questions test how quickly you can believe things."

Hence Guild O' The Balls Cannon.

'Course Hearne wasn't quick to believe Rhotterdahm or Telford, so you're okay being 40 years behind the times.

Let's Derb us up some math talk, that's what matters IQ-wise, at least awareness known to me consciously has signified.; 3/27/18, 9:00 PM
Guildofcannonballs said...: Of course, also, indeed persons with 135 IQ have high considered many things, especially after Buckley wrote about it in Playboy in the 1960's era circa America (sans Canada and Mexico).

Mostly the high IQ triages: you become the killer only so as not to become the murdered. That is where IQ unbridled steels its gaze.; 3/27/18, 9:05 PM
NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...: The smarter you are, the less likely it is that you can be convinced that you are wrong. That doesn't mean you are right.

There's always someone smarter.; 3/27/18, 10:01 PM
NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...: Our culture worships "smart" the way it used to worship integrity. It hasn't been a good trade.

One of my favorite quotes in modern cinema is in "Zero Dark Thirty," when an underling praises the protaganist's intelligence to Leon Panetta. The actor playing Panetta deadpans, "we're all smart."; 3/27/18, 10:04 PM
Zach said...: It's not a bad answer, although I disagree with the claim that Einstein was a super "high GHz" thinker.

Einstein was actually a very subtle and deep thinker, who could see subtleties that other people were overlooking and work them out to their logical conclusions. It's kind of like a sculptor spending two years making a statue that looks effortless and unplanned when it's finished -- the thing that jumps out at you is the statue, not the speed with which it was made.; 3/27/18, 10:45 PM
Zach said...: Frankly, it would be amazing to find someone who could come up with Einstein-quality ideas, whose only difference from Einstein was that he worked slower.

Go ahead, take your time. There's no rush!; 3/27/18, 10:58 PM
Anonymous said...: "Blogger Sebastian said...

"This genius couldn't take five minutes to scan the century worth of research on the subject?

"This genius puts any stock in what 'everyone says'?"

He's the nerdy male equivalent of girls who put their photos up on Instagram and ask, "Do you think I'm pretty?"; 3/27/18, 11:00 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: I had an IQ test taken when I was a teen. I scored 130 on verbal IQ, and 120 on non-verbal IQ (I think that the guy called it "spatial" IQ). I've always had a hard time with math. College algebra was okay, but I struggled through two semesters of calculus. I have no interest in it. It's horrible, like going through the motions of bandaging bleeding people. When I look at the quadratic equation I recognize it, but it is a chore to jam some problem into it & do the calculation, and no joy when I get the correct result. It is dreary.
But language seems magical to me. Give me a language problem, like translating an old Scots poem into modern English, and I'm all over it. I'll write a frikkin' paper on it, and spend hours researching the implications of my result. The last fun paper I did was translating a modern Russian short story about flowers into English. The Russian word for flower is the same as the Russian word for color ("svetka"). In its nominal form, anyhow. It was a fairy tale sort of story, of the thoughts of potted flowers throughout the year. The author was a woman who was a paraplegic (she died in the 1990s). She used many fancy & obscure Russian words to describe the colors of flowers throughout the seasons of the year. Except for green. She never used the word for green (something like "zheloni") other than at the story's end, to describe the fresh buds of a wild, frozen twig that was introduced into the house shared by the other plants. The author was making the point that all of the other flowers, for all of their fabulous colors, were dead, but the utterly ordinary, green, budding plant was alive.
I love that kind of thing.; 3/28/18, 12:15 AM
Robert Cook said...: "The smarter you are, the less likely it is that you can be convinced that you are wrong. That doesn't mean you are right."

I disagree. The smarter you are, the more readily you realize how ignorant you are.; 3/28/18, 7:29 AM
mikee said...: IQ is an interesting concept, but work with an AC guy or a plumber or an appliance repairman for a day or two and you'll see that intelligence comes in more flavors than those tested on an IQ quiz.; 3/28/18, 11:20 AM
Mike in Keller said...: There's a difference between IQ and wisdom. It is just true that a lot of rooms have people with IQs of 145, sometimes even 155.

A 135 IQ means you can pick up stuff fairly quickly. However, it does not mean you are very wise. Wisdom and IQ are not synonymous terms.; 3/28/18, 5:22 PM
Jeff said...: I've always had a hard time with math. College algebra was okay, but I struggled through two semesters of calculus. I have no interest in it. It's horrible, like going through the motions of bandaging bleeding people. When I look at the quadratic equation I recognize it, but it is a chore to jam some problem into it & do the calculation, and no joy when I get the correct result. It is dreary.

I've always been pretty good at math, but I also hated calculus. The calculus class was taught by an Indian TA whose accent was so bad that no one could understand most of what he said in his monotone. An audiobook would have been an improvement.

It wasn't until a regression analysis class showed me how useful calculus really was that I started to understand it. A couple of years later a real analysis class in grad school went back over all the stuff we learned in calculus and derived it all from first principles. Then I finally felt like I really understood it. It all made sense when it was well taught.

I think this is often a problem with math classes. The teaching is abysmal, and the textbooks aren't any better. In most subjects, you can read the textbook and learn 90 percent of what you'll learn from the class, but that just never worked for me in math.; 3/29/18, 1:07 PM