Objectifying Intelligence

Sometimes I wonder what people mean when they think someone is “really smart.” Do they mean this individual is well-read? Is the person generally knowledgeable in a wide breadth of topics? Is there a particular eloquence in his or her pattern of speech? Is it the realization of a greater depth to the person? Does extreme competence in manual tasks define intelligence? I don’t know.

IQ is probably the most common measure of intelligence, but it is far from a perfect system. People can improve their IQ by studying for an IQ test. IQ tests also test purely cerebral analysis.

An impressive memory is another measure of intelligence. People who memorize global flags or historical facts are heralded as brilliant. Top chess players, who memorize thousands upon thousands of chess positions, are thought of as some of the smartest people on Earth. Yet, those with excellent memories might suffer from a lack of logical reasoning ability or common sense.

Linguistic mastery can dazzle as well. Careful sentence structure and intentional sesquipedalians often insinuate mental acuity. While this shows a certain fondness for language, it is still only one relatively small realm of study.

As you might imagine, there are several other ways one could quantify intelligence. But is that even fruitful? We as humans have a proclivity to rank everything. Tier lists and top-10 rankings are everywhere on the internet. It can be fun to rank pieces of media we enjoy, for example, but when we start ranking humans, problems arise.

Whenever I go about ranking how intelligent people are, that unsurprisingly leads to pride and spite. If life is a competition to outrank others in intelligence, what makes life worth living? I have found it far more beneficial to avoid viewing others through a lens of how intelligent I perceive them to be. I learn something from everyone I encounter. We as humans have such unique worldviews that shape us in innumerable ways. It is true that some people are more “intelligent” than others, but, as I mentioned earlier, the standard for intelligence is quite variable. I find it fascinating how one man can competently lead a construction team while submitting to the leadership of an expert orator. Both orator and construction worker might deem the other as “intelligent,” but the shape and application of that intelligence varies wildly.

While I have still not been able to nail down a helpful measurement of intelligence, I am still content. It might satisfy my itching for semantic clarification, but practically, it is not beneficial for general daily living.