Intelligence vs Knowledge

I am replying to your topic by using  Melinda Gwinn's answer on :
Can a person with a low IQ come across as smart?
Melinda is a  Writer, Editor, Homeschooler

Originally Answered: Can a person with a low IQ come across as smart?
Easily.

Most of the smartest people, by most assessments, are not exceptionally intelligent in an intrinsic sense, but are highly educated. By contrast, a lot of brilliant thinkers are under-educated and ignorant in consequence, despite having excellent thinking skills on a technical level.

IQ tests don't help this, as the ones designed for adults are particularly prone to testing skills that can be, and are, attained through education and absorbed as knowledge, rather than indicating raw capacity for clear and logically valid thought.

Educated people, particularly people educated in the specific ways the test believes are valuable, will score higher even when their ability to reason in unstructured, dynamic ways remains low or average.

When I want to know what a person can actually do with their mind, I will feed them bullshit logic. How they respond to bullshit logic, either cleverly and amusingly or with greater logical consistently than I put into my own argument, tells me what they can do.

What tools they use also tell me a lot. Do they go for the weakness I deliberately put into the argument, resort to emotional appeals, or use other manipulation tactics to “win” the intellectual sparring bout? The smartest people, especially if they are kind, will go for the logical or practical weakness. Some people even find weaknesses I didn't insert deliberately.

The real question isn't what someone knows, but how well they use knowledge that they have. This includes day to day, practical matters like managing budgets and socializing as much as academic topics, as all of these involve solving complex, dynamic problems with the information presented.

All of these skills can be, and are, learned through trial-and-error and practice in addition to mimicry and formal education. Most of the time, if you want a raw assessment of someone's intelligence, you're best taking someone outside of their comfort zone, as true intelligence tends to be comparable in multiple areas of aptitude for most people. Anxiety and similar emotional issues can produce false negatives with this method, but it avoids the false positives of preexisting education (experience, in itself, is a form of education).

I know someone's got a great mind when I can talk about stuff they know very little about, and they can provide valuable insight regardless. Keep in mind, a good question is an extremely valuable insight.

The smartest people are bright and educated alike, but every combination of talent and skill you can imagine exists.

' Naiveté is the Most Important Attribute of Genius '


J. W. Goethe 


( Germany, 1749 - 1832 )

reading this and saying to self "Will not make Trump joke...will not make Trump joke..."

I think knowledge is easier to get than intelligence. Knowledge is about learning and remembering facts, theories, etc. But intelligence means understanding them.
As for Russians applying their past-time knowledge to their way of living nowadays, yes, that might be the case. It is what we, millennials, are fighting against now.
We still have that mindset: you can reach true happiness only through suffering. That can be wrong people you have to deal with or jobs you hate even if they're well-paid. Many people in Russia lack emotional intelligence, for example. That doesn't mean we're bad people. That only means nobody taught us to be different.

Intelligence cannot be bought with money.
Knowledge about matters such as law and engineering can be learned through a book, which takes time and therefore money.
However, I believe the more you read committing yourself to that, the better your brain gets.
So, although, intelligence is not the same as knowledge and it is harder and more rare than knowledge, I still believe humans can develop intelligence as well through labor and hard work on yourself.

Bracatinga Imóveis wrote:

So, although, intelligence is not the same as knowledge and it is harder and more rare than knowledge, I still believe humans can develop intelligence as well through labor and hard work on yourself.

One must be born with intelligence before one can enhance it. 

"There is no escaping the fact that intelligence is inherited. Hundreds of studies prove that 50% of the difference in intelligence between people is due to genetics, so genes matter, although they are certainly not destiny." (New Scientist magazine)

"Studies involving identical twins being raised in separated households show that they have extremely similar IQ levels, which means that genetics holds more weight on the intelligence scale than where one is raised." (Pennsylvania State University, USA)

"Heritability of intelligence is around 50% and rises to 75% by late adolescence."  (Molecular biologist Robert Plomin, King's College London)

"Heredity plays an important role in Intelligence, and environment sharpens it through experiences."  (Gulf Medical University, UAE)

Anecdotal evidence:  I have two children whom I raised alone for more than a decade.  Due to their performance and behaviours in classes, the district psychologist asked my permission to give them IQ test when they turned 8 (optimal age for IQ test on children).  I agreed to have my daughter taken the test first.  Her IQ was 173. 

After the score was given, the psychologist asked to meet with me and my daughter because he was baffled about many of her answers: they were very different from the ones most intelligent and logical minded adults had given for the same test (she took the adult test, not the one for her age group.) 

My daughter explained to him, in very precise way, why she gave those answers and why she believed her method would bring better result than the way things were done in the "general world" (her term).

He pondered about that, then replied that perhaps she had given him something to think about, but he added that as all tests result must follow a set of approved answers, her score would stay the same; moreover, she should learn to live and function as everyone else because not all new ideas would be accepted or welcomed.

I declined the invitation for my son to take the test the following year when he turned 8.  Knowing how the score was determined was enough for me.

Genetically, I had no doubt my children got what it took to be exceptionally intelligent: they're descendants of 6 generations of educators.  Their DNA and heredity gave the blueprint for their brains; it's my job to provide them with the right environment.  As a single parent, I didn't have much money, but they're exposed to all the best and free things I could get my hands on: public libraries, museums, theatres, music, literature, debates, and all the free time I had after 40 hour work week and a full load of college courses. 

Our TV was turned on only 2 hours on Saturdays and 2 hours on Sundays, but our apartment was filled with books and we talked constantly about everything -- whether the subject was serious or silly.  Every time my children wanted something that was not part of our family routines, they must present and argue the case to me.  If I could not refute them, then I would do everything in my power to give them what they wanted.  If I found holes in their arguments, then they had the options of either dropping the petition or building new arguments. 

I moved across two counties so they could attend the #1 public high school in California (#4 in the entire US at the time.)  That was the best decision I've ever made in my life.

I wasn't a tiger mom; I didn't push them to attain highest levels of academic achievement but I told them they should do everything to the best of their ability because if they didn't, they would have short changed themselves.  To tell the truth, although I didn't complain about their performance, I knew they didn't reach the best of their abilities in their teen years, but hey, wasting opportunities and making mistakes were valuable life lessons too.

My children are 43 and 42 now.  One is a labour and employment attorney while serving her second term as a pro tem judge in a CA Superior Court,  The other is a Jiu Jitsu-style masseur and a poet.

They're intelligent and smart, have strong sense of self and take responsibility for their actions.  They don't stop learning nor do they limit their knowledge to their career fields.  They're flexible and adaptable, articulated, ethical, and above all, excellent human beings.  They were born with good traits and have managed to keep all of those traits intact through the ups and downs of life. 

Did they work hard to shape their own intelligence and knowledge?  I don't know how to answer that question.  They were the products of good genes, but they became the whole persons through environments and the way they lead their lives -- you know, the usual things that everyone else does.  Nature, nurture, and the practice of everyday life are all innate to them even though life has not been easy for them most of the time.  The knowledge of good vs bad and the intelligence to select the right choice are not something they learned from books. They just knew.  They knew how to be good people to themselves and to the society in which they're members.  Intelligence and knowledge are one and the same in my children's cases.

If it's not the same to other people, then as I said, this is only an anecdote example.

When I have to make a decision, I usually use my creativity and common sense (the two combined are called "gut feeling") to quickly decide in which direction I want to go. Then I use my intelligence to come up with an logical explanation why this was the right one - and that is what I tell people.
So far I fared well with this and most others think I make intelligent choices.

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i HAVE BEEN A TEACHER FOR MORE THAN 30 YEARS AND HAVE 4 CHILDREN ALL OF WHOM HAVE HAD A UNIVERSITY EDUCATION.

Intelligence is not a given ability, we all have the same brain capacity, the difference is in teaching your children to learn, yes books, discussion ,games, board games, chess or whatever, all help develop the  child's thinking and learning skills. There are no right answers, and you can teach people to pass an IQ test. If you practice those types of test you can easily score a high mark. As you discovered ,people who think differently can be looked upon as odd, all great inventors thought differently , so  you did the right thing, Intelligence is a willingness to learn ,
Teach a child to learn and they will progress quickly

I am not sure any of these attributes actually have "bad distribution".

On the contrary, in almost every instance, the attribute is "normally" distributed  (= the famous "bell curve"). That means most people have an average amount of something, and a very few have a little/lot of it.

It is an interesting aspect of human psychology that for any positive attribute (e.g. intelligence, attractiveness) most of us will consider themselves above average. Yet, by definition (see the bell curve), half of us are actually below average. :-)

Knowledge is easily found as soon as you press the enter key on a Google search.

Intelligence is not.

Intelligence is rare - How many people work 9 to 5 in a crappy job for 40 years in order to buy a nice house, car, and massive TV, then retire and die without ever realising they were utter prats?

Intelligence is realising you don't need all the crap advertisers tell you you're an utter failure if you don't buy - and it's realising you're far better off in a lower paid job you like than in a job you hate but gives you the money for a big TV that does a grand total of nothing for your happiness.

Intelligence is realising happiness is worth a lot more than a new car.