[mikema63]

I'm not redefining it, I'm considering it in an entirely different context.

Edit: you seem to be stuck in a surface analysis. Intelligence, as a social construct is useful. As an amalgam of the various skills we value as a society it is a measure of worth in those aspects. IQ is predictive of academic success (though far from a perfect one).

I am merely pointing out that it's true nature is as a social construction. There is no biological understanding behind it to support it. It's a useful tool but not an objective thing that we just generally have.

We could just as easily define it with a separate set of skills, including perception and motor processing, if we valued those skills as highly as the ones we do use to define intelligence.

[Suntzu]

So I guess we could consider folks who can't throw or catch a ball stupid, well, in a different context.

[mikema63]

See my edit.

[Suntzu]

I'm not redefining it, I'm considering it in an entirely different context.

Edit: you seem to be stuck in a surface analysis. Intelligence, as a social construct is useful. As an amalgam of the various skills we value as a society it is a measure of worth in those aspects. IQ is predictive of academic success (though far from a perfect one).

I am merely pointing out that it's true nature is as a social construction. There is no biological understanding behind it to support it. It's a useful tool but not an objective thing that we just generally have.

We could just as easily define it with a separate set of skills, including perception and motor processing, if we valued those skills as highly as the ones we do use to define intelligence.

How much does an NFL quarterback make a year and how much does a Nobel Prize winner in physics make a year?

[mikema63]

If you measure social worth purely on income you could make that argument. But as a society we accept there are many jobs that are more socially valuable than an NFL player that don't afford as high a salary because of economic reasons.

Ask most people if they think NFL players are more important than scientists and you'll understand just how ridiculous that point is.

[Suntzu]

If you measure social worth purely on income you could make that argument. But as a society we accept there are many jobs that are more socially valuable than an NFL player that don't afford as high a salary because of economic reasons.

Ask most people if they think NFL players are more important than scientists and you'll understand just how ridiculous that point is.

You might be surprised.

[mikema63]

I doubt it very much, but at this point you don't seem to care anymore so...Whatever I guess.

[MistyTiger]

I think intelligence is not just reasoning, it is the ability to be creative, the ability to synthesize data and concepts and create something new with it.

One of my old jobs had us workers grade essays and compare that to computers grading essays. The findings showed that human workers did a better job at it. One possible reason is that writing has subtlety. Computers are only programmed to recognize data based on code.

[One Degree]

Isn't it kind of scary that our own intelligence is beyond our ability to understand it? Almost seems as if we were programmed by a superior being.

[mikema63]

Do you happen to be a creationist one degree?

[One Degree]

Do you happen to be a creationist one degree?

No, not at all. Just someone who marvels at the complexity of the human mind.

[One Degree]

No, not at all. Just someone who marvels at the complexity of the human mind.

I don't totally dismiss the possibility whether God or alien.

Edit: I find the human mind to be as simple as a tape recorder, yet capable of complexity beyond anything we know, unless the complexity is just our misunderstanding of the simplicity.

[mikema63]

I'm not sure tape recorder is the analogy I'd go with.

A neuron is pretty complex all on its own, but it's true the network is far more complex. The main problem is that our brains didn't evolve to understand themselves. It doesn't confer any evolutionary advantage in the Savannah to understand it's inner workings.

[Potemkin]

So I guess we could consider folks who can't throw or catch a ball stupid, well, in a different context.

Interestingly enough, when IQ tests were first being devised about a century or more ago, by Galton among others, the speed of reflexes was regarded as an indication of high intelligence. The first IQ tests included tapping the knee of the person taking the IQ test and the faster the response, the higher their score on the IQ test. So yes, Galton would probably have said that someone who can't throw or catch a ball properly was less intelligent than someone who could.

[Suntzu]

Still some experimentation using reflex to measure intelligence, but by that standard many animals are smarter than human beings.

[Potemkin]

Still some experimentation using reflex to measure intelligence, but by that standard many animals are smarter than human beings.

Indeed, and it might be said that, in some respects, some animals are smarter than human beings.

The basic issue is that the brain is merely a part of the central nervous system. It is a vastly hypertrophied part of the human nervous system, but still only a part of it. Why should we measure only the performance of that particular part of the central nervous system, but not the performance of the rest of it? If we measure the speed of a person's reflexes and the speed with which they can subtract 7 from 16, then are we really measuring two completely separate things? It's not obvious to me, and it wasn't obvious to Galton either.

[One Degree]

Science has definitively proven that intelligence is related to the overall health of the individual.
What was your question Dr. Hawking?

[Suntzu]

Indeed, and it might be said that, in some respects, some animals are smarter than human beings.

The basic issue is that the brain is merely a part of the central nervous system. It is a vastly hypertrophied part of the human nervous system, but still only a part of it. Why should we measure only the performance of that particular part of the central nervous system, but not the performance of the rest of it? If we measure the speed of a person's reflexes and the speed with which they can subtract 7 from 16, then are we really measuring two completely separate things? It's not obvious to me, and it wasn't obvious to Galton either.

For the same reason we don't call a person who has acute vision "smart" or someone who has an extraordinary sense of taste or smell "smart". Intelligence is the ability to reason.

[Potemkin]

For the same reason we don't call a person who has acute vision "smart" or someone who has an extraordinary sense of taste or smell "smart". Intelligence is the ability to reason.

But this is a rather arbitrary definition. For example, the ability to reason requires the ability to think abstractly and symbolically, which would automatically mean that no animal could be "intelligent". Yet we think of, say, a dog as being more intelligent than, say, an earthworm, so clearly this will not do. Clearly, intelligence has more to do with the overall competence of the functioning of the central nervous system. The ability to reason abstractly happens to be what humans are good at, but the ability to follow a scent trail is also a demonstration of the competence of the functioning of a dog's central nervous system, just as much as a human's ability to divide 42 by 7. Being human, we simply tend to value what we're good at more highly than we value what a dog is good at.

[Suntzu]

Do you figure a dog could smell his way to an atomic bomb or the Mona Lisa?