Why, different levels of intelligence.

Zach Alie · 2025-08-27 15:42:41

Why do you think some people are more intelligent, have better memory retention and think and solve faster, is it because they have more nuerons, or something else about they're brains, and does this intelligence hierarchy actually exist or is it made up to make people competitive?

Jai Ganesh · 2025-08-27 16:30:59

Individuals differ from one another in their ability to understand complex ideas, to adapt effectively to the environment, to learn from experience, to engage in various forms of reasoning, to overcome obstacles by taking thought. Although these individual differences can be substantial, they are never entirely consistent: a given person's intellectual performance will vary on different occasions, in different domains, as judged by different criteria. Concepts of "intelligence" are attempts to clarify and organize this complex set of phenomena. Although considerable clarity has been achieved in some areas, no such conceptualization has yet answered all the important questions, and none commands universal assent. Indeed, when two dozen prominent theorists were recently asked to define intelligence, they gave two dozen, somewhat different, definitions.

Human

Human intelligence is the intellectual power of humans, which is marked by complex cognitive feats and high levels of motivation and self-awareness. Intelligence enables humans to remember descriptions of things and use those descriptions in future behaviors. It gives humans the cognitive abilities to learn, form concepts, understand, and reason, including the capacities to recognize patterns, innovate, plan, solve problems, and employ language to communicate. These cognitive abilities can be organized into frameworks like fluid vs. crystallized and the Unified Cattell-Horn-Carroll model, which contains abilities like fluid reasoning, perceptual speed, verbal abilities, and others.

Intelligence is different from learning. Learning refers to the act of retaining facts and information or abilities and being able to recall them for future use. Intelligence, on the other hand, is the cognitive ability of someone to perform these and other processes.

Intelligence quotient (IQ)

There have been various attempts to quantify intelligence via psychometric testing. Prominent among these are the various Intelligence Quotient (IQ) tests, which were first developed in the early 20th century to screen children for intellectual disability. Over time, IQ tests became more pervasive, being used to screen immigrants, military recruits, and job applicants. As the tests became more popular, belief that IQ tests measure a fundamental and unchanging attribute that all humans possess became widespread.

An influential theory that promoted the idea that IQ measures a fundamental quality possessed by every person is the theory of General Intelligence, or g factor. The g factor is a construct that summarizes the correlations observed between an individual's scores on a range of cognitive tests.

Today, most psychologists agree that IQ measures at least some aspects of human intelligence, particularly the ability to thrive in an academic context. However, many psychologists question the validity of IQ tests as a measure of intelligence as a whole.

Zach Alie · 2025-08-27 16:53:16

A few days ago i watched a video on different levels of intelligence, where there was said that people from ranges of subnormal (need help to do basic cognitive tasks) to trancendant (those that indulged in very complex areas and questioned and thought of different out of the box perspectives), even though you said intelligence involves various factors and variables, some differences were quite substantial, examples given were like carl jung, socrates, buddha and various others who were considered on such a league where there thought and ideas were percieved as foreign and dangerous but proved to be more efficient in the long run,and certain of these people were able to make connections between wide varieties of subjects known as polymaths. I know intelligence differs on different scales, but isnt it also true that when you compare the normal person to a such a trancendant level intelligence person, it seems the overall intelligence and effficiency of that person is a lot higher and there cognitive ability spans over multiple subjects and is more flexible, than the average person, so wouldn't it be true to say the trancendant person is more intelligent and exceptional than the normal person, by normal here i mean can perform basic cognitive processes and problem solving, not having as you say that further intellectual ability.

Last edited by Zach Alie (2025-08-27 17:03:55)

KerimF · 2025-08-27 17:53:24

May I add a fact which is also related to intelligence?

Let us assume that A is more intelligent than B. Isn't it possible for B to know useful things that A has no idea of?
I mean, a more effective factor in one's life than his intelligence is 'necessity'. Not in vain we used hearing:
"Necessity is the mother of invention/innovation."

Even the most intelligent person won't solve a problem that some others may do if he has no interest to solve it.
And an ordinary person may solve a problem that he really needs to do while his finding (useful to him in the least) is not known by anyone else.

Zach Alie · 2025-08-27 22:16:35

I did not say higher intelligence directly means better capability or ability, as they say talent without work is nothing, i just said does it makes a difference if two persons both doing intellectual work have a difference in their work due to a difference in say intelligence or intellectual ability.

KerimF · 2025-08-28 03:29:43

Zach Alie wrote:

I did not say higher intelligence directly means better capability or ability, as they say talent without work is nothing, i just said does it makes a difference if two persons both doing intellectual work have a difference in their work due to a difference in say intelligence or intellectual ability.

If they have both exactly the same level of interest to do an intellectual work, the one who make it better and faster is a sign of being more intelligent. But even in this case, the result could be confusing if one made the work better and the other one made it much faster but not as good as the first one did.

On the other hand, when I meet someone, I usually suppose he is as intelligent as I am, but just his interests in life could be very different from mine which let us also have different sets of knowledge (and skills).

Zach Alie · 2025-08-28 04:17:51

Yes, things like intelligence are very ambigous, so they can't be calculated with utmost certainty, however unlike you i first assess someones intellectual ability by interacting with them (although even here their is discrepancy as different people using my method might get different results, and even i cannot say that i can perfectly calculate someones intelligence) like talking, discussing ideas, philosophical or scientific reasoning and the like and the properties i most look out for are: out of the box thinking, thinking in different perspectives, flexibilty (not the apologistic type), freedom of thought, broader views, quickness, wittiness, focused, clarified and understandable breaking down of concepts as i firmly believe Richard Feynmanns saying that to truly know if someone understands something, they should be able to condense a certain topic in a few sentences, kind of like picking up the main idea, i believe people who try to manuever and be dismissive or people who use many words with less significance to the main topic, to in certain cases hide their understanding of a concept are not as intelligent as certain other people, although don't take this for absolute truth this is just my experience and perhaps the experience of certain other people, however their can be subjectivity and bias based on the person, and their ability to assess a situation.

Last edited by Zach Alie (2025-08-28 04:20:48)

KerimF · 2025-08-31 07:17:53

Hi Zach, I am just curious how a person, who is sure that every human will end up to nothingness, sees any importance of one's level of intelligence.

For example, in this case, what could be 'the fruit' of being intelligent? I didn't say 'the end fruit' instead, because it leads to nothingness for the person in question.

So perhaps, I say perhaps, it is to serve the progress of 'The Nature' (in its trial and error). But this sounds familiar to me. Instead of serving 'The Nature' there are those who use their intelligence to know 'The God' they have to serve.

Zach Alie · 2025-09-09 20:46:01

I never said I am sure one ends up in nothingness — I only said it seems the most logical conclusion. And the fact that we may end up as nothing gives me even more reason to live fully. As Stephen Hawking said: “This is the only life we get, so make sure to live it to the fullest.”

When I was younger, the thought of death and nothingness did push me into an existential crisis. But I realized: if I can’t change it, why let it ruin every moment of life? Humans have always found ways to cope — through gods, spirits, duty, or purpose. My way was to acknowledge the truth of mortality without letting it paralyze me. That choice gave me freedom to ask questions, interact more meaningfully, and see life with curiosity instead of despair.

That’s where intelligence comes in. Questions like assessing different levels of intelligence — emotional, rational, or otherwise — matter because they help me adapt, connect, and understand people better. Intelligence is not just about “the end fruit,” but about the quality of our living moment to moment. As Neil deGrasse Tyson put it, “Every child is born a scientist.” Asking questions is a way of being human, whether or not there’s an afterlife.

P.S So no Kerim F— believing nothingness may be the end doesn’t make me glum or purposeless. It just means I create my purpose here and now, in this life.

KerimF · Yesterday 06:08:54

Zach Alie wrote:

I never said I am sure one ends up in nothingness — I only said it seems the most logical conclusion. And the fact that we may end up as nothing gives me even more reason to live fully. As Stephen Hawking said: “This is the only life we get, so make sure to live it to the fullest.”

I am afraid that this is exactly how all other living things do while being guided by their preprogrammed instincts. They have no other choice but to play their given/programmed role(s) in life before returning back to nothingness.

Zach Alie wrote:

When I was younger, the thought of death and nothingness did push me into an existential crisis. But I realized: if I can’t change it, why let it ruin every moment of life? Humans have always found ways to cope — through gods, spirits, duty, or purpose. My way was to acknowledge the truth of mortality without letting it paralyze me. That choice gave me freedom to ask questions, interact more meaningfully, and see life with curiosity instead of despair.

Me too, when I was around 17, my first important question which I had to find out its logical answer was about the death of my living body.

Zach Alie wrote:

That’s where intelligence comes in. Questions like assessing different levels of intelligence — emotional, rational, or otherwise — matter because they help me adapt, connect, and understand people better. Intelligence is not just about “the end fruit,” but about the quality of our living moment to moment. As Neil deGrasse Tyson put it, “Every child is born a scientist.” Asking questions is a way of being human, whether or not there’s an afterlife.

For instance, the common weakness that all human babies are born with is 'ignorance'. The role of the human intelligence is to defeat that weakness as much as possible. The more a person trusts the power of his mind, the more he can get the logical answers he is looking for. So, one of my axioms is that the Will/Power behind my existence gave me a relative perfect mind. I mean, every time my mind has a really important question, he is given the power to find/discover its logical answer too. But, in general, a theist is made to believe that his mind is supposed not to be able to answer every question he may ask, no matter how important the question, related to his life, is.

P.S So no Kerim F— believing nothingness may be the end doesn’t make me glum or purposeless. It just means I create my purpose here and now, in this life.

After all you are not wrong. You simply choose to see yourself just another living being though whose living body/flesh is much more evolved than of all other sp,ecies.

On my side, I try, since I was young, to let my possible eternal dream (as I mentioned it on an early post) after my body will sleep for good (will be dead), be as peaceful and joyful as possible. Of course, this is not easy at all to do, because I have to oppose the natural robotic nature of my body whenever I had to face a hard situation. (I had too many since I was young... till these days). At least my actual dreams are nice. I wake up when only my body decides, for one reason or another, to return back to the time-space realm. So, I am not sure what a dream, said a nightmare, could be.

Even if the eternal dream will never happen, I used to feel fine for having the unusual power to oppose, at will, the robotic nature of my body, while almost all people I know have no choice but to follow their instincts of survival, superiority, selfishness and applying justice on others whenever they have the means to do.

Last edited by KerimF (Yesterday 06:15:03)

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#1 2025-08-27 15:42:41

Why, different levels of intelligence.

#2 2025-08-27 16:30:59

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#5 2025-08-27 22:16:35

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#10 Yesterday 06:08:54

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