@donblanco Bruce Willis is not the kind of guy that likes basking in the sun. We're safe.

@willtochaos @donblanco
"I gotta go see about a girl" - (3:13 min) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6l7ULd_sGY

@donblanco @willtochaos
Much much Better than creating a nuclear bomb. I believe the phrase is, shooting yourself in the foot (or head).

@rice That's a valid question, indeed.

The quick way: take an IQ test, or another psychometric tool that conforms to whatever theory of intelligence you see as valid.

The long way: Live and see yourself becoming jaded and cynical by years of interacting with bureaucrats and highly conscientious people in general.

@willtochaos well, according to an IQ test I took in middle school (Stanford-Binet) after a head injury, I'm below average. According to uni profs and places I've been interning at before, I'm above average. Either way, when I was interning last year at a physics lab, no-one there seemed to be out of the ordinary. Neither my parents, who are both (successful) academics. Either IQ isn't that good of a measuring tool as has been suggested before as well, or there are other factors

@rice Intelligence is not a personality dimension. Average intelligence and high trait conscientiousness would predict more success than high intelligence and high openness to experience, for instance.

@willtochaos however high openness and high intelligence aren't exactly correlated, though? It's probably possible for someone to be of average intelligence and high openness, but... indeed, actually high openness would pave a road to higher intelligence in its traditional meaning. It's true that scientific fields and research-heavy fields don't necessarily signify much higher intelligence than average, as high consentiousness is required for persistence.

@rice They are moderately correlated. As you can certainly imagine, openness to experience and creativity allows the full expression of intelligence and a capability.

Which is certainly not always useful in academia. Societies rely heavily on conscientious individuals to do most of the work. When the historical time is right, individuals who are both open/creative and intelligent are required to advance to a new paradigm.

@willtochaos so, I can probably be successful in the things I want to do just because I'm high in openness and low in consentiousness, not because of my IQ which is non-existent, although it wouldn't make sense for my IQ to be below average with a high score (98) of openness to experience. Probably.

Doesn't really matter in the end though, but this small detail will forever make me feel like an impostor and increase my levels of anxiety.

@rice Talking to you, I'm led to believe that you are above average. After all, you seem to be able to discuss abstract subjects with a degree of competence and ability to inquire further.

Plus, as I said, intelligence is theorized to have the fluid and crystallized dimension. I score in at least a standard deviation higher than normal, but my linguistic skills are far superior than my logical-mathematical ones.

I acquire language quickly but am often a poor thinker on my feet.

@willtochaos If that's all It takes, then it's very likely that all of my friends and family are above average, and I don't even know how an average person thinks like. However, that's a scary thought, because it implies I'm very sheltered and socially privileged, having no understanding of the "average" at all. I don't know, truly, what it means.

I think that people high in openness clash with those who are more consentious. That's my experience with intelligence-related traits.

@rice I do not work in academia. And in my field of study, conscientiousness and grit are highly desirable attributes, if one is to survive the publish-or-perish paradigm and make it to a tenure-track position.

I work in logistics, instead, and am therefore surrounded by people who seem to rank in the 90 to 100 range, judging by the range of topics they are able to entertain.

I can tell you, it's a life of quiet desperation if you cannot escape somewhere else.

@willtochaos When I'll get a pleroma account, I'll DM you with some interesting ideas.

I agree with you about that feeling. That's why I had to change my major eventually and I'm still unhappy. I ended up taking a lot of elective courses, I know I'll end up doing something else though in the end.

@rice I majored in Philosophy. You would think that's a field that privileges the combination of intelligence plus openness to experience/ideas.

Turns out that modern institutional philosophy is a place that rewards the same conscientious hyper-specialisation as the rest of academia. That is: you better not dare coming up with any outlandish ideas, or else...

@willtochaos Agreed. That's why academia is a dead end. I became really depressed when I understood that

@rice For people who are intelligent and creative? Definitely. Hence the need for people with that constellation of traits to carefully examine the values being given to them by society.

They often won't fit with their tendencies, and it will generate considerable psychological suffering.

No wonder conscientiousness is (I believe) the highest predictor of life satisfaction.

@rice I have a pleroma account myself: willtochaos@pleroma.soykaf.com

@rice @willtochaos
90% of the people think they are above average; so your are exceptional.

@gleanORchaffs @willtochaos Most people struggle with quantifying their intelligence, it's quite understandable because we have such a narrow understanding of our own actions, besides there's a lot of bias etc. It's impossible to do so accurately. I certainly believe I'm around average in intelligence but it shouldn't keep me from doing great things, since I'm passionate above all.

@willtochaos I think one of the most pressing questions would be - how to define intelligence at all? Is it work ability, pattern recognition, memory? And yes, I understand that there's a lot of literature on this, but the question remains: there aren't any truly successful ways to describe intelligence. I think an absolute idiot" or someone with below average intelligence can be good at Math, it's about pattern recognition, relationships and abstractions. But

@rice Intelligence is that faculty of mind by which order is perceived in a situation previously considered disordered.

An absolute idiot may, perhaps, become good at basic arithmetic. With a lot of time investment, I daresay.

An average or above average person requires far less time investment. She is able to effectively use the resources given to her by nature and development and adapt to a situation accordingly.

This seems to me to be clear enough.

@willtochaos It isn't clear though. As I said, for example, I score low on IQ tests. I believe I'm of average or below average intelligence, but I've done things considered to be possible only for people of very high intelligence. This has always bugged me and I feel like an impostor when I get praised.

There have been some cases where it's also very clear that high consentiousness gets someone further even in a scientific career, requiring innovative thoughts/ideas, thus 1/2

@willtochaos 2/2 people of average intelligence but high consentiousness might still get quite far even in the "innovative" fields.

@rice There seems to be a lot of unexamined assumptions in what you are saying, though.

First, fluid intelligence vs crystallized intelligence. People with fluid intelligence are very good at the type of standard tests used to measure IQ. They are very quick at recognising and reacting to patterns.

I do not know what kind of work you do, but it surely is true that in most cases conscientiousness is more important than creativity in a scientific career.

@rice Truly, it seems that creativity is often NEGATIVELY correlated with success. And that's the reason for my original post: some of us are highly creative and highly open by nature, which is also moderately correlated with intelligence (anecdote: I have never met an open person who isn't also decently intelligent)

My post is aimed at saying that it is fine if you do not become the next Einstein and decide to 'waste' your life instead. It's up to you.

@willtochaos Yes, I understood the premise of the post. I really have to switch to pleroma, this character limit is too restrictive.

@pea oooh I want an account there yeah... that'd be really cool.

Feeling so special 😉

@willtochaos my point is though that people who believe they are next Einsteins probably aren't even close. I don't understand how someone can assess their own intelligence accurately, it's extremely difficult. IQ tests or not, it's a tricky subject.

I apologize because it's actually slightly unrelated to your original idea and I went off on a tangent.

@rice Because people make the mistake of considering an individual as separate from his ecology.

Einstein had an high IQ, was probably high in trait openness, and very importantly, was born in a time when a change of scientific paradigm was imminent.

But usually, the small, incremental changes in science are made by people who are bright and consistent, while the Einsteins are told to get the hell out. That;s life.

@rice Furthermore, brightness and genius is more common than assumed.

An education that allows the individual to flourish according to her gifts would be a good complement to whatever genetic gifts the person already possesses.

The vocational education we all have to muddle through is not always suited to intelligent individuals who also tend to be at least moderately open to experience.

@willtochaos it doesn't necessarily describe intelligence. So can intelligence exist without these skills, what does it entail? Or high intelligence means that aforementioned skills are developed?

There's also supposedly a genetic component.

Either way excuse my ramblings, just trying to say that it's really difficult to pinpoint the meaning of intelligence.

@Food Indeed!

@AmyJade I'm glad you do :)