Do you overestimate or underestimate the intelligence of others?

What is more important to you: to communicate your ideas as clearly as possible to the most people possible OR to communicate your ideas as PRECISELY as possible to an audience with a similar frame of reference?

Doesn't stop me doing it, necessarily.

If you were asking do you think other people think you are intelligent, I'd answer probably not.

Glancing, evocative references have I'm sure sent me down more interesting paths than glowing explanatory recommendations, in pop crit terms.

thanks for confirming my suspicions, you heartless basterd (wink wink emoticon)

If anything, I tend to overexplain things.....

In terms of intelligence, I always try to give people the benefit of the doubt (and assume they are smart), until their actions/words prove me wrong.

Sometimes I worry that I don't come off to other people as very intelligent both IRL and on ILX. I think this might be a complex of sorts based on the fact that I tend to assume others think the worst of me in most possible ways and also because I'm very aware of the fact that I've never really lived up to my potential either academically or occupationally. I combination of pretty intense ADD, laziness and a lack of discipline meant that I basically drifted from HS straight through graduate school by putting in the bare minimum required of me and yeah, I regret that now but can't really change it. As a result I feel like I a little about a lot of things but am not particularly knowledgeable in certain subjects despite being really interested in them.

Earlier today I misinterpreted a thread title and have felt dumb/worried about this ever since. I'm wondering if whether or not other ppl perceive them to be intelligent is something else other people are self-conscious about or this is yet another of my weird personal hang-ups.

"I feel like I a little about a lot of things " = I feel like I KNOW a little about a lot . . .

Sometimes I worry that I don't come off to other people as very intelligent both IRL and on ILX.

this surprises me tbh

As a result I feel like I a little about a lot of things but am not particularly knowledgeable in certain subjects despite being really interested in them.

just go apple-t "wiki + [thing you are arguing about]"

Lol oh don't worry I'm hip to the wiki trick but it does often make me feel like a fraud albeit a very knowledgeable one.

spend more time worryin that people think i think i'm more intelligent than i do, tbh.

I think you might just be in a bit of a funk today E, but no imo you dont come off as dumb, or anything like it, at all on ilx- enjoyin dumb jokes, maybe. I dont think you get docked marks for that. I fukn hope not.

You're probably right about the funk but it's something I'm pretty keenly aware of at most times. BTW I didn't post that expecting ppl to be all "u so smart". I'm genuinely interested in whether or not other ppl give thought to this and if so, in which direction.

I've gone through a couple of periods of worrying that I would never be smart enough to count/smart enough to take part in "important" conversations because I never learned theoretical stuff (was de-epmhasized at my school, I think, or I may have just completely overlooked it). I never learned the language of post-modernism, art or lit crit, or any of the writings/ideas/theories about HOW ideas are made and get into wider discussion.

I still don't know any of that shit and I do feel like a real rube sometimes (Rrobyn kindly schooled me last week on a museum field trip) but I just decided it doesn't matter anymore. I'm not going back to school for NOTHIN come hell or high water, so it's just too bad.

personally speaking i've alwsys rathered people assume i was lazy & feckless rather than dumb. I feel it's closer to the truth most of the time the question arises. Never been tested for any of the add's etc but do tend to get distracted or bored very easily indeed. Reasonably confident in my own brightness, so tbh i dont agonise over it a lot.

xp to self: Ditto feminist theory. Any kind of theory, really -- I don't haz it.

I'm not insecure about my intelligence, I guess -- I'm insecure about my education. Which, admittedly, I paid as little attention to as possible while I was getting it.

spend more time worryin that people think i think i'm more intelligent than i do, tbh.

kinda this although maybe not in the same way - i guess that's a certain aspect of advanced studentry, where you can feel like you're kind of bumbling and chancing along and getting caught out as basically peter sellars in being there is just around the corner.

btw ENBB, if you mean the thread i think you mean then imo nakh's use of the term 'anachronism' was highly questionable (or at least a convoluted conceptual game). besides that it's just the classic lazy ilxor move of not really reading the opening post.

o shit i misspelled sellers. don't judge me. :(

YOU FOOLS! I'M THE ONLY ONE WITH ANY INTELLIGENCE AROUND HERE!!!

Only joking, it's good for morale. Sometimes I'm concerned that people might think I'm stupid, or at least lacking knowledge/experience, when I'm talking with them about some technical subject. But that doesn't really matter, because in pretty much any field it's impossible to know everything. Meanwhile, on ILX (and in general social situations) I like stupid wordplay and dumb puns and dad joeks, but I never worry that posting any of those things will make people think I is stupid.

student lamo

xp, tbf

fine head o hair on me though, keeps the brain warm and active.

a steady diet of simpsons episodes has basically made almost anyone with a tv under a certain age smarter on average, methinks.

heat fucks with superconduction asshole, it's why ur laptop has a fan.

ps my phone doesnt notify me of xps, just so we're all clear

you can know a lot of details about particular subjects and chatter on endlessly and still be an epic moron imo.

Very true Omar, very true.

I've gone through a couple of periods of worrying that I would never be smart enough to count/smart enough to take part in "important" conversations because I never learned theoretical stuff (was de-epmhasized at my school, I think, or I may have just completely overlooked it). I never learned the language of post-modernism, art or lit crit, or any of the writings/ideas/theories about HOW ideas are made and get into wider discussion.

Laurel - I completely relate to much of what you said there. I feel like I know a little bit about those things but not enough so that I feel confident engaging in a discussion about them without worrying that I sound clueless. Maybe the problem is more that I'm easily intimidated.

also

I'm not insecure about my intelligence, I guess -- I'm insecure about my education. Which, admittedly, I paid as little attention to as possible while I was getting it.

― I've got ten bucks. SURPRISE ME. (Laurel), Tuesday, November 30, 2010 1:11 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark

This. I don't doubt my own intelligence. I know I'm smart. I guess I doubt my ability to convey that to other people? My education was fine I just worry that I put as little into it as possible and probably got as little out of it as possible in return.

knowing stuff is overrated. being interested in stuff is all that really matters.

^^^^^^^^^^^^ asking questions > offering opinions.

i probably overestimate people whom i respect, or at least find engaging on some level.

..and i prob underestimate everyone else.

multi-xpost

What most people call intelligence seems mostly irrelevant to how I view other people or myself. It rarely, if ever, crosses my mind that someone isn't smart enough for a task or an idea.

In relation to tasks, I think more in terms of whether a person has a talent or training for that job or the reliability to perform it. In relation to ideas, I find that the most useful and important ideas are simple enough that almost everyone can understand them, while exceptionally subtle ideas are rarely important enough for me to care whether others grasp them. Or if I do.

The whole idea of intelligence, as divorced from accomplishment, is a fairly new one. I trace it to the desire of government and other big institutions to identify which painfully young, unformed, and inexperienced students should be force-fed, in the hopes of staying ahead in the arms race. The fact that it sort of worked means the idea of it will stick around, despite it being really warping for those young people.

being fairly well-versed in those fancy theory languages they're as much of a hazard as they are a benefit tbh - v easy that they become an alternative to thinking rather than an addition to it, as anyone who's been around certain kindsa folx will know.

i'm more impressed with people who are always trying to learn and seek knowledge more than those who ramble on and on as if they've already learned everything and now it's just vomiting forth ad nauseum.

Yeah, I would agree with that wholeheartedly.

lol Merdeyeux - that's exactly what sparked this. So dumb! It's just interesting to me that I instantly assumed that I was at fault and focused on that rather than questioning the wording, you know?

"knowing stuff is overrated. being interested in stuff is all that really matters."

this is a luxury of the leisure class. poor people better bone up on their simpsons to compete in this post-simpsons economy. (maybe skipping the later seasons, though?)

to cite what is (to me) an obvious example, ayn rand was "intelligent" but she was still a complete idiot.

i estimate exactly right

:D

sometimes im like, maybe they see s.thing i don't, and maybe that makes them smarter, but then i actually listen to 'wowee zowee' and im like nah

that's too cromulent of a way to view things, Philip.

Enrique OTM.

There are a lot of smart people on this board, who have education levels much higher than mine, and are fascinated by things which I know nothing about. Occasionally it makes me feel kind of dumb, but that's alright. I am generally way more interested in reading/listening than posting/talking, so my shame is usually private. This kind of relationship is pretty much what I seek in real-life friends and social groups as well. All of my closest non-family relationships are with people as smart or smarter than I am. I guess Groucho Marx sums up my approach to friends and social groups best: "I don’t care to belong to any club that will have me as a member."

you always come across as smart on ILX, ENBB, and decent besides. you shouldn't worry about it, though of course you will. for my part, i worry that i am a clever species of dolt. also that i'm much, much stupider now than i was in my youth, but haven't adapted to the reduction in brainpower, so i go around thinking that my low-wattage insights are endlessly fascinating.

i think the quickest way for you self-deprecating folks to stop feeling so dumb is to have other people try to extract expertise from you that they would otherwise pay someone else for. i mean, maybe you'll feel stupid for not charging, but at least you'll feel, "oh my smartness is worth something, I am the smrt"

I don't have too many doubts about my expertise in certain areas, and people do come to me with random questions here and there, so I know my brane is good for something..but I am definitely, undeniably "bad" at talking about thinking in this specific language, and among certain sets of people that ability is the gateway to tons of other connections being made/people being taken seriously for their intellect. Obv prob anyone who requires you to have that capability in order to converse is a douchebag and you should discount that completely. But you know, still. It's a hallmark of "basic" higher education in some worlds.

I don't really know how I missed it except that I had no idea it or anything that would have led me to it was out there. Sometimes I think half of college was encoded with buzz-words and allusions to ideas I'd never heard of and didn't realize existed from the hints that were dropped.

I don't know if this is my school being "lol religious" or if it makes me "lol small-town". Or both.

Earlier today I misinterpreted a thread title and have felt dumb/worried about this ever since. I'm wondering if whether or not other ppl perceive them to be intelligent is something else other people are self-conscious about or this is yet another of my weird personal hang-ups.

― ENBB, Tuesday, 30 November 2010 17:49 (1 hour ago)

this is old paintings thread right? the title is kinda confusing cuz i've used ~anachronistic~ literally, tho usually it just means 'lol old shit that should have disappeared already'. so i wouldn't feel bad about that.

you seem intelligent to me, and i doubt anyone else here would think differently unless they assume being a talkative/engaging/fully-rounded person rather than an aspie c++ dude somehow suggests lower intelligence.

I feel you, Laurel. This may not be totally related, but I often feel like I am at a disadvantage at work because I don't really know the buzz speak thing that so many middle managers use to communicate with each other (and convince their bosses that they know wtf they are doing). I guess they pick this up in school or from "How To Succeed in Your Career" type books? Like, can I even get in their club without knowing these terms? Do I need to spend another five years in this place before I can speak it competently? One thing I have realized is that there are some really fucking stupid people who successfully hide behind this kind of language.

brb monetizing deliverables

stupid like a fox...!

I think the advantage you guys would have in these situations is that unlike fluency in latin or klingon, you could probably just make words up (in academese, and business-speak respectively), and no one could call BS on you for fear of having their own fundament crumble.

I think people frequently place waaaaaaay too much importance on this.

Of course they do but that doesn't mean that people aren't going to worry about it sometimes even if/when they realize that, in the grand scheme of things, it's relatively unimportant.

Oh sure people will worry about all sorts of inconsequential stuff that they can't do much to change but I feel like some people really over-rate abstract intelligence and its role in civilization and other human endeavours.

In answer to yr original question: it's a personal hang-up in terms of the big scheme of things but it's not a weird hang-up to have.

people really over-rate abstract intelligence and its role in civilization and other human endeavours.

not gwb.

well i did say some people

But GWB is a reasonably good example of how some people spent 8 years going "haha he is so dumb" and it made precisely cock all difference to his status as President or his role within his party/government.

I can't hear you, I'm leveraging platforms to incentivize leaner JIT manufacturing.

*boils the ocean*

nothing worse than a crumbly fundament

That is what I actually do, fyi. So crit theory really has pretty much no place in my life anyway, unless it helps me think about perceived increases in value of item to consumer. Actually supply chain stuff is kinda theoretical but you can work it all out from the nuts and bolts, if you just make some leaps. And verb a lot of nouns, that's also key.

*hegemonically essentializes the ideology of monetized deliverables*

pretty sure i grossly overrate my intelligence much of the time

But GWB is a reasonably good example of how some people spent 8 years going "haha he is so dumb" and it made precisely cock all difference to his status as President or his role within his party/government.

― 3:10 to Your Ma (Noodle Vague), Tuesday, 30 November 2010 20:03 (8 minutes ago)

srsly doubt he is remotely stupid. but unlike the majority of ppl outside of remedial institutions, his life encouraged a sort of intellectual downward mobility; never let it be shown that yr going to yale had anything more to it than legacy prference & finding it a good a place to drink/fuck/fraternize. then a further purge of highfalutin ideas required by his spectacularly successful reinvention from northern episcopalian paternalist to genial texan tard.

i think he might be actually stupid... a genuine god-botherer, so so i guess blocked viz a viz large tranches of knowledge and experience

'viz a viz' huh

in the way that the words are commonly used, dubya's stupidity/intelligence is irrelevant to his public career, except if we want to ponder the electoral advantages of appearing to be closer on the scale to "stupid".

i think he was attempting some sort of "plainspoken" bullshit, going w/unfrozen caveman lawyer's endlessly successful litigation tactics.

maybe there's some use in thinking about organisations or cultural movements or sets of ideas as stupid or intelligent? I'm not sure that there is, but those are the kinds of things that I think tend to make the individual's capabilities irrelevant.

its more beneficial to be motivated, dedicated, popular, attractive, ruthless or any number of things than 'intelligent' irl a lot of the time.

theres meant to be a 'probably' in there. It's good to be meticulous too.

i think he might be actually stupid... a genuine god-botherer, so so i guess blocked viz a viz large tranches of knowledge and experience

― rip whiney g weingarten 03/11 never forget (history mayne), Tuesday, 30 November 2010 20:22 (8 minutes ago)

there are some ppl who will argue organized religion is a sort of inorganic brain damage.

anyway, the 90s gubernatorial debates suggest gwb's cognitive abilities are some way beyond the average. that facebook thing the other day shows decent extemporization skills.

during his presidency he seemed more stupified than stupid, like how could it be this easy to become president? he was just pretending and yet, no, other people behaved as if he was actually the goddamn president. it must have seemed hyperreal.

srsly doubt he is remotely stupid.

gwb isn't stupid. he doesn't seem curious, tho, and he seems to enjoy positioning himself as anti-intellectual.

would posit that ppl that think that gwb is somehow actually stupid are greatly overestimating their own intelligence

cf sarah palin, who is probably of average intelligence

ppl overestimating how important bookish intelligence is gonna be to a son of texan privilege?

agreed x4

gwb is the fucking alpha and omega of ~incurious~

joyce, leibniz and mozart could be reincarnated in his living room and he'd just excoriate them for not wanting to bro down

except joyce who probably wouldn't turn down free drink

hey let's have a discussion about the meaning of intelligence

Pretty sure Mozart wouldn't neither.

Wouldn't wanna drink with Leibniz.

got beef huh

sided with newton

God-botherer, fucked with my man Spinoza

Kind of time-serving, public God-botherer iirc

Beef aside I don't think he'd bro down

joyce wrote most of gwb's ad-libs

that would explain the neologisms

if gwb is dumb by choice he's still dumb. stupid is as stupid does, and all that.

What the? I've been in a meeting for the last hour and now we're talking GWB? Woah.

;_;

my fault; i am ashamed.

DAMN YOU!

(not really)

BAN DANIEL

DAMN YOU!

i get this all the time, actually.

my assistant says this to me at least twice a day.

Honestly Daniel, sometimes...

lol :)

ENBB, was gonna say I have similar worries/doubts myself. You are not alone, believe me. In my mind I feel like I'm reasonably intelligent, but that whole 'in my mind' confidence is really just because it's me thinkin baout me on my own. Especially in groups or on ILX, I'm always inclined to sit quietly and listen, or hang back and read as the case may be, because I don't ever feel like I'm the person that everyone should pay attention to...I mean, I'm better than I ever used to be, but even now there's times where I post something, or say something out loud and think 'omg why are you saying it like that when you know how to speak/write clearly you MORON wtf wtf'.
Spiralling self-doubt, present and accounted for :)

It's spelt MORAN, tsk

post something, or say something out loud and think 'omg why are you saying it like that when you know how to speak/write clearly you MORON wtf wtf'.

I do this all the time.

ENBB for cripes sake you can write a clear paragraph that is easy to read and maintains my interest! Judging from a random survey of internet writing that is pretty good! What is funny is that in my experience you can't tell what someone's education level is from their writing ability. Also I've observed academic discussions where being clear to the readers / lurkers has not been a priority, whether it is history or theory. What is office "buzz speak", sounds scary! I never had it at work.

it is the worst, is what it is

I just realized, though, that some people don't write well on the internet because they never learned to type!! My brother had a 32 ACT and the whole college shebang but he can't write well on the internet because his typing stinks! He had someone type his papers in college.

yeah, all my dad's emails seem written by a middle-schooler, but it's mostly because he types with his index fingers and favors brevity. he's otherwise v articulate

It's hilarious when someone I know who was a hotshot scholar in high school and college shows up on a discussion....and whoops they look stupid in front of everyone because they haven't mastered the brain-to-finger connection! They had no idea that being able to type more than a short business-related e-mail was a requirement for being taken seriously. My brother even makes typos in e-mails, he sounds like an idiot.

Used to think I underestimated. Revelations that came to me over this past year though indicate that I vastly overestimate people's intelligence as well as emotional maturity and cognizance of current events. This hasn't changed the fact that I am for the most part an enlightenment-era type guy who believes egalitarianism and equality.

I work with academics (science field but still) and this:

What is funny is that in my experience you can't tell what someone's education level is from their writing ability

is often otm. One of them asked me to help edit one of their manuscripts this week and the writing is shockingly bad. I've made edits in track changes but felt so weird doing it because it just seems like it isn't my place to do so.

Like I said earlier I was having an off morning and don't spend nearly as much time thinking about this as some of my posts here might have suggested. It is, however, something that I'm always keenly aware of and I think hearing about how others feel about it and themselves in regards to it is pretty interesting.

writing/communication ability is another talent like any , smart people dont automatically have it.

it's not really like 'any' other talent. you can't really prove you're smart w/o it, in a lot of cases.

i'd suggest bias, with that comin from a writer kinda dude tbh

i factored that in, but you have to be able to communicate on some level, to be smart

i guess some discourses (like chemistry?) don't involve verbal expression in the same way

even so

u dont have to communicate on any level to be smart, just to have other people know it.

maths, chemistry, physics- some smart ppl in or around, they're not all bill bryson

The best way to prove how smart you are is to weigh your brain.
anyone who knows anything knows that.

^ physics

history mayne offtm. if a clever person does something clever, they needn't be able to write to "prove" to the educated classes that they're intelligent. proof is in the pudding, etc.

that being said: i often find that if a person can write well and with clarity, it is reliable indicator of their intelligence. the reverse is not nearly so reliable.

yes but brain weight is key

if a person can write well and with clarity, it is reliable indicator of their intelligence.

wouldn't agree with this, beyond showing a basic level of intelligence

yeah, but i'm in america. NO ONE can write well here.

history mayne offtm. if a clever person does something clever, they needn't be able to write to "prove" to the educated classes that they're intelligent. proof is in the pudding, etc.

i'd imagine that maths is *all* communication. obv not in the same way literary criticism is. but they have to be able to communicate their proofs.

with softer subjects, the quality of expression is very hard to distinguish from the quality of the thought

true for the softer subjects, hard to say how much of the spectrum of intelligence they should occupy tho, before generalising how important communication is.

it's funny (but not at all surprising) that most people pin the indicators of intelligence to things that they themselves value. writers and people who admire writing pin it to writing ability, clarity and elegance of prose, etc. scientists and technical people to the ability to grasp and process complex information systems. philosophers to cognitive fluidity and associative/integrative ability. wits & thieves to quickness & subtlety. empaths to emotional awareness and life experience. one can easily possess certain forms of intelligence while lacking others.

At work, we'd been looking at Powerpoints for maybe half an hour, and one of my coworkers shouted, "I don't want to look at any more WORDS." Not even read, just look at. As long as you aren't saying stuff *like that* I 99% of the time assume a person is smart in a way I don't know because I don't know them well enough yet.

xp

well i'm not a maths/science genius or anything, just arguing the other corner against communicative ability bias, though i do think it's important in displaying your abilites/inelligence obviously.

btw Er4ica you are probs tired of hearing this by this point in the thread but you are clearly a smart person, no 2 ways about it.

yeah. i'm mystified at the people here who are doubting their intelligence.

or GWB's lack thereof, right Daniel?

oh gwb is plenty bright.

Aw, thank you Abbott. More embarrassed than anything tbh because I realized it may have sounded like I was fishing for that when I wasn't. Was just one of *those* moments. Anyway, pretty glad I did bump this because some of the discussion here has been really interesting imo.

if in doubt, i always check david beckham's last reported income to reset my values on this type of thing

in purely ilx terms i lurked for a long time to avoid seeming naive and dumb. now i accept that sometimes i'm going to seem naive and dumb, so just post away. although i think i'm still mainly resident on the football threads. i guess there we have a bit of a manly 'look he said something dumb, time for some light-natured ribbing then we move on' thing, whereas elsewhere there's the risk of people saying nothing and leaving you to feel that everyone thinks you're dumb but aren't saying anything. which is somehow worse.

in purely ilx terms i lurked for a long time to avoid seeming naive and dumb.

and yr doing a phd in philosophy right? i guess some ppl just worry a lot, unduly

football threads are all challops and nonsense interspersed with pete_w's posts. Comforting entrance to ilx for sure.

and he mostly types crap

nakh attakh

and back to CW Mills I go

thought you were studying science jearnalism or s.th?

omerta

and back to Bush Mills I go

with softer subjects, the quality of expression is very hard to distinguish from the quality of the thought

not in both directions. fine words can easily conceal obtuse arguments.

true-ish -- there isn't an infallible standard for 'quality of expression', but i *don't* just mean it sounds nice. but sure it is a thing to keep in mind.

'quality of expression' the ability to convey the required concept with as little distortion as possible, or somesuch

there's the rub -- distortion *of what*?

there isn't a 'message' that precedes its conversion into words... or is there?

yes. i would argue the coupling between thought and words isn't as tight as you imagine.

nah

suppose it depends on whether we're talking hard data type info or yknow *feelings*, but yeah i guess that definitions lends itself to the former tbf

i don't know the answer

unless there was some machine-code of the brain that you could real off as a pattern of synapses firing, but then how wd you represent that so it cd be understood?

"reel off"

babelfish, obvs

afaik that isn't how the brain is thought to work btw

suppose it depends on whether we're talking hard data type info or yknow *feelings*

bit of an unfair dichotomy. are 'concepts' post-linguistic?

but yr overvaluing verbalisation imo.

suppose it depends on whether we're talking hard data type info or yknow *feelings*, but yeah i guess that definitions lends itself to the former tbf

"Tennyson and Browning are poets; and they think, but they do not feel their thought as immediately as the odour of a rose. A thought to Donne was an experience; it modified his sensibility. When a poet’s mind is perfectly equipped for its work, it is constantly amalgamating disparate experiences; the ordinary man’s experience is chaotic, irregular, fragmentary."

i'm with b streisand on this tbh ledge

linguists don't think of "language" purely in terms of verbalisation, what you're looking for is a medium in which thought cd take place that precedes language as structure. I wd suggest that looking for that leads you into an endless recursion of pre-languages.

or yeah what Eliot (?) said?

i'm with b streisand on this tbh ledge

"Sam, You Made the Pants Too Long"?

ironic that thread about over/underestimating intelligence has these fukn guys bombarding me with the heavy artillery of pre-linguistic theory tbh.

never mistake making stuff up after a couple of absinthes for theory

in the absinthe of a better alternative

also, on a phone so cant c&p which leaves me somewhat at a disadvantage.

Where would purely scientific notation fit into yr 'pre-language' spectrum?

scientific notation's a language, uncontroversially. see also: maths etc.

think of it like "programming language", and thanx for the DN

lol

yeah kickin myself for mithin malithe afore thought

never mistake making stuff up after a couple of absinthes for theory

AKA '19th century Parisian philosophers go out on the piss'

20th century english wasters stay in on the internet

it's 2010, mayne

the opensource of the masses

The OTM of the people