Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Outside of high SAT scores and high GPAs do you measure intelligence in any other way?
When I was in school and college my classmates were obsessed into a frenzy about scores and GPAs. But are there other types of intelligence that are relevant outside of the ivory towers?
I’ve met two self taught engineers, neither of which went to college. One had some electronics training in the military as a tech. One of them was designing the circuitry for endoscopic cameras for a top of the line medical and research camera company. The other, last I heard, had been hired to design and implement the alignmemt and tracking system for a new radio telescope. These are obviously very intelligent people who had nothing to do with “higher education” other than what they taught themselves.
So, I think intelligent people exist independent of universities. Some make use of them, others just go do it on their own. SATs etc. obviously meant nothing to them.
Yup. I've met some highly intelligent people who did not attend college. These are younger people and I mention this because a college education has become ubiquitous with more recent generations. What sets them apart is that they read A LOT! These people have excellent vocabularies and writing skills with knowledge on many subjects. For whatever reason, they didn't enroll in the college track courses in high school or they didn't attend college. However, they all enjoyed reading and they ended up in blue or pink collar jobs.
I've been around a fair number of "intuitive" intelligent people who didn't get their professional training from college study. For whatever reasons, they didn't enjoy college prep or college classes, and didn't test out well on ACT or SAT tests.
But their grasp of complex subjects was superb, their visualization of how to make things work in the areas of their interests was their strength.
They've designed and/or overcome manufacturing obstacles that stumped many others with college degrees and field experience in their respective areas of expertise.
I've seen this happen in everything from automotive components design, chemicals & products for many sectors of industry/consumer goods/manufacturing, sailboats/power boats/shipbuilding, medical devices, electronics/consumer and professional audio products, IT hard and soft products, optics, manufacturing techniques, food processing … and probably hundreds of other products/processes where I didn't know enough about the process/product and it's origins to know or recognize the creativity/intellect that was involved.
To claim that innovation and originality expertise can only result from training by the professional college education system is the height of intellectual snobbery. There's just way too many inventions, products, processes, techniques, and goods that are demonstrably the result of creativity that wasn't from "college educated" people. And I haven't even touched upon "the arts" … where music, written materials, and visual arts have oft-times been the product of non-college pursuits by many people.
Intelligence and education are two very different things. You can have one without the other. One reason they seem to get comingled so often is that, in general intelligent people are more educated. They aren't intelligent because they are more educated, but, because they tend to seek out more education.
It's not a chicken and egg thing. Intelligence comes first, then the education.
Yup. I've met some highly intelligent people who did not attend college. These are younger people and I mention this because a college education has become ubiquitous with more recent generations. What sets them apart is that they read A LOT! These people have excellent vocabularies and writing skills with knowledge on many subjects. For whatever reason, they didn't enroll in the college track courses in high school or they didn't attend college. However, they all enjoyed reading and they ended up in blue or pink collar jobs.
Highlighted sentence says it all. Along with this I firmly believe most people are born with a certain level of intelligence. How this is honed is what sets many apart.
My father was not allowed to attend high school by my grandfather, let alone college. My grandfather's very words to dad, "Enough of this foolishness, it's time to go to work".
My dad had a math aptitude that was uncanny and one wonders where this would have taken him. He read newspapers and magazines voraciously.
Because of his lack of opportunity, my father put no limits on me. Just wish I had his natural intelligence.
Oh absolutely! It's a mindset and attitude towards acquiring knowledge and using it.
Plenty of people with fancy degrees who are incurious and just plain ignorant in their speech and actions. The classic example is House Representative Louis Gohmert of Texas- who has a law degree and was a judge, but sounds incredibly foolish in his public pronouncements.
And there are plenty of people who don't have a lot of formal education but are well informed and thoughtful in their dealings.
I've been around a fair number of "intuitive" intelligent people who didn't get their professional training from college study. For whatever reasons, they didn't enjoy college prep or college classes, and didn't test out well on ACT or SAT tests.
But their grasp of complex subjects was superb, their visualization of how to make things work in the areas of their interests was their strength.
They've designed and/or overcome manufacturing obstacles that stumped many others with college degrees and field experience in their respective areas of expertise.
I've seen this happen in everything from automotive components design, chemicals & products for many sectors of industry/consumer goods/manufacturing, sailboats/power boats/shipbuilding, medical devices, electronics/consumer and professional audio products, IT hard and soft products, optics, manufacturing techniques, food processing … and probably hundreds of other products/processes where I didn't know enough about the process/product and it's origins to know or recognize the creativity/intellect that was involved.
To claim that innovation and originality expertise can only result from training by the professional college education system is the height of intellectual snobbery. There's just way too many inventions, products, processes, techniques, and goods that are demonstrably the result of creativity that wasn't from "college educated" people. And I haven't even touched upon "the arts" … where music, written materials, and visual arts have oft-times been the product of non-college pursuits by many people.
I've noticed in various fields that formal education tends to introduce biases, so that trained professionals can't see obvious facts, and discrepancies with what they were taught, that are right under their noses. It's as if the education blinds them, in some respects, and teaches them to dismiss certain ideas without investigating. The result is, that areas of science and medicine remain unexplored, treatments for illnesses are missed, and the potential for advancing science is held back by ignorance and closed minds.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.