ZOMBIE FORUMS

Okay, I'm probably making way too big a deal of this... But goddamnit, I HATE it when people say things like this. It's just elitist, and it annoys me to no end. Did you ever notice how anyone who ascribes to an elitist philosophy always counts themself as a member of the elite? You'll never find a Leninist who doesn't believe he's part of the intellectual vanguard, or an Objectivist who doesn't believe that he is a member of the independent entepreneurial class.

Anyway, as for what WanderingIdiot was saying about Intelligence vs. Knowledge: by that definition one could be intelligent without being knowledgeable; however, one could not be knowledgeable without being intelligent, because being knowledgeable implies a higher capacity to retain knowledge. I've known many people in my life who were just able to memorize facts and then regurgitate them when needed. At no time, however, did they actually THINK. Also, some people who don't have a great ability to gain knowledge or memorize facts are still geniuses. A poet or a composer does not necessarily have to be learned; he just has to be able to connect things together. Beethoven was widely viewed as mentally deficient and an ignoramus, for example.

I think what would work much better would be a threefold division of "smartness": Knowledge, the facts themselves (this is not an ability per se, it's more like intellectual "food"); Intellegence, the ability to gain knowledge easily; and Intellectual Creativity, the only element of "smartness" that is absolutely essential to what we call Genius. Intellectual Creativity is the ability to connect ideas in new, interesting ways.

As for whether Intellegence is genetic, I'd still say that it mostly isn't. Aside from cases of serious genetic defects like Down Syndrome, I'd say that the capacity to acquire knowledge is more socially determined than anything. Descriptions of feral children (i.e. children who grew up in the wilderness seperated from all human contact) seem to indicate that without socialization, a human being would probably function on about the level of, say, a retarded chimpanzee. Society is what makes us human; therefore, almost all attributes that we would consider distinctly human, e.g. intelligence, are determined by society.

Yeah, I said "us smart people". But that doesn't mean I consider myself some sort of H. sapiens superior, it just means I don't consider myself stupid. I don't consider you stupid, and generally the Gump-ian rule of "Stupid is as stupid does" is my motto - unless I'm in traffic, then I find a uniform law of stupefaction is in effect, but I digress.

But to pick at your nit just a tad more, tovarisch Icy, consider:
Elitism is an outgrowth of ego. Socialistic leanings be damned, with enough ego, cliques will form. It makes me happy to consider myself part of a clique that eschews the lackluster wit.

I admit, however, that you have a valid point. A true socialist would never consider themselves above or beneath their brethren. It's a lovely idea. *hears ego knock on the door* but the fundamental problem just rapped on my door. Sorry.

~edit - Yeah, that was off topic. I also like your trefoil premise of "intelligence capability".

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-MrWarMage wishes there was a pill to abate ego, and allow socialism to prosper, provided we could all pursue hobbies, too!!

There's a theory that puts intelligence into many different types, like musical intellect/ spatial intellect/ linguistic intellect/ etc

Though I forget all that it divides intellect into though.

I guess the question then becomes whether the "creativity" category is at least partly inherited or "nurtured". It does seem like these things could be genetic; possibly an ability to develop neuron connections faster, etc.

Now, on to non-obvious stuff.

I don't think it matters what kind of intelligence you have, at least for the purposes of this discussion, because they're all probably just different manifestations of the same thing, manifesting differently because of unrelated genetic/nurture factors.