What defines intelligence?

[Colleenyyy(:]

You guys say that i'm BSing, when in reality you do not know what you're talking about. Sorry but if you think that a persons brain capacity is judged off of nothing more than the size of their cranium, you seen to be a closed minded IB learner. To say that we may never know anything for certain, is probably the most brilliant response I've heard yet, and although I do agree with the idea of brain capacity and how one can only know so much, I feel that each person has their own way of thinking, and by referring to someone as unintelligent, you're classifying yourself as bias.

When referring back to the original question, I do not think a test or even grades can define who you are, and or what you think. In fact, there is no measurement or definition to how we can truly range anything in relation to Intelligence. A simple IQ test does not prove anything more than the fact that you're capable of manipulation or maybe even memorization. But to me the idea of memorization proves absolutely nothing... even if you are able to state something word for word, there is no proof as to you having an in depth understanding around the chosen topic(s).

And upon the idea of resources.. I feel that most everyone has access to them, and personally I feel that it is less of what you interpret them to be and more of what what you make out of your findings.

Edited November 17, 2011 by Colleenyyy(:

[Sandwich]

Keep on topic and discuss things sensibly (accusing people of 'BS' and insulting them is strangely missing from the Big Book of Intelligent Debate...) or you won't be allowed to continue to discuss things.

In terms of the size of a person's cranium dictating their intelligence, this has been refuted over and over. It is simply not the case. In terms of brain function, it's not about how much of it you have, but rather about how much you use it (i.e. the quality, quantity and integration of neural connections). You can even be missing half your brain and train the half remaining to fulfil pretty much all the function of what's missing. I can't work out if this is a genuine point or just being silly

Resourcefulness is definitely a form of intelligence in my opinion. Find somebody lacking this quality (and there are many, many of them out there), and you'll conclude they're pretty dim quite quickly. Just like some people can figure out particle physics but can't work out how to use a can opener until you show them! Some people have the nouse to work things out (and become engineers etc...) and others really haven't a clue.

IQ tests usually test mathematical ability and lots of shape-matching stuff. I did take the one I did seriously, it's just I fail at the former and honestly don't even know what they're getting at with the latter!

In terms of what IB grades show, they show a multitude of things. They DO show intelligence because to score highly you must comprehend conceptual things and also display a range of different types of intelligence - mathematical intelligence, being able to express yourself, being able to write and argue fluently and coherently, being able to take on board and apply concepts (science) and so on. They also show hard work and endeavour. The person who gets 1 point more or less than another person may or may not be more or less intelligent, but as IB grades are an amalgam of intelligence AND hard work, they're still a superior candidate.

Unless they did easy subjects... in which case, no comment. I personally think that the IB should differentiate between candidates who did easy subjects and those who did hard ones, because those two diplomas required a whole different level of effort!

IMO we all recognise an 'intelligent' person when we see one. Quantifying and defining it is the issue

[Ezak]

The size of the cranium is not important when measuring intelligence, rather how frequently the brain is folded. This is at least what i have heard and I might be wrong, but size doesn't really play a role, or any role at all, when it comes to intelligence.

Furthermore, if we don't specify what intelligence is it will be hard to pin down who to measure it or even acknowledge someone as intelligent. If we just use teh word as a vague term for someone being smart, or being a quick learner, you could easily walk around the question.

As the question was "what defines intelligence" I will have to answer ones ability to understand things, and how one manages to use knowledge to derive new knowledge from the previous one.

[URA BOAT]

Keep on topic and discuss things sensibly (accusing people of 'BS' and insulting them is strangely missing from the Big Book of Intelligent Debate...) or you won't be allowed to continue to discuss things.

In terms of the size of a person's cranium dictating their intelligence, this has been refuted over and over. It is simply not the case. In terms of brain function, it's not about how much of it you have, but rather about how much you use it (i.e. the quality, quantity and integration of neural connections). You can even be missing half your brain and train the half remaining to fulfil pretty much all the function of what's missing. I can't work out if this is a genuine point or just being silly

Resourcefulness is definitely a form of intelligence in my opinion. Find somebody lacking this quality (and there are many, many of them out there), and you'll conclude they're pretty dim quite quickly. Just like some people can figure out particle physics but can't work out how to use a can opener until you show them! Some people have the nouse to work things out (and become engineers etc...) and others really haven't a clue.

IQ tests usually test mathematical ability and lots of shape-matching stuff. I did take the one I did seriously, it's just I fail at the former and honestly don't even know what they're getting at with the latter!

In terms of what IB grades show, they show a multitude of things. They DO show intelligence because to score highly you must comprehend conceptual things and also display a range of different types of intelligence - mathematical intelligence, being able to express yourself, being able to write and argue fluently and coherently, being able to take on board and apply concepts (science) and so on. They also show hard work and endeavour. The person who gets 1 point more or less than another person may or may not be more or less intelligent, but as IB grades are an amalgam of intelligence AND hard work, they're still a superior candidate.

Unless they did easy subjects... in which case, no comment. I personally think that the IB should differentiate between candidates who did easy subjects and those who did hard ones, because those two diplomas required a whole different level of effort!

IMO we all recognise an 'intelligent' person when we see one. Quantifying and defining it is the issue

you said that ib test measure your intelligent..but what if you did not do as well on the IA's which dropped you score, but the reason you did poorly was because of lack of example or because you misinterpret the rubric...or some thing...like in our school the ib is a new program that just started and the teacher have no idea what to expect....so that their lack of knowledge will lower our intelligence because we did score good on IA's