Do we all have the potential to become the next Albert Einstein, or are some people born with greater brain power than the rest of us? The debate rages on, fueled by strong emotions and fomented by cherished ideologies. Many who subscribe to an egalitarian ideology argue that, except for the mentally challenged, we all …
Sometimes, highly intelligent people fall into what psychologists call the intelligence trap–a tendency of experts to overreach the limits of their expertise. One of the most dramatic examples of this occurred in 1998 with the failure of the investment firm Long Term Capital Management (LTCM) generally attributed to the prevailing hubris among its senior partners …
Does intelligence increase your ability to fool yourself? Read More »
This post is a response to a question posed by a visitor to this site. A significant part of Einstein’s groundbreaking discoveries drew from his gedanken (thought) experiments. When most people believed that time is absolute, i.e., it unfolds at a uniform rate and is measured to be the same by all observers, Einstein realized that concepts …
The qualities of social isolation and absent-mindedness have been evident in the great geniuses throughout history. Isaac Newton was so intelligent that he had difficulty relating to his peers, and became increasingly solitary through his adolescent years. This isolation enabled him to pursue his experiments with intensity as he sublimated his need for human interaction …
The World Shirt Event My mother was like Pluto–the planet, not the dog. The orbit of Pluto, our solar system’s most remote planet, has an eccentricity of 0.249; more than all other planets and over 14 times the eccentricity of earth. While this extreme departure from normalcy once caused Pluto to be denied its status …
During the past two centuries, this question has become the focus of an ongoing emotionally-charged discussion between the political Left and Right. The Left denies the existence of natural talent, while the Right asserts that it resides in our DNA. By denying the existence of talent, those on the Left argue that the distribution of …
Can a person without natural talent become a genius through effort? Read More »
In his bestseller, Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman outlined the two modes of thinking that he called System 1and System 2. Roughly speaking, System 1 mode consists of intellectual processes that are “hard-wired” into our psyche and are performed automatically, or with minimal effort. Our startled reaction to an unexpected loud noise or sexual arousal in response …
Why is it Strenuous or hard work for my brain when I do math? Read More »
Today, the United States of America celebrates its 246th birthday. Arguably, the greatest nation in the history of human civilization, America has led the world in almost all technological advances in the past 100 years, ranging from the development of electronic devices like the phonograph, the incandescent bulb, and the television, to computer technologies that …
I am surrounded by geniuses. They don’t live near me and most of them are no longer on the planet, but I absorb their ideas and insights daily through their writings and their creations. In his book Human Accomplishment, Charles Murray presents data to identify the sources of human achievement in the arts and sciences …
A visitor to my Quora site, Intelligence and IQ, posed the question above and this post is my response. Here are two questions that require a high level of intelligence and knowledge before they can be understood and then addressed. Detailed discussions of several such questions are provided at https://www.intelligence-and-iq.com/intelligence/ Will artificial intelligence ever surpass …
What are examples of Deep intellectual questions? Read More »
