A high IQ is a mixed blessing. In previous posts, I’ve written about the downsides of a high IQ, but in this post we’ll look at the part of a high IQ that may be called a “blessing.”
A person with a high IQ learns easily, can problem-solve at very high levels, and indulge in sophisticated abstract thought. This means that with sufficient work they can learn virtually any academic subject in the natural and social sciences. For such a person, virtually all career choices, except those that require special athletic or musical aptitudes will be available. Furthermore, the learning will be easier than for most people and can be acquired through books or computers with a minimum of external help. If coupled with tenacity and a passion to achieve, it represents an unbeatable combination of personal assets for achieving intellectual goals.
Such self-efficacy comes from an awareness of one’s intellectual gifts and a willingness to trust oneself against widespread opposition. However, those who are highly intelligent are usually intelligent enough to recognize that they may sometimes be wrong. Kipling captured this in his famous poem, IF, “If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, but make allowance for their doubting too.” This recognition of personal fallibility is manifest in the highly intelligent in an openness to dissenting opinion and a willingness to listen to opposing arguments. Absolute certainty and dogmatic adherence to a specific point of view or belief is the province of people of much lower intelligence, rarely the intellectually gifted. Steve Jobs, when asked how he identified intelligent people, described them as open to a wide panorama of different ideas.
As Steve Jobs observed, those who have a high IQ are usually interested in a wide variety of issues spanning a range that includes the physical and social sciences, the arts, literature, economics, and sometimes sports. The fact that they are open to discussion and usually less dogmatic in their views than people of lower IQ, makes them more engaging in conversation. People of high IQ usually have broader intellectual horizons than most and can support their ideas with references to history, science or current events.
Although there are many high IQ people who lack savvy in financial planning, most high IQ people are prudent in their day-to-day financial management, and are less likely to become mired in credit card debt or squander money on mindless shopping or lottery tickets. (Of course, we all know high IQ people who fall prey to such frailties, but we are speaking here about statistical averages.)
Perhaps the greatest benefit of a high IQ is the increased awareness of nature and its amazing complexities and symmetries. While a person of low IQ might look up at the stars and think, “Yup, there they are; not much changing up there,” a person of high IQ would see the unfolding of the universe, our existence and the possibility of extra-terrestrial life. Many of the greatest scientific minds, pursued knowledge until their death, never feeling sated with their current level of information, while many of those at the other end of the IQ spectrum have become bored with life by middle age and are closed to acquiring new perspectives.
