You don’t feel smart, but everyone else appears extremely dumb
Lonely isn’t the right word, because I’m not upset about not having a large group of people I consider myself close to. It’s somewhat disappointing that I can’t deeply relate to more people, though. I’d like to meet more likeminded folks, but I’m also less and less willing to tolerate draining relationships as I get older. Being particular about where you invest your time and energy tends to be socially limiting.
It’s a mixed bag.
Growing up was made difficult because school is so slow that I’d rather be getting into trouble than sitting in class. By the start of middle school I’d already read the entire high school honors reading list, I had to walk to the high school from my middle school in 7th grade to take math classes. I rarely had regular school work in high school, nearly all of my academic teachers designed a different curriculum for me, which was nice but probably mostly to keep me from acting up in class. I never studied or did a shred of homework, but got good grades.
Social interactions were tough, I’m not much of an empath, not that I don’t experience empathy but emotions just aren’t intuitive, actually they often are the opposite of what you’d expect to be helpful, especially among young people. I had to concentrate to read people’s faces and mannerisms to understand the emotional and social subtexts of most interactions. I self medicated with alcohol a lot in high school.
All of my academic classes in high school were honors, and my final 2 years were all AP, while lettering in 3 varsity sports (4 total, but you can only play 3 each academic year). It wasn’t until my second year in uni that I ran into a class for which I actually had to study (nuclear chemistry), and boy was that an awful surprise. A handful of classes were like this for me, most I just showed up 3 times and got a good grade: the first day of class so I wouldn’t get dropped, the midterm, and the final.
I read quickly, think systematically, and information just sticks in my head. It was very difficult to understand why this wasn’t how most people were. Everything I do I analyze for improvement, and remember to do it better the next time. My wife calls me a skill collector because people seem to think I’m super good at everything, but to me it’s just logical that if you’re going to take time do something you might as well do it as well as possible.
After uni things started getting easier. Being forced to closely analyze social interactions and systematically give the “right” reactions is extremely useful in professional life. I wear this mask in all my interactions with all but my closest friends. It’s a bit psychopathic, but I don’t do it to anyone’s detriment, it’s mostly to get along and fit in.
I’ve self selected for highly intelligent friends, and I’m exhilarated to meet new people who can communicate with the kind of bandwidth that our brains run at, if that makes sense. I’m still close with most of my friends from high school, who have had varying levels of success, but I still have to be guarded when it comes to activities or conversation to make sure I don’t stick out too much.
In general I have a very pessimistic view of people and the world. The average person isn’t very sharp, and half of all people are dumber than that. However many smart people do evil things, most of the time for no reason at all. It’s exhausting to keep up with it all, so I just focus on my path and my family, and do what I can to directly improve my community.
It would be nice to fit in a little easier, but I wouldn’t trade my experience for anything else.
The section about pessimism is relatable. I spent a few months in my teen years in a chatroom with the topic of being outcasts in some way or another, before realizing it was a self-prophecising kind of toxic the same way that incel culture is, but there were some people ranting about how stupid people are and woe is me, I’m Cassandra! And my impression at the time was thinking they’re probably an egotistical prick who thinks they’re better than everyone else. But on the other hand, it is frustrating to see, less how ‘dumb’ people are but how ignorant people are. It’s hard not to get a bit of ego at times. And this isn’t about IQ for the most part, these issues are often caused or compounded by other problems with education, social values, propaganda/indoctrination and the lot. I guess I feel the activist frustrated enough to yell “why don’t you care?” when obviously, rationally it’s more complex than that.
This is a big issue in tech communities as it becomes more accessible, people are entering who aren’t used to the DIY culture, who don’t understand unsaid (or said) rules like asking smart questions to not waste everyone’s time. The world is at your fingertips! Fucking put that question in a search engine first before you waste my time, my life has value goddammit! When I occasionally whine about reddit culture, that’s a part of it. People who are curious (and that’s perfect!) but don’t realize they’re asking questions they can learn the answer to themselves. It’s like if we’re talking about cooking and someone jumps in to ask “what is a herb?”, it’s a valid question, an important question, but for fucks sake you can learn that without asking us all! Or at least go to ELI5 & NoStupidQuestions where those questions are appropriate.
Keep in mind, that rant is specific to online questions, where you have the resources you need. It’s more acceptable in a conversation, and I certainly don’t want anyone to feel uncomfortable learning things.
Honestly, a community learning how to effectively direct people to an FAQ to onboard uninformed newcomers on answers and community expectations is the difference between a welcoming community and burned-out babysitters becoming toxic.
This is relatable.
It’s tough having a high IQ. Most people don’t understand the world and the flaws of humans, at least at the level I do. As such, I find it hard to connect to other people. Most people are morons. I feel deep sorrow in knowing the direction the world is going and that the inhabitants of the world are mostly idiots.
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Why do so many people (in this thread) unironically feel this way? “Intelligence” is a socially constructed and often useless idea that includes and excludes many things seemingly at random. For example, chess is often thought of as something that’s very intelligent, but skill at chess is (just like nearly anything else) based on practice & experience. Just because you’re good at chess and did well in school doesn’t mean that you alone can understand the problems in the world at a deeper level than an average Jo.
Everyone should read “What Is Intelligence, Anyway?”, a short excerpt from Isaac Asimov.
I’ll paste the part I think is most important, but the whole thing is worth reading:
Well, then, suppose my auto-repair man devised questions for an intelligence test. Or suppose a carpenter did, or a farmer, or, indeed, almost anyone but an academician. By every one of those tests, I’d prove myself a moron, and I’d be a moron, too. In a world where I could not use my academic training and my verbal talents but had to do something intricate or hard, working with my hands, I would do poorly. My intelligence, then, is not absolute but is a function of the society I live in and of the fact that a small subsection of that society has managed to foist itself on the rest as an arbiter of such matters.
Related to tests and skills, What if we just didn’t mark students?, a short talk from a university course runner and educator in general.
It makes some points that are already familiar or easy to notice, but it’s also an interesting exploration of academia, tests and skills. I know some students who learn under that lecturer and what they’re taling about clearly comes through in the course structure. One notable part is that one tutorial class is responsible for making notes for each week of lectures, and the whole cohort is allowed to bring those collaborative notes into the exam, like a semi-open book test. I heard they just decided one class to have a lesson on rhetoric instead of cybersecurity because it’s a pretty nerdy industry and one involving invisible risks, and there’s no point being an expert if you can’t convince your boss to let you fix the problems.
What is considered high? I have an above average intelligence, but I also have ADHD.
I have a fantastic memory, but I can’t always choose what I remember. I’m great at facts and trivia but I can’t remember things that are actually important in my life.
I didn’t have to study in school. I could glance over the material minutes before a test and pass without trying. Then, I got to college and I didn’t know how to study as I’d never done that before. I failed out.
So 100 is an average IQ. They will actually change the scoring to keep it that way. 115 puts you 1 standard deviation ahead. 125 or higher puts you in the top 5%.
I was similar in high school and college. I wasn’t good at studying and hadn’t needed to in high school. I had a rough first two semesters in college going on academic probation.
I was able to adjust in time and put the work in to pass but it could have gone either way. I tended do the best in my hard class because I put the most effort in those at the expense of my easy A classes hurting my GPA.
Same here.
I learned to read at 3, and taught myself English before starting in school by reading all the text I came across on my Amiga, recognizing words that were similar to the Danish ones and slowly picking up more and more.
I also got a My Little Professor at 3, a reverse calculator that gave problems to solve. My mom taught me addition, subtraction and multiplication, and my mothers “subtraction is the opposite of addition” was enough for me to figure division out. I did the hardest problems in all four categories in my head, with numbers with up to 4 digits, before starting in school too.
I never did homework in school, only things that had to be turned in. I always had my hand up in class, because my innate curiosity and mental capacity meant that I could figure things out as the questions were written on the blackboard. The lax attitude stuck. *Edit: It wasn’t because I didn’t try to get things that required more work from me. I always asked for harder problems when doing work in class, because I always finished the problems we were given to do while in class and finish as homework before the class was done.
My biggest problem growing up was bullying. I didn’t share interests with hardly any of my classmates, since I was at least 3 years ahead of them in my mental development. My best friend was 10 years old when I was 7, and he and I played Magic together because his classmates couldn’t figure it out. My glasses, small stature, and the fact that I changed schools twice didn’t help.
My IQ was tested several times back in school and I usually clocked in at 148 or 149. That said I don’t think IQ tests are very useful. They also test for very spefic types of thinking. Those traits that people considered smart have. It’s kind of circular.
I think it’s like a physical fitness test that just measures bicep thickness. It tells you something but not as much as it claims.
I’m very good a understanding systems and understanding how changes effect them. I also pick up concepts very easy but struggle with remembering the details.
Presumably that’s because I learned it quickly and didn’t have the repetition to cement the details. Because I know the concept I’m board trying to memorize the details.
I know what J K reproduction types are but don’t remember which is which. Same with baryonic particles I can’t remember if they are half integer spin or not and or if they obey the Pauli exclusion principle. But I understand what those concepts are.
I’m ok with people and general social interaction but I don’t read people well and stick to the social rules for a situation. I’ve totally misread interactions more than most people but usually keep it civil.
I do a lot of cooking and am very good at getting the effect I want. I know what protiens and starches do at various temps and how to calculate the right amounts of salt, acid, and sugar. I’m not good at winging it or being creative with flavors.
Probably the thing it’s get a little mad because you need to explain multiple times things you think are really easy or stop hearing some people when start explaining things because you know you can catch what they are saying anytime. It’s really shitty, I dont whant to be this way. Also people treat you different because “you can so it better”, no I can’t.
I’m struggling to take a lot of these answers seriously. You really think that way about yourself?
I have a high IQ as well as ADHD and Autism.
Out of context, scoring as high as I did really meant next to nothing. In the context of the diagnoses I received later in life, definitely made sense, and helped color a picture painted in two solid days with a psychologist.
Somehow, I think it’s important that the IQ test I took was not called an IQ test to me until after. Like, I knew I was in for tests, but more broadly told what things were about.
As a student, I had a science teacher who had been teaching many years, tell my mother he had never seen a student think in the manner I did. I was doing exceptionally well in class, but did not exceed in the fashion that would get me into an ivy league school, which at the time was supposed to be a goal. My father graduated MIT.
There are times when it’s great. When I can focus on something, I can learn a lot and get very good at it. However, I spent decades with two obstacles I could never get myself past: the inability to keep that focus or control it, and the inability to even understand other people enough to try to get along with them long-term.
The result is I am just now, at 41, starting to figure out what I want to do with my life after way too long in a profession I should never have entered, and burned out of twice. And by burn out I do not mean tired and sad, I mean hospitalization.
In summary, it can be pretty great, but in my case it’s fraught with difficulty as well.
Thanks for your response.
It’s interesting to see your story in relation to other stories I’ve heard or people I’ve met.
Before I describe them, it’s important to say that you don’t strike me as unkind. I wouldn’t want you to compare yourself to the people I’ll mention and conclude that you’re somehow bad. I’m taking the time to say this because I don’t know if the difficulties you’ve mentioned are a sore spot.
Alright. The people I’ve met. I’ve met people whose identity was tied to their IQ and it became painful for me to wonder what I meant to them. For sure I was not close to their IQ; they needed to take multiple tests because they were off the charts. But I always wondered if they liked me as a person, based on my values and how I did things.
I’ve also met very relaxed and kind people who went on to study at the schools that were supposed to be a goal, people who made me realize it’s possible to be wicked smart and simultaneously kind.
When you mention that it was important that you weren’t told that the test you took was an IQ test, I think about teenage me. Back then, I learned that people could judge me based on my IQ. I made the mistake of reading white supremacist bigotry, and read that they evaluated whether people were worthy of living based on things like IQ. I knew the whole white supremacy discourse was pseudoscience and bigotry, but I was scared of bigots in power evaluating my existence. I became terrified. I became very distrustful of people who I should’ve trusted, wonderful people who would’ve never had such narrow and mistaken views. That has changed, now that I have a clearer sense of self and more perspective. But I can’t help but wonder what would’ve happened if I wouldn’t have mistrusted wonderful people. I guess the discourse around IQ can really change the way you look at the world and what you do.
Is it too nosy to ask a couple of follow up questions? If not, here they are: you mentioned ADHD and the obstacle you could never get yourself past, the inability to keep your focus and control it. Is the diagnosis recent? Could medication help? Could any treatment help with the ADHD? As to difficulties understanding other people, do you know about relational frame theory, the self component of ACT, and the PEAK and AIM programs?
As far as medication, I have not decided yet. This is all recent, within the last year. Therapy has been helping a lot for my current state, but ADHD isn’t the focus. Recovering from burnout is.
I haven’t looked into anything you’ve mentioned.
I have been described as, and willing describe myself as, a good person with a capacity for kindness. I am not nice in much of what that means.
I think my political stances sometimes highlight that. I will willingly punch nazis given the chance. No, that’s not hyperbole. I have no tolerance for bigotry. I lost a good friend who became a cop, and then said some questionable but not outright hateful things in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder.
A flawed but not altogether useless analogy is I am not the guy who waves someone on at a stop sign when it is that person who is supposed to yield. I have no patience for it, nor do I have patience for it happening the other way around.
When I recognized that a now good friend wasn’t so harsh to me out of spite or hate but out of personal struggle, I wanted to know more, and now we not only became good friends, but we are to each other among the very few people we talk openly with about therapy and how it’s really going. We both understand and respect the need to break down the stigma of seeking help with mental health. We had both peered into the void.
But in public, I wind up ignoring a lot of people simply from wearing headphones and wanting nothing to do with any of it.
“How does this (dress, shirt, whatever) look on me?” My wife gets the truth, like it or not.
I could go on, and am willing to try to answer any questions.
People with High IQ are dumb.
They lack intelligence in everything except what they love and are narzisstic about.
People with high IQ and high EQ and many others might be awesome, as you can pull out lots of social patterns, wisdoms, etc. But only for those who had good experiences in Life and are a bit older.
What am I? Idk. I think I have a high IQ because of various diagnoses, but lots of mental issues are blocking any motivation to understand Math as fast like other People in University. There are incredible fast learners, but I see in them no experience or memory of pain, suffering, etc. Like, its the “fun” that steers us to learn. Becoming distracted pretty fast like me is pain. Its like I have only a High IQ when the Moon shines perfectly.
I believe that I have a good amount of EQ, because I too often only think about lives of other people and even wasted money to help a broken new friend, just to see the money never again and him either. I suffer just from the imagination of a friend who suffered. I could be the smartest person by being the dumbest Person. Meaning that when I would only see the world centered around me like an egoist/narzissist, I would be happy, because I would lack the intelligence to simulate another World of another Person. I would only know what I need like a dumb Person. I would lack a lot of intelligences.
Having an High IQ without anything else, makes you a very dumb Person is my Opinion. I feel like the word “IQ” is wrongly labeled, because you dont really measure “Intelligence” by it.
I had my IQ tested when I was 12 and it was high, but alas, not high enough to understand Rick and Morty
Jokes aside, I’ve been told that I catch onto things quicker and I’m good at solving things in creative ways!
If you believe psychology and IQ are nonsense, here’s a comment I copied over from another thread:
IQ means intelligence quotient. A bunch of people take a test and they’re compared to each other. Your result is your intelligence quotient.
Its origins were noble, because it was designed to identify students who needed extra help in school. The creator of the test knew that people could change their results with good instruction.
However, that noble origin story was besmirched by what happened later. Eventually, IQ tests were used as a way to classify people in more brutal and rigid ways. The USA military used it as a cutoff for aspiring cadets. USA colleges use tests that effectively are IQ tests to let people in or not. The worst part is that bigots around the world injected pseudoscience into IQ and used it to decide who they think are worthy of life and who aren’t. It’s as awful as it sounds.
You may notice that helping struggling students sounds wonderful, and you may think that we should go back to that.
However, some people are deeply marked by the dark history of IQ. They have developed beliefs that protect them from the dangers of bigotry and IQ reductionism. They believe that tests aren’t useful at all to tell us something about anything. They believe IQ tests should be banished and never used.
Other people believe IQ tests are a snapshot of how a person answered the questions to a test in a given day. Take the same test days, months, or years after a great education, and the result will be higher. Additionally, these people notice that, in research, IQ scores are robustly associated with other things, such as quality of relationships, happiness, income, and other measures. They contend that learning about the world, about ourselves, and how to think critically and solve problems has massive domino effects in peoples’ lives. Once again, these people believe that a test result one day doesn’t doom you for life and doesn’t define you. A bad test result shows the gap that a good education would fill. These people know that a good education makes the mind curious, nimble, and open.
As a maths person, I have scored high on IQ tests for years. There are plenty of topics I am not great at, but IQ tests typically focus maths topics like pattern recognition.
I like the acknowledgement of racism in IQ tests. There is a bias in the test for western maths education. Sadly, the results could be used for eugenics. Many great mathematicians I have met are neurodivergent, LGBTIA+, cis-women or other groups the eugenics crowd want culled.
My current politicical perpspective frames this as enforcement of heirarchy, legitimized “scientifically” by the IQ test. There are plenty of high IQ people, such as those in maths, that do not fit the eugenic vision. The heirarchy becomes self-fulfilling and “natural” by culling the non-comforming people. The “top” of the heirarchy must legitimize their position, so the bottom doesn’t resist doing all the work for little personal benefit.
IQ tests measure something. Don’t use that measurement to justify heirarchy. Eugenics is bad. A better future, built from the bottom, is possible. All power to all people.
Its origins were noble
No they most certainly were not. It’s origins is in eugenics and white supremacist nonsense.
If we ignore Alfred Binet, then sure I can get onboard with you :) Indeed, the pre-IQ head-measuring stage of racism was filled with white supremacist nonsense. In that sense, it is a history filled with pseudoscience and pain.
Out of curiousity, would you classify Alfred Binet as an eugenicist and white supremacist?
Binet took part in a commission set up by the French Ministry of Education to decide whether school children with learning difficulties should be sent to a special boarding school attached to a lunatic asylum
Yes.
In my perspective IQ only has so many consequences, due to the limitations of the method. Nowadays we know to separate different forms of intelligence and also that transferring skills between those forms can have an impact on overall ‘performance’ . That being said, it can be a good indicator for stuff but as you point out, it’s often misused as divider instead of an accelerator.
Thanks for asking this question. I have enjoyed reading the answers people gave you.
It’s very tiring having to start off every conversation by letting people know that I’m more intelligent than them, but it is necessary.
I just laminated a bunch of cards that say Wile E. Coyote; Super Genius and hand them out. Saves time.
E: ducking autocorrupt
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that’s one thing my mom did for me that I appreciate. When they asked her if she wanted me to skip grades she said no.
