Intelligence

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There are many threads centered around topics related to intelligence, such as the ability to 'use logic', 'rationalize' and in general, just a lot of people discussing their above-average intelligence. It gets especially bad when self-proclaimed (I'm not saying they are wrong) highly intellectual individuals start to use ASD as their reason for their intelligence, and then making wild claims that NTs are stupid, dim-witted etc.

I don't really understand why it's such a common topic on this forum, nor do I understand the common belief that NTs are stupid creatures that can't or are bad at seeing details, rationalizing etc.

The irony is that I'm creating another topic centered around intelligence. What really is intelligence anyway? I often see only math associated with intelligence, but that should be a myth beaten dead by now. A capable computer can do most math faster than any human - therefore processing speed and ability to 'do math' aren't exactly the best indicators of intelligence. The ability to do something such as typing out cohesive posts with proper grammar and overly complicated words isn't either IMO, as that is something you learn in a way no different to learning how to shower properly.

There are individuals whom can pickup various concepts easier (math is the obvious one), though does that really make them more intelligent than another? Maybe others have different though patterns that force them to question what would be seen by others as unnecessary details, slowing the time in which they complete the work down.

You must understand that this forum is home to many people who have insecurities to greater or lesser extent (myself included). For some posters, trying to put their own intellectual abilities, or logic/reasoning skills in a positive light and contrasting them against mainstream trends of mediocrity and exaggerating them, is a means of venting and coping with their frustrations. It sometimes bothers me, but most of the time I think it has its place on this forum, except when, as you mentioned, it deteriorates into 'all non-autistics are such-and-such, all autistics are blah-and-blah'.

Intelligence itself is a complicated thing, in my assessment, and right now I'm not really up to deeper discussion on the subject (being tired), but I will say this: IQ tests aren't all they're cracked up to be. I was tested multiple times at about 131 on the WAIS, yet I find that my creativity and my ability to improvise (both very important factors in determining a person's intelligence) are sorely lacking. At best, my mind is a repository for factoids, and even in that respect, I'm not all that impressive.
I enjoy both 'highbrow' activities like visiting musea and reading about history and politics, as well as 'lowbrow' activities like listening to Jason Derulo and watching superhero flicks. YMMV when you assess my intelligence. Some very smart people I've met think I'm an unmitigated dunce, some other very smart people I've met enjoy conversing with me very much.

I would like to say that I am probably no more or no less intelligent than anyone else.

Although I am not an academic, I know that I am more than capable of learning anything about anything.

I just don't like to go on about it though.

Honestly, I don't know where you're seeing all these narcissistic claims, because I've been here a while and I just do not see a lot of "I'm smarter than everybody, because my ASD makes me a super genius" threads. I do see posters here, usually younger, expressing pride in the fact that they have a knack for some intellectual gift that gives them an edge over their neurotypical peers and I can't fault them for that, when you live with a disability that makes you feel (and get treated as) inept and looked down upon, it's healthy to have something you can point to and say "At least I'm better at THIS than they are."

Personally, I am all too aware that I'm no genius, if I were, I'd be running my own business empire, or teaching in a university, or working at NASA or CERN, instead of living on Disability and posting all day on an Internet forum. Still, I'm more intelligent in many ways, than most of the people I know, even though they are far more socially functional and therefore materially successful than myself.

As far as NTs being dull witted, after several decades in the Real World, slogging through a career, side-by-side with dozens of neurotypicals and working with the public in person and over the phone, I can say unequivocally and with absolute conviction, the vast majority of them are thick as bricks - in a word, stupid. Their thinking is circular, critical analysis is nonexistent, their world view acquired socially, rather than by process of reason - whatever they are told is true, is accepted without question, especially if they are made to feel it's the 'superior' point of view. They loathe reading and will learn only when forced or paid to do so. And once a reality paradigm is accepted, they will relinquish it only when instructed to do so by the authority figures who issued it to them in the first place, usually their government or mass media.

There are exceptions of course, but that's why they call them exceptions.




Math is much more than processing speed. Yes, computers can add and subtract faster than humans, but it takes a human brain to comprehend the implications inherent in higher mathematical concepts. Computers can only do those calculations because humans program them to do so. I'm a horrible mathematician, but I recognize and respect the facility it takes to work out calculations that can predict astrophysical phenomena and describe the functions of Quantum Mechanics.




Then most human beings must be showering incorrectly (or not at all), because if you look in any other forum or comments section on the Internet, you'll see immediately that 99% of the English speaking population of the planet cannot construct a grammatically correct sentence, or compose a single paragraph without at least one misspelled word (and that's in spite of having SpellCheck right in front of them).

As the saying goes: "If were easy, everybody would be doing it." And "everybody" is not.



Actually, yes, it does. Some of us can't even wrap our heads around basic algebra. But that's one intellectual gift and it's, possible to have one type and not the other, but it's also possible (and rather common) not to have any outstanding talent whatsoever.

^This...although I have only 2 decades of experience with this in the work world, this has been my experience as well. It's not something I especially enjoy or take pride in either. It just is what it is, and it's aggravating.

I've asked myself whether I simply have an internal bias or prejudice to see other people as less intelligent, but I think it's actually the other way around. I tend to expect other people to be smarter than they are and I am continually surprised and disappointed when they are not. Although that might be considered a form of stupidity on my part.

And I do realize that despite whatever intelligence I have, I can still do some incredibly ditzy, stupid things. But the thing is, I recognize it. I catch myself at it. I even do whatever I can to anticipate or prevent it.

But it seems to me like most people are rather oblivious to themselves. It's as if they just blunder and BS their way through things without a lot of thought. That's what makes me see them as "thick."

I don't think academic ability or IQ tests are necessarily good measures of intelligence. It is a quality that is hard to define. I guess I would just call it being perceptive.

I have observed that some high-functioning ASD people seem to be better at reasoning than most NT people.

Reasoning would seem to be a huge component in IQ, perhaps more so in mathematics/science.

Why is this NTs and not just people in general? There are going to be a lot of 'dull witted' NTs that you run into as the majority of people are NT, and what is classified to be above average intelligence is relatively rare in the human population. There are also what you would call, 'dull witted' autistics in the world, just it's far less likely to find an autistic person. At their core, NT and autistic brains are not able to be generalized in terms of their 'intellectual power', as they are all unique and so it all depends on each individual rather than a group.

On this forum the majority of people would classify themselves to be above average in terms of intelligence, but that doesn't mean there is a correlation between ASD and high intelligence purely because some other forums don't show this. This forum is a place where only a strict subset of autistic individuals would typically visit for lengthy periods of time.



Math isn't the only indicator of intelligence. Possibly at the highest level it means something, but other than that I see more achieved through work/practice than natural ability when it comes to most math. Perhaps being good at some math is a decent indicator of one type of intelligence, but that is only one type, and by no means the most important.



Maybe they don't want to construct grammatically correct sentences. What purpose does it serve them? It's similar to learning how to perfectly make a banana cake - it may taste better and make you some good acquaintances but ultimately a cake is a cake unless something went severely wrong - i.e. the post is completely incomprehensible. Making pumpkin soup is easy, but no one bothers to make that perfectly unless it's something they want to do.



I agree with this. What I meant though was intelligent as a whole, not just in one specific type. I only say intelligent as a whole as that is what society discusses intelligence to be (this forum included).

Have you observed this online or in real life?

What reasoning do you refer to anyway?

There is also a lot of subjectivity applied to definitions of "reason" and "logic" here. For example, providing facts and statistics to support one's argument might be derided by someone who does not agree with the conclusions.

Plus many people misuse the label "logic" and apply it to things that would be more appropriately described as "received wisdom."

Basically, this forum is no better or worse than any other in this regard, in my estimation.

Both.

For example, I call up a support center for my HSA Aetna Healthcare debit card, and inquire about purchases.

I tell the person I tried to buy a Subway sandwich, and the charge did not go through. She immediately tells me, "YOU CAN'T DO THAT!".

However, I have been doing it for several years. I just did today too. So she is someone who is paid by Aetna to provide answers, and she does not know what she is talking about.

ASD people I have met in real life (these high functioning ASD computer programmers) do not seem to think so trivially.

EDIT: I feel like given an ASD person, and a NT person on average, my "success" with having that person understand intelligent conservation would be much higher with an ASD person.

It has been my observation that, when people enter into the work environment, their intelligence drops by maybe 15 or so points. That their decision making becomes clouded and they take actions that don't make sense.

My sense is that (after spending > 1 year on WP), my perspective is off. That I simply don't understand the broader perspective. That they make decisions and take actions based upon some social construct that I simply do not understand (and, may never understand). That, perhaps, instead it is me being myopic.

I agree. I think emotional/social intelligence is far more important, at least for getting by in this world.

A neurotypical teacher thinks that if a curious child like Thomas Edison asks a question in class then that means the child is not paying attention and that child is suffering from autism or attention deficit disorder and must be immediately medicated.

This makes literally no sense. It sounds more like conspiracy theory than literal reality.

Also, Thomas Edison was an invention-stealing animal electrocuting jerk. Plus, the reason Hollywood is in California was to get as far away from Edison's lawyers as possible because he was quite aggressive about enforcing patents and controlling the film industry.

That's a societal thing not an NT thing. When I was kicked out of the regular high school and sent to a continuation school, it was completely different. In regular high school it was shut up, listen and memorize. In continuation school It was a completely open environment where participation, questioning, and critical thinking were encouraged. I went from being a 0 GPA student to actually benefiting from the instruction which was actually more like guidance. This was the only time in my life that I actually wanted to go to school. But this style of schooling was reserved for less than 1% of school kids and was viewed by the system as token education for kids that would never amount to anything. I think the attitude of the school district towards the teachers was "these kids are throwaways, so do whatever you want." Ironically, that attitude was what gave the teachers at the school the flexibility to step outside of the cookie-cutter approach to education that you're talking about, and create a program where people with alternative learning styles could actually thrive. All of the teachers at the school or NT.

Unfortunately, after one year at the continuation school it's funding was pulled and it was shut down. That was my sophomore year and I easily passed the high school proficiency exam despite having a less than 1 GPA throughout my entire school career. Maybe things have changed, but back then I think many people on WP would have thrived in that continuation school environment.

There weren't that many students there for obvious reasons, it was full of kids that could not make it in regular school. But I found that many of my peers were highly intelligent. However, all of them had some kind of behavioral or emotional problems. Despite being the "bad kids" everyone got along pretty well because we all had something in common. This was before the days of medicate everything so again, maybe times have changed.

I think the point that he was trying to make is that schools are built around one learning style and do not serve students that have an alternative learning style. He is trying to say that those who cannot conform to the cookie-cutter learning style are viewed as defective. Regardless of whether Edison was a scumbag I'm sure you would agree that his thinking style was atypical and I believe that is the point that androbot2084 was trying to make.