the deal with IQ

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Speaking only for myself: I wonder if my EF issues and my high IQ aren't necessarily inseparable.

I am sure there are people on this forum with higher IQs than my own (I think firemonkey is one). I am sure there are people on this forum with lower IQs than my own. "There will always be greater and lesser persons than yourself".

Here's to all of us, forgetting none of us.

Your mileage may vary.

I are wantin' to get me one of dem IQ thingamiggers.... ! ....( HUMOUR implied)


[The above was written to hopefully not be offensive , but to add alittle comic relief, Experiences in the Midwest here
have jaded me alittle . No offence meant to anyone attempting to identify with this expression .
Have seen repeatedly in the past these IQ discussions go off the rails,it seems in the past on this here Planet ]

Thank you for the above Fenn..

Pardon my Cynicsm

IQ tests are designed to measure a pretty specific set of things. However, they would need to write a test where everybody is guaranteed to hit at least one question that's too hard for them. Being off the charts would be like my cousin that took an IQ test and got 100% of them correct.

Personally, I'm not that high, I'm just high enough to consider most IQ tests to be far too easy to be of much use.

The whole thing is kind of inevitably problematic as they're written with the ability to compare results in mind, which means that a bunch of people that do amazing things aren't necessarily going to know what to do.

The higher the IQ the less likely it is to be verifiable. At a certain point that area of intelligence is so high that it's no longer the bottleneck. For me, the IQ, specifically pattern matching components, are probably why it took so long for the autistic traits to become obvious enough to investigate.

I've known some people with learning disabilities who struggled in most school subjects & were also socially awkward so probably had lower social intelligence. They struggled with various life things more than the average person their age & few people probably woulda considered them very smart. Yet they scored highish on IQ tests. I've also read various things about Aspies being more intelligent than NTs & having higher IQs. Yet from what I've seen on this forum & other places lots of us Aspies struggle with various things & are often thought to be dumb by our NT peers. I think intelligence is a very relative thing & IQ tests & other methods are not capable of accurately measuring intelligence.

Actually it was a therapist who recommended that I try out for the tests to get into Mensa...presumably for therapeutic reasons. So I did. And it was "therapeutic" (ie boasted my self esteem) for about one nanosecond. What I call "the Mensa experience" is mostly quite humbling.

r00tb33r: It's great for pondering the futility of your existence and being miserable.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\I thought we had Neurodiversity for that

auntblabby: many celebrities and captains of industry belong to mensa...
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\Not so much; those folk are too busy for Mensa
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\The International Mensa web page says there are currently ~150,000 members, worldwide,
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\and Wikipedia provides a list of "famous" members (past and present)
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\I don't know about you, but I've only heard of a few of these "famous" people
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\And your friend's experience doesn't surprise me
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\Mensa primarily allows some "odd" people to socialize with people sort of like themselves
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\They're not there to test each other's knowledge...everyone is in the same top 2%
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\Socializing and eating are why people are there

naturalplastic: ...you are able to...read your comic books without moving your lips!
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\Not a requirement
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\P.S. If you plan to go to any gatherings in the Mid-Atlantic region we could compare notes via DM.

Jakki: Hmmm...if a person is into getting recognition from mensa, should we be expecting better posts ? here .
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\Um...probably worse!

Fenn: ....
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\Yeah, what he said!
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\I would note, however, you only have to qualify once for Mensa, and it can be a fluke...
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\And, regarding "...help some people who feel alone or isolated to find people they can connect with, or find a mentor."
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\I (eventually) found someone to marry!

firemonkey: Having a very high IQ is rather meaningless
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\It is just a different Neurodiversity...and, from having met quite a few Mensans, I know it is meaningless
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\Except, perhaps, for socializing

I was diagnosed at 62, but I don't think such a late dx had anything to do with being superintelligent-because,unlike you,I'm not. It had far more to do with everything being seen as stemming from a severe mental illness, coupled with a personality defect. My daughter set the record straight,before I moved to Wiltshire,re lots of falsehoods that had become entrenched about me. She was also the one who mentioned autism, not me, at my 1st psych appointment here in Wiltshire. After that it was just 7 months till I got an Asperger's diagnosis.

There's going to be a lot of reasons why people are missed, clearly it's not just folks with higher IQs. However, IQ tests do tend to test pattern recognition, matching and extension as a significant portion of the testing typically, which are also things that are quite useful for masking.

I would be somewhat curious about what the breakdown is for those that are diagnosed later on. My guess is that there's also a bit of additional leniency that goes in as geniuses are supposed to be kind of odd, if you go by the stereotypes.

Yes, but you need the intellect to fully appreciate the extent of it.

2% is an awful large number anyway. I looked into Mensa some 20 years ago, wasn't anything special. Just a bunch of folks who like to blow smoke up their ass, and feel special doing it.

Mega was a bit more interesting, though testing at such statistical extremes is considered unreliable.

These days I think I couldn't care less, who am I going to show my shiny membership? Get real. Nobody gives a f**k.

I'm far better at pattern recognition than mental rotation, or 3x 3 matrices. I've always struggled socially, be it IRL or online. It's just comparatively worse IRL. I've heard that people form their opinion of other people within a very short space of time. For whatever reason I don't come across well. My flaws as a person are quickly and easily spotted, and that becomes the yardstick used to judge whether I'm worth knowing as a person or not. There are two very different communities that really buck that trend. A major schizophrenia/psychosis spectrum forum, and the Facebook high IQ community. Both don't reject me due to my being somewhat socially weird. I've had more than a few friendship requests since starting to get involved with the latter community in 2020. 600% increase in FB friends. Mostly from that community.

'

You must've been hanging out with a different bunch than I was. I met my bride in Mensa and some of our Mensa friends drove hundreds of miles to be at our wedding.