The Notion of Intelligence

Not a Stellar Algebra Student

"You know how a stupid kid turns his head to answer but a smart kid will roll his eyes over to you without turning his head from the TV screen?"
--Omar Ahmad in The New Yorker "Helping Hand" quoted  by Karen Russell


Actually, no, I did not know that was a sign of intelligence, staying focused on the TV while answering a question. Mr. Ahmad is a programmer who makes video games which help rehabilitate stroke victims at Johns Hopkins.

This ability, to "decouple" attention from motion is supposed to be a hallmark of intelligence, we are told, in this excellent (or otherwise excellent) article. This may be a useful skill in playing video games, which if you live in the video game world, may be a key to success.

But when I think of intelligence, I think of something like body habitus, big muscles on an athlete, which might be enhanced by weight training but is just basically "there" genetically. You know if you lifted weights like a mad man for years, you would never bulk up like that guy. Something "innate."

Decoupled Regularly 

This characteristic (decoupling)  to which Mr. Ahmad alludes is something I would think, I know, can be taught. When I first learned to play basketball, one of the first things my friends taught me was not to look where I wanted to pass the ball.  Larry Bird was said to have eyes in back of his head because he could pass to a spot he wasn't facing. Does that make him a smart kid or a kid who has practiced something?

There as so many things we "know" are manifestations of "intelligence" which can actually be trained. Listen to quarterbacks interviewed after the game and some are articulate, others not so much, others who sound just one step up from Neanderthal and yet watch them squatting behind center, looking over the defense, analyzing patterns, recognizing indicators learned with coaches in the film room in the week prior to the game, and then exploiting the weakness of the defense, calling a new play to exploit that weakness at the line of scrimmage. That quarterback cannot solve a differential equation, may not know his multiplication tables, cannot understand an analogy and abstraction leaves him cold, but he can employ that intelligence called "football smarts" at the moment he needs it.

When I was 7, learning football with my friends and my brother, we talked about setting up plays: Run three plays to the right, then run one which starts right but actually goes left. Set up a pattern and then change it. 

All through life, I've met people who looked from one set of indicators to be pretty stupid, but when you saw them function in some other realm, they were brilliant. Musicians are particularly likely to be this way--they can sound really dumb but they can understand the intricacies, the math, of music which is beyond most mortals.

I suspect "intelligence" is a mix of learned behavior and what the speaker values. 
Clearly, there are some people who are dumb as a stick, but once you get beyond that group, the whole notion of "intelligence" is likely simply a short hand for people who have talents you admire, wherever those may emanate. 

Highly Intelligent Football Smarts