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Originally Posted by Jugga J  All talk. Really, this is the problem with these forums, most people are too dam big headed.
This thread has just turned into people boasting.
I don't think Genius is a title that is given too you just because you've answered some multiple choice questions correctly. Geniuses have to show immense creativity and often show traits like obsessive compulsive, Schizotypal personality disorder. etc. etc. IMO, none of you show any of these, sorry too disappoint.
It also depends on what scale we are uisng. Are we using the American distribution that is measured out of 200 or the standard 140 one. ? |
Well the original topic was "high IQ" not "genius". I think many people here have agreed they are two different things. Also yes I definitely agree that all IQ tests are not created equal, but that is again a different topic. If you're just surprised that many people have replied claiming high IQ, I would point out that people tend to congregate in peer groups, and Steve's blog is "for Smart People" after all (hmph!). Also, I think people are naturally more interested in topics of personal significance, and therefore more likely to read and reply if they have been tested to have a high IQ.
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Back to the original question though, I often wonder the same thing and waffle between naturally assuming that everyone thinks like me and being confronted with the fact that I do think differently both in terms of quantitative measurements (such as IQ) and qualitatively (I've always tutored classmates/friends and often have to understand HOW a person is thinking/learning/problem solving). I also don't know how much my odd ways of thinking are related to "high IQ" versus just being an individual thing.
I have a strong sense of an invisible structure where ideas fit, and when I'm learning new things I can sort of feel myself unconsciously fitting everything I'm learning into the existing structure (or expanding the structure or adjusting it if part of the new idea is that existing info is less true). Then when I'm solving problems, I revisit the structure and feel around in it for ideas, and sometimes when I'm stuck intentionally break apart pieces of the structure and move around how ideas fit together (or often take a nap- somehow sleep clarifies/solidifies/fixes things). Because of this, I'm very attuned to inconsistencies (which is useful in my IT consulting job LOL!) and good at figuring out what questions to ask to reconcile them. It also means that I always have lots of associations in mind and can come at ideas from different directions when trying to understand someone else's thoughts. Finally it tends to mean that I can see where my structure is empty/foggy and as I learn a little bit about a topic I'm always visualizing what I don't know.
In school I was funny because I have a very hard time memorizing unrelated facts- to the point where I still have to pause to think when asked "what is 7*3?" (pretty much if I care enough to memorize something I have to put it to music or patterns of movement or colors or smells or something... also I am very quick to forget individual facts if they are no longer relevant to me), but I have a very good memory when asked to fit things together and solve problems (and I'm good at looking things up- I often have a visualization of where the information came from/exists and an outline of how it fits into other things rather than memory of the information itself). Often for tests in school I would come at every question from first principles and extrapolation and logic rather than from remembering a specific algorithm or memorization of individual facts (yet somehow I was usually the first one finished... I truly couldn't imagine what others were thinking about when they took five times as long as me on a test).
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As far as relating to others, people tend to find me unusual but palatable enough both in my thought processes and their external manifestations in how I choose to live my life. A lot of the time I feel like my relationships are somewhat shallow and don't/can't go to certain places, and I like a certain amount of alone time when my thoughts can race around without trying to express them to anyone. It has been a tough road at times to accept myself as "weird" and not try to judge others or myself as better/worse, but I think that's true for most people in one way or another.
I sympathize with the women on here commenting that its hard to find men to date. Even though I'm introverted and "weird" I do tend to find guys happy to date me (I think men don't give a damn about how smart a woman is, they just want agreeable interesting conversation and enough intelligence and common sense to be independent). My problem has been that as I get to know men I tend to find the connection just stops at a certain point where the men don't follow my thoughts/ideas and so I stop expressing them and start feeling unhappy and restless and limited and eventually have the unhappy task of doing an honest "its not you its me" breakup (yes I know I need to "get a life" and not depend on a romantic relationship for all intellectual stimulation- I'm working on it!). Also with the vast majority of men I could win a rational argument every time and control the relationship and be annoyingly "always right", which isn't at all what I want- I like constructive challenges and criticism and inspiration to keep growing.