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Intelligence, IQ, and Matters of the Mind

I. Definition and Discussion of Intelligence:

What does the term "IQ" stand for, and what does it really mean?(Defines "IQ", and discusses the practical meaning of IQs)
How valid is it to judge intelligence by IQ scores?(How valid is it to measure one's intellect using only one number?)
Deviation IQ's vs. Ratio IQs (Explains the difference between the "old" ratio IQs, designed to measure children's intellects, and the "new" deviation IQs designed for adults.)

II. Childhood Intelligence

What are hypergifted children like, and what are their special needs?(Hypergifted/profoundly-gifted/prodigiously-gifted children are children with Ratio IQs of 183 or above)
Terman-Cox lifetime study (1921 to present) of 1,528 gifted children (culled from 250,000 California schoolchildren).
- "Gifted Children: Myths and Realities"(Book Review in "Ubiquity" Magazine)
- "Genius" (Amazon.com),
- "Children Above 180 IQ (Leta Hollingworth's, "Children Above 180 IQ", Amazon.com)
- Deviation IQ's vs. Ratio IQs
- Log-normal distribution Discusses the fitting of high-range IQ data with a log-normal distribution (modified bell curve) rather than a purely-Gaussian bell curve.
Is IQ irrelevant once it reaches 120? (Discusses the surprising fact that worldly success, including academic success, is largely independent of IQ once the IQ exceeds about 120. Note: This claim is strongly disputed by insiders insofar as it applies to leading U. S. mathematicians and physicists. Deviation IQs of no less than 150 and probably primarily 160+ are claimed to be necessary for cutting-edge work in these esoteric and competitive domains.)
- The Empty Promise (Grady Towers' discussion of the fact that even academic success seems to be independent of IQ above IQ 120 - see above.)
- Genius(Book Review)
- Is It a Cheetah? (Link to Stephanie Tolan's wonderful article concerning hyperbright children.)
- Terman Study (See "Terman-Cox lifetime study (1921 to present) of 1,528 gifted children" below.
- "Gifted Children: Myths and Realities" (Book Review in "Ubiquity" Magazine)
- "The Role of the Hyperbright in a Rational Society" (See below)
- Personal Experiences

III. Adult Intelligence

What role should the hyperbright play in a rational society?(Given that worldly success is largely independent of IQ once the IQ exceeds 120, what role should we expect our super-intelligent to play that most if us can't fulfill?)

Figure 2 (This is an S-curve histogram of the fraction of test-takers who solved Problem 33 on the Mega Test as a function of their Mega-derived deviation IQs. Figure 1 shows the corresponding histogram for their estimated ratio IQs.)
Figures 3 and 4 (These are the ratio IQ and deviation IQ histograms for Problem # 36 (the toughest nonverbal problem on the Mega Test).
Figure 5 (This is the ratio IQ histogram for Problem #33 - "Slicing a cube of cheese".)
Table 1 (This is a table of additional histograms and tabular data for other problems on the Mega Test.

Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the smartest one of all? (9-2-2000: Added Greg Smith to the list of super-prodigies)
- "Accidental Genius
- The World in 2020
- Michael and Maeghan Kearney (Book review of "Accidental Genius" in Ubiquity Magazine)
- Greg Smith (Started college at 10. Link to a website featuring news releases regarding Greg Smith)
- www.gregoryrsmith.com (Greg Smith's website)
- rsmith@rmc.edu (Greg Smith's email address)
- Kenneth Wolfe
- Gauss (Brief biosketch for Karl Friedrich Gauss, "The Prince of Mathematicians")
  - Men of Mathematics (Amazon.com)
- Mega Test
  - Mega Test
- 9-Year-Old College Prodigy
- Who Are They? - The Megans are the ~25 people who have qualified at the one-in-a-million level of IQ. Others whose SAT scores betoken the highest levels of intelligence are Bill Gates*, Paul Allen*, and perhaps, Steve Ballmer, with Microsoft Corporation. Warren Buffett, the Sage of Omaha, and George Soros of hedge fund fame are among other multibillionaires said to be included in this stratospheric league.
- *- Bill Gates is said to have scored 1590 on the pre-1995 SAT, while Paul Allen is alleged to have gotten a perfect 1600.
What are these supersmart people like? Are they arrogant? Weird?
Gender Differences in IQ
Is the IQ ceiling on the Mega Test 176? 180?
- Andrzej' and Joe Chieffo's Comments on the Mega Test Ceiling
Regression to the Mean
The Making of a Genius

IV. IQ Tests and Testing
To see some examples of the differences between 1940 IQ tests and those of the present day, click here.

V. The Flynn Effect

VI. Book Reviews and Biosketches

"Accidental Genius" (Amazon.com. Written by Kevin and Cassidy Kearney about their phenomenal children, Michael and Maeghan.)
Michael and Maeghan Kearney (Ubiquity Magazine. Book review of "Accidental Genius")
"Children Above 180 IQ (Amazon.com. Leta Hollingworth's classic study of 31 children with IQs above 180)
Gauss (Brief biosketch for Karl Friedrich Gauss, "The Prince of Mathematicians")
"Genius"(Ubiquity Magazine. Book review of Dr. Hans Eysenck's study of the roots of genius)
"Genius" (Amazon.com)
Gifted Children: Myths and Realities (Amazon.com)
"Gifted Children: Myths and Realities" (Ubiquity" Magazine. Book review of Dr. Ellen Winner's trailblazing study.)
Greg Smith (Started college at 10. Link to a website featuring news releases regarding Greg Smith)
Is It a Cheetah? (Link to Stephanie Tolan's wonderful article concerning hyperbright children.)
Kenneth Wolfe (Merrill Kenneth Wolfe spoke his first sentence at 6 months and finished his 1st grade reader at 1 year)
William Sidis (Thought by some to be the smartest human who ever lived.)

VII. Miscellaneous

In his book, "Genius", Hans Eysenck mentions several child prodigies who have come to mundane ends..
Dr. Daniel Goleman's test for emotional Intelligence.
Personal anecdotes concerning Einstein.
A letter to Guy Fogleman, Promethean, Ph. D., concerning the role of personality factors in human endeavor.
A derivation of the formulae for calculating the fraction of deviation IQ's above a given deviation IQ and for calculating the average IQ above any given level.
Keirsey Temperament Sorter for a Myers-Briggs type of personality test. We can thank Rostam Seddiq for pointing out this interesting personality test.)

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