Ryan Díaz
1/27/2012
What is Intelligence Anyway?
Intelligence is something that I have tried to understand my whole life. My first thought was
that intelligence only involve the mind. It was not until recently that I have looked at the idea of many
types of intelligences. I was brain washed by society as a kid that real intelligence means doing well in
academics, but I always doubted my intelligence because I was never excellent in every subject. I have
always been good in sciences, mathematics, and history; but I always straggle at expressing my ideas
on paper or vocally, even though I am able to learn how to speak a language very fast. I thought that to
be consider smart a person needed to be good in all academic subjects, the truth is that I was, and
society was wrong.
In the composition “What is Intelligence Anyway?” by Issac Asimov, he describes how society
distinguishes people's intelligence by a test base on academic knowledge. Asimov describes ho his
manic couldn't have possibly get a score of 80 in the test, but every time he had a problem with his car
he would rush to to him to get it fix. One day the mechanic got Asimov with a logic question and
Asimov got it run. The mechanic stated “I knew for sure I'd catch you. Because you're so goddamned
educated, doc, I knew you couldn't be very smart.” This showed Asimov how there is different types of
intelligences and that academic intelligence isn’t the best one to partake in society. The mechanic was a
lot better working with his hands than Asimov, so why isn't been creative or good at solving technical
problems consider as a type of intelligence? Engineers are consider smart to the eyes of society and
they do the same work that mechanics do, but with more math and science involve. The statement of
the mechanic could be interpret as a prove to the speculations of people that are highly educated,
lacking the basic abilities that the “normal” people have.
In Howard Gardner “A Rounded Version: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences” he proposes the
idea that people have different types of intelligences, and that they are all essential to live in society.
Gardner states, “the students with the lower IQ is vastly more successful in business than the student
who scored higher.” This outcome is one key prove that people depend on many intelligences and not
just the linguistic and logical mathematical intelligences. Gardner ask the question “What constitutes
an intelligence?” Are the only people with intelligence the once who can solve a writing test? Society
has not given the other human abilities the credit that they deserve; if the fact is that only linguistic or
logical mathematical intelligence is real than why are people drawn to the great athletes or the great
musicians? Intelligence can't be limited to one type, different people have different talents and different
levels of intelligence for each type.
Recent neuroscience research suggest that the human brain can be train to be extreme
performance. A person could be train to be a great musician we the right train, or a great
mathematician; this has been proven every time a person trains for a physical or mental competition
they are training their brain to improve in that activity. In other words you force your brain and body to
adapt to it's environment. The fact is that for some people is easier to learn some things than others, but
just because you think you are not good at something it doesn’t mean that you can't get better. I agree
with Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences, and on the ability of people to improve on
anything that they desire.