Is there intelligent life here?

[Bushranger]

When I read about the question of, if there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe it causes me to consider: What exactly is the measure of "intelligent life".

 

The resultant scores on I.Q. tests of humans is usually represented as a bell-shaped normal distribution with the mean (and I think mode), of the range being 100 points. As a former (retired) teacher, I have observed that a person with an I.Q. score of 100 will demonstrate little of what could be expected of an "intelligent" person despite being referred to as "average". Persons with 100 I.Qs will not likely rise to be mathematicians, rocket engineers, surgeons, etc... they will be manual workers doing simple repetitive things.

 

On the other hand, Albert Einstein and Marilyn vos Savant with their superior I.Q.s are atypical and cannot logically be considered as representing human intelligence any more than could a person with a 40 I.Q. Therefore, we seem to be stuck with the "average" I.Q. as most legitimate measure of human intelligence rather than the noteable exceptions. That begs the question: Would a species from another world use the mean of human intelligence as the measure of such and then conclude that, there was no intelligent life on earth or at least that humans were only a moderately intelligent species?

 

 

 

[dimreepr]

For me intelligence is the ability to socially interact with a dangerous animal.

As apposed to 'clever' the ability to do sums.

[cladking]

There's no such thing as "intelligence" in the way most people define it. What makes people different in terms of the ability to understand, predict, and manipulate knowledge has hundreds of parameters which would each need to be measured as well as the influence of each of these characteristics on every other characteristic. But the resultant measure still wouldn't be "intelligence" in terms of what people call intelligence.

 

Most of what we mistake for intelligence is really the ability to use and manipulate language on many levels. The closest thing that exists to what we call intelligence is what I call "cleverness" but this is an event rather a condition.

 

For most practical purposes it would be quite accurate to say there is no intelligent life on earth. All animals sometimes exhibit cleverness however. Due to the accumulation of knowledge in humans made possible by language, human cleverness often exhibits significant complexity.

 

People with average IQ's tend to be quite a bit brighter than more "intelligent" people give them credit for. I've known people with IQ's of 95 who could figure out and operate extremely complex equipment. It just takes them a little longer and they have less flexibility. Indeed, you can glue the legs of a cockroach to a little car and it will operate it to go to a food source.

Edited December 18, 2016 by cladking

[John Cuthber]

"Is there intelligent life here?"

Yes, but I'm only visiting.

[StringJunky]

Etymology of intelligent: early 16th century: from Latin intelligent- ‘understanding’, from the verb intelligere, variant of intellegere ‘understand’, from inter ‘between’ + legere ‘choose’.

 

If an organism can make a choice between available options it is thus. IIRC earthworms can do this; they are at the most basic level of intelligence.

Edited December 19, 2016 by StringJunky

[cladking]

"Is there intelligent life here?"

Yes, but I'm only visiting.

 

You're lucky.

 

I get rebooted every morning whether I want to or not.

[Sensei]

Intelligent life form is learning, gathering knowledge, and reusing it in the future.

 

f.e. don't put finger to hot water.

The first time animal, or human (regardless of their IQ), don't know it hurts.

But after doing it one, two, three times, ...., it'll be recorded and reused in the future to predict results in advance.

Edited December 19, 2016 by Sensei

[Ophiolite]

For me intelligence is the ability to socially interact with a dangerous animal.

As apposed to 'clever' the ability to do sums.

Interesting. I might well make the same distinction, yet I would reverse the word usage.

[dimreepr]

Interesting. I might well make the same distinction, yet I would reverse the word usage.

 

Semantics, what a bugger...

[Bushranger]

I've known people with IQ's of 95 who could figure out and operate extremely complex equipment.

 

How was it that you happened to know that the people you are referring to had I.Q.s of 95? An estimation or did you have access to their I.Q. test scores?

[Bushranger]

What makes people different in terms of the ability to understand, predict, and manipulate knowledge has hundreds of parameters which would each need to be measured as well as the influence of each of these characteristics on every other characteristic.

 

Would you mind listing some of those parameters?

[cladking]

I can't seem to quote or cut and paste.

 

I am merely estimating their intelligence rather charitably. I do often have additional knowledge such as their performance in high school or college. But even people whose test scores I've seen and were quite low often have some remarkable abilities such as disassembling internal combustion engines and repairing them.

 

Thought and awareness have a great number of parameters and characteristics and both are critical to performance on IQ tests. Visual acuity, intuitiveness, logic, memorization of taxonomies, understanding, speed of thought, ability to think in four dimensions, ability to manipulate knowledge, etc, etc all have profound implications on what we call "intelligence". Each of these exist on a continuum and are composed of other characteristics which we don't understand and can't list in their totality. We certainly can't measure any of these things since even the "easy" ones like visual acuity are very specific to the individual. A person with very sharp vision and no interest in bugs might not see something that a far sighted entomologist can see.

 

We simply mistake technology as prima facie evidence of human intelligence. In actuality technology is merely symptomatic of language and the language of science.

[Bushranger]

I am merely estimating their intelligence rather charitably. I do often have additional knowledge such as their performance in high school or college.

 

 

Without knowing what their I.Q. scores are, your estimate is just a guess and persons that you have estimated to have an I.Q. score "95" may just as well have an I.Q. score of 110 or more. A guess is a guess is a guess. The person whom which I have observed are those who had their I.Q. scores in their school records and/or those whose General Technical (G.T. the Army's I.Q. test), scores were made available to me in the Army.

Also, "performance" in high school and college is not an indicator of what a person I.Q. score would be.

Edited January 3, 2017 by Bushranger

[cladking]

I don't believe in "intelligence", I certainly don't believe in IQ tests.

 

My estimation of an individual's ability to be clever is hardly infallible and I'm not claiming it is. But there is a reasonably good correlation between my estimation and their ability to perform specific tasks. People have highly divergent talents and abilities and this is sort of my point. There is and can be no "score" that will reflect a person's capabilities. While there's no such thing as intelligence even the various aspects of what we call intelligence can't be quantified.

 

I know some of these people fairly well.

[Moontanman]

The SETI people define it as the ability to build a radio telescope...

[cladking]

The problem with such definitions is that they are illogical and don't fit our understanding of the nature of intelligence. A thousand years ago nobody could build a radio telescope. No individual really invented this but rather it was an accumulation of knowledge and technology which led to it.

 

We are mistaking the existence of the knowledge and technology for intelligence while overlooking the process we use to accumulate them. This process requires no "intelligence". It is not predicated on understanding or the speed at which an individual thinks.

[Itoero]

The problem with such definitions is that they are illogical and don't fit our understanding of the nature of intelligence. A thousand years ago nobody could build a radio telescope. No individual really invented this but rather it was an accumulation of knowledge and technology which led to it.

 

We are mistaking the existence of the knowledge and technology for intelligence while overlooking the process we use to accumulate them. This process requires no "intelligence". It is not predicated on understanding or the speed at which an individual thinks.

Such a process was not possible without 'intelligence'. IQ tests are of course not 100% correct. They give an idea of someone's intelligence.

[cladking]

The process was not invented full blown nor were its discoveries. At each juncture, at each improvement, was an individual who came up with a clever idea. This clever idea didn't necessarily require a lot of knowledge or understanding, merely that it was a logical outgrowth of what already existed. Indeed, many very clever ideas are simply wrong and must fall by the wayside or they become obsolete over time. Some would be useful if not too far before their time. But all progress is now and always has been the result of such ideas and it is my contention that a better (more reflective of the reality) perspective of this is that these ideas are the result of an event (cleverness) rather than a condition (intelligence).

If intelligence resulted in man visiting on the moon then how was it accomplished without understanding the nature of gravity?

Edited January 6, 2017 by cladking

[swansont]

 

If intelligence resulted in man visiting on the moon then how was it accomplished without understanding the nature of gravity?

 

 

Because the nature of gravity was not a requirement for the problems that they needed to solve. They didn't even need to use the best theory (general relativity) to do it. Newtonian gravity worked just fine.

 

Scientists and engineers solve problems all the time without needing to know the underlying nature of what they are working on.

[cladking]

Scientists and engineers solve problems all the time without needing to know the underlying nature of what they are working on.

Indeed! We each have been given an accumulation of knowledge built up over many centuries. It's simply not necessary to understand why or how something exists, merely the means to manipulate the knowledge that applies to it. We use these models to "understand" what is established. If we shoot hot gasses out the bottom of a combustion chamber it will create thrust and if the thrust is greater than total weight it can create lift. This has been known since the time of Newton. Yet Newton had no more ability to reach the moon than an elephant. It was equally improbable.