The caption in this image is VERY true :-)
Posted on 01/26/2015 8:10:21 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Who was the smartest person to ever live? There are certainly many worthy contenders. Today, the very name of "Einstein" is synonymous with genius. Others may suggest Stephen Hawking. Those who appreciate literature and music may proffer William Shakespeare or Ludwig van Beethoven. Historians may recommend Benjamin Franklin.
Before I submit my own suggestion, we must first discuss what we even mean by smart. Colloquially, we routinely interchange the words smart and intelligent, but they are not necessarily the same thing. There is an ongoing debate among psychologists, neuroscientists, and artificial intelligence experts on what intelligence actually is, but for our purposes here, a simple dictionary definition will suffice: "capacity for learning, reasoning, understanding, and similar forms of mental activity; aptitude in grasping truths, relationships, facts, meanings, etc."
Implicit in this definition of intelligence is general knowledge. An intelligent person capable of understanding quantum mechanics is useless to society if he is completely ignorant. So, a truly smart person will know a lot of things, preferably about many different topics. He should be a polymath, in other words.
Finally, there is the element of creativity. Creative people think in ways in which most other people do not. Where society sees a dead end, a creative person sees an opportunity.
Which person from history was the bodily manifestation of intelligence, knowledge, and creativity? Our blog's namesake, Isaac Newton, of course!
What was Newton's IQ? It's impossible to say. IQ tests didn't exist in the 17th Century, and if they had, Mr. Newton certainly would not have deigned to spend 90 minutes filling out ovals on a multiple choice test. Besides, he likely would have finished the test early and then spent the remaining time correcting errors and devising more difficult questions.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearscience.com ...
I see what you did there 0_o
Yeah. Hottest woman on earth...
Feynman was a very good one.
It’s actually a highly subjective question. A better one would be the smartest society. 18’th century France, Germany, and England would qualify, making incredible inroads into math, physics, natural philosophy and so forth. You could wall off Africa, and they would remain in the neolithic age for the next 200,000 years.
The caption in this image is VERY true :-)
For some reason Hugh Hefner came to mind when I read the headline.
Jesus Christ
The Smartest Woman in the WorldTM might take exception.
Good call. Von Neumann was in a class by himself.
To be serious for a moment, yeah, Claude Shannon. He’s up there with von Neumann but Johnnie was funnier.
I had a physicist friend who studied under Curie and personally knew all of the big name scientists of that time including Einstein, Teller, Bohr, Heisenberg, Feynman, Born, Dirac, Dyson, Compton, Pauling, etc, etc. His stories were facinating and very personal. Anyway, he said Bohr was the top dog because he was critical for all of the quantum physics that came after. He rated Bohr higher than Newton. Personally, I think Leonardo was the most well-rounded intelligent man of all ages.
I am watching a movie on an old VHS tape. It is “Forbidden Planet”.
There is only one girl on the planet. She is played by Anne Francis. If she is not the prettiest girl in the world, she will do as a substitute.
I love that old film!
I finally scored a bluray of it...it’s awesome in HD.
FWIW, in my view, there are 3 particular levels of cognition: 1) knowledge (awareness of things as they are), 2) wisdom (what to do about it), and 3) understanding (why?).
Now that Solomon was wise means that he KNEW WHAT HE OUGHT TO DO. It doesn't mean he was necessarily "smart". The fact that he didn't do what he knew, while no knock on his wisdom, was nevertheless an obedience/behavioral problem, and leaves him in a chaos when it comes to "smarts" (which is a horse of another color).
“So I submit that the smartest, most intelligent person who ever lived is none other than the Living Word of God himself, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Source of all wisdom and intelligence. He made no show of high intelligence, but in fact, as God in human flesh, was the most intelligent man who ever lived. Someday soon, this most intelligent of all men will rule the world as King and Lord. What a day that will be.”
Beautiful.
This tape is in good shape but I can tell it no where near approaches a good Blu-Ray. For one thing the colors are just a bit off. Sometimes the men’s faces are just a little too red.
In many lists, Martin Luther gets top billing.
I love when Robbie the Robot makes up the huge batch of whiskey for that fellow :-)
I would say myself but I am just so incredibly humble.
I’m take a lot of pride in my humility.
on a side note.......
Why are all the candidates “White Guys?”
Is this another racist thread ?
/s
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