Posted on 05/14/2014 10:22:17 AM PDT by dsc
Forget being smarter than a fifth-grader. Most Americans think they’re smarter than everyone else in the country.
Fifty-five percent of Americans think that they are smarter than the average American, according to a new survey by YouGov, a research organization that uses online polling. In other words, as YouGov cleverly points out, the average American thinks that he or she is smarter than the average American.
A humble 34 percent of citizens say they are about as smart as everyone else, while a dispirited 4 percent say they are less intelligent than most people.
Men (24 percent) are more likely than women (15 percent) to say they are “much more intelligent” than the average American. White people are more likely to say the same than Hispanic and black people.
So, this many smart people must mean that, on the whole, the United States ranks pretty high in intelligence, right?
Not quite. According to the survey, just 44 percent of Americans say that Americans are “averagely intelligent.” People who make less than $40,000 a year are much more likely to say that their fellow Americans are intelligent, while those who make more than $100,000 are far more likely to say that Americans are unintelligent.
The results are not surprising. Western cultures have a habit of inflating their self-worth, past research has shown. The most competent individuals also tend to underestimate their ability, while incompetent people overestimate it. Not out of arrogance, but of ignorance—the worst performers often don’t get negative feedback. In this survey, 28 percent of high school graduates say they are “slightly more intelligent” than average, while just 1 percent of people with doctoral degrees say they are “much more intelligent.”
Of course, a Ph.D. doesn’t necessarily measure intelligence, nor does how much money you make. Those factors, along with gender and race, may be better indicators of humblebrag ability than brainpower.
Well, the point of the scheme is to deceive people about the adequacy of their education. The truth is that elites fear education, and want the unwashed to possess only enough education to perform their assigned tasks. Excessive information or reasoning skills only lead to awkward questions, and then the trouble starts.
Flatly untrue. If I'm smarter than everybody else, I'm the smartest person in the country.
That wasn't the question at all.
Marina Koren is apparently one of the 5% who over-estimates her intelligence.
In most measurable statistics, the distribution shows a preponderance at or near the average. The image of a bell-shaped curve is invoked. The highest point in the curve is where the average is, and thus most people are at or near the average. As you go towards smarter or stupider, you get fewer and fewer represented. Thus, the number of really, really smart people is very small, and luckily the number of really, really stupid people is also quite small.
Since most people are grouped around the middle of the bell-shaped curve, it is understandable that many of them might mistakenly believe they are closer to the smart end than the stupid end. It doesn’t take much to be just a little above average, and being a statistical measure, most people have not had their stupidity quantified. They don’t have tests for stupidity. They used to give IQ tests, but people who scored well made the others feel bad, who then beat up on the high scorers. I was one of those who got beaten up on.
Obviously, from the vocabulary utilized in this post, and the cogent analysis of the subject at hand, it can be inferred that, indeed, I actually AM smarter than average.
I have to disagree with your premises if you read the summary.
“people who are dull-normal at best, and downright stupid a lot of the time, that they are just as smart as everyone else?”
Apparently many who are not so IQ and the groups often thought of/treated as less IQ actually do think themselves lower. So maybe your ideas don’t quite gel here.
ah know i is.
Smarter is another one of those words that has so many definitions that it is practically meaningless.
Well, at this stage of my life, I can say that all the things I see today are just variations on a theme I figured out long ago. I don’t know if that makes me smart, wise, intelligent or what.
People of below average intelligence who think they are the smartest people on the planet.
Like, for example...oh, I dunno....a certain fellow who was born in Kenya, grew up in Hawaii, and ended up going into politics in Chicago?
Quite right.
Saw a local news program where a mom was objecting strongly to mistreatment of her Downs Syndrome daughter at school.
One thing she said stuck with me. “Just because she’s retarded, it doesn’t mean she’s stupid.!”
Uhhh, actually that’s pretty much exactly what it means, for some definitions of “stupid.”
But not necessarily others.
The term “smarter” is subjective. Does it mean IQ? Does it mean superior knowledge is one clearly defined area, or perhaps a dollop of knowledge in many areas? Perhaps it means street smarts.
The woman with the free Obama phone and Obama bennies who called the radio show in Texas thinks that all but the wealthiest working stiffs aren’t as smart as she is.
Unless you define “smart”, people are going to be inclined to favor their own strengths in their self-asessments. The results of the survey may not be off.
Even pilots?
Technically speaking, however, exactly 50% of the population is above average IQ.
Although it is very difficult, impossible really, to accurately determine whether someone has an IQ of 99 or 101.
Similar problems apply out at the ends of the scale. For all practical purposes, comparative IQ becomes more or less meaningless above something like 145 or 160. We just can’t measure it accurately in those ranges.
What is scary and appalling is that average libtards not only have only average intelligence, but also lack basic knowledge. Yet, they are able to form pressure groups that are able to convince corrupt politicians to do irrational things that end up destroying the country.
Maybe we should develop a test to measure SQ...
Not true, though it is possible. Half the country is below "median" per the definition.
Just because you’re educated doesn’t mean you’re smart. It just means you’re educated.
Told this to a snot nosed fighter pilot one time when he was quite dismissive of his ground crew...it took him a while to figure it out.
To me, one can be either or both...depends on the person how they want to go through life.
Like, for example...oh, I dunno....a certain fellow who was born in Kenya, was educated in Indonesia and Pakistan, grew up in Hawaii, attended some of the most expensive universities in the US at no cost, and ended up going into politics in Chicago?..............oh, THAT guy....................
“Even pilots?”
Are you asking that if a pilot is a competent pilot that he may think he’s competent at everything else? It depends on the person. I, for example, know instantly if I’m qualified on any given subject. But people who don’t know what they don’t know will assume that whatever view they have on that subject is the only true view.
According to Thomas Lipmann in “Public Opinion” we all operate on the picture of reality in our heads and not on reality itself. We have an opinion on, say, gay marriage and may know nothing beyond what we’ve heard on CNN while only half listening. To that person his is the only opinion on the subject. Others know there are many complex views and they’ve read several articles and could argue the subject on TV against a proponent and tie that guy in knots. But both of these people are operating not on “reality” but on their picture of reality. (One of them, however, may have a much more accurate picture of the societal cost and long term impacts.)
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