WANDERINGS THROUGH THE MINDVERSE
*"What is a tell-tale sign that you're in front of a very intelligent
person?"*

A question that appeared in Quora.com.
I wanted to share my response to this list-serve, with the hope, as always,
that it doesn't waste your time.


*What's a tell-tale sign you're in front of a very intelligent person? *He
or she is breathing.

If the person to whom you are speaking is breathing, you can be well
assured that you are in the presence of a* very *intelligent person: a
person in possession of the most intricate structure in the known Universe.
Or, as Bill Bryson, author of “The Body: a Guide for Occupants” wrote:

*"Just sitting quietly, doing nothing at all, your brain churns through
more information in thirty seconds than the Hubble Space Telescope has
processed in thirty years. A morsel of cortex one cubic millimeter in size
-about the size of a grain of sand- could hold two thousand terabytes of
information, enough to store all the movies ever made, trailers included,
or about 1.2 billion copies of this book. Altogether, the human brain is
estimated to hold something on the order of two hundred exabytes of
information, roughly equal to "the entire digital content of today's
world," according to Nature Neuroscience. If that is not the most
extraordinary thing in the universe, then we certainly have some wonders to
find."*

Has everybody cultivated their innate intelligence? Does everybody believe
in the sophistication of his/her own mind? Certainly not. Most of us are
not conditioned to believe in it. Instead, we are conditioned to play a
role in society based on our respective positions within it. Moreover, we
are subjected to IQ tests and are told that we fit somewhere in here:


[image: IQ-Bell-Curve-w-Scores (1).jpg]

[Complex human minds being forcibly compressed into a rough Gaussian
distribution.]

Consequently, the pygmalion effect, the psychological phenomenon which
causes us to conform to the expectations of those around us, becomes
predominant. It dictates our behavior and is the basis of our
self-perception. Many people might not come across as highly intelligent
because they truly don’t believe they are and are acting accordingly. Also,
the notion that intellectualism is the sole reserve of the elite will make
many people avoid any intellectual pursuits. Because they secretly believe
themselves incapable of cerebral activity, many people will avoid such
acitivity and become disdainful of it. [We all tend to develop an aversion
to that which makes us feel diminished.]

And, yet:


*On average, each person generates 50,000 - 70,000 thoughts per day. H*ow
many of these thoughts could be described as “profound?” Oh, precious few,
I suspect. For instance, 35,000 of my most recent thoughts within the last
day have been “Brazil lost to Croatia?!” “Brazil lost to Croatia?!” “Brazil
lost to….”
We’re thinking about mundane matters and, unfortunately, almost all of us
are also plagued with an onslaught of negative, self-diminishing thoughts.
These thoughts tend to act on our minds like rock-eroding rain droplets.
More’s the pity….50,000 - 70,000 thoughts: intangible, miraculous thoughts
arising out of an unfathomably intricate structure containing as many
neurons as there are stars in a small galaxy. All too often we’re using
this power to deteriorate ourselves.

Does everybody write like Shakespeare, compose like Mozart, contemplate
like Neitzsche, or compute like Newton? Of course, not. These
afore-mentioned figures and many like them are outliers in a specific area.

All the same, everybody possesses something remarkable.

When students come to apply for a position on the planetarium staff, the
application I give them is a long, blank sheet of paper. Most look
flummoxed initially until I say, “Show me who you are. Express the best of
yourself in whatever way you choose.” The submissions have been
staggeringly impressive. I’ve received all manner of origami models,
drawings, written works and other astonishingly creative submission. When
an applicant is not required to write an essay or answer questions, but are
instead allowed to choose their own medium, they tap into that part of
themselves that often remains hidden.

Or, as John Taylor Gatto wrote in “Weapons of Mass Instruction,”

“Genius is as common as dirt.”

So, when I go to the laundromat and talk to the attendant who has recently
arranged a veritable city of ceramic Christmas houses along all tops of all
the dryers or when the supermarket cashier tells me about her recent
embroidery projects, or when one of the University custodians who is a
recent emigree from Burundi speaks about the challenges he confronted
during his travels to the US, I know I am in the presence of a very
intelligent person.

In fact, I hope I will always remember that I am in front of a very
intelligent person every time I converse with someone.

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