How many Intelligences do we have?

HOW MANY INTELLIGENCES DO WE HAVE?

Intelligence is the faculty to handle abstract symbols which represent the reality mediately. The main abstract symbols are: letters (Linguistics), numbers (calculation) and figures or patterns (drawing). Linguistics, calculation and drawing are the basic forms of intelligence.

A skill is the activity aimed at achieving a specific purpose: social (sympathy), personal (reflection, intuition), art (painting, sculpture, music, literature, oratory), sports (kinesthesia) and ornamental (woodwork, metalwork, ceramics, embroidery, knitting).

An imitation is the conduct or operation of the human being that are executed by an animal or a robot respectively. Artificial intelligence (AI) is an imitation.

We can consider imitation, skill and intelligence as stages through which man passes in its development. First we imitate, later interact and finally understand.

 

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Given your definition of intelligence, I'd say we have many forms of intelligence. Money, credit, and stocks are symbols of wealth and some people are very skilled in handling that. Metaphors are symbols and so we have poetic minds that can understand everyday mundane things in new and profound ways. Gestures and facial expressions are symbols and so there are people apt at reading people's feelings and states of mind. I would even venture to say we have new forms of intelligence evolving in us. This ability to scan over huge amounts of information as when we surf the internet and find relevant data for our purposes might be thought of as a new intelligence. Young people are learning to multitask now sitting in front TV sets, laptop screens, and cellphones processing multiple data inputs at the same time. Even navigating the virtual worlds of video games is an intelligence of sorts that involves skills in eye-hand coordination, making snap judgments, and successfully accessing cost vs benefits in new situations.

 

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To Magical Realist:
I agree with you. Although many of the skills that you say are combinations of the basic forms of intelligence, or are applications of it.

 

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There are also skills we don't have that could help us build our intelligence, not yet things that represent reality symbolically - so not yet your definition of intelligence - but just the ability to detect reality in more ways - some we know and can build intelligence from, but lots we can't. Seeing ultraviolet light is one way of navigating that we can't do unassisted. I've read that bees can, along with polarised light, to assist in finding nectar. Other animals can sense movement underground to help them navigate each other, or predators, weather to find water, insects through soil for food etc. Some things, like becoming more sensitive to tactile sensations, are ones we haven't evolved to use but could practice like the skills in video games (maybe in games), and possibly become more sensitive to them... it could eventually lead to a new form of intelligence. On the subject of metaphor, the majority of ours are based on sight, our main source of navigation. A lot of our language comes from metaphor, sometimes in the (mostly unknown) etymology, but repeatedly in everyday phrases. "I see" = I understand, also feeling down, "I'm here for you" and "the past is behind me," "he's further ahead in the work," etc. More subtle ones I can't think of right now.

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But they seem to be accountable for a big part of our perception of the world and the way we talk about each other, and a lot of them are based on sight and space. Big = important is one that crops up a lot, which must be an intuitive belief from so long ago. If we were to work on tuning our other senses it could lead to things we might not be able to think of right now. And some things that we have but that require a lot of knowledge and equipment that most of us don't have. I know I'm talking very basic abilities, but that would only be a starting point.

 

Very interesting your contribution Praxinoa.

Some animals have some sense more developed than us. But this is a skill, not intelligence. Other faculties besides intelligence are: perception, affection, morality and will. Animals are guided by instincts mostly.

 

But we started guided by instincts too.

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And they're involved in intelligence and its applications. We're still evolving in new ways which leads to new knowledge, but another way is to go back to something we mainly ignore and explore that too. But the intelligence you're talking of is really a way of handling abstract thought and knowledge, and this seems to mainly derive from metaphor - which like I say is for the most part and the most used metaphors derived from sight. There's a theory that when we started to think in a more abstract way, the parts of our brain used for perceiving our whereabouts, keeping track of what we had to do etc, took on the new task of handling abstractions, and these, in the way we talk about them, come from metaphor (though we can perceive the difference between abstraction, theoretical thought, metaphor etc, and reality - although young children can't, and when they're older seem to understand them gradually). Studies have been done that show a correlation between physical warmth and emotional warmth for example. It seems like if some of our senses got stronger, skills of the wild I suppose, we'd find intelligence lying there eventually. One thing that sets us apart from a lot of animals is that we look for it, knowledge for the sake of knowing.

 

Posted by Praxinoa:

What do you mean with: the most used metaphors derived from sight?

 

I always thought there were 2. Book smarts and common sense. Rarely does a person seem to have both.

 

Sorry, that was badly phrased.
I'm going with the assumption that a lot of abstract thought is based on the way we understand the outside world, through basic senses (skills), sight, smell etc. It seems like sight is our most used sense, because it's been our most useful. I'm leaning towards language a lot, mathematics perhaps explains a much higher range of phenomena in its abstract symbols. It's more focused on the outside world. Letters mean little in general unless they're strung together into words. Words can explain a lot too, I'm focusing a bit too much on emotions, success etc, any subjects you'd bring up when you're talking about yourself or other people. And to me it seems that a lot of that ability is based on metaphorical thought, more specifically relating things you feel or your relative position in a job to things we'd have found in the outside world before those things existed - and those metaphors (or similes) are generally based on sight more than the other senses, it appears (another sight-based metaphor) that it's our principle basic sense as a species. "I look up to him," "I see," "[something quite abstract like love] is on its way," and maybe ones about growing intellectually/spiritually/morally, in the way we see people and plants and animals grow around us. Using colours for emotions - often found in abstract art as well. I am focused quite specifically on language, but maths seems to stem from the things we see as well, counting small numbers of things we saw repeated around us before we went to new depths and detail. All I meant was that perhaps if we developed our other senses more or incorporated them into our lives more, we could find new types of intelligence (by the original definition you gave) lurking there, in a new "language" we've barely touched upon yet. Not sure how mad I'm coming off.

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But we build on things we know and learn about in more detail, and leave some things behind. Of course we've managed to recognise a lot in other animals, but quite little compared to what there seems to be, and a lot of the things we know or hypothesise have come to us quite recently. Whereas when we look at a culture of humans and their language, they might have different leading philosophical or scientific ideas, but we can quite easily translate between each other. Do you think there are other types of intelligence we could have, Sibilia?

 

To Praxinoa

My starting point is the definition: Intelligence is the faculty to handle abstract symbols which represent the reality mediately.

Linguistic intelligence refers to the management of: words, concepts and the rules to relate them properly.

Praxinoa says:

Occult powers? I don't think so. Perhaps with the evolution of human being arise new forms of intelligence.

 

I'd say if drawing's one, music should be.
I can't help being interested in how new forms could rise. By the definitions of intelligence and skill here, I'd say in general it's skills that we're working on. Then again that could just be because building skills takes less time than it does for a new type of intelligence to emerge.

 

Your response seems rather simplistic conceptualization of something quite complicated. How would you define Book smarts and what denotes common sense? When I hear multiple intelligences Carl Jung and Howard Gardner inevitably becomes a thought in the definition. They define intelligence not by general ability but by sensory "modes." There tends to be a natural pattern of these modes when they are measured in humans. These modes are:

Verbal/Linguistic - Word Smart
Logical/Mathematical - Logic/Math Smart
Bodily/Kinesthetic - Body Smart (The ability to use bodies and hands with great skill.)
Visual/Spatial - Art/Space Smart
Musical - Music Smart
Interpersonal - People Smart
Intrapersonal - Self Smart
Naturalist - Nature Smart (Awareness of the cycle of living world)

(http://www.rolandsmith.com/curriculum/Multiple_Intelligence/MI Overview.pdf)

Now there is one other type of intelligence Gardner mentioned but did not classify, possibly because it is difficult to conceptualize or its tautological nature. Existential intelligence can be described as a talent in understanding and communicating difficult concepts of reality and humans relationship to the world. This type of intelligence has not been fully understood and remains somewhat controversial in its nature.

This is the prominent theory of multiple intelligences in social science. Just thought I would distinguish the flawed common concept with the scientific one. Thanks for your time.

 

Posted by Orleander:

The common sense is not intelligence, it is an ability.

The Theory of multiple intelligences is wrong because we must differentiate between intelligence and abilities. This theory is very kind: Everybody is intelligent.

INTELLIGENCES
Verbal/Linguistic - Word Smart
Logical/Mathematical - Logic/Math Smart
Visual/Spatial - Art/Space Smart

ABILITIES
Bodily/Kinesthetic - Body Smart (The ability to use bodies and hands with great skill.)
Musical - Music Smart
Interpersonal - People Smart
Intrapersonal - Self Smart
Naturalist - Nature Smart (Awareness of the cycle of living world)

 

I don't really understand why there must be a differentiation, nor do I understand your list. By your own definition they all seem to be abilities that everyone possess to a degree, so your explanation actually supports the multiple intelligence's theory.

 

One does not even need a brain to be intelligent. Apparently intelligence begins with response to stimulus. The rest is a matter of sophistication.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=brainless-slime-molds

 

Allseeingeye Wrote:

Write4U wrote:

Intelligence is a general faculty. We always use it, abilities are specific. We use them for a particular task. Perception is an ability. Abilities are helped for the intelligence (concepts, numbers and dimensions).

 

Howard Gardner, actually suggested 8 ways of learning, that can not be considered all like intelligence. Intuition is included in the intrapersonal way.
Some animals can be trained in specific tasks.

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I must say that if you are looking at intelligence you shouldn't be looking directly at quantification, or small comparisons. Broad comparisons will only yield comparative usefulness within the scope of a task or domain.

I love the question however.

Intelligence has never been defined in any succinct way. It must be operationally defined. Not that we don't have an affinity for recognizing it; we, however, often fail to recognize the more useful elements of it. I offer a base: memory/cognition/action/result, but memory and cognition are very difficult to apply to multiple forms of intelligence and cognition is not currently something that can be measured directly. Without some means of testing (domains of intelligence) externally (knowing all factors) would, or is, beyond human grasp.

 

David Bohm named the ultimate abstract intelligence of everything, "Insight Intelligence", from which sprang potential, from which springs the Implicate, from which instantiates reality.

 

People are funny

I read an old thread with questions about Intelligence Quotient, one of them was "who and when the next genius was going to be discovered, one with an IQ of 300, 400 maybe even 700?". I had to laugh because obviously the person had no idea how IQ scores are calculated.

Time to dispell some myths and common misconceptions about IQ

1: IQ scores greater than 204:
Currently impossible, if you had an IQ of 204, you'd be the smartest person in the world, you're IQ would make you smarter than 1 in 7 billion. Want to be the smartest ever? Well then you'd need to boast an IQ of 210, that'd give you and IQ greater than all the people who've ever lived. If you go for higher then your placing bets on the future and that you're IQ is greater than those yet to be born.

2: Tickle told me my IQ is 145, I'm really smart:
Great for tickle, but what standard deviation did they use? Was it 15 like most psychologists like to use, or 24? Watch 145 shrink. 145 - 100 = 45, 45 / 24 = 1.875, 1.875 * 15 = 28.125, 28 + 100 = 128. An IQ of 128 is good, means you're score was greater than 1 in 32, that is definitely something to be proud of, but miles apart from a score greater than 1 in 700 like and IQ of 145 s.d 15 might suggest.

3: Online IQ tests aren't accurate:
Wrong, though some online tests are just garbage, some are actually really good and can give you a ballpark idea of where your IQ stands, but always find out the standard deviation used to calculate your score. If a sd of anything but 15 was used to calculate your score, convert it, because when you hear on the news or in movies about really smart people you can be pretty sure their using a sd of 15.

4: IQ scores don't mean anything:
Wrong, there is a very good reason why intelligence agencies and the military test their recruits, IQ is considered too strongly correlate with other intellectual abilities, though strong correlation does not mean they perfectly correlate.

5: I'm stupid because I have an IQ below 100:
Wrong, even with an IQ below 100 you can still (and probably do) possess remarkable intellectual talents.

Something to consider, statistically speaking if you're reading this thread you possess talents on par with the large majority of those visiting this site.