Well, there you go. See you only need average IQ to work out many things - although you might be wrong sometimes.
I don't think I'm that interested in intelligence so much as in intelligent people. I do know a bit about it because I've been tested so many times, and because one notices things when one lives.
The interests that really drive me are homes, decor, travel, photography, beauty, architecture, cycling, and clothes. Of course, there's not a high readership for those things on Medium, so it's silly to write about them. :)
I look to see what people read, and I noticed a high readership for people wanting to read how to spot intelligent people. And I was right. I have had more than 28,000 reads on this piece, and normal is about 100 for most people. So it was a good investment of my time. It also pushed my earnings up.
I am always fascinated with people who think that somehow one's surroundings can make one intelligent. My IQ has been measured between 165 and off-the-graph, depending on the type of test and whether I drank coffee before hand or not. Coffee totally messes up my brain.
However, in my entire life, I never had one conversation with my mother or father. I was beaten to hell and gone. I grew up in South Africa, so there was no television. I was not allowed to socialize. Because I was autistic, I didn't speak to people at school. I also didn't listen in class, except math. I never did a day's homework in my life. So I'm not sure where those influences were.
You can read some of my 'influences' here.
https://medium.com/humans-being-humane/how-i-overcame-42-years-of-chronic-abuse-84dcd4885ed6
I realized when I was 21 that people were supposed to say hello to each other. I realized when I was 45 that people lied. I realized when I was 62 or 63 that people spoke to each other to connect, not just to pass on information. I was 67 when I realized people were self-interested, and that's when all the confusion that had dogged me for a lifetime fell into place.
In other words, I had no social education and no academic education at all. All I did was read and read and read. During my school years, between 2 and 4 books a day, and after that a book a day. I still read for five or more hours per day. So I pick up many things.
Yes, when I type on my phone (I loathe phones), I make typos. I don't get paid for responding to comments. Writing on the web is a hit and miss affair. Sometimes you make quite a bit of money. Sometimes you starve for a couple of years. It's very insecure.
However, it's the only job I can do without alienating everybody around me, and I cannot abide the stress. I dropped out when I was 45.
Until then, though, I worked as a casino dealer (9 games), computer programmer, secretary, Engineer and CEO placements, website designer, editor, ghostwriter, scriptdoctor, sales rep (business to business), and I worked in hotels around the world, newspapers, magazines, casinos, etc. I've done so many things that I can't remember them all. So it enables me to have a wide knowledge about many things.
I read approximately 600 books on psychology, neurology, intelligence, self-help, etc. Why? because, if you read my story on 42 years of chronic abuse, I was trying desperately to find out what was wrong with me.
Every time I went to a doctor, one of the first things they did was give me an IQ test. And they always told me that I fitted the genius category, etc. Sometimes, they gave me the score, etc. I've been told many things about my brain.
Not a single one of them picked up that I was autistic. That I discovered through finally doing tests in my late 60s.
Did I make a quick and hasty emotional response? I think I was irritated at your presumption and your insult. But also, I wasn't near my laptop, and I was on a bus going to see a castle with my daughter, so, because I also have a processing disorder, I can't come up with things immediately.
My words to you stand. If you actually thought I was boasting, then that is something you would do. You were projecting. That was obvious to me. It happens all the time when one is a writer. There are always people whom one triggers, and they always accuse you of all sorts of things.
It's why I am going back to college in the fall to learn to do other things. I have to earn a living because I was never able during my lifetime to save anything for retirement and my social security is $224. But I'm done with all the insults because people cannot step outside their own lives and see the many possibilities that one particular action might stem from.
https://medium.com/humans-being-humane/on-being-disliked-77395b49333f
Goodbye
