High IQs, You Say

  By Florida Bill 

                                                 In recent days and weeks, I have seen a good number of stories on the social airways about celebrities, politicians, athletes and other prominent persons with incredibly high intelligence quotients (IQs).
                                 Discussions about who is  smart and who is officially a bit of a dim bulb can liven up any conversation. Reports on IQs levels--not to mention how they are measured--actually differ from one account to another, so the final word on who is a whiz kid and who has an empty head may not be completely accurate.    
                                  There are various charts as to which numbers equate to levels of intelligence.   Basically, the average IQ across all Americans is a score of 100, with 91 to 109 considered average or normal.   Stepping up, 110 to 119 is considered to be "superior intelligence" and 120 to 129 is considered "very superior intelligence." A score of 130 to 139 is listed as "Gifted," and 140 or above is considered "Genius or Near Genius."   And the higher the score, the greater the genius; and when you surpass 200--well you do not fool with that egghead. 
                                   If you thought that the young singers and composers, Lady Gaga and Shakira, were just a couple of dingbats earning millions--guess again.  There is another side to those faces.  They are, so we are told, certified geniuses checking in with IQs of around 140-160.  Actually, we are told that there are a good many geniuses around Hollywood.  Among them are actors James Woods who logs in with super intelligence of 180, and Matt Damon at 160; and the long gone actress and Oscar winner, Judy Holiday (no doubt social media might ask who that is) scored a 172.
                                    IQ is intelligence quotient and it is derived from standardized testing results when a portfolio is available from which to glean the information. When the paper work is not fully available, as is the case with Gallileo (185) and Leonardo Da Vinci (220), other factors are considered.  California Professor Dean Keith Simonton has used a technique of assembling everything about a person, including achievements, discoveries and compositions to estimate an IQ.  It is a "histriometric" approach to assessing  brainpower (IQ) when results of standardized testing are not to be found or test scores are missing, the professor has explained.   
                                     Does it depend upon who is asking, or who has the info?  Most reports which I have seen, find genius genes in many of the same persons, including Madonna, Hillary and Bill Clinton, and chess master Gary Kasparov.  Also on top of the brain mountain are: Dolph Lundgren, Rocky's Russian nemesis (160), Sharon Stone (154), and Conan O'Brien (160).
                                      Amazingly, the iconic President Kennedy is down there with a lot  of regular folks at 117, and President Reagan is said to be just an ordinary guy at 107. President Nixon hit 143. There are some reports that George W. Bush, the younger. has an IQ of only 91--yet there are others who claim his brain power is closer to 126, very intelligent.  For Bush, maybe some political "histriometrics"?
                                      Mohammed Ali, the Louisville boxer and poet, was said to have an IQ of 78.  That is mighty low ball alongside Sylvester Stallone (AKA Rocky) punching in at genius level, 160.  Muscular ex-Gov. Arnold Schwartzenegger scores 132. 
                                      Famous classical composers (Bach, Hayden, Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn) were estimated by a Catherine Cox in 1926 to have IQs between 160 and 170. Music geniuses all. Lady Gaga's talents as a writer and composer must surely account for some of her membership in that stratosphere of the intelligence continuum.
                                     The typical child prodigy usually has an exceptionally high IQ.  For example, Korean born Kim Ung-Yong has been recorded as having an IQ score of about 210. Yong reportedly could speak fluently at six months old and was a guest student in physics at Hanyang University by the time he was three-years-old.
                                      The highest IQ ever recorded was 228, according to the Guinness Book of Records.  This score belongs to the "smartest"  person in the world,  Marilyn vos Savant, 70, a Parade magazine columnist, author and lecturer.  Ms Savant scored it when she was 10 years old.
                                      Oh yes, one other thing.  President Trump is said to have an IQ of 156, dwarfing Hillary Clinton's 140.
                                     Like everything, there are challenges to all this rhetoric about super high IQs.  The numbers and lists which are being tossed about were said to have been published initially by Mensa, the UK-based society considered to be the oldest and largest high IQ society in the world. 
                                   But, Mensa has said that it has not published any such list of celebrity members and in fact never issues list of Mensa members to the press and does not disclose individual IQ scores to anyone. The genesis of all this discussion of individual brain-power is unknown, according to Mensa.  
                                  The Huffington Post is said to be the only media member which has acknowledged that these lists attributed to Mensa are "fakes." One of the critics of the "Mensa" published list observed that the report is a "measure of just how easy it is to get a catchy story to move.... and hang around even after being retracted."
                                    It is all kind of fun and interesting to read about who is supposedly smart and who is just average and those who are barely scratching the surface of the brainpower spectrum.    Accurate?  No doubt, only those with the highest IQs know for sure.
                       
                                    
                                   
                                 
                                             XXX