To be honest, as I chat with more and more random strangers these days it does begin to dawn on me that we all do roughly spend ~70 years on this planet devoting our attention to one thing or another, and that though people might not have what is seen as “classical intelligence” (i.e. high IQ’s, political savvy, high empathy / sociopathy, etc.), we are genuinely absolute genius’s in one particular field or another.
For example, I had an old roommate whose politics would make me drink and stare at the horizon whilst he consistently acted against his own self interests to punish people he was told are responsibly for his financial lot in life. But, he was an absolute wizard when it came to predicting the outcome of a sports game. It could be anything - football, hockey, tennis, whatever - he immediately ran their stats straight off the top off his head, summarized their strengths and weaknesses and came out with an outcome that was on the whole close to the truth.
Another example, my ex. We never really had deep philosophical discussions about the state of the world, and her consumerist lifestyle was one I tried to actively ignore. But, she was incredible at turning a house into a home – her interior design skills would genuinely surprise me at how well-thought out and in-depth they were, not only in terms of style and decor, but also in the way that she would execute and coordinate the tasks with me to beautify our home.
TL;DR – I do really think most people have high intelligence in one specific field or another, we just value people unequally using classical measures of success (wealth, education)
If your roommate was so good at predicting the outcome of sporting events, couldn’t he have used that skill to fix his financial situation, rather than blame others?
Tbh, transforming your talents into money is also a skill that some people have in spades and some people lack entirely. I’ve actually always bristled about that skill specifically, because I think Kim kardashian is an absolute phenom in that area and it always rankles when people say she’s stupid. She turned: a moderately famous but deceased and no longer relevant dad; relatively very high wealth (but not comparable to her current estate); an assistanceship to Paris Hilton; and a sex tape into an absolute empire. That’s a lot of points in her favor, but she makes the best possible decisions so consistently, she’s got to be one of the marketing greats.
To be honest, as I chat with more and more random strangers these days it does begin to dawn on me that we all do roughly spend ~70 years on this planet devoting our attention to one thing or another, and that though people might not have what is seen as “classical intelligence” (i.e. high IQ’s, political savvy, high empathy / sociopathy, etc.), we are genuinely absolute genius’s in one particular field or another.
For example, I had an old roommate whose politics would make me drink and stare at the horizon whilst he consistently acted against his own self interests to punish people he was told are responsibly for his financial lot in life. But, he was an absolute wizard when it came to predicting the outcome of a sports game. It could be anything - football, hockey, tennis, whatever - he immediately ran their stats straight off the top off his head, summarized their strengths and weaknesses and came out with an outcome that was on the whole close to the truth.
Another example, my ex. We never really had deep philosophical discussions about the state of the world, and her consumerist lifestyle was one I tried to actively ignore. But, she was incredible at turning a house into a home – her interior design skills would genuinely surprise me at how well-thought out and in-depth they were, not only in terms of style and decor, but also in the way that she would execute and coordinate the tasks with me to beautify our home.
TL;DR – I do really think most people have high intelligence in one specific field or another, we just value people unequally using classical measures of success (wealth, education)
If your roommate was so good at predicting the outcome of sporting events, couldn’t he have used that skill to fix his financial situation, rather than blame others?
Tbh, transforming your talents into money is also a skill that some people have in spades and some people lack entirely. I’ve actually always bristled about that skill specifically, because I think Kim kardashian is an absolute phenom in that area and it always rankles when people say she’s stupid. She turned: a moderately famous but deceased and no longer relevant dad; relatively very high wealth (but not comparable to her current estate); an assistanceship to Paris Hilton; and a sex tape into an absolute empire. That’s a lot of points in her favor, but she makes the best possible decisions so consistently, she’s got to be one of the marketing greats.
80% prediction rate isn’t anything to bank on :P
If you know the rate, and it’s that far above 50%, you should be able to make it work.
it’s 80%, 65% of the time :-)
I have a PHD in interior decorating too!