I've yet to come across a definition of intelligence that satisfies me, maybe this is my fault and not the fault of the definitions. I am curious to hear your take on intelligence.
I have read so many different definitions of intelligence. There are probably as many definitions of intelligence as there are experts who study it. The one I most like is not much different from the answer given above by Joachim:
Intelligence is the ability to learn about, learn from, understand, and interact with one’s environment. Within this framework, intelligence require a number of specific abilities:
1-Ability to adapt to new environment or changes to your current environment
2-Ability to acquire and use knowledge
3-Ability to reason
4-Ability to evaluate and judge
5-Ability for original and productive thought.
The word environment has a wider meaning that include a person's immediate surrounding including people around, working place or even the environment of the earth, such as landscape, terrain etc.
I have read so many different definitions of intelligence. There are probably as many definitions of intelligence as there are experts who study it. The one I most like is not much different from the answer given above by Joachim:
Intelligence is the ability to learn about, learn from, understand, and interact with one’s environment. Within this framework, intelligence require a number of specific abilities:
1-Ability to adapt to new environment or changes to your current environment
2-Ability to acquire and use knowledge
3-Ability to reason
4-Ability to evaluate and judge
5-Ability for original and productive thought.
The word environment has a wider meaning that include a person's immediate surrounding including people around, working place or even the environment of the earth, such as landscape, terrain etc.
Intelligence is difficult to define, as it is a very complex phenomenon! It is a combination of several cognitive abilities like;
Being able to apply knowledge
Being able to analyse and interprete
To be able to adapt to situations and environment
Responding to situations appropriately
Keeping senses in critical situations
Giving proper responses
Using all senses with mind and heart, at right places, at right times
Reacting in the right way
And so on!!
Jaya is probably right - the reason it is so hard to define is that what we label intelligence is a collection of abilities rather than a single thing. And, on top of that these abilities might be context specific as well.
Howard Gardner is probably the most recognized writer who has questioned the idea that intelligence can be considered a single thing.
For me intelligence is like a polished diamond with many facetes. It cannot feel in one category. For me it is a complex combination of different types of abilities to accept and process the information from the environment (social and natural), abilities to produce the optimal outcome based on the information available, and all sorts of creativity, all together. But I am not psychologist. I share a non-professional opinion.
Interesting.
The question, as such, seems to ask, once more, a definition of intelligence as a unitary entity, that you can define in discreet terms, mathematicians, then measurable.
The argument seems to avoid studies and researches of the past 30 years, through which has been clarified the multidimensionality of this complex set of cognitive attitudes that traditionally we define as intelligence.
I like the definition from the mainstream of intelligence, which is a document by 52 experts of intelligence. I think that it is an acceptable "working definition" among various others :
Intelligence is a very general mental capability that, among other things, involves the ability to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend complex ideas, learn quickly and learn from experience. It is not merely book learning, a narrow academic skill, or test-taking smarts. Rather, it reflects a broader and deeper capability for comprehending our surroundings-“catching on,” “ making sense” of things, or “figuring out” what to do.
Gottfredson, L. (1997). Mainstream science on intelligence: An editorial with 52 signatories, history, and bibliography. Intelligence, 24(1), 13–23. doi:10.1016/S0160-2896(97)90011-8
At least of one thing we can be sure:
none of us is always equally intelligent and, almost never, in the same way in all the different possible situations.
As it is then possible to theorize about intelligence as generalization of different phenomena and experiences, and try to give a single definition?!
What were in the past the consequences of a similar thoughtful approach?!
What are the real reasons beyond words?!
If the etymology of a word is linked in any way to the origins of the concept that it conveys, then the word intelligence has at least two sources:
- on the one hand, it derives from the Latin adverb "intus" (inside) and from the Latin verb "legere" (see below and beyond, understand, give form and substance to ideas and informations);
- another possible origin is related to the Latin preposition "inter" (between), consequently intelligence means attitude of discovery, curiosity, ability to build relationships and connect various aspects of reality.
How much of this semantic universe is still valid today?
Another piece of the puzzle.
The question, as such, considers the intelligence as a property of cognitive functions and even more of the human mind.
In fact we are well aware of how the animals live in a organized way with intelligent behaviors. We could say almost the same of many plants and vegetable organisms.
In this sense the intelligence is not simply describable as a complex function of the human brain.
Therefore (and even more) a general definition of intelligence should consider the interaction of living organisms in a complex environment, like ours world.
Even if we add up all definitions of intelligence, given above by all researchers, we will not be able to still define it, completely, hence my statement - it's very difficult to define it !!
The difficulty lies in wanting to use a single (limited) comprehensive concept, and equally as a consequence of an anthropocentric way of thinking.
The "matter", any "matter", it is not difficult, is "simply" complex.
And It is no a coincidence if intelligence feeds itself of complexity.
As in an old joke, you say that the double bass is heard only when there is not, in the same way we could say that we perceive clearly not the presence of the intelligence, but rather its absence.
A bit like in studies on black holes, we don't know exactly where they are and of what they are made but we can understand their effect on the surrounding space.
In essence, the intelligence, or as network of interactions between different cognitive functions, or as multidimensional property of human mind, it seems to be defined better understanding his weaknesses, his absences or missed runs.
"A bit like in studies on black holes, we don't know exactly where they are and of what they are made but we can understand their effect on the surrounding space."
I like that Mauro - it is a good reminder that what we observe or measure is often a result and not the thing itself and this is part of the reason why it is so hard to pin down. Intelligence itself may be multifaceted but intelligent behaviour is orders of magnitude more diverse and complex.
Forgive me for this long winded answer...Intelligence can be defined through the theoretical framework in which it upholds. The philosophy behind choosing a theory can dictate what the intelligence measures. The only absolute truth is that there is no one “true” definition. Intelligence is broadly defined by what it measures. These questions must be explicit and not purport to measure that in which it does not. There are theorists looking to (1) see that learning is a result of an intelligence score, or that (2) by a certain point, an individual should have a certain level of competence (Ackerman & Lohman, 2009). Beyond this, there is still the uncertainty of what “should” be measured. These guiding questions often need empirical evidence to be considered impactful by the scientific community, speaking to the reason why there is criticism over Gardner’s Theory. They should also able to inform interventions, therefore, the more domain-specific and less falsifiable, the better (Ackerman & Lohman, 2009). This creates a challenge for developing intelligence tests.
What is measured is dictated by two philosophies. According to Bredo (2006), the first is the Externalistic nature of psychologists such as B.F. Skinner, who believe in studying behaviour empirically. Related to this is the universal generalization of “g” or general intellect. On the other hand are those with autonomy of mind, the Internalists who believe that domain-specific criteria are more suited to the individualistic nature of intellect. This type of information is not used to make major decisions about a student’s ability, but to gage how much assistance a student might need in a particular subject area, or if a student needs less burden on their working memory for example (Ackerman & Lohman, 2009). The Cattell-Horn-Carol (CHC) theory guides the development of the WISC-IV and Woodcock-Johnston, which are both looking at domain-specific intellect and a general measure of intelligence in order to account for variance (Bolt, Salvia & Ysseldyke, 2013). Building on this, Ackerman adds PPIK to Binet’s theory, by stating that there is an individually common domain knowledge that becomes crystallized and prior to this, PPIK proposes a lifespan perspective of fluid intelligence (Ackerman & Lohman, 2009).
The most important element of intelligence testing for me is construct validity. Though measuring for specific tasks would show irregularities within individuals, it is more valid to measure for predicted outcomes against both experimental tasks and non-experimental treatment related to the criteria within an intelligence test (Ackerman & Lohman, 2009). The derived result is one with no theoretical suppression. This seemingly uses the method of priori reasoning to account for the generalization of structural norms and the individualistic nature of post-positivism (Bredo, 2006). This however is not as "transactionalist" as Sternberg (2008), who defends the impact of the environment on individuals and their need to adapt to their environment.
I don’t agree with a universal curriculum or assessment. I do believe that children would be better self-regulated and disciplined if their interests dictated their attention, storage and processing. This is what would increase what we know today as "IQ".
The construct validity (statistical tool) can be really important to the intelligence testing but does not represent anyway a real measure of "intelligence" as properties of human adapted behaviour.
The history of researches in the field of assessment of intellectual capacities already has more than a century of life and in this regard I refer to the wonderful book by Stephen Jay Gould, The Mismeasure of Man.
I guess all this should lead us to reflect, at least just for the fact that, despite all this time and all of these efforts, we have not been able to formulate a comprehensive theory and assessment instruments that can meet the different scientific and methodological guidelines.
http://robinlea.com/pub/The_mismeasure_of_man.pdf
Thanks for the various definitions of intelligence. I personally like Howard Gardner's definition of intelligence as the ability to solve problems and to create products that are of value in our culture.
This definition would include the abilities 1 to 5 that Issam has described.
in a previous era, innovation and creativity may not be so critical. But with our lack of resources and the many needs in our present society, we need to constantly innovate and create.
I think that the idea of intelligence as ability to solve problems and create products that represent meaningful values in a specific social environment can be defined as developmental guideline of human behaviour.
However we should to remember that the Howard Gardner definiton's of multiple intelligences allows to highlight the individual specificities of different intellectual attitudes in relation to different problematic situations.
Is something quite different from the processing of a research model on a presumed and possible multidimensionality of intelligence as human ability to adapt.
In this sense we think about to "multidimensionality" as "physical" property of an intelligent system to operate "in parallel" respect to multiple dimensions (space/time relationships) of experience.
This feature is (or should be) a specificity of analog systems of information processing, as indeed seems to be the human brain.
So now I'm wondering if intelligence can only be descriptive of the individual. Mauro said "Therefore (and even more) a general definition of intelligence should consider the interaction of living organisms in a complex environment, like our world." I'm pretty interested in ants, they are extremely organized in their behavior and display seemingly intelligent decision making. Can we say that ants are intelligent though? And if we can, are we to say that a colony of ants is intelligent but a single ant is not? Or is this no more than the phenomenon of emergence bearing a striking resemblance to what we consider intelligence. Or at least what we would consider intelligence if we had carried out the task. For example, there are some ants that can survive in water (as a group) by joining together to form a sort of mesh raft. The interesting thing is how malleable and adaptive they are in the shape of their raft. So the initial action of forming a raft may be tropistic but the tropism is manipulated to adapt to the situation. If you agree that language is innate in humans then our system of language is much like the ants' raft, the initial idea is with us from birth, but we are capable of manipulating our language much like the ants manipulate their raft, to fit unique and novel situations.
My analogy might be a bit of a stretch, but does anyone agree that intelligence is (at least in part) the ability to manipulate natural or intrinsic behavior? To what extent can we relate human ingenuity, intelligence, and behavior to intrinsic behavior?
The reflection aims to be, at the same time, easier and broader.
Your question, in its first version, was focused on a general definition of intelligence.
In this sense it is essential to consider a point of view not exclusively anthropocentric, just in order to understand the full potential of the assumption of intelligent behaviors.
If we consider instead the specificities of intelligence in terms of evolutionary adaptive behavior, it is equally important to understand that the single functions and skills expressed do not correspond to the sum of parts.
Finally, it may be necessary to realize an integrative model of study, through a qualitative approach, about the understanding inherent the processing of experiential data as part of our decision-making and creative capacity.
According to me (thinking spiritually) intelligence is state of mind to face problem.It is Like filter Program installed in mind to filter important information from surrounding environment which is occupied by sense. It very depended on state so it's highly variable to person to person and state to state. It's according to me. You can find thesaurus of intelligence at here.
http://thesaurus.com/browse/intelligence
Interesting topic as well as replies. When it comes to intelligence, I think Gardners' theory can help.
Gardner, H. (1983). Prames Op Mind: The Theory OF Multiple Intelligence.
Hatch, T., & Gardner, H. (1989). Multiple intelligences go to school: Educational implications of the theory of multiple intelligences. Educational Researcher, 18(8), 4-10.
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