You know who really confuses me in terms discerning their intelligence? Yale and Harvard grad George Bush. Clearly very smart to have gotten elected, even with his family connections, but at the same time he often appeared genuinely pretty dumb (for someone of his credentials). And it's hard to claim he was putting on an act like a certain other contemporary prime minister.
I remember an article that one of Dubya's economic advisors wrote several years after he left office, entitled "[George W. Bush is smarter than you](https://www.keithhennessey.com/2013/04/24/smarter/)". The main thesis was that in public, Bush leaned hard into the "ordinary Joe" persona, but in private, he was a lot more analytical than he let on. It was perhaps an intentional strategy, to encourage people to underestimate him, so that he could appear more "authentic" and the opposite of a "coastal elite" or "intellectual". David Brooks [similarly made comments](https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/david-brooks-praises-bush-dings-maher-in-playboy-interview) that Bush was "60 IQ points smarter in private than he was in public".
I personally don't buy this theory. Bush was not an *idiot*, and in all probability he's smarter than the median American. Like you said, it's hard to get elected without at least meeting *that* bar.
But he was far from a great thinker -- all evidence points to him being very intellectually incurious and prone to seeing the world in Manichean, black and white terms -- which is not a trait I see in particularly analytical thinkers: they will at least acknowledge, even revel in nuance and shades of grey.
What intelligence Bush did have seems to be more often employed in justifying and defending what he already decided, for other reasons, to believe.
A lot people have said the same thing about Trump -- that he is smarter than he lets on, even Scott Adams going so far as he's a genius at understanding the human psyche and figuring out how to raise such a devoted cult following. And, I guess, well, if you consider blind narcissism, appealing to base prejudice, and skill at manipulating people as forms of intelligence, then he might well be. I prefer not to. In all other forms of intelligence, ones that I respect, he's a buffoon.
Anyways, here's a [wrap-up](https://theweek.com/articles/465047/george-w-bush-smart) on W and more links in there if you wanted to peruse further. It certainly was a topic of discussion at one point.
To be fair, that is fairly common, that smart people aren't neccessarily better at discerning the truth, they are just better at justifying things to themselves.
I’m old enough to have been an adult in the W years. As much as I disliked W by the end of his second term, I never thought we’d elect someone as actually dumb as W pretended to be. At least 45 didn’t get a second term.
Also I’ll take W’s fake pathos and stock phrases over Trump’s vain logarrhea any day. If it was W vs Trump I would have still been just as excited to evict the orange menace.
W was way smarter than Trump. Low bar I know, but the dude could at least self-reflect and managed to act Presidential when necessary. Everything I’ve read about Trump is that he was a moron even behind closed doors.
I actually listened to Clinton's podcast for one episode, and it was mainly him rambling about things he liked (jazz in this case) but here's the thing: He's *good* at that kind of thing. Even in an old-man kinda way and as someone who has uh... negative opinions about Clinton, I had to see that he's definitely very good at talking, at being interesting. And I don't even care about jazz.
I honestly don't know how much weight to give "Rhodes Scholar".
There's plenty of them who accomplished great things, but then there's Mel Reynolds and David Vitter and Naomi Wolf and Eric Greitens
You’d think “rationalists” would recognize a “post hoc ergo propter hoc” fallacy as obvious as this but then I suppose if they did then this sub would be a hell of a lot quieter.
My dad has a 135 IQ and drove a dump truck. My mom had somewhere around a 110 IQ and has a masters degree. If dad had been 5 points higher he could have driven a tractor and trailer for sure.
Well the smart move is to only simulate low IQ people so they will not try to escape the simulation.
Wait... that means, if there are no real smart people irl, we might live in a simulation. OW GOD WE NEED TO GET OUT.
MrSneerclub, I don't feel so good ...
> only simulate low IQ people so they will not try to escape
I'm here to remind you that not only is the Church of the SubGenius still a thing but also that among our many mottos is
# EARTH—WE MUST GET OFF!
Make of that what you will.
The use of the word “superiority” casts the whole concept into question and drags it from an ethereal musing directly into the darkest days of our modern world. Humans are not very dissimilar genetically. Heterosis does also account for the opposite effects and at least distances itself from the eugenic roots.
I’ve heard stories arguing that Clinton is extremely smart and had an
incredibly memory and excellent deducting reasoning skills. Whether or
not that’s true, it’s interesting that his vibe was so incredibly folksy
that you wouldn’t immediately think it’s true. A pretty amazing combo
for a politician.
Rhodes Scholar Yale Law grad Clinton definitely isn’t in the 90th percentile of IQ
What a weird comment, I don’t even like Clinton
Somewhere in the US there is a truck driver with an IQ of over 140. This IQ fetishism is weird.
And I say that as somebody with a proven IQ of over i.
Fortunately, I don’t have to worry about simulating either Obama or Clinton. Bad news for you, though, flagamuffin.
Obama, as the product of a miscegenetic impregnation, has an innate genetic superiority arising from heterosis.
the more you talk about IQ the less you probably have of it
the more i learn about iq (specifically quantifying it), the less meaningful i think it is
I’ve heard stories arguing that Clinton is extremely smart and had an incredibly memory and excellent deducting reasoning skills. Whether or not that’s true, it’s interesting that his vibe was so incredibly folksy that you wouldn’t immediately think it’s true. A pretty amazing combo for a politician.