IQ and Intellectual Achievements
A conversation with ChatGPT. Great scientists and philosophers like Einstein or Kant are often attributed very high IQ scores by the media. Do you think that this is justified? Have these intellectuals made their achievements primarily because of their high IQ or because of other talents? For instance, I'm not sure if you really need an exceptionally high IQ to be an original thinker. I think your intuition is largely correct. The very high IQ scores retrospectively assigned to Einstein, Kant, Newton, Goethe, etc. are usually much less scientifically meaningful than they appear. And even if we knew that someone had an IQ of 160+, it would not by itself explain why that person became an Einstein or Kant. 1. The famous IQ numbers are mostly speculative Einstein never took a modern IQ test, as far as we know. Consequently, claims such as “Einstein had an IQ of 160” are essentially retroactive estimates . The same applies to Kant, Newton, Leonardo da Vinci and many other historica...