We have emotional intelligence and then social intelligence, political intelligence, narrative intelligence and last night I heard about vocal intelligence. I like the idea of expanding our understanding of abilities to include more than just the mathematical or logical - as Howard Gardner has explored. However I'm getting a bit tired of hearing about "xxx intelligence". I'm not completely sure why but it's starting to feel overused - even cliched. It's in danger of taking a bunch of stuff that people do (and do well or poorly at different times in their lives) and making it mysterious.
The problem with the original Intelligence Quotient (IQ) is that it reified (& unified) something that might not be one simple thing (I find the Flynn Effect fascinating). These other intelligences could broaden out the notion of what it means to be an effective human being OR they could just be marketing labels that obscure more than they illuminate.
What next "blogging intelligence", "eating intelligence", "gardening intelligence"?
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3 comments:
Enjoyed your rant! Perhaps it'll be intelligence intelligence?
Damn! I was typing this and Daryl beat me to it!
Sorry I didn't get to catch up with you while I was in town - ended up being rather busy...
Matt, I am very disappointed. You missed the ultimate intelligence: Spiritual Intelligence. See http://www.amazon.co.uk/Spiritual-Intelligence-Ultimate-Bloomsbury-Paperbacks/dp/0747536449
It's not a bad book from memory. Ah - Just found some notes I have here electronically - they define spiritual intelligence as the intelligence to address and solve problems of meaning and value. The authors talk about the ego-centered nature of western society that is materialist and that lacks humility, gratitude, and a sense of interconnectedness. Many problems are actually existential with a disconnection from self.
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