# Genius hunters **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 12, 2015, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455 "2015-02-12T06:21:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2015, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/21 "2015-02-12T14:45:28Z")
> [@Bill\_Door](#): > > What makes you think they want to be found? If they wanted to be found they’d be in plain sight. They’re probably in deep cover for a reason. There’s your hook, why and from whom are they hiding? ``` This is a big part of what inspires the book. The genius hunter has a theory that we have super geniuses amoung us who derive so much pleasure from entertaining their own thoughts that they have literaly become hopelessly addicted to thinking. Anything interupting those thoughts is percieved as an intrusion and met with hostility. These people for the sake of survival have learned how to blend into society at one level or another doing mundane tasks that minimise the interuptions to their thinking. They are incapable of expressing their thoughts via key board or verbaly as the process is so slow it might be like comparing the speed of light to the speed of sound. Every concept they grasp on to starts quickly expanding and expanding until it runs out of energy and burns itself out, at which point they grab another concept and repeat the process, over and over uselessly. The hunter is challenged with establishing a profile of those he hunts using a variety of baits and lures to help identify them. He discovers that what these geniuses all have in common is a simple lack of perspective, they have no concept of where things start and where they end, they are only capable of expansion. He has to trick them into experiencing something that will trigger an even stronger emotional response than they are getting from their own thoughts and the hunter is the one who controls the stronger response ingredients. He sells the stronger hook back to the geniuses in return for their thoughts which inadvertantly forces the geniuses to finaly focus. The stronger hook might be sex, power, something spiritual, it could be anything. ``` ---
**Author:** ![BlankSlate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blankslate/32/80_2.png) [@BlankSlate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlankSlate)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2015, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/22 "2015-02-12T14:48:37Z")
If they’re so smart, they already know someone is hunting them and they’ve banded together. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2015, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/23 "2015-02-12T15:07:13Z")
> [@BlankSlate](#): > > If they’re so smart, they already know someone is hunting them and they’ve banded together. There’s the core of HBDC’s novel: a vast network of “down-and-outers”/ghetto dwellers/underclass who have brains that could light up Manhattan… and are organized. ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2015, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/24 "2015-02-12T15:12:25Z")
> [@HoneyBadgerDC](#): > > If I ever finsihed anything I would happily show it. I tend to write for my eyes only strictly as an entertainment device. I was going math teacher on you. It’s how we were admonished wrt finding answers. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2015, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/25 "2015-02-12T18:31:34Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Since this is for drama… Given the typo in the title, I was thinking comedy. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2015, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/26 "2015-02-12T23:05:57Z")
One small problem: Last I heard, it was considered impossible to accurately assess the IQ of an adult. I remember being tested at ages 8 and 13. Those test were looking for kids who could extrapolate from known info to answer questions. I was sick at home when the first one was administered. For some reason, I remember one question/problem: There were 4 drawings of a small boat and a pole - in three, the boat was in various un-tethered positions relative to the pole. In one, it was tied. The question: Which boat is moored? Answering this question as an adult is meaningless - for an 8 yr old, it requires something to “click” just right. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2015, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/27 "2015-02-12T23:36:33Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > One small problem: > > Last I heard, it was considered impossible to accurately assess the IQ of an adult. > > I remember being tested at ages 8 and 13. > … > There were 4 drawings of a small boat and a pole - in three, the boat was in various un-tethered positions relative to the pole…Which boat is moored? > > Answering this question as an adult is meaningless - for an 8 yr old, it requires something to “click” just right. Interesting. Can you point out some research in that direction? I do remember learning many years ago that IQ was, at least historically, defined as Mental Age/Chronological Age, with the idea that hey, there are 9 and 10 year olds that have the brains of 14, 15, or even 16 year olds, so maybe we ought to let them jump ahead and take high school classes. At those ages, there really is a sharp upward progression and there are major things that I thought about the world at, say, seven that I had grown out of by age twelve. Now, can I say the same thing about the progression from age 25 to 30? Sure, I learned some things, but I don’t recall encountering any profound, life-changing increases in knowledge or ability. And, of course, if you start saying that hey, this guy has an above-average IQ because he thinks like a 42 year old even though he is only 38, then _what does that actually mean in practical terms_? No human development theory that I’ve heard of includes any profound learnings at that age range (as opposed to, say, what one typically learns between age 4 and 8, say). ---
**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/28 "2015-02-13T00:51:47Z")
I don’t do scholarship - all I can do is google “psychometrics” ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/29 "2015-02-13T01:46:53Z")
> [@Tom\_Tildrum](#): > > Given the typo in the title, I was thinking comedy. 😛 I had a similar thought but was being charitable. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![The\_Joker\_and\_the\_Thief](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e79b87/32.png) [@The\_Joker\_and\_the\_Thief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Joker_and_the_Thief)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455/30 "2015-02-13T02:24:12Z")
You’d do very well searching in mental hospitals–quite a lot of smart people seem to suffer from mental illness, or just get caught up in their thoughts and locked up because no one understands them. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/genius-hunters/712455.md?page=1)