I passed the Mensa test and have been offered membership.
I know that many will dismiss this as vanity or whatever. But its always been something that I wanted to do. Kinda like learning to ice skate backwards; not necessarily a defining monent, but cool none the less.
Most fart smellers know how to spel.
[Homer Simpson]
I am so smart! I am so smart! S-M-R-T! I mean S-M-A-R-T!
[/Homer Simpson]
James Carroll
Congratulations !!!
I qualified for Mensa and I joined. Since then, I have gone to one meeting. Still, I feel it is somewhat impressive to say you are a Mensa member.
Oh but far be it from me to be pompous about being a Mensa member.
A few years ago, I E-Mailed them to say I have a nice website with math & science calculators that Mensans would find very helpful. They did not list it because they said I needed a personal page on my website. So, I sent a second E-Mail back to say that about half their website links were dead. I also went on to say many of the Mensa member websites had no personal pages whatsoever. I found a great example - someone’s website was exclusively about zoning ordinances in some county in New York. So, I got an E-Mail back saying those sites were posted before they made that rule and I’d better make a personal website or I’d get no listing. Luckily they had no restrictions on what a personal page had to be so… here is what I concocted:
www.1728.com/prsnl.htm
As long as we are patting ourselves on the back: I got a 167 on the WAIS-III; Mensa still doesn’t interest me.
A fine example of the truth of the notion that intelligence does not necessarily translate into wisdom.
A high IQ number does not mean you’re smart. It means you have a high IQ.
For the record, I was a Mensa member at 11. Woo.
So, does this mean we’ll see you at the Snowball RG in Piscataway, NJ next spring? How about the Pittsburgh one? I was against joining Mensa for several years until two friends talked me into going to an RG. I told myself I had nothing better to do so I’d stay a polite three hours and leave, and wound up leaving three days later (it was Labor Day Weekend).
Mensans, Mensa groups, and Mensa subgroups vary. I’m not in the organization for the bragging rights. I’m in it because I have fun and I like the company. There are events in my area which I won’t go to because I don’t enjoy them. There are some individuals who I heartily dislike. There are also some people and events I heartily enjoy including Games Nights and the people who go to them. I can be pretty socially awkward at times. In Mensa, that’s not only OK, it’s pretty much expected! The only group of people I know who, at their best, can compare to Mensans at their best when it comes to being smart, funny, kind, and interesting are Dopers. I’d say RGs and the one Dopefest I’ve been to are similar in terms of company and conversation. I’ve also been known to say this message board is kind of like an on-line RG.
Welcome, enjoy, and I hope I do get to see you some day. For me, being a member of Mensa has been a blast. On the other hand, I’ve chosen to make it that way. Cheapskate that I am, if I’m going to pay the money for membership, I am going to get my money’s worth out of it.
CJ
Doesn’t passing the Mensa test just show your ablity to answer the Mensa’s test questions(ie, you could gear yourself to answer the questions they give you), not some sort of arbiting that 'you’re smart because you passed!"?
I are smart to.
My mom said so, not necessarily a defining monent, but she gave me some iscreem.
Well so did I, and I know what an incorrigible dumbass I am on so very many levels, so don’t get yourself too amped up about it.
Of course you realize that when the New Order[sup]TM[/sup] comes, the “smart ones” will be the first to be rounded up.
True, but we dumbasses won;t know what to do with 'em once we’re done rounding.
The tests for Mensa membership are not created by Mensa; they are standard I.Q. tests. You can’t “gear yourself up” for them other than by making sure you are not tired, hungry or ill. They are not subject matter achievement tests like the current S.A.T.s. The testing sessions generally administer two different tests; you need to score in the 98th percentile on either one to be offered Mensa admission.
I one sense you’re right; like any I.Q. tests, they measure test-taking ability as well as logic and whatever else it is that I.Q. tests measure. There is also a “culture-fair” test available for those who for one reason or another have difficulty with the standard tests.
And yeah, JC, come to Snowball.
One of these days we are going to have to have a secret symbol of some sort so that the Mensans at gatherings can recognize the Dopers. Or maybe not. 
Mensa will accept a bunch of standardized tests to qualify you for membership. Based on the SAT scores that clear the hurdle (1300 before 1974, 1250 between 1974 and 1994), it doesn’t sound very exclusive to me.
I qualified for Mensa in the third grade. Being 8 I didn’t even know what Mensa was and sure wouldn’t have wanted to hang out with a bunch of old nerds.
I looked into joining a few years ago and passed all their pre-tests but I asked around about it (I think I asked here) and the general feeling I got was that the people were mostly annoying and nothing you do at meetings is worth the dues you pay.
Hey, congradulations! Don’t let all these people get you down. It’s like bragging about discovering something revolutionary at a Nobel Peace prize reunion. Here on the SDMB, there are some awe inspiring braniacs. 99.99995% of the population and stuff. So yeah, they are likely not to be too impressed.
I am though! I seethe with envy at the gifts you all have. Speaking from somebody that is a bit slow on the uptake and even has trouble remembering it all when I do understand it, you are truely blessed. I took some cheesy IQ test which was supposed to be a real one at the local library, and bombed it with a 95. (I am in college now though, and still make A’s and B’s for the most part, some stuff comes easy, some comes hard, and they say the average college students IQ is 120, so I cross my fingers and hope there is that correlation)
Sure, you all talk about how IQ doesn’t matter, but really it can help a whole lot. I mean a person with great problem solving skills and a huge capacity for memory is going to score high on an IQ test, so it is highly likely that with a high IQ, you have a greater “intelligence” than somebody with a lower score. Not always, I am sure, but I bet with an IQ of 167, a person is going to be smarter than me in every possible way.
So don’t think that because people that are your peers dismiss having IQ as meaningless, that automatically the average joes are going to think the same thing. From this “average joe,” it sure looks good from my place.
<random>Anyone know the name of the IQ/Percentile ranking system where your number is the solution to in f(x) = 100-10^-x = percentile score? I.E. the above 99.9995th percentile person would be a 3.3. </random>
I’d ask for a second opinion. The first one obviously didn’t know what he was talking about.