# What makes a person 'smart' ? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 12, 2011, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400 "2011-10-12T06:30:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BoeBah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b5ac83/32.png) [@BoeBah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BoeBah)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/1 "2011-10-12T06:30:01Z")
\*\*What do you think makes someone “smart”? \*\* And I am **NOT** talking about some sort of new IQ test, I want to know what **YOU** think is the one thing that makes someone “smart” in daily life. \*What he/she knows \*What he/she has learnt \*How he/she has learnt \*How he/she sees/thinks about the world \*How he/she thinks/processes information \*How he/she could answer this question \*… ---
**Author:** ![Dereknocue67](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6de8d8/32.png) [@Dereknocue67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dereknocue67)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/2 "2011-10-12T08:26:25Z")
I became smart when I realized I wasn’t. ---
**Author:** ![sandra\_nz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eada6e/32.png) [@sandra\_nz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sandra_nz)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 8:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/3 "2011-10-12T08:56:50Z")
The ability to adapt to a novel environment is my biggest definition of ‘smart’. So being able to take your previous experience, your skills, your capabilities, and apply them to a brand new situation you haven’t encountered before. ---
**Author:** ![Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8491ac/32.png) [@Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fake_Tales_of_San_Francisco)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 9:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/4 "2011-10-12T09:13:12Z")
> [@sandra\_nz](#): > > The ability to adapt to a novel environment is my biggest definition of ‘smart’. So being able to take your previous experience, your skills, your capabilities, and apply them to a brand new situation you haven’t encountered before. So if Einstein tried playing football but wasn’t very good at it, he wouldn’t have been very smart? Surely being exceptional in one area but poor in others still has merit. ---
**Author:** ![Apollon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e47774/32.png) [@Apollon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollon)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 9:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/5 "2011-10-12T09:54:01Z")
> [@Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](#): > > So if Einstein tried playing football but wasn’t very good at it, he wouldn’t have been very smart? Surely being exceptional in one area but poor in others still has merit. Football would be unfair, because you also need to be strong for that. It should be a purely mental task for the test to be fair. If he failed that, he would still be highly intelligent, though not smart. Those things are not the same. For me, smartness is the coefficient of all the particular forms of intelligence someone has, including “classical”, emotional and social intelligence. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 10:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/6 "2011-10-12T10:23:51Z")
I think people can be smart in lots of different ways. I think I recognize people as being smart if they are capable of some kind of synthesis - creating something novel or interesting all by themselves. It can be anything though, an idea, a phrase, a joke, a solution to a problem, a musical passage. I know it when I see it and usually they will continue to show it and often in different ways. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/7 "2011-10-12T10:45:52Z")
I think the ability to read and comprehend things is important. Moved from General Questions to In My Humble Opinion, which is what the OP is apparently searching for. **samclem** , Moderator ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/8 "2011-10-12T13:22:06Z")
For me a lot of it is the will to work hard at whatever you’re trying to learn, and to learn from your mistakes instead of pretending they don’t exist. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/9 "2011-10-12T13:34:51Z")
Thinking before acting. ---
**Author:** ![rhubarbarin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb9ed0/32.png) [@rhubarbarin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhubarbarin)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/10 "2011-10-12T14:04:54Z")
For me it’s less about IQ, abilities, and knowledge and more about intellectual curiosity, how quickly they can grasp concepts, and critical thinking skills. ---
**Author:** ![Gary\_Robson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gary_robson/32/3448_2.png) [@Gary\_Robson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_Robson)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2011, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/11 "2011-10-12T17:59:47Z")
I think of “smartness” as having two components: wisdom (what you know) and intelligence (how you reason). I don’t think of a person with an eidetic memory as automatically “smart” just because they can recall massive amounts of information. Nor do I think of someone as “smart” just because they can do six-digit square roots in their heads. It takes a combination of the two. To expand on what **sandra\_nz** said, if someone is capable of doing well with an unfamiliar situation based on their ability to apply existing knowledge, that’s a smart person. If I can give you a set of rules to a brand-new game, and you can reason out a winning strategy on the fly, that makes you smart. > [@Dereknocue67](#): > > I became smart when I realized I wasn’t. You do realize that when you said that, you stopped being smart again? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Dereknocue67](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6de8d8/32.png) [@Dereknocue67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dereknocue67)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2011, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/12 "2011-10-13T07:45:50Z")
[quote=“Gary “Wombat” Robson, post:11, topic:599400”] You do realize that when you said that, you stopped being smart again? 😃 [/QUOTE] You’re right of course. I guess I had an enigma moment. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Namkcalb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c89c15/32.png) [@Namkcalb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Namkcalb)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2011, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/13 "2011-10-13T09:04:40Z")
[How hot they are…](http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-scientific-fundamentalist/200903/beautiful-people-are-more-intelligent-i) ---
**Author:** ![Gary\_Robson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gary_robson/32/3448_2.png) [@Gary\_Robson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_Robson)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2011, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/14 "2011-10-13T16:36:28Z")
> [@Dereknocue67](#): > > You’re right of course. I guess I had an enigma moment. :smack: Now those [Enigma](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enigma_machine) people – _they_ were smart! ---
**Author:** ![Grestarian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grestarian/32/3227_2.png) [@Grestarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grestarian)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2011, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/15 "2011-10-13T21:11:39Z")
> [@Dereknocue67](#): > > I became smart when I realized I wasn’t. No, at that point, you gained an element (but only one) of wisdom. ---
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2011, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/16 "2011-10-13T23:16:47Z")
My friends always refer to me as “The Smart Guy”. But I’m not that smart. People think I’m smart because of the way I talk. I talk like a college professor, i.e. I accentuate certain syllables, and my eyes look up when I’m thinking. I don’t do any of this purposefully; as a result of attending college for most of my life, I think I assumed many of the mannerisms of my college professors. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2011, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/17 "2011-10-14T18:37:54Z")
One way to appear smart is to have a good memory. I was born with a bitching memory. Once something is in my brain, you couldn’t get it out of there if you put a lit firecracker up my nose. And I can pull it out at a second’s notice. I cannot take any credit for this. I was born with it. ---
**Author:** ![Soliloquy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5ac83/32.png) [@Soliloquy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soliloquy)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2011, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/18 "2011-10-14T19:22:56Z")
I know a lot of useless information. I read a lot and always have, and i have a great memory. People think I am smart. But there are tons of things that I know little to nothing of substance about. The people who know a lot about the subjects that mystify me are some of the people that I might consider smart. I think I have to agree that people are smart in different ways, though. Where I work, intellectual pursuits and capabilities are not the norm. Street smarts are, however. I know many, many people who have never used a semi-colon, can’t engage in political debate, have no idea what 42 is the answer to, and with whom I use small words when I talk. But they can spot a tweak with a stash or a gansta who is packin’ from a mile away ever time. ---
**Author:** ![Rachellelogram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rachellelogram/32/8689_2.png) [@Rachellelogram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rachellelogram)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2011, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/19 "2011-10-14T19:33:28Z")
Quick thinking, a facility for (if not inclination toward) wordplay, introspection, thinking before speaking, knowing their audience and speaking appropriately. Intelligence is more than just a poindextrously-high IQ. It’s also being emotionally intelligent and realizing that you don’t talk to same way to a group of stay at home moms who dropped out of high school as you do to the college professors at a thesis defense. ---
**Author:** ![Queen\_Tonya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/4491bb/32.png) [@Queen\_Tonya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Queen_Tonya)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2011, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400/20 "2011-10-14T19:39:13Z")
> [@rhubarbarin](#): > > For me it’s less about IQ, abilities, and knowledge and more about intellectual curiosity, how quickly they can grasp concepts, and critical thinking skills. Agreed. Especially on the intellectual curiosity thing. Smart people question, they are interested in things purely for the sake of discovering what happened, how things work, the what ifness. Not smart people may have great gobs of accumulated knowledge on a thing or three, but no desire to seek knowledge as an end to itself. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-person-smart/599400.md?page=2)