How to distinguish a smart person from a stupid one: signs of a smart and stupid person. How to understand that you are smart? What does it depend on: is a person smart or not?

In this article we will analyze the signs of a smart and stupid person, and also identify the signs of each type of person.

As practice shows, having diplomas or gold medals is not an indicator of intelligence. It is not only pleasant and interesting to communicate with an intelligent person, but you can also gain some knowledge from him. But you cannot divide people only into stupid or smart individuals; do not forget about the average group. This material will help you learn about your abilities or weaknesses, as well as how to understand your interlocutor. By the way, be attentive to the demagogue's tricks, so pay careful attention to the details.

Signs of a smart person

Every smart person is unique, but they all have several characteristics in common, which you will now learn about:

1. Ability to solve any problems. An intelligent person does not see unsolvable problems. He tries to find an original way out of any situation and, as a rule, comes up with it.
2. The ability to listen. An intelligent person is a person who knows that by listening carefully and asking leading questions, you can learn a lot of interesting things about the interlocutor, which is why an intelligent person cannot be a chatterbox.
3. Good memory. The ability to remember and skillfully use knowledge stored on memory shelves is often called intelligence.
4. Broad outlook. An intelligent person is aware of everything. He is interested in all areas of life, he is able to support any conversation.
5. Desire to share knowledge. A smart person never tries to make someone look like a fool (although it is very easy for him to do this). On the contrary, he tries to pass on his experience or help others become a little smarter.
6. Modesty. The phrases of smart people are not replete with incomprehensible words and scientific terms. They speak a language that everyone understands and seem to be ashamed of their genius.
7. Competent organization of leisure time. Smart people don't spend hours on social networks looking at funny photos, pictures or videos. They prefer interesting and educational books or documentaries. At the same time, smart people know that they also need rest from intellectual pursuits, so sports, playing music or painting are very attractive to them.

You can connect seemingly unrelated concepts

People with high intelligence are able to see things that others cannot and draw parallels between ideas that are not entirely related. Do you think there is no connection between sashimi and watermelon? You are wrong, they are usually eaten raw and cold.

Journalist Charles Duhigg argues that making these kinds of connections is a hallmark of creativity, which can be closely linked to intelligence.

How to become smarter?

What can you do to make your brain work better? We'll give you some tips on how to become (not seem) a little smarter:

• Breathe deeply. A brain saturated with oxygen works better.
• Read more. Give preference to reading a book rather than watching a movie based on it. Firstly, this way you will force your brain to illustrate the work on its own, and secondly, you will immerse yourself in it much deeper.
• Get rid of junk words. In addition to the fact that they clog up speech, they also confuse thoughts. You should completely forget about profanity.
• Train your brain. Memorization exercises, arithmetic operations and various types of brainstorming should become your favorite pastime.
• Be interested in everything that happens in the world. You will not only be aware of all events, but will also be able to share or exchange opinions with family and friends.
• Don't be afraid to step out of your comfort zone. Stop spending all your free time in front of the computer. Go to the city tournament “What? Where? When?" or visit an art gallery, you will enjoy it.
• Learn to use your mind. Scientific research shows that people think no more than 10% of the time. We do many actions automatically, we say stupid things, guided by emotions. Try to control your actions and think before you speak.
• Embrace the idea that you are truly smart. Once you start thinking this way, you will think and act differently.
• Make sure your wording is clear. The words and thoughts of smart people should not be ambiguous. Express yourself clearly, speak confidently, and be poised and self-sufficient.
• Strive for excellence. Never stop there. Strive for perfection in everything: in cooking, in work, in raising children.
• Leave time for reflection. Sometimes a person needs to isolate himself from the whole world and think in silence alone with himself. Don't deny yourself this.
• Read biographies and quotes from smart people. You will understand that many of them are self-taught, without multiple degrees, but constantly striving for self-development.

Miasin.Ru

What does it mean to be smart?

What does it mean to be smart? Different people will answer this question differently. Some, for example, will call smart those who know how to make money and become rich, or those who managed to gain power, or who acquired fame and glory, or who know how to live beautifully and for their own pleasure. In a word, being smart for these people simply means achieving success in earthly life. “We live on earth only once,” they will say, “there will be no second time, therefore, we need to achieve success with all our might, acquire wealth, power and enjoy life while there is time.” The logic here is simple: we will eat, drink, have fun and take everything from life, because tomorrow we will die. Of course, many people will not be satisfied with such a frankly low concept of the human mind, and when asked who can be called smart, they will say that smart is someone who has received a good education, acquired wide erudition, speaks several languages, has traveled a lot, knows a lot etc. “It’s the kind of person who can be interesting and useful to communicate with,” they will say, “these are the kind of people who are really smart.” Some will also say that a smart person is an experienced, insightful person who knows life and people and knows how to apply this knowledge in his life. Such or similar answers are usually given by worldly people to the question of who can be considered smart.

Christianity, however, answers this question in a completely different way. This is what St. Anthony the Great says: “People are usually called smart because of the incorrect use of this word. Not those who are smart are those who have studied the sayings and writings of the ancient sages, but those whose souls are smart, who can judge what is good and what is evil; They run away from the evil and the harmful to the soul, but they rationally care about the good and the beneficial to the soul and do this with great thanksgiving to God. These alone should truly be called smart people. A truly intelligent person has one concern - to wholeheartedly obey and please the God of all.” From the above words of Saint Anthony, first of all, it is clear that it is impossible for a person to be smart without God. Only the one who pleases God, who fulfills His will, can be called smart.

The Monk John Climacus speaks in exactly the same way about this subject, for whom to be smart means to fulfill the will of God at all times, in every place and in every matter. That is, only the one who knows the will of God in any situation and tries to fulfill it is truly smart and wise. It is precisely this kind of wisdom that the Holy Scripture teaches us when it says through the mouth of the Apostle Paul: “Do not be foolish, but know what is the will of God.” The main Christian prayer teaches the same thing, the words of which “Thy will be done” we say every day.

Actually, whose will else, besides the will of God, can a person fulfill? According to the Monk Seraphim of Sarov, a person can fulfill three wills: the first is the will of God, completely perfect and saving; the second is the will of the person himself, which even when it is not disastrous, is still not saving, and, finally, the third will is demonic, completely and always disastrous. From this it is clear that there is only one saving will - this is the will of God, and the other two wills do not save us, but lead to destruction.

So, anyone who wants to be saved must certainly fulfill the will of God in his life. However, in order to fulfill it, you must first know it. Is it possible for a person to know the will of God, and if possible, then how to do it? The saints, for example, knew the will of God directly from God. The Monk Seraphim of Sarov could directly answer a person asking about monasticism: “There is no way for you to go to the monastery.” Or to a person asking about marriage: “God does not please this marriage,” or to someone else: “You will marry such and such a person, and this marriage will be happy.” And he never made mistakes, because he did not say anything on his own, but only what he learned from God. In the same way, His other great saints knew the will of God.

Well, the saints knew the will of God directly from God, this is understandable. Well, for us, who are still far from the perfection of saints, how can we recognize her? This is not a simple or easy matter, it is a science that you cannot overcome right away. It cannot be studied purely theoretically, as, for example, the laws of physics or traffic rules are studied. It is studied only through many works, many struggles and trials, many experiences of Christian life. As a person draws closer to God, he receives from Him the gift of spiritual reasoning and becomes able to accurately recognize His will.

What is the gift of spiritual reasoning? According to Elder Paisius the Holy Mountain, spiritual reasoning is purity, Divine enlightenment, spiritual clarity. Christians should strive in every possible way to acquire this gift. For those who have not yet reached this high level, there are some ways that can help on the path to studying this science. Let's list the main ones.

So, firstly, anyone who wants to fulfill the will of God in his life must certainly read and carefully study His Word - the Holy Scriptures, in which the Lord Himself reveals His will to man. And you don’t just need to read Scripture, but you need to fulfill in life what is written there. That is, we must try to apply the words of Scripture to every situation in life. With any of our choices, we need to remember that the Lord is now looking at us, and think about what He expects from us and how He would like us to act. We need to remember what words, what commandments of Scripture can be applied to a given situation and, based on this, try to make the right choice, that is, a choice pleasing to God. A person who conforms his actions to the Word of God will gradually increase in the knowledge of the will of God.

Secondly, anyone who wants to do the will of God must read the lives and works of the holy fathers. Saints are people who laid down their lives to fulfill the will of God, and therefore they can teach us the same. Reading the lives of the saints, we should imitate them, try to live the way they lived. That is, when we don’t know what to do, we need to remember how the saints acted in the same or similar situation, and try, as far as possible for us, to act in a similar way. If we fulfill this to the best of our ability, then we will become imitators of the saints in fulfilling the will of God and little by little we will learn to recognize this will.

Thirdly, there is another way to find out the will of God: ask your confessor or a spirit-bearing elder. However, you must definitely come to your confessor and elder with faith, and preface your question with a prayer to God, so that He will reveal His will through His servant. In the old days, people did this - they went to St. Seraphim or to Ambrose of Optina, and they revealed to them the will of God in one case or another. And this is the simplest and most reliable method, but it is almost inaccessible to us, for in our time the holy elders have become extremely impoverished, and today rarely does anyone have a confessor.

When it is not possible to ask confessors or saints, there is another way to find out the will of God: prayer to God for admonition. The Holy Fathers teach that it is good to pray three times before making any decision. The Venerable John the Prophet says that when you cannot ask your elder, then you must pray three times about every matter and after that look where your heart bows, even by a hair’s breadth, and do so; for the notification is noticeable and in every way understandable to the heart. In cases where the matter does not require a quick solution, St. John advises praying three times within three days. For our Savior also went away three times to pray and, praying three times, uttered the same words.

Elder Paisius the Svyatogorets argues similarly with Saint John. According to him, in order to fulfill the will of God in any matter, it is necessary, firstly, to pray, secondly, to think (since it was not in vain that God gave us a head) and, thirdly, to act. And this is a very wise rule, for prayer sanctifies a person’s mind, so that he becomes able to find the correct solution, that is, in accordance with the will of God.

All the above rules, in a sense, are summed up by the instruction of St. Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow, who, when asked how to find out the will of God, says the following: “Call out in the word of Paul: Lord! What will you have me do? Is what I am doing acceptable to You, O Lord? If you wish, bless; if it is displeasing, do not allow me to do what is displeasing to You. And then listen to what the Lord tells you - in His word, in your mind, in your conscience, in the advice of wise and pious people and in external indications and signs.”

So, brothers and sisters, we must, using all the above means, learn the great science of knowing and doing the will of God at all times, in all places and in all matters. Because if we do not do the will of God, then we do either our own will or the will of demons - and both of them do not lead us to salvation, but, on the contrary, lead us to destruction. The only good, saving and perfect will is the will of the Lord God, our Creator. Only He alone knows how to save each of us. Only His will is our sanctification and salvation. It is His perfect will that we must seek, recognize and fulfill in every possible way all the days of our lives, according to the word of our main prayer: “Thy will be done as it is in heaven and on earth.” Amen.

https://www.zavet.ru/b/ipavlov/001.htm

Let's dispel the myths

It's time to talk about which statements about smart people are not entirely true.

A smart person knows a lot. This is partly true. However, a truly smart person is one who knows how to properly manage his knowledge.

Intelligence = education. In fact, having even ten higher education degrees is not a sign of intelligence. Education helps enrich and sharpen the mind, but cannot replace it.

Mind = intelligence. Equating mind with intelligence is also not entirely correct. After all, intelligence is not only the ability to answer test questions correctly and quickly, but also intelligence, cunning and life experience. An intelligent person knows this and tries to develop comprehensively.

You have a high level of self-control

Smart people are able to overcome impulsiveness. They do this by planning, clarifying goals, exploring alternative strategies, and considering consequences.

Scientists have found a connection between self-control and intelligence. In 2009, they conducted a study in which participants were asked to choose between two financial rewards: a small amount up front or a larger payment a little later.

The results showed that participants who chose the second option and showed more self-control performed better than others on intelligence tests.

Researchers say it's all the work of the brain's anterior prefrontal cortex. It helps people solve complex problems and demonstrate self-control in achieving goals.

9th place – Garry Kasparov, IQ 190

Harry grew up in a family where chess was treated with special reverence. Parents, engineers, often spent evenings at the chessboard. The boy also joined his favorite family activity, improving his IQ.

Already at the age of 22, Kasparov defeated Anatoly Karpov and became the champion.

And in 1997, Harry played a draw with the computer, losing to it only once, which amazed the entire world community.

Don't compare yourself to others

During my university years, I often encountered situations that made me feel stupid. I could study a theorem for two hours and still not figure out how to prove it. Of course, such difficulties are quite normal, but experiencing this, I certainly didn’t feel smart.

The people who surrounded me at the university were no stupider, and many were even smarter than me. Many of them won international competitions and could beat me at chess blindfolded. But I don’t give up, I try to constantly develop. I try to follow my own path and not compare myself to others. The latter doesn’t always work out, of course, but I try.

The only person you should compare yourself to is your past self. And the only person you should be better than is who you are now.

Sigmund Freud

1st place – Terence Tao, IQ 230

The person with the highest IQ lives in Australia (although he is of Chinese origin). At the age of 2 he could perform simple arithmetic operations, and by the age of 5 he was solving complex mathematical problems.

At the age of 12, he took part in international mathematical Olympiads.

Are you impressed by the success? Train your brain and, perhaps, in the near future you will find yourself on the list of the smartest people in Russia, which already includes A. Wasserman, Zh. Alferov, G. Perelman and others.

You are an owl

According to scientists, the later you go to bed and get up in the morning, the smarter you are.

One study, published in 2009 in the journal Personality and Individual Differences, looked at the relationship between IQ and sleep habits among thousands of young people. Participants who were smarter than their peers said they stayed up late into the night and woke up late on both weekdays and weekends.

Another study looked at about 400 US Air Force personnel. The results obtained were similar.

You often delay until the last minute

Don't be afraid to miss deadlines

Quora user Mahesh Gharkoti says that smart people often procrastinate on mundane or trivial tasks, mainly because they try to spend more time on more important things.

The idea is quite interesting, but some scientists would say that smart people often procrastinate even on tasks that they consider important. Wharton School of Business psychology professor Adam Grant suggests that procrastination (or the tendency to put off important things until later) is the basis for innovation. For example, Steve Jobs, one of the founders of Apple, used this as a strategic method.

Grant commented to BusinessInsider journalists:

“Most of the time that Steve Jobs devoted to analyzing various ideas, he spent primarily on those ideas that stood out from the general framework of the most understandable, obvious and familiar ones.”

Intellectual life

Since the time of its “infancy,” humanity has strived to break out of the captivity of animal nature and for this purpose has used all the resources given to it by this very nature.

But still, he managed to win his rightful place in the sun solely due to the unique qualities of his own thinking .

The most “effective” of these properties turned out to be:

1. Logicality - thanks to logic, people build long chains of dependencies and take into account all the properties of an object.
2. Evidence - proven chains can be taught to future generations as reliable facts, gradually increasing the amount of knowledge accumulated by ancestors.
3. Criticality - this characteristic of human thinking allows you to discard outdated or unreliable results so that information always remains relevant.
4. Breadth – it is the breadth of thinking that is responsible for covering a huge layer of problems and their corresponding solutions within the framework of specific circumstances.

Thus, the concept of intelligence, previously limited only to the semantic connotation of a set of various mental abilities, appears to us in a new quality - as a generalized set of behavioral characteristics directly related to the success of adaptation processes to new and more complex life tasks.

Nevertheless, human nature is based on other qualities that once allowed Homo sapiens to stand out from the animal world, and then go beyond the existence of one person and become the starting point for the development of society.

This became possible thanks to such features of intelligence as:

1. curiosity;
2. depth of mind;
3. flexibility.

The inquisitiveness of the mind and the cognitive activity of each individual ensured the further development of intellectual abilities thanks to a sincere interest in the world around them.

Deep intelligence helped to separate significant tasks (searching for food, shelter) from insignificant ones (the taste of food, the appearance of housing), and the flexibility of the mind allowed a person to use the accumulated experience as widely as possible and taught him to set priorities.

Over time, a person learned to overcome the limitations of thinking and abandon its stereotypes. Well, thanks to the “mobility” of intelligence, Homo sapiens acquired the ability to endow a familiar object with new properties in a matter of minutes - as a result, an ordinary stick could become both a weapon, a staff or a tool.

Are you interested in fundamental issues?

How long have you read Landau's works?

According to Ram Kumar, smart people “very often think about the Universe and the meaning of life.” Such individuals, Kumar writes, “constantly wonder about the meaning of everything.” Such insatiability for new knowledge, along with the inability to satisfy it, can become the reason for their frequent worries. Slate's David Wilson writes that smart people may be better equipped to analyze situations from multiple angles, so they are more likely to anticipate when things might go wrong.

About the disadvantages and advantages

I have quite a lot of achievements; during my student years I was a prize-winner of many Olympiads and always showed excellent results in tests. I have completed internships in world famous companies.

My achievements make me proud of myself and I am happy when I see that my parents are proud of me too. I like it when others use me as an example. But despite this, there are several points that upset me.

• People quickly get used to everything. When I started to make the first significant progress, my family was ready to throw a party about it, and now it’s just a smile and a nod.
• True friends will be able to share your sorrows and joys. And if many can cope with the first, they are ready to listen to you for hours, console you and give life advice, but not everyone can cope with the second. Envy is a constant companion of any human relationship, even friendly ones.
• Knowing your reputation as a “super smart guy,” many people will call you arrogant and cocky.

It’s difficult for me to communicate with many of my friends; sometimes I get the impression that I’m a loner. Often I want to be simpler, to be like most people. Sometimes I feel like I'm a teenager again, with the same phrase constantly running through my head: “Nobody understands me.”

Own little game

I attended a private school, but my family was forced to move to a small town, and I continued my education at a less prestigious educational institution. Thanks to the foundation I received in private school, I studied well without putting in much effort.

Then I entered the university, and at the end I was supposed to become an engineer. I prepared diligently for admission, since everyone said that studying would be very difficult and good preparation was needed. But in the first few weeks at university, I realized that studying was not difficult for me and that it was quite boring because of it. I quickly found myself in a fun company and started skipping classes.

I attended about 10% of my classes and studied for all the exams in one night. My grades, accordingly, have never been particularly brilliant.

I can't call myself an intellectual, but I won my own little game: in one night I could learn what others had been studying for a whole semester. I proved to myself that I am a capable person.