Twenty first century intelligence has strayed a long way from Weischler (progenitor of the WAIS tests – that is the foremost intelligence tests, used in education and neuropsychometrics) original definition
“the global capacity of a person to act purposefully, to think rationally and to deal effectively with his (or her) environment.”
Weischler was specifically interested in “non-intellective factors” that could not easily be computed. However the current concepts embraced by IQ tests are those that can be computed, and are those areas where more than anything humans go head to head with computers and their dogs.
Computers have struggled with is Verbal Comprehension, however think Siri, Google, Google Assist and Alexa and they are catching up fast. Computerised cognitive therapy is as good as a live therapist. Mostly computers work by computing all possible answers and then by one scheme or another, weighing the correct answer and making that choice. They can learn how to weight their own answers depending on the success of their choice.
However well a computer does in a game of chess, Jeopardy, or an IQ test, they have yet to be creative in an unprogrammed way.
The crux of this is the ability to generate and differentiate information from a random sequence of numbers.
Computers can make choices, very rational choices that depend upon the information they have been given to make that choice. And by the definition of intelligence, computers are hard on the heels of even the “brightest” of humans. But we all know this is not true. We “know” that a computer may be logical, rational, fast, accurate and a lot better at working out how to divide up a restaurant bill after a drunken night out but they are not bright. Whatever your iPad could do, whether it could guide Apollo safely back to earth or not, it would not, off its own bat have decided to go to the moon in the first place.
Having slagged off computers, what is going wrong with our own definitions of intelligence? Apart from they being bastions of Largely White Male Supremacy and designed to keep down the rest of the world’s population. A quick glance at a few “ten most intelligent people in the world lists” show that these people, with IQs of 190 and above, are apart from their prodigious IQs no more successful than any other group of moderately successful people brought together because of any other characteristic
apart from the Chinese – who are there alongside Deep Throat and every other advanced computer system
in it is evident that computers are getting ahead of the game. It is a matter of translating what the human says, into workable commands for a computer. Mostly they learn by learning all possible combinations and giving the most likely answer. With the Performance Subtests part of an IQ tests, for most right thinking computers they are a no-brainer. Picture arrangement – can computers do jigsaws, of course they can! They know their higher maths from their calculus, and anything with a formula is easy peasy for a piece of metal and plastic.
Although once Si Information comprehension – depends on your definition of ‘Information’ and ‘comprehension’. Think speech regonition software and automated switchboards
Arithmetic – a computer no brainer
Digit Span – memory – the best bit about a computer