Who Had the Highest IQ of All Time?

[Dooga Blackrazor]

Highest IQ?

I'm doing a project on IQ and for posters I'm doing some information on the person with the Highest IQ in the world. Unfortunately, this seems to be a difficult thing to determine.

Marilyn Vos Savant is supposed to have the highest IQ according to Guiness. But Guiness isn't really commonly used in Scientific discussions as a source of knowledge. Regardless, I tried to find this on the site and couldn't.

Some sites state William James Sikes was supposed to have had the highest IQ of all time. Other's say this is just a farce. The things the sites say he was capable of are amazing, but it's difficult to say if their true.

Some sites say Goethe or Leonardo da Vinci were the most intelligent in the World. Is there a designated most intelligent individual with the highest IQ? Or am I better off just taking a few people and saying on the poster something like? Who do you think it is?

Thanks to anyone who responds.

 

[Janitor]

"Who do you think it is?"

I would have no idea who it is among living people. As far as all-time, I would place my bet on Leonhard Euler. I think it was said of him, "He calculated as others breathed." But he was not some idiot savant who could extract cube roots of big numbers in his head and do nothing else. He was a very creative mathematician whose work was at the cutting edge of the mathematics of his day.

 

[BlackVision]

Marilyn Vos Savant is supposed to have the highest IQ according to Guiness. But Guiness isn't really commonly used in Scientific discussions as a source of knowledge.

Marilyn Vos Savant's 228 IQ is as a child. Child IQs are less accurate and has a higher standard deviation than an adult IQ test. Marilyn Vos Savant's Adult IQ has been ranked at 186.

Some sites say Goethe or Leonardo da Vinci were the most intelligent in the World.

Goethe and Leonardo da Vinci could not have the highest IQ since they died before IQ tests were ever invented. So how could they have ever taken an IQ test? Although if they did take one I'm sure they would do well but it's impossible to estimate exactly what score they will get.

The person with the highest IQ alive today is suppose to be Kim Ung-Yong from South Korea. Who's IQ was ranked at 210.

"Testers have only been able to estimate the IQ of Kim Ung-Yong, who was born in Seoul, Korea, on March 7, 1963. His IQ has been placed at exceeding 200. He was fluent in Japanese, Korean, German, and English by his fourth birthday. At four years, eight months he solved complicated calculus problems on Japanese TV. He is considered to be the most brilliant person alive. One factor may be that his parents, both university professors, were born at precisely the same moment: 11:00 a.m., May 23, 1934."

Source: http://campus.murraystate.edu/academic/faculty/winfield.rose/wub.htm

 

[quddusaliquddus]

It's me :D


... no seriously ... ... it's me :D

Jokes ... no really ... I'm jokin!

Hey BlackVision ! How weird is that? Why/How would the simultaneous births of his parents affect hois IQ?

 

[BlackVision]

Hey BlackVision ! How weird is that? Why/How would the simultaneous births of his parents affect hois IQ?

Probably doesn't. It's just weird and all and something to ponder over.

 

[Dooga Blackrazor]

Thanks for the help. Does anyone know anything on Sidis?

 

[Integral]

This is a pointless question, with no possible chance of arriving at a meaningful answer. Two reasons.
1. There is no universal test of intellegence.
2. No possible way of testing all living humans.

Seems to me it is a waste of time to even ask the question.

 

[Evo]

Thanks for the help. Does anyone know anything on Sidis?

I had read about Sidis some time ago.

His life was destroyed by his parent's attempts at creating a genius.

Young Sidis could read at 18 months. He'd written four books and was fluent in eight languages before he was eight. He gave a Harvard seminar on the fourth dimension at nine. He entered Harvard at eleven. He may've been the most intelligent person who ever lived.

Here is a partial list of William James Sidis' extraordinary capabilities and accomplishments:
1. Given IQ is a purely anthropocentric means of assessing intelligence, Sidis' IQ is crudely estimated at 250-300.
2. Infant Billy listened to Greek myths read to him by Sarah as bedtime stories.
3. Started feeding himself with a spoon at eight months (after two months of trial and error).
4. Cajoled by Boris, Billy learned to pronounce alphabetic syllables from blocks hanging in his crib.
5. At six months, Billy said, "Door." A couple months later he told Mom he liked things, doors and people, that move.
6. At seven months he pointed to Earth's moon and called it, "moon." He wanted a 'moon' of his own.
7. Mastered higher mathematics and planetary revolutions by age 11.
8. Learned to spell efficiently by one year old.
9. Started reading The New York Times at 18 months.
10. Started typing at three. Used his high chair to reach a typewriter. First composed letter was an order for toys from Macy's.
11. Read Caesar's Gallic Wars, in Latin (self-taught), as a birthday present to his Father in Billy's fourth year.
12. Learned Greek alphabet and read Homer in Greek in his fourth year.
13. Learned Aristotelian logic in his sixth year.
14. At six, Billy learned Russian, French, German, and Hebrew, and soon after, Turkish and Armenian.
15. Calculated mentally a day any date in history would fall at age six. Absolutely fascinated by calendars.
16. Learned Gray's Anatomy at six. Could pass a student medical examination.
17. Billy started grammar school at six, in 3 days 3rd grade, graduated grammar school in 7 months.
18. At age 8, Billy surpassed his father (a genius) in mathematics.
19. Corrected E. V. Huntington's mathematics text galleys at age of eight.
20. Total recall of everything he read.
21. Wrote four books between ages of four and eight. Two on anatomy and astronomy, lost.
22. Passed Harvard Medical School anatomy exam at age seven.
23. Passed MIT entrance exam at age eight.
24. Intellect surpassed best secondary school teachers.
25. At age 10, in one evening, corrected Harvard logic professor Josiah Royce's book manuscript: citing, "wrong paragraphs."
26. Attempted to enroll in Harvard at nine.
27. In 1909, became youngest student to ever enroll at Harvard at age 11.
28. In 1910, at age 11, lectured Harvard Mathematical Club on 'Four-Dimensional Bodies.'
29. Billy graduated from Harvard, cum laude, on June 24, 1914, at age 16.
30. Billy entered Harvard Law School in 1916.
31. Billy could learn a whole language in one day!
32. Billy knew all the languages (approximately 200) of the world, and could translate among them instantly!


Here are a couple of links for the above references.

http://www.quantonics.com/The_Prodigy_Review.html

http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi969.htm

 

[quddusaliquddus]

How did his life get distroyed?

 

[killerinstinct]

Destroyed, that is extremely fascinating.

 

[Evo]

How did his life get distroyed?

You would have to read the book to fully understand what his parents put him through.

"William James Sidis was not the first nor last child wounded by parents trying to create a trophy. Others have lamented the creative productivity we lost when Sidis dropped out of society. What I grieve is all the joy that his well-honed mind should've given him -- all the joy that Sidis was never able to access."

 

[Dagenais]

This is a pointless question, with no possible chance of arriving at a meaningful answer. Two reasons.
1. There is no universal test of intellegence.
2. No possible way of testing all living humans.

Seems to me it is a waste of time to even ask the question.

Isn't Mensa the Universal IQ test?

Or is that just for those that speak English?

 

[Evo]

Isn't Mensa the Universal IQ test?

Or is that just for those that speak English?

Mensa is a society.

 

[Dagenais]

Mensa is a society.

Don't they administrate their own version of an IQ test?

 

[Evo]

I'm not sure if they have their own version or if it is a standard test.

 

[JohnDubYa]

RE: "6. At seven months he pointed to Earth's moon and called it, "moon." He wanted a 'moon' of his own. "

Hmmm... a baby born with an inate understanding of the English language. Sure, whatever.

 

[JohnDubYa]

To a more important point, there is no way of establishing the IQs of people once they reach adulthood. It is all just shoddy guesswork, and usually colored by political/sociological convictions.

 

[selfAdjoint]

It is all just shoddy guesswork, and usually colored by political/sociological convictions.

.

Self-referential?

 

[Tigers2B1]

RE: "6. At seven months he pointed to Earth's moon and called it, "moon." He wanted a 'moon' of his own. "

Hmmm... a baby born with an inate understanding of the English language. Sure, whatever.

Read the quote you posted? The quote indicates "at seven months" not that he was "born with an innate understanding of English ..."

 

[Tigers2B1]

To a more important point, there is no way of establishing the IQs of people once they reach adulthood. It is all just shoddy guesswork, and usually colored by political/sociological convictions.

I would be interested in seeing your source for that statement. Is there something from an .edu source (or other source generally thought of as credible) on the Internet that can be linked?

 

[franznietzsche]

"William James Sidis was not the first nor last child wounded by parents trying to create a trophy. Others have lamented the creative productivity we lost when Sidis dropped out of society. What I grieve is all the joy that his well-honed mind should've given him -- all the joy that Sidis was never able to access."

Happy genius is an oxymoron. Anyone that smart can't be an optimist, logic contradicts it too well.

 

[JohnDubYa]

Gee, self-Adjoint, I don't recall guessing the IQs of adults, so I fail to see how my statement could be considered self-referential.

So how does one go about testing the accuracy of an IQ test? If an IQ test says 185, how can one determine that 180 is less accurate?

IQ tests are completely bogus when used on adults, because the phenonemon they attempt to measure cannot be separated from the adults' life experience. A person who takes a calculus course is going to do better on portions of the exam than an illiterate farmer, but IQs are not designed to test knowledge.

Now, you can test the aptitude of an adult to a certain extent, but IQ? Baaah!

The smartest guy in the world is probably some potato farmer, who simply has not had the opportunity, or possibly the gumption, to take advantage of his good fortune.

And testing the IQs of adults is completely pointless anyway.

By the way, I think the smarter you get the more you appreciate the world. Any idiot can focus on problems and bemoan his lot in life.

 

[Dooga Blackrazor]

I agree with the pointlessness of IQ tests John. Knowledge effects IQ tests in an amount that people don't want to let on. So do many other factors. Eventually we may be able to calculate intelligence from properties of the brain itself but from written tests I don't think its possible. For those wondering, Sidis can actually be verified from Prometheus society if you deem them to be a legitimate source of information.

Concerning your comment about intelligence effecting appreciation. I'd say that probably would be more of a wisdom & maturity issue than intelligence itself. I wouldn't say your theory isn't possible though. I notice as I got older (and with it smarter), I started to appreciate the world more. However I can't accurately conclude that the intelligence increase is a factor or the only factor contributing to that. It's an interesting theory that I myself have thought about before.

 

[JohnDubYa]

My comment about Sidis regards the absurdity that a baby (or anyone) would call an object by its proper English name without being taught.

 

[BlackVision]

A person who takes a calculus course is going to do better on portions of the exam than an illiterate farmer

NOT true. IQ tests, the official ones, are not culturally bias. It wouldn't make a difference whether you flunked out of elementary school or if you got a PhD. IQ measures one thing and one thing only. Your natural cognitive ability.

I want someone to look at a Matrices IQ test such as "Raven's Progressive Matrices" and tell me how education will have any impact on your ability to take that test.

 

[Dooga Blackrazor]

The rate at which you can mathmatically solve problems, through multiplication and other things could effect IQ test results. If your good at Calculus your brain would also be more used to an exposed to mathmatical thinking. Perhaps there is a question in which your tricked somehow. If you took a Calculus course you'd know where to look for the answers.

If you take a course on System of Equations and do tricky problems you'll be more exposed to possibilities of how to achieve an outcome. That could help you on an IQ test. From personal experience I took an IQ type test in which the answers were shown afterwards. It revealed that vowels effected the answer of a question. I then knew in future IQ tests to check and see if vowels effected the result.

Cultural differences may or may not effect non-timed IQ tests but I'm sure they'd effect time-oriented tests. Official tests may be more accurate but I wouldn't deem them an accurate measurement intelligence in an individual. IQ test accuracy is often an opinion anyway though.

 

[JohnDubYa]

RE: "NOT true. IQ tests, the official ones, are not culturally bias. It wouldn't make a difference whether you flunked out of elementary school or if you got a PhD. IQ measures one thing and one thing only. Your natural cognitive ability."

Your statement is (mostly) accurate when applied to children. However, we are discussing the application of IQ tests to adults. There is no way to measure "natural" cognitive ability since a person's education affects his cognitive ability.


If you disagree, post one of the questions used in the IQ test and we can discuss it.


And you didn't answer my question, "How do you test the accuracy of an IQ test?"

 

[Tigers2B1]

My comment about Sidis regards the absurdity that a baby (or anyone) would call an object by its proper English name without being taught.

The original comment didn’t indicate that he wasn't 'taught' the word – I imagine he learned the word like all babies do. I think the point was that, at 8 months old, Sidis had some idea of the relationship between the Earth and the Moon - shown by his request for a "moon of his own." That at 8 months he already had the association in his head. That was my read anyway -

 

[Tigers2B1]

The rate at which you can mathmatically solve problems, through multiplication and other things could effect IQ test results. If your good at Calculus your brain would also be more used to an exposed to mathmatical thinking. Perhaps there is a question in which your tricked somehow. If you took a Calculus course you'd know where to look for the answers.

If you take a course on System of Equations and do tricky problems you'll be more exposed to possibilities of how to achieve an outcome. That could help you on an IQ test. From personal experience I took an IQ type test in which the answers were shown afterwards. It revealed that vowels effected the answer of a question. I then knew in future IQ tests to check and see if vowels effected the result.

Cultural differences may or may not effect non-timed IQ tests but I'm sure they'd effect time-oriented tests. Official tests may be more accurate but I wouldn't deem them an accurate measurement intelligence in an individual. IQ test accuracy is often an opinion anyway though.

Truly culture free tests of mental quickness correlate highly with the results of IQ tests. Here is an artcle related to these culture free tests.

Here’s the link - http://www.brainmachines.com/body_wolf.html

…The idea was to provide a way of testing intelligence that would be free of "cultural bias," one that would not force anyone to deal with words or concepts that might be familiar to people from one culture but not to people from another. The IQ Cap recorded only brain waves; and a computer, not a potentially biased human test-giver, analyzed the results…
It was not a complicated process. You attached sixteen electrodes to the scalp of the person you wanted to test. You had to muss up his hair a little, but you didn't have to cut it, much less shave it. Then you had him stare at a marker on a blank wall. This particular researcher used a raspberry- red thumbtack. Then you pushed a toggle switch. In sixteen seconds the Cap's computer box gave you an accurate prediction (within one-half of a standard deviation) of what the subject would score on all eleven subtests of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale or, in the case of children, the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children--all from sixteen seconds' worth of brain waves. There was nothing culturally biased about the test whatsoever. What could be cultural about staring at a thumbtack on a wall? The savings in time and money were breathtaking. The conventional IQ test took two hours to complete; and the overhead, in terms of paying test-givers, test-scorers, test-preparers, and the rent, was $100 an hour at the very least. The IQ Cap required about fifteen minutes and sixteen seconds--it took about fifteen minutes to put the electrodes on the scalp--and about a tenth of a penny's worth of electricity.

 

[Tigers2B1]

...IQ tests are completely bogus when used on adults, because the phenonemon they attempt to measure cannot be separated from the adults' life experience. A person who takes a calculus course is going to do better on portions of the exam than an illiterate farmer, but IQs are not designed to test knowledge.

Now, you can test the aptitude of an adult to a certain extent, but IQ? Baaah!...

I'm still waiting for your .edu or other credible sourse for that assertion. If your assertion is in fact true that information needs to be got to either the defense or the prosecution in some of these murder cases ---- since IQ tests are used in the U.S. legal system. IQ scores are part of the process determining whether a convicted murderer gets a sentence of death or some other punishment. Linked is the Supreme Court's holding in regarding the use of IQ in Atkins v. Virginia

http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/00-8452.ZO.html

Here is a quote from the decision itself. Note that there is extensive discussion of the use of IQ in the decision notes located at the bottom, after the decision ---

…In the penalty phase, the defense relied on one witness, Dr. Evan Nelson, a forensic psychologist who had evaluated Atkins before trial and concluded that he was “mildly mentally retarded.” His conclusion was based on interviews with people who knew Atkins, a review of school and court records, and the administration of a standard intelligence test which indicated that Atkins had a full scale IQ of 59.

 

[Tigers2B1]

...If you disagree, post one of the questions used in the IQ test and we can discuss it...

Standardized IQ tests are not published so I don’t know what a standardized culture free test looks like. However, I may have seen a 'culture free test' at one time even though it wasn’t described to me that way. I suspect this online "IQ test," which takes about a minute to load, is composed of what might be thought of as 'culture free' type questions. Not actual standardized IQ questions used by professionals but, nevertheless descriptive of the types of questions I saw. Does anyone know what professionally administered culture free questions look like and if so, do they look anything like what is shown at this site? ----- That is, they don’t assume much or anything in the way of “knowledge,” -- if these questions even do that. Also ---- if these questions aren’t considered culture free why would that be?

http://home.hetnet.nl/~rijk42/progressivUS.swf

 

[JohnDubYa]

As I said:

"Your statement is (mostly) accurate when applied to children. However, we are discussing the application of IQ tests to adults. There is no way to measure "natural" cognitive ability since a person's education affects his cognitive ability."

A person who has an IQ of only 60 has no education. In fact, his cognitive abilities have not developed much beyond his childhood years. Therefore we are, in effect, testing the IQ of a child.

Those on the upper scale of IQ have had too much meaningful interaction with their surroundings to make IQ tests practical. You simply cannot remove a person's cognitive skill developed in life when testing his IQ. If you can't, then you are testing aptitude, not intelligence.

And no one has answered my question, how can you tell if an IQ result is accurate?

 

[Monique]

People worry so much about their IQ, I think intelligence should be measured by success. Being able to accomplish things in life is much more important than being assigned a number..

 

[selfAdjoint]

People worry so much about their IQ, I think intelligence should be measured by success.

Hmmm. Some people achieve success by skullduggery. Examples will come to mind, I am sure. I think it would be better to be an obscure "quick study" than to be one of those.

 

[JohnDubYa]

We need to design a Success Quotient. :)

So who would have the highest SQ?