Idiot Brain

by Dean Burnett

  Our brains can really make judgements based only on what we know, and what we know is based on our own conclusions and experiences, so we tend to judge people’s actions based on what we do. So if we’re polite and complimentary just because social norms say we should be, then surely everyone else does the same? As a result, every item of praise you receive can be somewhat dubious as to whether it’s genuine or not. But if someone criticizes you, not only were you bad, you were so bad that someone was willing to go against social norms to point it out. And thus, once again, criticism carries more weight than praise.

  The brain’s elaborate system for identifying and responding to potential threats may well have enabled humankind to survive the long periods in the wilderness and become the sophisticated, civilized species we are today, but it’s not without drawbacks. Our complex intellects allow us not only to identify threats but to anticipate and imagine them too. There are many ways to threaten or frighten a human, which leads to the brain responding neurologically, psychologically or sociologically.

  This process can, depressingly, cause vulnerabilities that other humans are able to take advantage of, resulting in actual threats, in a sense. You may be familiar with “negging,” a tactic used by pick-up artists where they approach women and say something that sounds like a compliment but is actually meant to criticize and insult. If a man approached a woman and said the title of this section, that would be negging. Or he might say something like, “I like your hair—most women with your face wouldn’t risk a style like that,” or, “I normally don’t like girls as short as you, but you seem cool,” or, “That outfit will look great once you lose some weight,” or, “I’ve no clue how to speak to women because I’ve only ever seen them through binoculars so I’m going to use cheap psychological trickery on you in the hope that I will do enough damage to your self-confidence that you are willing to sleep with me.” That last one isn’t a typical negging line, admittedly, but in truth it’s what they’re all saying.

  It doesn’t need to be this sinister, though. We probably all know the type of person who, when someone has done something to be proud of, will immediately jump in to point out the bits they did wrong. Because why go to the effort of achieving something yourself when you can just bring others down to make yourself feel better?

  It’s a cruel irony that in looking for threats so diligently, the brain ends up actually creating them.

  _____________

  * Social learning can explain much of this. We pick up much of what we know and how to behave from the actions of others, particularly if it’s something like responding to a threat, and chimps are similar in that regard. Social phenomena are covered more extensively in Chapter 7, but it can’t be the whole explanation here, because the weird thing is that when the same procedure was performed with flowers instead of snakes, it was still possible to train chimps to fear them, but the other chimps rarely learned the same fear by observing them. Fear of snakes is easy to pass on; fear of flowers is not. We’ve evolved an inherent suspicion of potentially lethal dangers, hence fear of snakes and spiders is common.14 By contrast, nobody fears flowers (anthophobia), unless they’ve got a particularly vicious type of hay fever. Less obvious evolved-fear tendencies include fear of elevators, or injections, or the dentist. Elevators cause us to be “trapped,” which can set off alarms in our brains. Injections and the dentist involve potential pain and invasions of body integrity, so cause fear responses. An evolved tendency to be wary or fearful of corpses (which could carry disease or indicate nearby dangers, as well as just being upsetting) may be behind the “uncanny valley” effect,15 where computer animations or robots that look almost human but not quite seem sinister and disturbing, whereas two eyes slapped on a sock is fine. The near-human construct lacks the subtle details and cues an actual human has, so seems more “lifeless” than “entertaining.”

  4

  Think you’re clever, do you?

  The baffling science of intelligence

  What makes the human brain special or unique? There are numerous possible answers, but the most likely is that it provides us with superior intelligence. Many creatures are capable of all the basic functions our brain is responsible for, but thus far no other known creature has created its own philosophy, or vehicles, or clothing, or energy sources, or religion, or a single type of pasta, let alone over three hundred varieties. Despite the fact that this book is largely about the things the human brain does inefficiently or bizarrely, it’s important not to overlook the fact that it’s clearly doing something right if it’s enabled humans to have such a rich, multifaceted and varied internal existence, and achieve as much as they have.

  There’s a famous quote that says, “If the human brain were so simple that we could understand it, we would be so simple that we couldn’t.” If you look into the science of the brain and how it relates to intelligence, there’s a strong element of truth in this aphorism. Our brains make us intelligent enough to recognize that we are intelligent, observant enough to realize this isn’t typical in the world, and curious enough to wonder why this is the case. But we don’t yet seem to be intelligent enough to grasp easily where our intelligence comes from and how it works. So we have to fall back on studies of the brain and psychology to get any idea of how the whole process comes about. Science itself exists thanks to our intelligence, and now we use science to figure out how our intelligence works? This is either very efficient or circular reasoning, I’m not smart enough to tell.

  Confusing, messy, often contradictory, and hard to get your head round; this is as good a description of intelligence itself as any you’re likely to find. It’s difficult to measure and even define reliably but I’m going to go through how we use intelligence and its strange properties in this chapter.

  My IQ is 270 . . . or some other big number

  (Why measuring intelligence is harder than you think)

  Are you intelligent?

  Asking yourself that means the answer is definitely yes. It demonstrates you are capable of many cognitive processes that automatically qualify you for the title of “most intelligent species on earth.” You are able to grasp and retain a concept such as intelligence, something that has no set definition and no physical presence in the real world. You are aware of yourself as an individual entity, something with a limited existence in the world. You are able to consider your own properties and abilities and measure them against some ideal but currently-not-existing goal or deduce that they may be limited in comparison to those of others. No other creature on earth is capable of this level of mental complexity. Not bad for what is basically a low-level neurosis.

  So humans are, by some margin, the most intelligent species on earth. What does that mean, though? Intelligence, like irony or daylight-saving time, is something most people have a basic grasp of but struggle to explain in detail.

  This obviously presents a problem for science. There are many different definitions of intelligence, provided by many scientists over the decades. French scientists Binet and Simon, inventors of one of the first rigorous IQ tests, defined intelligence as: “To judge well, to comprehend well, to reason well; these are the essential activities of intelligence.” David Weschler, an American psychologist who devised numerous theories and measurements of intelligence, which are still used today via tests such as the Weschler Adult Intelligence Scale, described intelligence as “the aggregate of the global capacity to act purposefully, to deal effectively with the environment.” Philip E. Vernon, another leading name in the field, referred to intelligence as “the effective all-round cognitive abilities to comprehend, to grasp relations and reason.”

  But don’t go thinking it’s all pointless speculation; there are many aspects of intelligence that are generally agreed on: it reflects the brain’s ability to do . . . stuff. More precisely, the brain’s ability to handle and exploit information. Terms such as reasoning, abstract thought, deducing patterns, comprehension; things like this are regularly cited as examples of s
uperior intelligence. This makes a certain logical sense. All of these typically involve assessing and manipulating information on an entirely intangible basis. Simply put, humans are intelligent enough to work things out without having to interact with them directly.

  For example, if a typical human approaches a gate held shut with large padlocks, they’ll quickly think, “Well, that’s locked,” and go find another entrance. This may seem trivial, but it’s a clear sign of intelligence; the person observes a situation, deduces what it means, and responds accordingly. There is no physical attempt to open the gate, at which point they’d discover, “Yep, that’s locked”; they don’t have to. Logic, reasoning, comprehension, planning; these have all been utilized to dictate actions. This is intelligence. But that doesn’t clarify how we study and measure intelligence. Manipulating information in complex ways inside the brain is all well and good, but it’s not something that can be observed directly (even the most advanced brain scanners just show us blurs of differing color at present, which isn’t especially useful) so measuring it can be done only indirectly by observing behavior and performance on specially designed tests.

  At this point, you might think that something major has been missed here, because we do have a way of measuring intelligence: IQ tests. Everyone knows about IQ, meaning Intelligence Quotient; it’s a measurement of how smart you are. Your mass is provided by measuring your weight; your height is determined by measuring how tall you are; your intoxication level is calculated by breathing into one of those gadgets the police make you breathe into; and your intelligence is measured by IQ tests. Simple, right?

  Not exactly. IQ is a measurement that takes the slippery, unspecified nature of intelligence into account, but most people assume it’s far more definitive than it is. Here’s the important fact you need to remember: the average IQ of a population is 100. Without exception. If someone says, “The average IQ of [country x] is only 85,” then this is wrong. It’s basically the same as saying, “ The length of a meter in [country x] is only 85 cm”; this is logically impossible, and the same is true for IQ.

  Legitimate IQ tests tell you where you fall within the typical distribution of intellect in your population, according to a proposed “normal” distribution. This normal distribution dictates that the “mean” IQ is 100. An IQ between 90 and 110 is classed as average, between 110 and 119 is “high average,” between 120 and 129 is “superior,” and anything over 130 is “very superior.” Conversely, an IQ between 80 and 89 is “low average,” 70 to 79 is “borderline,” and anything below 69 is considered “extremely low.”

  Using this system, over 80 percent of the population will fall in the average zones, with IQs ranging from 80 to 110. The further out you go, the fewer people you’ll find with these IQs; less than 5 percent of the population will have a very superior or extremely low IQ. A typical IQ test doesn’t directly measure your raw intelligence, but reveals how intelligent you are compared to the rest of the population.

  This can have some confusing consequences. Say a potent but bizarrely specific virus wiped out everyone in the world with an IQ of over 100. The people left behind would still have an average IQ of 100. Those with IQs of 99 before the plague hit would now suddenly have IQs of 130+ and be classed as the crème de la crème of the intellectual elite. Think of it in terms of currency. In the US the value of the dollar fluctuates in accordance with what happens in the economy, but there are always 100 pennies to the dollar, so the dollar has values that are both flexible and fixed. IQ is basically the same: the average IQ is always 100, but what an IQ of 100 is actually worth in terms of intelligence is variable.

  This normalization and adhering to population averages means that IQ measurement can be a bit restrictive. People such as Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking reportedly have IQs in the region of 160, which is still very superior but doesn’t sound so impressive when you consider the population average is 100. So if you meet someone who does claim to have an IQ of 270 or some such, they’re probably wrong. They’ve been using some alternative type of test that isn’t considered scientifically valid, or they’ve seriously misread their results, which does undermine their claim to be a super genius.

  This isn’t to say that such IQs don’t exist at all; some of the most intelligent people on record supposedly had IQs of over 250, according to the Guinness Book of Records, although the category of Highest IQ was retired in 1990 due to the uncertainty and ambiguity of the tests at this level.

  The IQ tests used by scientists and researchers are meticulously designed; they’re used as actual tools, like microscopes and mass spectrometers. They cost a lot of money (so aren’t given away online for free). The tests are designed to assess normal, average intelligences in the widest possible range of people. As a result, the further to the extremes you go, the less useful they tend to be. You can demonstrate many concepts of physics in the school classroom with everyday items (for instance, using weights of different sizes to show the constant force of gravity, or a spring to show elasticity) but, if you delve into complex physics, you need particle accelerators or nuclear reactors and frighteningly complex mathematics.

  So it is when you have someone of extremely high intelligence; it just becomes much harder to measure. These scientific IQ tests measure things such as spatial awareness with pattern completion tests, comprehension speeds with dedicated questions, verbal fluency by getting the subject to list words from certain categories, and stuff like that; all reasonable things to look into but not something that is likely to tax a super genius to the extent where it would be possible to spot the very limits of his or her intelligence. It’s a bit like using bathroom scales to weigh elephants; they can be useful for a standard range of weights, but at this level they’ll give no useful data, just a load of broken plastic and springs.

  Another concern is that intelligence tests claim to measure intelligence, and we know what intelligence is because intelligence tests tell us. You can see why some of the more cynical scientist types wouldn’t be happy with this situation. In truth, the more common tests have been revised repeatedly and assessed for reliability often, but some still feel that this is just ignoring the underlying problem.

  Many like to point out that performance on intelligence tests is actually more indicative of social upbringing, general health, aptitude to testing, education level, and so on. Things that aren’t intelligence, in other words. So the tests may be useful, but not for what they’re intended.

  It’s not all doom and gloom. Scientists aren’t ignorant of these criticisms and are a resourceful bunch. Today, intelligence tests are more useful—they provide a wide range of assessments (spatial awareness, arithmetic etc.), rather than one general assessment, and this gives us a more robust and thorough demonstration of ability. Studies have shown that performance on intelligence tests also seems to remain fairly stable over a person’s lifetime despite all the changes or learning they experience, so they must be detecting some inherent quality rather than just random circumstance.1

  So, now you know what we know, or what we think we know. One of the generally accepted signs of intelligence is an awareness and acceptance of what you don’t know. Good job.

  Where are your trousers, professor?

  (How intelligent people end up doing stupid things)

  The stereotype of an academic is a white-haired white-coated chap (it’s almost always a man) in late middle age, talking quickly and often about his field of study while being utterly clueless about the world around him, effortlessly describing the fruit fly genome while absent-mindedly buttering his tie. Social norms and day-to-day tasks are completely alien and baffling to him; he knows everything there is to know about his subject, but little to nothing beyond that.

  Being intelligent isn’t like being strong; a strong person is strong in every context. However, someone brilliant in one context can seem like a shuddering dunce in another.

  This is because intelligence, unlike physical strength, is a product of
the never uncomplicated brain. So what are the brain processes that underpin intelligence, and why is it so variable? Firstly, there is ongoing debate in psychology about whether or not humans use a single intelligence, or several different types. Current data suggests it is probably a combination of things.

  A dominant view is that there is a single property that underpins our intelligence, which can be expressed in varying ways. This is often known as “Spearman’s g,” or just g. Named after Charles Spearman, a scientist who did a great service for intelligence research and science in general in the 1920s by developing factor analysis. The previous section revealed how IQ tests are commonly used despite certain reservations; factor analysis is something that makes them (and other tests) useful.

  Factor analysis is a mathematically dense process but what you need to know is that it is a form of statistical decomposition. This is where you take large volumes of data (for example, those produced by IQ tests) and mathematically break them down in various ways and look for factors connecting or influencing the results. These factors aren’t known beforehand, but factor analysis can flush them out. If students at a school got mediocre grades overall on their tests, the principal might want to see exactly how the grades were achieved in more detail. Factor analysis could be used to assess the information from all the test scores and take a closer look. It could reveal that math questions were generally answered well, but history questions were answered poorly. The principal can then feel justified about yelling at the history teachers for wasting time and money (although he probably isn’t justified, given the many possible explanations for poor results).

  Spearman used a process similar to this to assess IQ tests and discovered that there was seemingly one underlying factor that underpinned test performance. This was labeled the single general factor, g, and if there’s anything in science that represents what your everyday person would think of as intelligence, it’s g.