Don't let it
be.
A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single
man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral. ~Antoine de
Saint-Exupéry, Flight to Arras, 1942
We live in an age of data,everything can be statistically
analysed,we can have a pie chart for this,a neat formula for that. We treat
intelligence in the same way,we treat it in a mathematical way, and we like to
give people a number. A child is encouraged to know exactly what level it is
at. Yet is this picture of intelligence,helpful, should intelligence ever be
conceived in this way ? I would argue that it is not; if anything it distorts
intelligence and its nature.
So
let me first say what I consider the nature of intelligence to be. In the words
of 'Hey Jude' by the Beatles,intelligence lies in taking a sad song and making
it better. What I am arguing is that intelligence is creative. It is the art of
making a situation the best it can possibly be. Intelligence is the art of
adapting experience. I imagine intelligence to be similar to fishing. Imagine the
stream is experience,on its own it will just flow, it is just a process. The
act of intelligence, is the act of plucking the fish from the stream. You can
not take too many fishes,for too many would be hard to keep. The good
fisherman, knows just how many fish to take from the stream. This is the same
with intelligence,too many thoughts would overwhelm us. We must be
selective,and selection involves a creative process. Thus in this conception of
intelligence,intelligence is not given as commonly held. It is not a gift, it
requires work. Intelligence is an
act. However the question must then be asked,what is intelligence selecting towards ? What is their end? What
is their goal ? I would argue that the end must be happiness.
This may at first seem a vague goal. You will ask - 'Well define
happiness then fella', or say that everyone has different ideas of what
makes them happy. I would agree with you it is a vague goal. However I would
say that it is still the goal that we aim towards. This requires a leap of
faith on my part. It requires me to hold the belief that it is more intelligent
to want to be happy,than to want to be unhappy. This is a leap I am willing to
take. Once I take this leap, I can link a critique back to my starting point of
the conception of intelligence as a number. For in the statistical definition of intelligence,we miss and
disregard a lot of what I would class as intelligent action. Take for example
the person,who sees the suffering of African children,goes over to Africa and
helps to build a school. You may say that this is a kind, perhaps moral action
but not necessarily intelligent. Yet I would say that this action lies at the
heart of intelligence. The person that is building the school, has identified a
problem, a state of experience they do not agree with,and attempted to solve
this problem. They have taken a sad song,and tried to make it better. This
links intelligence and morality,and so it should. This is not a new or novel
idea, in fact it goes back all the way to Socrates.
This conception of intelligence see the intellect as active rather than
passive. It says the intelligent man is the man who can not simply read a
pattern,but can make the pattern that they see is best. Does this mean that
anything is permitted ? Well yes
and no. Everything should be attempted and tested, if only in the mind. For
example genocide, does not need to be physically tested before we know its a
bad idea,it can be tested in the arena of thought. However in general, all
ideas and solutions should be tested. The fact I used the word tested, means
there is something that an idea must be tested against. The test is seeing if
an idea will work when it comes up against the wall that is experience. So for
example, I have the idea that I want to fly. If I jump out of my window, I will
injure myself, and if I take injury to be a negative thing I will see that my
initial idea of flying has failed. However if I get in a plane,and jump out of
it with a parachute, I have seen that I am able to fly, without injuring
myself. Thus the second course of action is the more intelligent. After a
period of time we may accept other peoples tests,rather than having to do them
ourselves. This stage is why most of us will accept a scientist, or a doctor.
However we must not become complacent, we must continue to test for ourselves.
Or else our intelligence becomes flabby, and flaccid.
So
I argue that intelligence is active not passive,creative not given,moral not
mathematical. So people, take up your fishing rods,and catch a sad song,and
make it better.
By Lloyd Duddridge
