<p>So how do you tell when people are brilliant or dumb (as opposed to, say, immature as a result of their age)? </p>
<p>(I’m not suggesting that you can’t…I just think it’s an entertaining question to ask.)</p>
<p>One of the most intelligent, witty, and overall worldly people I know happens to be enrolled in all basic CP courses. He’s just not motivated, unfortunately.</p>
<p>I remember slacking off in freshman year, and subsequently getting placed in AB instead of BC calculus. That really hit my self esteem; I’d constantly feel like I was “above” the other kids in the class, partially because the class was so ridiculously easy for me…</p>
<p>…that makes me sound arrogant, and I kind of was, and probably came off as sort of rude to my teacher. But now that I think about it, it was my own damned fault that I didn’t put in the effort, and I was dumb to procrastinate. </p>
<p>So, I don’t “look down” on people in lower level classes as long as their attitude is agreeable. I loathe the morons who love to roll their eyes at anyone who tries to take the class seriously, or to learn/grow more. It’s the common “I’m pretty smart, I’m just doing poorly 'cause I’m a bad*ss who doesn’t care” bluffing tactic.</p>
<p>/rant</p>
<p>I know some people who are insanely smart at certain subjects, but they take non-AP classes in their “weak” areas, and thus have more time to focus on their strengths, and get the highest grades in the class. Well, I don’t think they did it so they could have higher grades, rather that was just a consequence of it. But they are very brilliant people. </p>
<p>I try not to look down on people based on grades and schedhule difficulty, but every once in a while, a stereotype escapes my mouth, as I call someone “not smart” because of their grades, although I know so much better.</p>
<p>Repede:
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<p>To play devil’s advocate, intelligence isn’t entirely analogous to athleticism. IMO, the proper old-SAT-associations would be “smarter-less fat” and “more academic-more athletic”. People are very sensitive about their intelligence, so there’s a taboo around calling people dumb because they take dumb classes, even when it’s true.</p>
<p>Now, on an off topic note, I think “Tom”'s being a better student than Jack is certainly more important and noteworthy than being a better athlete, but high schools that can’t afford computers and textbooks, but still pour thousands into their football teams, and pay their coaches more than their science teachers, would probably disagree with me.</p>
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<p>What’s a dumb class, and how do you tell when people are dumb?
(The obligatory comeback for this is, “You know people are dumb when they ask the same question over and over.” But now you can’t say it, because I already did.) </p>
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<p>He’s smarter, not necessarily a better student.</p>
<p>LOL look at us trying to sound deep.</p>
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<p>When it’s full of dumb people</p>
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<p>When they take dumb classes. :)</p>
<p>But seriously, “dumb” and “smart” are relative, of course; AB Calculus is genius compared to Honors geometry, but basic compared to MVC. So I suppose the qualifier “dumber” would be more quantifiable. It’s not very difficult to determine which classes within equivalent subjects are dumber than others, and then translating this to whether the kids are dumber in that particular subject would require that you control for factors such as laziness, lack of background knowledge, late bloomers etc.</p>
<p>Now, as for whether the kid who is in five “smarter” classes but two “dumber” ones is smarter or dumber than you as a whole…flip a coin.</p>
<p>EDIT: and grades, availability, etc. matter as well…</p>
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<p>Correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought we were operating under the [potentially false] assumption that “better student = smarter”. But my point doesn’t change either way.</p>
<p>The question asked at the beginning of the thread was, “Do you regard classmates who are in lower level classes than you as ‘dumber’?” and most people are saying no. </p>
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<p>Honors Geometry is generally not taken by people in the same grade as people taking AP Calculus. (I took regular Algebra I in 9th grade and differential equations, among other things, in 12th grade. Did my IQ change?)</p>
<p>I thought the particular quote was in a different context, but oh well.</p>
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<p>You’d be surprised…
But implicit in my “control for [tangential] factors” disclaimer is that we’re comparing two students with parity in terms of work ethic, age/grade, opportunities, etc.</p>
<p><a href=“I%20took%20regular%20Algebra%20I%20in%209th%20grade%20and%20differential%20equations,%20among%20other%20things,%20in%2012th%20grade.%20Did%20my%20IQ%20change?”>quote</a>
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<p>Actually, it did, in a sense. IIRC, IQ tests adjust for age; if you took one that did not grade to the curve, I’m sure you’d score higher now than you would as a freshman. Your brain was/is still growing.</p>
<p>BTW, how did you get from Algebra I to Differential Equations/MVC in four years? In our school, it goes Algebra I -> geometry -> Algebra II -> pre calc -> BC Calc -> MVC.</p>
<p>IQ scores really don’t drastically adjust according to age. IQ exams (Stanford-Binet) are scored according to the equation of (Mental Age/Chronological Age) * 100. So, even if your brain gradually grows during adolescence and your “mental age” (performance on the test) rises, your overall IQ would still be pretty close to what it was before because your chronological age grew as well. In fact, the mean scores of people ages 11-13 still correlated with the mean scores of people 17-18 (correlation coefficient of around .96 – meaning a near perfect correlation) in a given study.</p>
<p>^right, but I pointed out that the intelligence your “IQ” is supposed to represent does indeed increase through puberty, it’s just that your score is scaled by your age.</p>
<p>Uhh…I’m coming back to the OP’s question…</p>
<p>My school is in a low-income area, so anyone who takes 2-3 AP classes is above-average in my opinion. Also the AP classes are really easy, I’m taking AP calc, government and computer science and Spanish 3 is my hardest class.</p>