TRANSCRIPT
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The Rabbi Daniel Lapin Podcast
Episode: The Difference Between Intelligence and Wisdom
Date: 01/27/23 Length: 38:43
Daniel Lapin 0:00
Greetings, happy warriors, and welcome to the Rabbi Daniel Lapin show where I, your rabbi reveal how the world really works and you know that. So, let us move right on because we got a lot of very important material that I want to impart to you today material that will be immediately usable information and understanding that you can deploy into your five F's right away, you can deploy right away into improving your relationships, with your money, with your social life of your friends, with your family, with your, with your faith, and with your body. And those things that we will start off with right away is a an analysis of the difference between intelligence and wisdom. Now you hear this all the time don't you hear people? Oh, she's so intelligent, or are you? Somebody else, you know, people use those terms interchangeably, oh is very wise person. But they're not interchangeable at all. They could hardly be more different. It says as if one is is cheese, and the other is carrots. They are all they're not even in the same food group. intelligence and wisdom. So think about that for just a second, how would you explain intelligence and wisdom? Let me try. The generally accepted measure intelligence is what we call IQ. And there is a standardized test or a standardized system of testing. And, you know, average, the the the, the median there is, is about 100. And really, really, really high intelligence people are 150. And people are sort of below at the borderline of functionality in a modern economy, you know, maybe 70 or something like that. That's the IQ now, I should indicate that.
Daniel Lapin 2:21
It's been made very controversial for about the last 20 years since about 2000. And that's because the soft social sciences, like psychology, for instance, and and those kinds of areas, they've been badly corrupted by progressive as thinking. This all started when the Charles Murray and the late Richard Herrnstein published a book called The Bell Curve, intelligence and class structure in American life. They published that 96. And it did cause considerable stir, and a lot of controversy and turbulence. And I think the process began with that book. It didn't really swing into visible action till about 2004 years later. But what began to emerge was a downplaying of the importance of intelligence. Why is that? Well, because Murray and Herrnstein in the bell curve proved and one of the reasons that they became so hated and the book became so vilified, is because yes, it did prove very effectively, and, and incontrovertibly, that intelligence is tied to the class structure in America. Now. Please listen to this very carefully. I don't want there to be any confusion at all. When we speak about class structure today in America, we're talking chiefly about university elite. That's really what class structure is, people whose value system is derived from their years in university, people whose prime social relationships derive from their university days, perhaps even their marriages and family are tied to universities, the sports they're interested in the people they're interested in the topics they're interested in, above all the kind of activities they engage in. And so yeah, there are many universities in the country entry to which almost guarantees you a place, you know, in the top 10% of the country's elite, not necessarily in earning power, because many of the business elite people have made their money and are making the money in business are not necessarily University centric. But when we speak when Charles Murray and Richard Herrnstein spoke about class structure in American life, they're mostly talking about University and yes, having IQ does gain you access in university. And if you've got a high IQ, you'll make it onto the faculty of university and you'll remain in academics and that'll be the life you choose in the life you live.
Daniel Lapin 5:17
What is IQ? IQ is cognitive ability, the speed of processing. It doesn't mean you're good with people. It doesn't mean that it certainly doesn't mean you're wise, but I'll come to that in just a moment. And so, flying an airplane always involves IQ people, you know, let me put it this way. You really do not want to get into a commercial airliner being flown by somebody with an IQ of 85. You really don't want that, just because the amount of processing that's needed the speed with which you got to assimilate data from many sources. And yes, most of the flight is under autopilot. But when something goes wrong, then you really need IQ. I don't think anybody has ever published the IQ of your remember pilot, Chesley Sullenberger. He was at the time, a 57 year old pilot with US Airways, and on January the 15th. In 2009, he took off from LaGuardia Airport on US Airways flight 1549 on his way to Charlotte, and then from Charlotte, right onwards to Seattle. And within a few minutes after takeoff, Sullenberger Chesley Sullenberger known to his friends of Sally, who, by the way had been a fighter pilot. This is one of the best things if flying a commercial airliner takes a higher IQ flying a combat jet fighter considerably more. And so airliners are always Airlines was thrilled to hire pilots whose prior training had been in fighter aircraft with the United States Air Force. That was Sullenberger. Soon after the plane took off, it's about everyone in the whole world knows, it hit a flock of Canadian geese, both engines were knocked out. It didn't have a lot of altitude yet, and Sullenberger made what I think I was very interested in this at the time, and I followed it. In my view, and I have flown airplanes I have had a pilot's license, it's no longer active. But in my view, he saved that, that airline he planted down on the Hudson River. And, yeah, a lot of things went right. But he also knew, in very, very speedy processing, he didn't have a lot of time to make all the decisions and make all this happen. That's pure IQ. It's nothing but intelligence and training, of course, well, you can't be trained if your intelligence is low. That goes without saying, If you ever watch you're really good chess player, you're talking about very high IQ, that's for sure. And here's the there's bad news and good news, right? The good news is that you really do not need anything beyond a broad range of acceptable IQ, to live a wonderfully successful life, to make plenty of money, and to have good friendships and to have a terrific family and to look after your body and to have a spiritual understanding as well. You don't need a very high IQ for anything. The truth is, and I've done a lot of research on this, and a lot of working on this, a very high IQ is in some ways, an obstacle to success. And I've spoken about this in my books, and, and in various podcasts in the past. So the good news is that you know what, your IQ just really isn't that important, unless you desire entry to the academic and intellectual and university centric elite of the country in which you live. If that's the direction you want to go, then yeah, maybe if you'd like to work on the faculty of the university, high IQ would be a big asset. But if you'd like to go to university to learn structural engineering, you know what your IQ is just fine. You don't have to worry if you're listening to this show. Your shoes just fine.
Daniel Lapin 9:51
Are you 150? Yeah, probably not. Neither am I. It doesn't matter. But neither are you. 85 or 90 either. You're definitely in the above average. And again, it doesn't matter from 90 to 130. It's all just fine. No problems at all. Above that, and well below that become a little bit questionable. And it is true that men are over represented in the two tails of the bell curve. Over on the one side where we're talking about very low IQ barely functional, more men than women on the very high side, more men than women, which is why there are very few women, chess grandmasters of chess. And yes, you know, we're all used to the old cause of sexism, and they don't make good welcoming for it. No, it isn't that it's that it takes to be a chess master takes a very high IQ. And in the same way that a high school with, shall we say, 3000 Boys, is going to field a better football team than a high school with 35. Boys, right? It's simply clear, because the distribution of football talent also follows a bell curve. And if you've got a school of 3000 students, you have a much higher number of top rate players, people with high football talent. If your high school is a small, private high school of 35, boys, you know, you don't have a lot of choice, you take the best out of the 35. But they probably maybe none of them are even as good as the best players in the other school. So that's just a reality. The the upper end of the IQ bell curve is men are disproportionately represented there. And so yes, you have more men as chess grandmasters. So the the good news is I said that IQ is it's not that important, unless you want to be a fighter pilot, or you want to be on the faculty of the university, in certain areas. By the way, that's it's not true. If you want to be on the faculty and diversity or gender studies, good luck, you can do that with an IQ of 62. It's not a problem. But anything else, you need high IQ for those areas.
Daniel Lapin 12:15
But for success in life, you don't need high IQ, you just need a broad average just gotta be like most of us, and you're just fine. What's the bad news? The bad news is you pretty much cannot change your IQ. It's pretty much fixed, in terms of what you receive from your parents, how you came out in the genetic or the ovarian lottery. That's all it is. Can IQ be changed? At all? Yes, over several generations. So in other words, if you're talking about the IQ, right of the of the lap and family into future generations, it depends who Susan and my children marry, and who our grandchildren marry. And then, you know, several generations down the road, there may well be a lap and with an IQ up in the higher ranges, and there also may be one with the IQ down in the lower ranges. That's all there is to it. In what ways can it be changed Well, partially who your children and grandchildren marry. And secondly, the extent to which sexual restraint is practiced in your group. Now, you might say, what scientific studies support this information? And I did, are there any scientific studies that show that when a group practices sexual restraint, the IQ of that group goes up now they know not that I'm aware of, and for very good reason, and they'd be wildly politically unpopular and incorrect. This is ancient Jewish wisdom information. And everything that I've seen in my life seems to support that the the, the popular cultures view of IQ, started getting extremely nervous and agitated around about, as I said, the year 2000. And the reason was, because it began to be perfectly obvious that not only was a class in American society, predicted by IQ, but it also seemed as if taking into account stirred certain statistical provisos and within the limitations of the meaning of statistics and means and an averages. There seem to be some correlation between racial groups and IQ. And that was red hot. There was information they had got everybody very, very unhappy, because it seemed as if there was a scene applicant difference in IQ between Northern Europeans in the world at the upper end, and Southern Africa, Africans on the other in sub Sahara and sub equatorial Africa. And as the sort of information began to be assimilated, it got people very upset. And again, none of this matters to you or to me on an individual level, because there is no specific correlation. And that in that sense, in other words, I can be part of a group, let's say, I'm part of an Indian immigrant group in America who happened to have, I think, perhaps the highest IQ, and I at the same time could end up, you know, being not a particularly high IQ individual and vice versa. So, on an individual level in our lives, you and me probably doesn't make a whole lot of difference. But from an academic point of view, and also from a political and public policy point of view, it was very, very disturbing. So for instance, one of the things you saw happening from about 2000 onwards, was trying to D link IQ from the attainment at American universities. And so, where as a the, the poor representation of various racial groups in Ivy League universities, you know, was Asians were disproportionately up there, whites were kind of pretty much where they should have been. And non white groups tended to be underrepresented. Why? Well, because University isn't the be all be all and end all of life. But if it is to you, and don't forget, our our political leadership class has become disproportionately University centric. You know, General Eisenhower, not University centric, President Truman, not University centric, of course, way back before that Woodrow Wilson in the United States of America present very University centric, and Bill Clinton very University centric job, Joe Biden, well, sort of political, political life. I mean, he's never been anywhere else, but in politics. But again, the people who he surrounds himself with and the people who have advisory strong advisory role, you know, university centric world, so. So yes, if you believe that university, life is important, it's the be all and end all and that somehow you and your children are Nobodies, if you don't get a degree from a prestigious university. Well, in that case, I'm afraid IQ does count. And so not surprisingly, as I say, when it became a question of groups, and because IQ is so linked to university access, entrance and graduation, the AP tests, the LSAT tests, all of these things, very IQ centric. And so what happened was that non whites people began were represented in smaller than their numbers in the population. And that's when everything changed. And all of a sudden, nothing was more important than racial representation. And you all know, the history of the last 23 years in the United States of America, intensifying over the last five years, and intensifying even more over the last two years. And that's the direction in which it's been going. And so
Daniel Lapin 18:54
does IQ guarantee successful? As I said, No, it's it depends entirely. I mean, you could have a very high IQ and be kind of non functional in just in terms of the skills you need in life. So no, IQ only is important if you want to career in academia. If you want to be an airplane pilot, and if you want to get a qualification or credential the degree in mathematics, perhaps in medicine as well and a few other professions as well. But even that doesn't guarantee success. guaranteed success comes when you have all your five F's in life, moving forwards, growing onwards and upwards and in balance with one another. When your finances and your family when your physical fitness and your friendships are all in balance along with your faith. You got little to complain about in life, everything will be going well. But that in no way depends on IQ, none of that none of those things depend on IQ. So that's a that is a sort of brief summary of IQ. And now I'll give you a brief summary of wisdom and you'll be able to understand the difference between intelligence and wisdom.
Daniel Lapin 20:24
But before that, please visit the website Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. And do join all of us as a happy warrior. Go ahead, read up about it. And if you go on the website, Rabbi Daniel lapin.com, you'll find how to get access to the happy warrior website, which is wehappywarriors.com. And you too can become a basic member of the happy warrior community. I've told you in the past what the benefits of that are, so I won't go over it. Again. We don't have time right now. But go ahead and let us stand shoulder to shoulder together with one another, all as active happy warriors in order to improve our lives dramatically through our five F's wisdom, okay. First information. I remember I told you, you can measure IQ. And by the way, a lot of controversy now, because since about 2000 Science, which has become very corrupted by woke progressivism and secular socialism, has tried to downplay the significance of IQ. It's tried to denigrate the validity of the IQ test. And it has tried to disconnect IQs anything predictive? And the answer is, you know, it is predictive of certain things not have general success in life, but it is certainly predictive of certain things. And so today, it's considered very bad manners. It's very hard to get find out your IQ anyone else's. As a matter of fact, psychologists now are extremely uneasy about even administering the IQ tests, which everyone used to do. And there was a time while you were at high school, you everyone had their IQ tests done no more. That's not done. Because of the sensitivity about all it's going to come out that different groups. Well, yeah, if you do statistical calculations, you will see that different groups have different IQs. Yes, there are some very brilliant, brilliant people that aren't just in a very tiny universe of acquaintances that I have in the people in Zimbabwe people in South Africa. But statistically, it is true that in sub equatorial Africa, the IQ runs at about 70, which is, that doesn't mean any individual person is tarred and feathered. But in to whatever extent statistics is a tool, and it is a tool, that is a reality. Sweden, North Europe, IQ, much higher than that.
Daniel Lapin 23:15
So these are things that are very real, but also very sensitive, or when it comes to wisdom, there isn't actually a way to measure wisdom, right? Because wisdom is outside the area of science. And science is all about measurement. And so, if there's no way to measure Wisdom, what is it? How do you know about a well let me give you a clue, wise people can recognize wisdom. Now, that's a little bit problematic, because people without wisdom, well, they pretty much don't recognize wisdom. And, and that is why I think it was the Australian philosopher Karl Popper, who was talking about the side you know, being able to recognize wisdom and so on. And he said, Look, if a thug with a gun pointed at your head, is, is about to shoot you and you start talking to him. And you explain the the morality of taking a life and you explain that it could impact his life and you basically give a wise analysis of why he shouldn't shoot you. You know, he is going to shoot you because it takes wisdom to recognize wisdom. Wisdom is also using a phrase chosen by me for this purpose. wisdom is knowing how the world really works. Wisdom takes into account past and future as well as the present as a matter of fact, wisdom understands that the present is really the process that converts the past to the future, excuse me that converts the future to the past. Now, how do we distinguish between areas that respond to IQ and those that respond to wisdom? How do we do that? How do we distinguish between areas that respond to IQ and those that respond to wisdom? And there are some areas, many areas that sort of need a mixture of both? Well, the answer is, if it is more physical, then it's going to be a an IQ intelligence thing. If it's more spiritual, and spiritual includes anything to do with the human being, with freewill, the choice making decisions that humans uniquely possess, all of that is going to involve wisdom. In other words, the more human connected the issue is, the less likely it is to respond purely to intelligence analysis. So, you know, perhaps it'll be best if I give you some examples. And that'll be more helpful than trying to come up with better definitions. So the way that electrical currents behave in, shall we say, semiconductors, that's an IQ issue. That's an intelligence issue. Experiments in molecular biology, that's IQ, how to design an airplane wing for high altitude usage with high load bearing ability. That's IQ writing code for computers and software. That's IQ. How about wisdom, wisdom is much more tied to life success, because you can be a very, very good computer coder, and a very good aeronautical aeronautical engineer, and have a totally messed up life. But if you have wisdom, then you don't have a messed up life.
Daniel Lapin 27:08
So wisdom is very tied to life success. You want to know about building and nurturing and marriage. This has nothing to do with intelligence. This has everything to do with wisdom, economics, a whole area of economics, shockingly, in spite of the fact that for the last 100 years or so there's been an attempt to move economics into the area of science, and rename it econometrics. Because, you know, measuring is what science is all about. So we measure you can't. So there's a tiny little bit of economics, that is IQ based the statistical analysis and so on. But basically, because economics has to do with the financial behavior of human beings, it does require wisdom. The fact is that two human beings can be exactly the same. You know, theoretically, you have to make this a thought experiment, but they can be the same in age and earning history and skills and qualifications, etc, all the way. And after 40 years of a career, they could have wildly different net worths. Why, because saving and investing is an issue of character strength, it's not IQ, the person who spends all his money on consumer items, fancy cars and jewelry. It's not that he doesn't know that there's information about investing. It's that he doesn't have the wisdom and internal fortitude, to restrain himself from spending, and to save and invest. Now you're talking wisdom, not intelligence. Sales, if you want to succeed in sales in business in entrepreneurial activity, 80% wisdom 20%, IQ,
Daniel Lapin 28:57
a leadership leadership in the military leadership in business leadership in your family, leadership in in your church. 80% wisdom 20% IQ? What's the IQ part? The 20% You know, things that you become knowledgeable in in terms of management techniques, and so on and so forth. That's all basic IQ, but the skills of leadership 80% wisdom. So how do you increase your IQ? Well, you don't what you try and be happy with if IQs really important to you. You try and make sure that your grandchildren and great grandchildren will have higher IQ and even that there's no way to guarantee. How do you increase your wisdom? Well, you're doing that, in my view, you're doing that right now. Because the central theme of this show the rabbi Daniel Lapin show is understanding how the world really works. And there are a lot of people who are very High IQ and very low wisdom. There are some people who have very high wisdom and rather low IQ. They are people like that. But it's a little less common. It's much more common to find very intelligent people with zero wisdom. And one of those people turns out to be in my view, I don't know him personally, I don't I don't even know people who know it or do it. Well, maybe I do. But, uh, but, uh, Microsoft co founder, Bill Gates, right. Very intelligent, no question about it very high IQ. Probably 150. I think he once said, but wise. I know. Why do I say that? Well, because last Monday, he gave a speech at the Lowy Institute, which is a think tank in Sydney, Australia, by the way, their entire function is globalism, and one world ism and so on. Anyway, he spoke for them. And what he spoke about was, well, his Well, let me give you one of his sentences from his speech. And by the way, the Lowy Institute has a website, and you can go on and actually see his speech Exactly. And listen to exactly what he said. He said, I tend to see China's rise as a huge win for the world. He said, Bill Gates, I mean, that's 20% of humanity. So the idea is, he sees the world as one place, and China's rise is great for the world. Look, China's rise is not very good. If you're an American, it isn't. Because America's influence and that means the strength of your dollar, and in many, many, many aspects of being an American, are going to diminish dramatically the more that China rises, but Bill Gates sees it for as a world. Now I have to tell you that there is a marvelous verse in Genesis chapter 10, verse five, and I don't know if you want to hear it in the Hebrew, [Hebrew spoken]. Here's how the King James translated by these were the islands of the Gentiles divided in their lands, everyone after his tongue off to their families in their nations. I wouldn't use the word Gentiles I would have said by these were the islands of the nations divided in their lands. Anyway, the key thing is the word islands. And and let me tell you what ancient Jewish wisdom has to say about that. ancient Jewish wisdom says that God's plan for humanity was a pattern of islands. In other words, not literally islands in the ocean. But each nation its own island, obviously, with connections by air or by ship. And obviously, overland leaving the island analogy, everyone, obviously, connections, but the idea is that each island should, each nation should be able to develop according to its own wishes, and according to its own inclinations, and then all the other nations of the world are going to be able to watch each other. And that way, little by little, we will learn we will see what works best, what doesn't work best. And so the god centric view of the world, is that we should be a world of many different nations, trading with one another peacefully not fighting, but trading, and very opposed to the idea of one unified world government very, very opposed to that, because that defeats the whole concept. And, and that, of course, is exactly how the founders of the United States of America who by the way, were very wise people, they did know how the world really works. And the 10th Amendment to the United States Constitution says the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people, those founders were wise. They was what they said was, we're giving more power to each individual state, each state must have the right to do its own thing. But that way, the idea was the different states would look at each other, we'd see what works, we'd follow that we'd see what doesn't work with no, no to try there. That's how it works. But strengthening the federal government at the expense of the states is a process that's been going on for a long time the United States. And it is a very negative idea. The federal government has grown in strength that states have been weakened time and time again. One of the reasons that Donald Trump was so hated was they recognized that he understood and was in favor of state strength. dissenters of California, excuse me, DeSantis of Florida understands that Gavin Newsom of California who may well be the lead Democratic presidential nominee in 2024. Very much believes in set extension of centralized authority. Sacramento has been getting stronger and stronger and stronger in California politics, counties, and cities have become considerably less strong. So that's an idea if if you think in terms of wild globalism and the world, and we're all in this together, you're not a very wise person. That's just not the way things work. Well. And yes, the United Nations certainly a dreams of being a government with real powers over the whole world. Of course, the people there believe that how could they not, but the longer that takes, the better it will be. So when Bill Gates says, I tend to see China's rise as a huge win for the world. I mean, that's 20% of humanity. Yeah. China's rise is not a huge win for the world's a huge win for China. And China's rise is a great win for all the people of China and China itself. He says, in the United States, we have per capita gross domestic product five times what China have. So we have a disproportionate share of the world's economy. Really, like who, who says how much it shouldn't be distributed. Our redistribution of wealth, aha, now, now we see, again, to be a socialist means you're not a very wise person. And it's as simple as that, really. We only have to look at the history of socialism from the Tower of Babel onwards, to know that that's just not something that works really well. And so says Bill Gates, you know, I do think the current mentality of the US to China in which is reciprocated, is a kind of lose lose mentality. If you ask us politicians, Hey, would you like the Chinese economy to shrink by 20%? Or grow by 20%? They would vote Yeah, let's see misery those people that's not the English word. Not understanding that for the global economy, the invention of cancer drugs, a solution to climate change, hey, you know, we're all in this together. No, that's not exactly the way the world really works. And that is the way the World Economic Forum in Davos really works. That's the way Klaus Schwab of the World Economic Forum forum thinks, and that's largely how intellectuals in American academia think the, during the interview, Gates also said that the United States is politically in a weak state, adding that countries like China now need to play a bigger role in world governance. Well, I don't think I have to point out the flaws to you in that, and I think you can see for yourself that if we're talking about intelligence, yeah, no question about it. Bill Gates is a superbly competent software code. Well, it used to be isn't now, but he was unquestionably very, very bright guy. Wisdom, not so much. And so happy warriors. Remember, what you need to be proud of, and you need to be happy to have and what you can grow and increase, which you cannot do for your IQ is in fact, your wisdom. And I think a very good first step for that is becoming a happy warrior as I described earlier, and being part of the rabbi Daniel Lapin show. Until next week, I want to wish you all a week of growth in your families and in your faith in your friendships and your fitness and your finance. Until next week, I'm Rabbi Daniel Lapin. God bless you
