Aibu to ask you about the BRIGHTEST person you have ever known?

[managedmis]

Shameless copying from the tightest thread

I knew someone at uni (a UK uni) whose first language wasn't English, smoked dope for 3 years and did no work who got a first then offered a scholarship to Oxford for a masters. She was pretty clever.

You?

I was doing my masters at 28 and one of the others in the class confessed it was her birthday. Turned out she was turning 21. She'd stopped doing her Phd to do a masters that she thought would be helpful but was going back to the Phd the next year. And she'd stopped training as a professional ballerina when she was 15 because that was interfering with her uni studies. She mentioned this just in passing and the rest of us sat with jaws on the table.

My friends 4 year old. He is so articulate and his grasp of sarcasm, puns and irony is amazing in one so young. His vocabulary is way beyond your average and he has a brilliant memory too. He’s great company and it’s been a pleasure to see how he’s developed so far. I’ll be back to update you all on his stellar career and many academic achievements in due course

I can't think of anyone I always surround myself with un-intellectual people so that I look good by comparison😁
But I'm very interested to read about all the super brainy people 😁

My late dear Mum. She came to England from Germany in 1947, aged 16. Her Mother left her to live in Southampton with her uncle and aunt. She was enrolled in school, passed her high school certificate and it was decided she should become a dentist. My Mother also wanted to study languages but obeyed the family and became a dentist!

My former flatmate's boyfriend. Went to Cambridge, read PPE, and became a City stockbroker. He knew everything - could have the most amazing conversations with him. Sadly the lifestyle of a highflying stockbroker seemed to include copious amounts of cocaine and vodka, so he lost his job a few times, went to rehab a few times, but never really lost the taste for the booze. He died in his late fifties.

Similarly, a friend of DH's - astonishingly bright, brilliant at his job but again, became addicted to alcohol and cocaine. And Thai prostitutes. Lost the money, lost the plot, also died relatively young (early fifties).

There's something about having a particular kind of intelligence where I think they almost need something to dull their brains a bit. I think they never stop thinking about things, and it gets a bit exhausting and then they over do it.

I have a friend who knows lots about almost everything. She is very laid back, was a truant, a poor student but passed everything well. She helped me revise and knee it better than me in half an hour. She worked part time in charity work and has set up and run all sorts whilst getting in with everyone easily. She is happy and has great friends and knows what matters. She is very astute at understanding people and their motivations - I am good at reading people but she just seems to download them. She needed more money a few years ago so went back to a different area full time - universally adored and brilliant and headhunted left right and centre. She eschews lots of the offers not wanting the work but rather the life - smart cookie

A couchsurfer guest who stayed with us once - he was doing his postgrad in some obscure branch of theoretical physics and managed to explain particle wave duality to me. He not only understood Quantum Mechanics* he could explain it too. That's clever.

*And knew that anyone who says they do, doesn't.

I think I would say my Mum. She's a psychologist and autism specialist. What I love about her is she has the academic intelligence and kudos to be a professor and doing talks and research but she's also got the human and emotional intelligence to be getting stuck into things. She runs a special needs school and does one on one sessions, runs free youth clubs and consulting. She has literally given her life to autism and the thing that impresses me most is that that never stemmed from any personal tie to it. She started work as a young teacher and it all grew from there. She's given a lot of families and young people a lot of hope.

She's also a very sparky, funny woman. And she's a killer observer of people.

I have met a lot of very clever people, but the one I really remember was a Somali refugee client, who I represented in her successful application for leave to remain in the UK. She was left behind by her family as they were fleeing Somalia, because she became very ill, needing a roadside tracheotomy at one stage (she had an impressive scar). I met her a few months after she'd come to the UK. In that time she had learned fluent English and, despite not having any leave to remain herself at that point (as she had arrived later than the rest of her family, who already had leave to remain), was sorting out schooling etc for all of her her younger siblings in place of her (not very competent) father. She was amazing. I wish I knew what happened to her.

A very close friend of my dads son was an absolute genius in my eyes.

Got a first class degree in a tough subject from LSE (one of the 6% in '05)
His maths was impeccable.

Give him any sum, any equation. Anything. He'd solve it in his head in seconds.
He helped me with my maths when I was at school, explained things in a way I understood, with great patience and believed in me all the way (even though I was (am!) quite thick.)

His general knowledge was something else too. I used to go to him with the most random questions and he'd have answers, it was incredible.
Such a kind hearted, brainy, warm soul.

Unfortunately he hit hard times and turned to the bottle. Had a heart attack aged 32 and died on the spot.
So much talent. I miss him terribly

A colleague at work - she's just so clever and on top of things. She'll be a Permanent Secretary one day.

My cousin. He's an inventor and started in his pre-teens.

A work colleague years ago - in an intellectual area (strategy / finance bit of the civil service) she stood out for her intelligence, which took some doing (it was a team full of people with Oxbridge firsts and similar).

She writes an astonishingly witty and erudite email, can converse on pretty much any topic (from opera to management theories) with deep understanding and in general makes me feel both energised and slightly dim by comparison. All this while being a genuinely lovely person.

Myself

Me

My English teacher at school. She did an English literature degree at Cambridge (and got a first), before becoming an English teacher.

Then she decided she wanted to be a doctor so went and studied medicine at a top medical school.

She practised medicine for a few years, but then decided that teaching was the right career for her after all, and returned!

Someone I never met in real life. We used to post on a talkboard years ago, that was a small enough community that the regulars all “knew” each other pretty well. She was incredibly, awe-inspiringly intelligent. So widely read, and just knew something about everything, and more than most about a lot of it. But she just came across as incredibly interested in everything- there was no arrogance in it at all. I admired her hugely. Sadly she died a few years ago after a sudden illness took a turn for the worse, leaving a wife and two young children. I suspect a lot of people miss her still.

My mentor. He was a very senior military officer before he retired. Studied for an MBA then more degrees in his “spare time”. Has an amazing grasp of complex issues and world politics - and can explain them easily for me to understand

An old school friend of mine turned down Oxford! She's a Professor and published author now.

My best friend
She dropped out of high school and sixth form then went back to education in her 30s
Managed two masters and a doctorate
I was blown away by the book she wrote for her PhD - we are both history buffs
Meanwhile we both work in the VCFS - I duck paddle she is doing full time day job n training to be a social worker in her free time

My DP. He’s been to hell and back and he’s made a big fuck off success of himself. I’ve never met a man so clever and handsome. He’s literally a dream.

Is anyone else really struck by the preponderance of men posters identify as “the brightest”?

Depressing that we don’t automatically see women as “bright”

My DH. He is very smart. And modest about it. I see him when he is absorbed by something - he has a particular way of concentrating. The house could fall down around his ears and he would not hear it. DD2 is taking after him. She works out extremely complicated classical pieces on the piano with that same "type " of concentration. It is like the world disappears for them. And their eyes look funny in the concentrating time....

Quite a few women mentioned too Mouthy! Don't loose heart yet! :)