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 have a friend who suffered a head injury and has become depressed at how much he now struggles intellectually. He was sent for many many medical tests, appointments with psychologists and psychiatrists etc only to discover that after his brain damage he still has cognitive abilities that put him in about the top 2% of the population. He had never realised until his injury that his ability was out of the ordinary, as that had always been his normal. He says he now lives his life in a state of feeling like he is constantly in a fog and everything is a struggle.

Which is my roundabout way of saying he's the brightest person I've ever met.

Define bright?

I once knew a 14 year old who could strip and rebuild a car engine as easy as I draw breath and restored a vintage mini to concors standard on his own beforemhe could drive. He lacked even basic literacy skils and is still not a confident reader in adulthood.

Given he was entirely self taught and had extraordinary practical, problem solving and deductive skills, I'd say him.

He didn't think it was anything special, but I was in awe of him

A guy I used to work with in the UK, when I first met him in a bunker in a government installation he was listening in on two bugged phone calls simultaneously. In one ear the call was Russian, the other ear was Arabic, he was taking notes in English.

It turned out later his previous job was designing the guidance systems for nuclear missiles.

My husband. I’m pretty nerdy (first from Cambridge) but he is way beyond me. He can think things I just can’t see (without explanation) and crucially as I age I begin to realise little things of what he said ages ago were true. He has a PhD and went to Yale for research. I’m quick but he has a depth of analysis I can’t reach without endless help! Sustained academic thinking/reading (in the Arts at least) really makes a difference to how articulate/analytical/precise people are compared to others. I also knew a man who did his PhD on Proust in 2 yrs. He was ferociously academic and a lovely bloke. Think he was a Prof with a tenured Chair whilst still in his 20s. Also met a carpenter once who could calculate like a machine - measurements/angles/conversions - just lovely to watch/see/hear specialists in action I suppose.

I have a friend who’s a bit like Cumberbatch’s Sherlock in that she picks up on what’s happening in a way most people just can’t. She notices detail and puts things together that no one else would ever think to. It’s intimidating and a little heady to watch her hone in on things. (Obviously she doesn’t quite manage the feats in the TV show, but she is shockingly good at deducing what is going to happen).

Another friend from uni didn’t go to any lectures, flipped through the books before the exams and got a first and course prize. Very annoying.

My boyfriend in 6th form was extremely intelligent. Particularly in maths. He wasn't really geeky either! He's now some managing director of a big finance company in the City I believe. He used to help me with my chemistry homework he just didn't seem to need to try. He just knew the answers. It amazed me!

I have a photographic memory which has been useful in the past. I could get good results in examinations because I could memorize loads of stuff and when at work I didn't need to look up some telephone number because they were all in my head (I was telephonist for BT)

I honestly don't know which person in my life is the brightest. I was lucky enough to be born into a family of Mensa members and marry into a family of incredible people. I went to school with so many people who have achieved great things. My ex was incredibly smart, and my husband is too. He tells me I am too, but I feel dumb around most of the people in my life because I never used my intelligence or made anything of myself.

If I had to pick one, I'd go for my father in law. He is a theoretical physicist and he had a severe stroke when he was head of the physics at his university. Doctors who looked at his brain scans afterwards said tgat the person those scans belonged to must be a vegetable because it wiped out so much of his brain. Yet within a few days he was back to doing algorithms in his head and beating people at chess again. He was able to go back to work and continue to shine in his field. His brain was just so used to making new connections and pathways that it found ways to ensure his mind was saved. His physical recovery was not as succesful, but he is an amazing person as well as one of the most modest and gracious people I know.

A lovely lovely man who was a teammate on my first job working in IT in the 80s. We were working with some incredibly complicated stuff and he just totally got it. He was so clever. Very sadly no longer with us, cancer is a bastard.

I have known a few. One woman with a PhD ex work colleague was intelligent but she had absolutely no common sense, she said this herself! Other people I have known have been intelligent but in different ways and in different areas. My mother was very intelligent and if she had of been born when I was she would have gone to university and done well, my daughter is highly intelligent too. I have a good iq /level of intelligence but my mental health is really poor and my psychiatrist says that my intelligence makes it worse due to over thinking about many things and variables.

I work at a uni so most of my colleagues have high intelligence, they can't half be stupid at times though

Love reading about all the different types of intelligence. I'm glad someone's already highlighted the difference between being intelligent and being educated.

A friends dd. When she was 5 she asked her dad for a cheque so she could join MENSA. Turned out she had already filled out forms etc. already.. she is now in her 20s, fluent in 4 languages including Korean and Japanese and doing a PhD in something very complicated no one except the elite few understand.. oh and shes also a really nice person and does triathlons

My sister. Top in her class at Cambridge as well as captain of a sports team there. Has gone on to be very successful in her career, and has a fantastic sense of humour and is generous to a fault. She was an extremely difficult act to follow at school and teachers would often sigh, shake their heads and bring up her name if I made any sort of transgression. She'd be very easy to hate because of that alone but the thing is she's so bloody nice and I love her to bits!

I went to Cambridge university. One of my friends was top of the year, and in one exam the tutor said they threw away the solutions and used his paper to mark everyone else’s! He’s also a really nice guy.

A colleague I used to work with. He was phenomenally bright, had a Starred First from Cambridge, done a PhD, written books in his field. He was also incredibly gifted musically. However when I worked with him he was in his 40s and was in a fairly junior admin role as he couldn't cope with any stress at work. He's a really lovely person.

My DS! Missed the 11 plus by a few marks .Went to all Boys Secondary then did A levels at another School .Went to a RG uni, now has a Masters in Chemistry .Also taught himself Guitar from the internet .(Obviously takes after his DM!.)

My Ds age 15. He has just been diagnosed with autism and that is having a massive impact on his life.

He is incredibly clever but will never be able to reach his potential because of his autism. At the moment he hates himself and says he will not be able to achieve anything in his life.

I've got a doctorate from Oxford (as does DH) and am a scientist so know lots of smart people. Some of the descriptions here sound like colleagues on the spectrum, capable of being able to retain lots of information easily and obsessive behaviour in some areas but although they have very useful skills they aren't the smartest. Trying to think who the smartest person I know is, there are a few and what links them is the speed of their understanding and their ability toget to the crux of the matter and their creativity, they all are very nice people who are generous with their abilities and encouraging of others. I don't really recognise this idea of someone who is so bright they can't cope with life, I think that's a rather lazy stereotype designed to make people feel better about themselves and is maybe based on people who are bright but have other issues in their life (lack of support from their family etc).

My friends, colleagues and I are all really bright. Not really a surprise as we are all in the same career with very high Uni entry requirements! Hard to single out one as cleverer than the others

IME people who "coast" through school and University without doing any work are usually lying about how little work they're doing.

Not me, breezed through with top grades and only knuckled down in my last year of my degree.

The brightest person I know is a friend of my DH.
I once went around his house and had a really in depth conversation with him about politics. He had his laptop open but I felt like he was giving me his whole attention.
He was actually carrying on two other conversations by DM, coding in Python and playing chess, all in different tabs.
I only took a look at the screen because hald way through the conversation he remarked "Oh, thats gone viral. Good." It was a chart he'd made earlier plotting average wages against trade union density.
Thats him on a good day. On a bad day he's too crippled with anxiety to get out of bed.

My DH. He is remarkable and thinks he isn’t but just has to work harder than others. He doesn’t realise that yes, he works hard but that’s part of intelligence and most people working their best wouldn’t come within a stones throw of him. He has a brilliant mind. Works in a very academic area and is constantly disappointed when he meets his ‘hero’s’ of the low quality of their work and thinking. He was top of his year at Cambridge and won 3 academic prizes on top. You should see him in a general knowledge quiz. He knows everything about every topic.

He’s not very affectionate though

I know lots of very clever people. Only one has a Phd (my OH! He also went to Oxford, got best mark in his year and subject and did a post doc), He also works incredibly hard and with focus because he works in a field he LOVES. He is also brilliant at thinking about issues. But gosh he's slow on the uptake sometimes with more everyday things and emotions! I know an incredibly clever doctor (I don't think they all are, which is why I remark on his intellect), and a farmer who used to be a police officer - joined the Met at 16 so has few formal qualifications. But he reads and reads and is, imo, completely, intellectually brilliant.