The Internet says that MENSA is looking for the top 2% and their IQ cut off is 132. I had thought the cut off was 150. They may have lowered their standards over time
I'm pretty sure that 132 has always been the Mensa cutoff. I've never been around them, but the second hand reports I've always heard is that the people who join are generally pretty insufferable about their feelings of supposed superiority - that its used as a crutch for insecure nerds to try and feel better about themselves. There are different recognised IQ tests, an example being the Stanford-Binet IQ test, and each test yields different results, so when you give a referent, it is important to say which test you took. Also, IQ is a measure relative to people of your own age. Statistically, as people get older, everyone slightly reverts towards the mean. If you give IQ tests to children you can get some wildly variant numbers, but if given to an equal group of 35 year olds, the numbers settle towards the middle quite a bit.
I would be curious how much it's weighted in selection. Probably not a whole lot. I had those scores, Eagle Scout, class president, sports, band, theater, future valedictorian, solid recommendations, pretty good essay, decent interview, and applying to the engineering school all stuffed into my application. Whatever stood out to admissions from all that, it got me accepted to a top 10 school with two school-offered scholarships that paid for 90% of everything. I earned that ****. Actually, my main scholarship was in honor of a professor my dad had had in class 30 years prior. That was pretty cool. I can tell you, having interviewed and worked with dozens of engineers since then, that the following things don't matter one iota: the prestige of the school you went to, your college GPA, and how advanced your degree is. And probably your IQ. The willingness to learn and especially to teach yourself is paramount.
I interviewed a guy who’s last name was Bob. He had a masters, was a vet, great referrals. I didn’t give a crap about that. I just wanted to see what a person with the last name of Bob was like. I also interviewed a guy who’s name was almost identical to a friend of mine who passed away. I ended up hiring them both.
yeah its curious these guys know square root then all sudden get a car loan for 29% from a sales rep thats got no teeth brain or ged
i had to interact with a chick named daisy dong. sorta get the giggles out first every time before i dealt with her
Smart guy, I liked him. He was 6'4" and built like a tight end. Women would get literally weak-kneed around him (I saw it happen). He had a history of steroid usage and infidelity before I hired him but he had cleaned his act up and was a devoted family man. He had just gotten promoted to a group headed by a lady (shocker) and died of heart failure at 38. Super sad. The other guy won me over with his nerd talk. He was tall and lanky and had shaggy hair and reminded me of Chewbacca. I was describing these translation devices we had deployed and he goes 'oh, like a protocol droid!' (like C3PO from Star Wars). Also a smart guy and had a bit of a limp from where he had fallen when he was shitface drunk and broken his leg in four places. He never drank again after that.
Quite a story in two paragraphs. Glad I asked. Too bad about Last Name Bob. Hate to see that happen to a guy who's finally cleaned his act up.
I took them several times in my childhood and adult life. I have extreme ADD. Before they knew what ADD was, schools wanted to know what to do with me since I would nail pretty much every standardize test but get kicked out of class constantly. The last time I took one was when I was 24 and officially diagnosed with ADD. I've tested as low as 140 and as high as 165 depending on how well I could stay focused. Edit: BTW, IQ has very little to do with success in life. Grit, determination, and forward thinkers have more of a direct correlation on success. A person with a really high IQ with average grit will not do as well as a person with average IQ that is determined. This has pretty much been proven. The guys with really high IQ and are super determined become Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Jobs, Bezos, and Buffet.
Everyone is interesting if you dig down enough. I like to hear people talk about themselves. People are fascinating.
And salesmanship. My brother & I both went to Texas Tech. Both graduated in 96. He did a restaurant RHIM degree and I did Finance. I was always considered to be the smarter of the two of us back then. But my brother has such an intoxicating persona. Everyone likes him. As with everything in my life, only 60% like me. I have a distinct persona. I'm proud of my kid brother. He's done far better than most of us will ever do, but his ability to connect with folks worked far better than any education.
