MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES THE POSSIBLE HUMAN

THE GAP BETWEEN SCIENCE AND THE POPULAR PERCEPTION
May be wider in the area of human mental process than for almost any other topic—with the possible exceptions of global warming and losing weight. Scientists and researchers toil away in their laboratories and clinics, trying to accumulate an agreed-on body of knowledge about the human biocomputer and its capacities. Meanwhile, educators, parents, business managers, publishers, writers, and advisors of every stripe are left to evolve a street-level understanding of how we think and how we might think better. It would seem that the exchange of knowledge between “gown and town” could be much richer and more useful than it has been. For example, one of the charming “scientific facts” that seems to have become firmly embedded in the popular consciousness is that we humans use only a small part of the brain’s thinking capacity. This seems eminently reasonable—especially after having read or watched a typical day’s “news.” However, somewhere in the foggy zone between science and experience we’ve developed a peculiar cliché:“Well, studies show that we only use 7 percent of our brain’s capacity.” The percentage number varies, but is almost invariably low. And it’s usually an odd number: 5 percent, 7 percent, but sometimes 10 percent. The next time you hear someone—including yourself—make such a “scientific” pronouncement, you might pause and ask the speaker:
“By the way, how do scientists measure the brain’s capacity? Do they measure it in thoughts per second? Megabytes? Megahertz? RPM? Furlongs per fortnight?” There is no credible method for measuring mental capacity; we don’t even know how to define it. Nevertheless, this “fact” has remained popular for a long time. Unfortunately, the journey we’ve embarked on in this book must necessarily traverse that foggy zone between science and experience.My academic friends are probably already appalled at my cavalier acknowledgement of Gardner’s multiple intelligence theory, which many feel has little basis in research. Some will take me to task for not being sufficiently “rigorous” in my assertions and in the evidence I adduce for their support. Some will cry “foul” in protest of what they see as prostituting the whole concept of intelligence as the academic community has traditionally defined it—for allowing the barbarians to overrun the palace. And some of them get really mad about it. At the same time, many of my colleagues in the business sector, where I earn my livelihood, seem convinced that even if there are multiple intelligences, so what? It doesn’t matter.The competitive process sorts it all out: the cream will always rise to the top. All you have to do is hire the smartest people you can find or afford and pay them well. Maybe they’ll act a bit smarter if you treat them nicely, but beyond that, why concern yourself with trying to make them any smarter? The smart ones will make it to the head of the pack anyway.This is the same logic that governs the educational system. The difficulty presented by the gap between science and experience in this case lies in the confusion of terms like smart, intelligent, intelligence, skill, talent, and thinking ability. Clearly, they do not all mean the same thing in the academic world, and the secular world seems rather confused about what they do mean. In the discussion that follows, I have no aspiration to narrow the gap between science and experience, but I do recognize an obligation to explain what I myself mean when using those terms and others related to them, and to explain what I believe is possible.The best I can hope for is to request an armistice with both gown and town, while I attempt to trace what I believe can be a practical framework for thinking about thinking: practical intelligence.