High IQ is... merely high IQ

“Some think people with a high IQ can be omnipotent,
but that’s not true."

~ Kim Ung-Yong, World Recorder Holder for highest IQ score of 210.

It's very 'human' to seek easy proxies to 'know'.
To know the past.
To know the 'facts' now.
To know what's in the future.
By dusting off earth from rocks, staring into crystal balls, shaking a bamboo holder full of sticks, getting an octopus to pick out the winning soccer team...

This stems from a fundamental need to feel like we are in control.

We try to measure/estimate/predict everything, then attempt to use the measurements/ estimations/ prediction we have made.

Of course, mankind started to measure how 'smart' a person is. Many tests are devised, each claiming to be more 'accurate' than the previous. The more hoops one is able to jump through, the 'smarter' one is. The test outcomes become a fact that labels the test-taker for life.

Once this obsession catches on, the act of test-taking takes on a life of its own. The class of 'Smart-Chasers' emerge. To the 'Smart Chasers', anything or anyone who has been tested as 'smart' has to be the best. Not once has these Smart Chasers stopped to wonder if ace-ing maths tests really did mean that one would be the best leaders for the nation. But somehow the system is designed that way. Also, the more effort they put in to chase the smarts, the more special these 'Smart-Chasers' feel about themselves. When sorely lacking in talent, one can still feel special by defining effort as the barriers to entry.

Then you have a class of those who have aced the tests, the 'Smarts'. These are 'successful' test-takers who enjoy the extraordinary benefits and aura bestowed upon them for ace-ing the tests. Unwilling to give up these privileges, the 'Smarts' are unlikely to change the system that has brought them where they are. Most Smarts, even if they refuse to admit it, despise those who are not like themselves. No different from more traditional means of differentiation such as lineage, caste, race etc. To keep up the barriers to entry, to keep themselves special.

Mr Kim Ung-Yong is definitely intelligent, but not because he has the world's highest IQ. But more importantly, he has the honesty and courage to see through the bullshite and disregard the rubbish expectations and assumptions the world has made for him.

He asked himself,"Why must the person with the world's highest IQ be working for NASA?"

That's what makes him better than everyone else.