The debate about who is the smartest people in the world continues, but now they have reached a new level. Subjective assessments are giving way to research, and the criteria for comparison are becoming more impartial.

Russians

There are still not so many indicators that claim to be objective in calculating the level of intelligence of peoples. This is, firstly, the average level of IQ, secondly, the number of scientific discoveries made by representatives of the people in the course of history, and thirdly, the number of winners of scientific prizes, primarily the Nobel Prize.

In terms of IQ, Russians are by far not the first in the world today, occupying only 34th place in the ranking. This is partly due to the fact that testing is still not a recognized and relevant type of research in our country. There is a historical explanation for this: in 1936, the USSR issued a decree "On pedological perversions in the system of the People's Commissariat of Education", which banned any tests. The ban was only lifted in the 1970s.

In terms of the number of Nobel laureates, Russia is also not ahead of the rest (23 laureates against 356 in the United States). But the Russians have made a huge contribution to the intellectual treasury of mankind, thanks to the discoveries and inventions of their scientists. So, Russian engineers Yablochkov and Lodygin invented the world's first electric light bulb, Alexander Popov invented the radio, Vladimir Zworykin is considered the "father of television", Alexander Mozhaisky created the first aircraft, Igor Sikorsky created the first helicopter, the world's first bomber, Alexander Poniatov designed the world's first video recorder, Prokudin-Gorsky made the world's first color photographs, Andrey Sakharov created the first hydrogen bomb, Gleb Kotelnikov - the first backpack parachute, Vladimir Fedorov developed the world's first machine gun, Nikolai Lobachevsky made a revolution in mathematics ...

This list could be continued for a long time. If we recall such luminaries of science as Dmitry Mendeleev, Mikhail Lomonosov, Ivan Pavlov, Ivan Sechenov, then doubts that the Russians are one of the smartest peoples in the world disappear by themselves. And this is without taking into account the contribution to the world culture of our classic writers.

Peoples of Southeast Asia and the Japanese

The countries of Southeast Asia are consistently among the leaders in terms of intelligence. Professors Richard Lynn and Tatu Vanhanen (University of Ulster), authors of the study "Intelligence quotient and the wealth of nations" and "Intelligence quotient and global inequality" believe that this is due to high competition among students, with strict Asian discipline. Scientists have also found a diet rich in vegetables and seafood to be beneficial for the development of intelligence.

The first place in terms of intelligence among Asian countries is occupied by China, and especially its Hong Kong region, where there are special conditions for the growth of indicators in the natural and exact sciences. So, in Hong Kong, schools have recently become especially popular, in which students are encouraged to engage in ... study in their free time. This desire for knowledge is bearing fruit. In the ranking of education, Hong Kong was second only to Finland. The average IQ in Hong Kong is 107, the first in the world.

In second place after the Hong Kongers in terms of IQ are Koreans. The Korean education system is considered one of the best and most efficient in the world, students in Korea are willing to spend 14 hours a day on education. However, she also has a significant disadvantage: during the examination period in this country there is a wave of suicides.

Speaking of smart Asian peoples, one cannot fail to mention the Japanese, who are recognized leaders in the high-tech sector. The scientific leap began in Japan after the war, today the University of Tokyo is one of the best in Asia and is included in the ranking of the 25 best universities in the world, the literacy rate among the Japanese is 99%, the IQ level is 105.

English

Pyotr Kapitsa said that the level of intelligence of a nation can be assessed by the scientific discoveries made by its representatives. Having counted the achievements of the peoples, the scientist came to the conclusion that the British are the smartest nation at the moment. The British have indeed made and continue to make a huge contribution to world science. The names of such scientists as Newton, Faraday, Maxwell, Rutherford, Turing, Fleming, Hawking are known all over the world. Large among the British and the number of Nobel Prize winners, British scientists have received the award almost every year since its inception. 121 English scientists received the Nobel Prize.

In terms of the development of science, Great Britain occupies the first places even today, the citation index of British scientists is the first among the peoples of the Old World.
However, it must be said that since the late 1980s, the system of English education and science, having moved away from regulation and strict control by the government, began to lose ground. Education ceased to be elitist, and money began to be distributed for such research, for which they would not have given even a pound before. Hence today we have such a meme as "British scientists". Thanks to good funding, British scientists are doing a lot of research, the need for which for the development of science is doubtful.

Jews

The contribution of Jews to world science and culture is difficult to overestimate. Despite the fact that Jews make up only 0.2% of the world's population, according to 2011 data, out of 833 Nobel Prize winners, 186 Jews. Thus, there are 13.2 Nobel laureates per million Jews. The following Swiss and Swedes have this figure of 3.34 and 3.19, respectively. Jews became laureates 32 times in chemistry, 30 times in economics, 13 times in literature, 47 times in physics, 55 times in medicine, and received the Nobel Peace Prize 9 times. Of the 300 and a half American Nobel Prize winners, almost forty percent - 36.8 - are Jews.

Germans

Germany has been the center of European scientific thought since the Middle Ages. The first universities and scientific centers were opened here, people from all over Europe came to Germany for education. Johannes Gutenberg, Rudolf Diesel, Johannes Keppler, Max Planck, Gottfried Leibniz, Conrad Roentgen, Karl Benz are known to everyone. German philosophers Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer became the classics of philosophy. In terms of the number of Nobel Prize winners, Germany ranks third, behind only the US and the UK.

15 399

Our world is inhabited by all kinds of people with extremely varied levels of intelligence. Of course, almost everyone considers themselves smart, and it is very difficult to get an accurate estimate of our own intelligence. After all, our thoughts always seem smart in our own head, don't they?

Intelligence is very important. Especially in a professional context, high intelligence can be your best asset. But people who are less intelligent often have habits that make them stupid and can also be quite disastrous in a number of circumstances.

Here are five main differences between smart and stupid people.

1. Stupid people blame others for their own mistakes.

It's very conspicuous, unprofessional, and something a smart person would never do. If you consistently try to force your mistakes on others, you are demonstrating to everyone that you cannot be the sharpest tool in the shed.

Stupid people don't like to take responsibility for their mistakes. They prefer to blame others.

“You should never absolve yourself of guilt. Be responsible. If you had a role—no matter how small—whatever it is, own it,” advises Bradbury. "The moment you start pointing the finger at others, people start seeing you as someone who lacks responsibility for his actions."

Smart people also know that every mistake is a chance to learn how to do better next time.

A neurological study by Jason S. Moser of Michigan State University found that the brains of smart and stupid people actually respond differently to mistakes.

2. Stupid people always have to be right.

In a situation of conflict, smart people more easily sympathize with the other person and understand their arguments. They can also integrate these arguments into their own thought and revise their opinion accordingly.

A sure sign of intelligence is the ability to look at things and understand them from a different perspective. Smart people are open to new information and change settings.

Stupid people, on the contrary, will continue to argue and will not budge, regardless of any valid arguments against them. It also means they won't notice if the other person is more intelligent and competent.

This overestimation is called the Dunning-Kruger effect. This is a cognitive bias, where less competent people overestimate their own skills while underestimating the competence of others.

The term was coined in a 1999 publication by David Dunning and Justin Krueger. Psychologists have noticed in previous research that in areas such as reading comprehension, playing chess, or driving a car, ignorance leads to confidence more often than knowledge.

At Cornell University, they did more experiments on this effect and showed that less competent people not only overestimate their own skills, but also do not recognize that someone else's skills are superior to others.

Dunning writes: “If you are incompetent, you cannot know that you are incompetent. The skills you need to get the right answer are exactly what you need to understand what the right answer is.”

Of course, this does not mean that smart people always think that everyone else is right. But they listen carefully and consider all arguments before making decisions.

3. Stupid people react to conflicts with anger and aggression.

Obviously, even the smartest people can get angry from time to time. But for less intelligent people, it's a reaction when things don't go their way. When they feel that they do not have as much control over the situation as they would like, they tend to use anger and aggressive behavior to secure their position.

Researchers from the University of Michigan conducted a study on 600 participants with parents and children for 22 years. They found a clear correlation between aggressive behavior and lower IQ.

The researchers wrote in their paper: "We hypothesized that low intelligence makes learning aggressive responses more likely at an early age, and this aggressive behavior hinders further intellectual development."

4. Stupid people ignore the needs and feelings of other people.

Intelligent people tend to be very empathetic towards those around them. This allows them to understand the other person's point of view.

Russell James of Texas Tech University conducted a representative study of thousands of Americans and found that people with higher IQs are more likely to give without expecting anything in return. As it turned out, a smart person is better at assessing the needs of other people and, most likely, wants to help them.

"People with higher cognitive ability are better able to understand and meet the needs of others."

People who are less intelligent have a hard time thinking that people can think differently than they do and therefore disagree with them. Also, the notion of "doing something for someone without expecting a favor in return" is more foreign to them.

All times are selfish, this is perfectly normal and human. But it is important that we strike a balance between the need to pursue our own goals and the need to consider the feelings of others.

5. Stupid people think they are the best.

Intelligent people try to motivate and help others. They do this because they are not afraid to be clouded. They have a healthy level of confidence and are smart enough to accurately assess their own competence.

Stupid people, on the other hand, tend to pretend to be different in order to look better. They consider themselves superior to everyone else and can always judge them. Prejudice is not a sign of intelligence.

In a Canadian study published in Psychological Science, two scientists from Brock University in Ontario found that “people with low IQs tend to be more prone to harsh punishment, more homophobic, and more prone to racism.”

Many biologists believe that the human ability to cooperate contributed to our common development. This may mean that the most important sign of intelligence is working well with others.

Ivan Maslyukov

Director, entrepreneur. Creator of the international network of urban games Encounter.

1. A smart person talks with a purpose

At a meeting, by phone, in a chat. Conversation is a tool to achieve a goal.

Stupid people talk for the sake of talking. So they indulge their laziness when they are busy. Or they struggle with boredom and idleness in their free time.

2. Feels comfortable being alone

A smart man is not bored with his thoughts. He understands that important events and discoveries can occur within a person.

Stupid people, on the contrary, do their best to avoid loneliness: remaining alone with themselves, they are forced to observe their own emptiness. Therefore, it seems to them that something important and meaningful can only happen around them. They follow the news, tend to companies and hangouts, check social networks a hundred times a day.

3. Trying to keep balance

• Between external experience (movies, books, stories of friends) and own experience.
• Between believing in himself and knowing that he could be wrong.
• Between ready knowledge (templates) and new knowledge (thinking).
• Between an intuitive hint from the subconscious and an accurate logical analysis of limited data.

Stupid people easily fall into one extreme.

4. Strives to expand the range of his perception

A smart person wants to achieve accuracy in sensations, feelings, thoughts. He understands that the whole consists of the smallest details, therefore he is so attentive to trifles, shades, to the small.

Stupid people are content with average stamps.

5. Knows many "languages"

A smart person communicates with architects through buildings, with writers through books, with designers through interfaces, with artists through paintings, with composers through music, with a janitor through a clean yard. He knows how to communicate with people through what they do.

Foolish people understand only the language of words.

6. A smart person finishes what they start.

The foolish one stops as soon as he starts, or in the middle, or almost finishes, on the assumption that what he has done may turn out to be unclaimed and will not bring any benefit to anyone.

7. Understands that a huge part of the world around was invented and created by people

After all, a shoe, concrete, a bottle, a sheet of paper, a light bulb, a window once did not exist. Taking advantage of what was invented and created, he wants to give something of himself to humanity in gratitude. He happily creates himself. And when he uses what others have done, he gladly gives money for it.

Stupid people, when they pay for a thing, a service, an object of art, do it without gratitude and with regret that there is less money.

8. Follows an information diet

A smart person has a memory of facts and data that are not needed to solve current problems. At the same time, studying the world, he seeks, first of all, to understand the causal relationships between events, phenomena, things.

Stupid people consume information indiscriminately and without trying to understand the relationships.

9. Understands that nothing can be appreciated without context.

Therefore, he is in no hurry with conclusions and assessments of any things, events, phenomena, until he analyzes the totality of all circumstances and details. Smart very rarely criticizes, condemns.

A stupid person easily evaluates things, events, phenomena, without delving into the details and circumstances. He takes pleasure in criticizing and condemning, thus, as it were, feeling superior to that which is the object of his criticism.

10. Considers the authority of the one who has earned his authority

The smart one never forgets that even if everyone is of the same opinion, they can be wrong.

Fools recognize an opinion as correct if it is supported by the majority. It is enough for them that many other people consider a certain person to be an authority.

11. Very selective about books and films.

A smart person does not care at all when and by whom the book was written or when the film was made. Priority is content and meaning.

A stupid person prefers trendy books and movies.

12. Has a passion for self-development and growth

In order to grow, a smart person says to himself: "I'm not good enough, I can become better."

Stupid, seeking to exalt themselves in the eyes of others, humiliate others and, thus, humiliate themselves.

13. Not afraid to make mistakes

A smart person perceives it as a natural component of moving forward. At the same time, he tries not to repeat them.

Fools have learned once and for all the shame of making mistakes.

14. Knows how to concentrate

For maximum concentration, an intelligent person can withdraw into himself, be inaccessible to anyone and nothing.

Stupid people are always open to communication.

15. A smart person convinces himself that everything in this life depends only on him.

Although he understands that this is not so. Therefore, he believes in himself, and not in the word "luck."

Stupid people convince themselves that everything in this life depends on circumstances and other people. This allows them to relieve themselves of all responsibility for what is happening in their lives.

16. It can be hard as steel or soft as clay

At the same time, an intelligent person proceeds from his ideas about how he should be under different circumstances.

A fool is hard as steel, or soft as clay, based on the desire to meet the expectations of others.

17. Easily admits his mistakes

His goal is to understand the real state of things, and not to be always right. He understands only too well how difficult it is to make sense of the diversity of life. Therefore, he does not lie.

Fools deceive themselves and others.

18. Acts mostly like a smart person

Sometimes smart people allow themselves to relax and behave like stupid people.

Stupid people sometimes concentrate, show willpower, make an effort and behave like smart people.

Of course, no one can act smart always and everywhere. But the more you are from a smart person, the more you are. The more stupid, the more stupid.