I have not seen it specifically mentioned in many articles about different intelligences, but I am convinced that if a person is not naturally endowed with intelligence in a certain area, the speed at which information is reaching the brain exceeds the speed at which it can be processed.
I imagine this to be a bit like pouring fine sand through a funnel.
If we pour it slowly it will flow nice and smoothly but if we increase the flow, no matter how fine the sand, it will eventually stop flowing through the funnel and start backing up, and eventually won’t flow at all. If we shake the funnel or put pressure on the sand it may flow in a lumpy, inelegant kind of way or maybe in sudden bursts, but it will not be smooth and effortless.
The result of overload of processing information on the brain is that the individual, no matter how hard they try, will never really shine in that particular area. Their funnel opening is too narrow.
If they are naturally endowed with intelligence in that particular area, their funnel opening will be bigger so more can flow through without getting blocked up.
That is why I couldn’t play field games that well (no matter how hard I trained – and sometimes I trained very hard) but I need only hear a tune three of four times and I can not only memorise it, but unless it is very complicated, am usually able to bang it out on a musical instrument a short time later.
While I have some sympathy for those who have to listen to me, I myself know that my brain can process musical information quickly but the bodily/kinesthetic information required for team games backs up like the sand through the funnel, or, indeed, like traffic backing up at a junction where the lights don’t stay green long enough to let enough cars through.
(Of course, practice, practice and more practice will always widen the funnel. However, I believe that if we are naturally endowed in the particular skill we are practicing, the funnel will widen a lot quicker than if we are not).
Now to the important bit!
it’s easy for those who process things quickly to behave in a superior manner to those who don’t, if they are of a mind to do it.
An obvious manifestation of this is in the example I used, i.e. sport, where men and women who are endowed with high levels of both spatial and bodily/kinesthetic actually set out to be superior to others so that they can win the match.
If, for example, other parameters (such as fitness, weight, age, gender etc.) are generally equal, those who are fast processors will be better at the most important aspect of decision making, that is, in the split-second that is available, imagining what might happen, not only in the immediate future, but in the future that is a few steps beyond the immediate.
Another manifestation of superiority (this time in the world of linguistic/cognitive intelligence) is the highly competitive, win-at-all-costs world of the points system and subsequent college education where superiority is highly prized and those who can’t keep up are jettisoned.
Now let me go back to the Chapter on Cause and Effect here briefly.
If I do something, I probably know that something else will happen, and can usually predict the most likely something else from a relatively small number of options. This is one degree of separation between cause and effect.
However when the predicted something else happens it is likely that there will be a number of other possible somethings else to consider after the first something else.
And so on – with each step getting more complicated.
A good example which might be familiar to you would be playing draughts or chess. Selecting the best option from the first action (the first cause) to a few steps downstream, and determining what might happen depends on selecting the most likely effect from many different potential somethings else. The accuracy of our prediction will be based on:
~ Our ability to process the information (the width of the funnel).
~ Our experience – i.e. how we have integrated knowledge gained from doing the same thing, observing and taking mental notes of the effects.
~ Our ability to stay in touch with the reality of previous experiences, their effect on us and our environment.
~ Our ability to make connections between what happened in the past and what might happen in the future.
While it is obvious in sport, because it is played out in public view for our entertainment, or mainstream education, where people are graded into A, B, C etc. I believe that it is true throughout all the intelligences.
And here’s another important bit!
If we find it difficult to process information quickly it is probable that every decision will be influenced by what will offer immediate success in the first step, rather than what would be the best option to ensure – or at least optimise – success in the long term.