My most common experience with people calling someone "smart" is finding that the person knows many facts. Wechsler thought that an intelligent child would have picked up many facts from school, reading and general living so one of the questions in his test is "How far is it from New York to Paris?" Binet and his later American co-workers thought that an intelligent child would be able to use logic well so in their test, one of the questions is "Scientists have found the skull of a 10 year old boy in a graveyard in Spain. They think it is the skull of Christopher Columbus. What is funny about that?" I have met many people, children or adults, who might be confused or simply silent in the face of either question while still being intelligent.
When a person gets a good idea, one that helps herself and others, I consider that person intelligent, whether or not they answer a question with what someone else thought was the 'correct' answer. Most days, I see or hear something that seems notably intelligent to me from all sorts and ages of people, many of whom have the distinct impression that they aren't very "smart".
But aside from intelligence, there is a related but separate property of people: intellectual hunger, much the same thing as curiosity. The person is much like the heroine of "Main Street" by Upton Sinclair. Such a person may lead any sort of life in any era and do any sort of work but if given a chance, they will usually attract books to them. They will wonder about the world. They think, they ponder, they reflect and they wonder, that is, question. Since knowledge is expressed in words, they will be interested in talking and reading. A good word in my opinion for such a hungry mind is "intellectual". I have tried to talk with college students about the possibility of their being intellectuals and many of them do not seem to have an idea of what has sometimes been called "the life of the mind." Being a person of letters has often been connected with the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) since these religions of the Bible have often expected their followers to develop literacy so that they could read that book.
But mechanics, actors, politicians and artists often have excellent memories and imaginations and use them to perform difficult or complex actions and feats, mental, physical and social. So, high levels of intelligence do exist in people who are not concerned with symbols or so-called book learning. As far as I am concerned, someone who watches tv news or listens to broadcasts or podcasts might have an ongoing curiousity and internal involvement with world developments or scientific issues without even being able to read in any language at all. Such a person would still be an intellectual.
(Improved by Dr. L.S. Kirby)
