Allt börjar med att Linda Leopold vill bli smartare. Efter att ha klarat Mensas inträdestest blir hon del av en brokig, intelligent skara (lastbilschaufförer, matematiker, flöjtister) som löser rebusar och diskuterar livets stora frågor. Men Mensa är bara början. Där ovanför hägrar en rad världsomspännande sällskap med allt snävare antagningskrav.
I Smartast i världen tar journalisten och författaren Linda Leopold med läsaren på en spännande resa in i IQ-sällskapens hemliga värld. Nyfikenheten för henne från det vardagliga umgänget i svenska Mensa till Thessaloniki, Dubrovnik, New York och Harvard. Hon möter människorna bakom de högsta IQ-talen och ställer sig frågan: Hur blir man egentligen smartast i världen?
Intressant läsning! Jag har undrat en del över hur IQ korrelerar med intelligens och hur relevant det faktiskt är med såna begrepp, och jag tycker att denna dök ned i dessa frågor och lyckades besvara vissa av dem på ett bra sätt!
This book would fit right in with Malcolm Gladwells early works - but Linda is an even better writer - also I hope she tries writing something like a international thriller one day set in this Mensa world, something tells me it could be great.
Written almost like a thriller this is a book about for me a very interesting subject, intelligence. Just like Moonwalking with Einstein, the author immerses into the world of the topic. When Foer participates in memory championships. Linda enters Mensa and later on high IQ societies as she find herself having an IQ of 150+. Does these writers know they have a gift before writing or is the gift easy to achieve? According to some in both "Moonwalking with Einstein" and "Smartast i världen" it's the later, but I'm not convinced. Linda's book starts out very good with a history of the field of research around intelligence and then later goes through all the secret societies around IQ and the people considered to be the most intelligent in the world. It's here the book starts to slow down and become less interesting even if the question why all these societies with so much intelligence have achieved so little is very interesting...
An easy to read, and interesting book about a intriguing topic. A genuine interest and curiosity about what intelligence are, and a during the hunt - an insight into more or less exclusive secluded clubs for the most intelligent.
The subject at hand closes in on fundamental questions that are more actual than ever in Sweden. Namely how we see gifted people, and especially kids in schools today. And why it's so against the norm to stand out, why intelligence almost is a bad thing.