Alien(ating) Intelligence

Intelligence is a problematic subject to study. For one, it manifests itself in many ways, some of which are difficult to measure.

The more we study other animals the smarter they seem to be. But how smart are they exactly is hard to tell, because the way their brains work is so different from ours. What looks to us as play might actually be part of some complex social interaction that we don't understand. 

It's not just animals either, as even plants and mushrooms are shown to communicate. But concluding that this is a sign of intelligence isn't easy, because it's so difficult to define what "intelligence" even means in this case.

The same issues arise with the possibility of intelligent life outside Earth, only the complexities are even more profound. How could we understand intelligence that has developed in an another world, since we are struggling so much to understand its various forms on our own planet? 

Even if we encountered real space aliens, it might be difficult to recognize them as intelligent beings, let alone understand their language or motivations. In fact, we might not even recognize them as being alive, as "life" is still something we can't even define properly.

And of course, there's the hot topic of Artificial Intelligence. When machines finally become sentient (which is another term that lacks proper definition) and surpass us, we may not be able to even realize it's happened.

Unless there are some unmistakable signs, of course.

But we don't really need to talk about AI, aliens or animals to highlight the topic. Even within our own species, if the intelligence gap between individuals becomes too large, they will have trouble communicating with each other. Studies suggest that people with a very high IQ often aren't as successful in life as one might expect - they tend to feel lonely and frustrated, as they feel so different to the people around them. Mental health issues also appear to be more common among highly intelligent individuals.

Which is perhaps something we should pay more attention to, especially in our schools.