Concept in Definition ABC

There is general agreement that man is the only living being with advanced mental faculties. Those capabilities are summarized in the concept of reasoning. That is why it is said that we are rational animals. And the reason is based on the intellect.

People are surrounded by images, things and events. To order and understand all this, we activate our intellect, the ability to understand the reality that surrounds us comprehensively.

From the psychology and other related disciplines, an attempt is made to measure the human intellect. There is evidence (the tests of intelligence ) that evaluate the different mental capacities (spatial, verbal, logical, etc.). In this way, it is possible to know what someone's IQ is. It is a procedure that measures and specifies a value to the intellect.

In recent decades, the intellect is no longer valued as much as the main factor of understanding. A new concept has appeared: emotional intelligence. The management of our emotions

Y feelings It is important and we cannot affirm that we are intelligent if our affective and emotional life is a disaster because we do not know how to deal with problems related to the sentimental.

Reflection on the intellect has traditionally been done with respect to humans. However, ethology (the science that studies the behavior of animals) also analyzes the intellect of different species. It has been shown that some animals, especially mammals, are capable of processing information and consequently have an intellect.

In addition to the human and animal intellect, there is the artificial intelligence. It is knowledge that has been developed in recent decades and it certainly has many applications. The human intellect creates another type of intellect, the artificial one, and this can in some respects surpass the possibilities of the human mind.

It is believed that it was in the Middle Ages that the idea of ​​intellect arose. Medieval philosophers distinguished two sources of knowledge: faith and reason. Through faith man understands some ideas (God, eternity, etc). Through reason, the human being is able to understand the complexity of the world. And reason is expressed through the intellect. There is a wide debate about the intellect. Some currents affirm that it is based on the observation of the senses (empiricism). Other currents consider that the information of the senses does not explain all the processes mental, since there are ideas that do not require any experience based on observation (the rationalism).

Topics in Intellect