{"id":5906,"date":"2026-05-26T02:41:03","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T02:41:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/?p=5906"},"modified":"2026-05-26T02:41:49","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T02:41:49","slug":"what-makes-someone-smart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jugular.org.au\/index.php\/2026\/05\/26\/what-makes-someone-smart\/","title":{"rendered":"What makes someone smart?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n \t<\/i> Read Time:<\/span>4 Minute, 31 Second <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n

Saif Alam edited. Ara Downey<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think as medicine students, we hear a sentiment like this more often than not: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou\u2019re in medicine? You must be so smart!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a fair assessment to make. Admission into medical schools is only becoming more and more competitive with each year, with this year\u2019s applicants expected to get ATARs in the high 99s. Considering this, it\u2019s easy to conclude that you just have to be smart to outcompete everyone else that applied. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But something about this idea nagged at me: Was my admission into medicine because I was \u2018smart\u2019?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the bulk of my adolescence, I believed that intelligence was something innate. I can trace my first exposure to this idea back to a conversation between my high school math tutor and my dad. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou need a certain IQ to be at the top. I think Saif is better than most at maths.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though I didn\u2019t realise it, that comment would define my perspective on intelligence for many years after. It was as if my subconscious mind had reshaped itself then and there. Perhaps a big reason that comment stuck with me was my own insecurity: growing up in an immigrant household where academics can be seen as the be-all-end-all, hearing that from someone I considered a mentor deeply satisfied me. I recall concluding that I was \u2018smart\u2019, and integrating this into my self-identity; this was reaffirmed by family and friends emphasising accomplishments that made me seem \u2018smart\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Except none of that really felt real.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There were numerous occasions where a math problem would stump me for hours, and even after solving it, something didn\u2019t feel right. I needed something intuitive; simply memorising a solution I didn\u2019t understand felt like a weight pushing on my skull. I asked questions of multiple teachers, constantly, because I couldn\u2019t wrap my head around things like chemical colourimetry equations. I compared my past paper marks to my peers, and time and time again, I found myself scoring lower than them. Why? If people say that I\u2019m smart, why do I feel the opposite?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was cognitive dissonance at its finest \u2013 a battle between my desire to uphold the expectations of my the people around me, and my sense that I wasn\u2019t who I was perceived to be. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t until almost a year after graduating high school, when I encountered this substack article<\/a>, that I first allowed myself to reconsider my perspective on what it means to be smart. The author Qureshi suggests that our brains are like machines, composed of both hardware and software. Hardware, he proposes, consists of one’s processing speed and working memory — the capacity to build solutions from constituent parts, to calculate and interpret information with ease. This was what I had always believed to be the bulk of what people viewed as intelligence. Qureshi, however, also introduced the idea of software. He suggested that this was something anybody could learn to \u2018download\u2019, but it would require an act of \u201chonesty\u2026 and bravery\u201d. Honesty, in this context, is required to reflecting upon what you\u2019ve learnt and truthfully examining whether you actually understand what is happening. It allows you realise that there are gaps in your understanding which you must fill. Bravery, on the other hand, is needed to seek out what is needed to fill in these gaps — to have the courage to tell someone \u201cI don\u2019t understand\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This model of intelligence unravelled some the of knots in my perspective. I had never imagined that what I had seen as a flaw could actually be a pathway to become more intelligent. Curiosity bolsters understanding. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I cannot lie; I was still sceptical about the sentiment that \u2018software\u2019 could truly override the \u2018hardware\u2019. However, I discovered that some of history\u2019s brightest minds have echoed this perspective themselves. Isaac Newton, for example, is quoted as saying, \u201cBut if I have done the public any service this way, it is due to nothing but industry & a patient thought.\u201d Similarly, Albert Einstein famously stated, \u201cI have no special talent. I am only passionately curious\u201d. Perhaps this is just humility, but to me, it feels like proof that anyone is capable of becoming intelligent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite all of this, I still don\u2019t believe that being \u2018smart\u2019 was what got me — or any of us — into medicine. Even with this flexible, learnable model of intelligence, I still don\u2019t think of it as a thing that anyone simply possesses, even myself. Instead, I believe the most important things are curiosity and a willingness to dedicate oneself to learning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Note: There was honestly many things I wanted to talk about in this article that I didn\u2019t get the chance to include \u2013 the debate between being smart academically versus being smart in games or hobbies, other forms of intelligence such as emotional, the nihilistic view that there will always be someone smarter than you (thus investing time to foster intelligence is futile) and a deeper exploration into \u201cimposter syndrome\u201d. I\u2019ve linked a few substack articles that inspired me and covers some of what I missed out on below:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\ud83e\uddf7great things require patience, not perfection.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\ud83e\uddf7everything is a win when the goal is to experience<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\ud83e\uddf7how to live with the discomfort of learning (instead of running from it)<\/a><\/p>\n

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