Thinking About Intellect
I am very familiar with the word intelligence, but was not that much with the word 'intellect' till i read an article by Swami Parthasarathy in my newspaper. now i think i know the answers to the following questions:
What is Intellect? Is it different from Intelligence?
Yes, there is a subtle difference. While intelligence develops acquisition of information (knowledge) from external sources: schools; universities; teachers; textbooks, intellect develops through individual effort. Through exercising the faculties of questioning, thinking and reasoning; not accepting anything that does not admit logic or reason. Any amount of intelligence cannot per se guarantee a developed intellect.
Intelligence is much like data fed into a computer system. A computer charged with a complete knowledge (information) of fire extinguishers, firefighting and fire escapes. All the knowledge stored in its memory cannot help its usage, without a software that can help it do so. A room, even though it has such a computer, if accidentally catches fire, can very well go up in flames,. The knowledge, the information, is of no use to you without an intelligent software - the intellect.
Similarly, one needs a powerful intellect to put the knowledge, intelligence acquired to practical use. That can help explain why even among millions of doctors graduating from medical schools only a few have discovered life-saving procedures, cures and remedies. Similarly, among millions of engineers only few can design something unusual like the Panama Canal or Eurotunnel. It is their intellect that renders their performance outstanding. Besides hindering success and progress, intelligence without intellect can indeed destroy peace and happiness in the world.
Not realizing the importance of the intellect in life, common education, makes no attempt to develop and spread it. Instead, it merely indulges in promotion of acquiring intelligence through surface reading of others periodicals and publications. Few go into the depth of any literature. Education, therefore, has lost its meaning and purpose. For generations human beings have turned into intelligent robots and are traversing through life without awareness, much less enquiring into the meaning and purpose of life.
I think, that the world today is in a state of chaos due to this perversion in human development - only intelligence and no intellect. That helps me explain why even highly educated businesspersons, professionals and scholars become alcoholics, are short-tempered and succumb to worry and anxiety.
It is such a mind that craves alcohol, loses temper; constantly harbors worries of the past and anxieties for the future. When the intellect remains undeveloped and weak, it is unable to control the vagaries of the mind. A powerful intellect, with or without academic distinction, can hold the mind under perfect control and direct action to spell success and peace. Most often the educational systems the world over are responsible for the debacle of the intellect. Education is becoming synonymous to information. Get information, memorize it, process it in the prescribed manner, and you become educated. Students are awarded a degree, a certificate, after passing an examination based on a set format. Depending on the rating of this examination, students become qualified for certain job, regardless of their other qualities. That is what is education today. That may be a pragmatic way to educate the masses of a populous nation, but it cannot desirable for its independent development. Apparently the powers that rule are not very keen that there is enough intellect in the society. To develop human resources in the real sense not just training sheep that follow herds!!
I conclude with a thought of Anthony De Mello:
"When you become conscious and aware, you become wiser. That is what you call real self-growth. Understand your pride and it will drop - what results will be humility. Understand your unhappiness and it will disappear - what results is the state of happiness. Understand your fears and they will melt - the resultant state is love. Understand your attachments and they will vanish - the consequence is freedom."
Rakesh Mohan Hallen