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A two-year old from California is the youngest American to become a member of Mensa:
Kashe Quest may be a two-year-old but her skills include naming all of the elements on the periodic table, identifying all 50 states by shape and location, learning Spanish and deciphering patterns, according to her parents.
"She has always shown us, more than anything, the propensity to explore her surroundings and to ask the question 'Why,'" Kashe's father Devon Athwal told CNN. "If she doesn't know something, she wants to know what it is and how does it function, and once she learns it, she applies it."
The Athwals said that as soon as Kashe said her first word, her skills developed rapidly. Soon she was speaking in sentences that contained five or more words.
Through their daily observations, it struck the family that their daughter might be advanced for her age.
A 4m15s video on YouTube shows her in action.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @12:04PM (2 children)
At the rate she's going, she'll probably design her first IED by the time she's five.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @01:35PM
I'm sure Tribecawld Quest faced the same rigorous testing as all mensa candidates do
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Tork on Saturday May 29 2021, @08:08PM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Kell on Saturday May 29 2021, @01:08PM (9 children)
Mensa is an intelligence test to see if you're smart enough to avoid paying for a meaningless Mensa membership.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @01:20PM (1 child)
MENSA is where you get the High School Experience you missed out on , when you are 30+.
Meet my wife via wife, via MENSA. Married and dropped out. Still married after 34 yrs.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Sunday May 30 2021, @06:31PM
I noticed that the membership was heavily dominated by men, though not sure what the ratio was. 2/3rds men, maybe? That still true, now?
(Score: 2) by looorg on Saturday May 29 2021, @03:17PM (1 child)
They do charge for the test to. They are not as bad as Scientology tho.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @07:09PM
They should use that in the promotional material. Yeah, we're snobby bitches where 1 extra IQ point means I am right and you are a dumbass, but hey we're cheaper than the Scientologists.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @11:43PM (4 children)
I got in based off my SAT scores, but I admit I joined Mensa. That first year I attended one of their get-togethers. I didn't renew my membership. (In my defense, that was back in pre-internet days, so there was no way to know but find out for myself.)
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 30 2021, @01:34PM (3 children)
Ah yes, Mensa are a fun bunch. [archive.is].
I've no issues with them as such, each to their own and all that. but decided way back based on the antics of people I knew who were in that particular clique that it wasn't for me.
I revel in my (assumed) dumbfuckedness, besides, you do have to ask yourself, would I really join an organisation which allowed the likes of Jimmy Saville and Gary Bushell to become members?
I think not...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 30 2021, @01:51PM
https://ekuriren.se/eskilstuna/efter-fylleslaget-pa-hotellet-mensas-ordforande-kallar-medlemmar-for-javla-idioter [ekuriren.se]
You have to run it with some translate site yourself but basically at a yearly meeting about five years ago the whole thing ended in a drunken brawl. The hotel they had the event at had to summon the police to break up the drunken party.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Sunday May 30 2021, @06:49PM (1 child)
I've never been that hot on joining Mensa, for the same reasons. I don't need a membership with them to feel secure about my own intelligence. And I am wary of the snobbishness of it all.
Also, having high intelligence in common, and nothing else, doesn't make for much common ground. I used to think everyone of intelligence should be guided by their genius to the same answers on the important questions of life, but am less sure of that now. Shouldn't all or almost Mensa members agree that Global Warming is real, caused by us, and a problem? What about religion, should they all be agnostics or atheists? Should they all lean liberal? Agree with everything on RationalWiki? Have the sense to discern and reject woo? But there are people who do very well on IQ tests, yet totally miss the boat on rationality.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 30 2021, @07:54PM
You certainly revealed your own biases, which you are entitled to. Most of them are not a sign of intelligence, though. They are makers of a particular tribalism.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by SomeGuy on Saturday May 29 2021, @01:23PM (1 child)
Give her a smart phone with some clips of Family Guy and in no time she will be drooling on the floor, purchasing mindless crap, loving blue LEDs, and worshiping an imaginary sky fairy like every other 'merican.
Otherwise when she gets older she will come to the sad realization there is no place on this planet for anyone with a brain anymore and shoot herself.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @07:13PM
No no, MENSA is just the bottom rung of high IQ associations. If she works hard at becoming extra douchey she might get recruited into the Prometheus Society or an even more
expensiveexclusive group of nauseating underachievers.(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @01:34PM (2 children)
So we can finally get working fusion by the time she graduates college
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @07:18PM (1 child)
Something tells me we're going to get a book of poems instead.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @11:33PM
No, it'll be like when that Jew woman took all the credit for the Black Hole visualizer thingy even though 850,000 out of its 900,000 lines of code were written by one dude, and the only thing the Jew woman actually did was change the color of text on a label, perhaps she also resized a dropdown to make it more readable.
The worst part was that the dude who did all the work was forced to simp and tell all the meanieheads to back off his colleague. If those were the days before woke bullshit, it would have been her that got cancelled for trying to hog all the credit rather than he risking getting cancelled for not going out of his way to defend the bulbnosed Jew harpy who took all the credit for his hard work.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Saturday May 29 2021, @01:36PM (16 children)
As Kell suggests above, being invited to Mensa is something of an intelligence test. Accepting the invitation is a failure.
So, a two year old is precocious. She's unusual, but only that. Unusual. As noted by one of the anchor ladies in the video, you see no phone, tablet, ipod, or even television. Wow. The child apparently lives in the real world. Unusual. But, no, she's not exhibiting any super genius traits yet.
What they are doing is, setting the child up to be a spoiled, entitled Karen type of person. And, setting her up for eventual failure.
Just let the kid be a kid for a couple more years. At least let her get into elementary school before making a huge fuss over her. Mensa? They're just going to use the kid for PR purposes. The fact that the parents have pushed the child into public view at age two suggests that they will play along with the PR people.
Kinda reminds me of those parents who push their toddler daughters into a modeling career.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Saturday May 29 2021, @02:10PM (1 child)
"I don’t want to belong to any club that would accept me as one of its members" - Marx, G.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Tork on Saturday May 29 2021, @08:10PM
"Any club that won't let me in is stupid and and everyone in it eats poop." - Tork, aged 6.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @03:01PM (1 child)
I have a cleaner rephrasing of your take, I think.
No matter how smart/dumb the child is, the parents are idiots. You can tell that by the joining of MENSA and the pushing of a 2 year old into the light.
I just feel sorry for the kid, and I can only hope the publicity will lead to saner adults contributing to the whole thing to improve hopes of a normal childhood.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @07:22PM
It's a great point.
What high IQ society - presumably consisting of psychologically wounded former prodigies - would put a 2 year old on the front page? One gets the impression the grown ups are aiming for reflected glory and/or sympathy about the problems of being too smart ohhh pooooor me.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by looorg on Saturday May 29 2021, @03:25PM (6 children)
There are quite a few things about this article that are odd. I get that this is mostly supposed to be a feel-good article targeting parents with toddlers but it's really quite stupid.
While some of the things mentioned in the article are impressive for someone that is two years old it's not exactly necessarily a sign of a high IQ. There are idiots, of various ages, that can memorize the phonebook, when those existed, and while impressive it's not exactly a sign of have a high IQ.
The article is very vague on the actual testing. Apparently if one trusts the family and CNN things are very different over at MENSA in America but over here they don't actually administer the real test to toddlers age two.
They don't normally test anyone that is under 18 years old. I doubt things are actually that different. But there are slight differences between the various countries and what tests they approve and what scale they use. Monitored and supervised testing by them is preferred (cause they charge you per test taken, $35 or so, if successful there is an annual fee of about $40) and you have to be at least 18 years old, there is an exception every now and then where they run the test for 16-17 year olds but it's just a few times per year. But they don't actually test children.
There is a gifted children program but that is not the same, it's as noted mostly bases on estimates and observations and I am not even sure it's actually for the children but more of an ego-boosters for the parents to have them feel superior for their future little potential genius.
What they have probably done here is the WPPSI, or something similar, which is a development test for preschoolers, mostly used to see if they are retarded or not, but most of that is based on judgements, observations and estimates by the tester. There is no reading, writing or anything like that involved. Testing children in this high IQ regard is horribly inaccurate at best and mostly just estimates. It's not even the actual purpose of the test.
Secondly they don't really give you an exact set in stone figure or that is to say the number is not fixed, the 146 in this case is yet more estimation and complete bullshit. All they really care about is that its in the top percentile and that varies somewhat depending on the scale but it's usually 130+, 131+ or 135 and above. If they gave the number 146 to the parents that is yet more bullshit and a number they just pulled out, the scale doesn't tend to go that high or is even that accurate. It's just an ego-boosting estimate at best.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @07:50PM
Yep, the reality is that assessing the intelligence of somebody that young, is not easy. It's worth noting that at that age, very few children are actually assessed for their intelligence level unless something is already suspected to be off and even then, it's not typically what one would normally consider to be IQ or equivalent.
It's far more useful to just give the kid access to whatever stimulating materials you can get and worry about the ultimate intelligence level later on when they're actually mature enough to be measured in a reliable and valid way.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Sunday May 30 2021, @02:54AM (4 children)
My experience is dated, and other SN members my age and older have recounted different experiences. However . . .
Starting in 3rd grade, we were subjected to testing multiple times throughout our school years. That first test put me in 99th percentile plus, with a disclaimer that they couldn't measure accurately above the 99th. I took a total of four tests administered by the same group before I graduated, plus the SAT and ASVAB tests, and a couple others whose names I've forgotten. All of which went into my school records. Long story short, my school system was obsessed with identifying intelligent kids, for all of my twelve years in the system.
In retrospect, it seems that it is entirely up to the individual school systems how often testing is performed, how much weight is attached to the testing, and what they do with/for the child based on that testing.
Some kids were rapidly pushed through the public school system, and into college by age twelve. I'm sure followup studies have been done to see how all those kids fared in life.
Another study might be interesting. I'm sure no one has ever looked into how all the testing might harm a child. Being identified as very intelligent or super intelligent can and does cause resentment among peers, and even among family. Being singled out as "special" is not always a good thing.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by looorg on Sunday May 30 2021, @11:20AM (3 children)
But what kind of tests was it? IQ or just development tests? They ran development tests here early in elementary school, to determine if you were slow and had to have extra teaching or be put in some kind of remedial or advanced class or could stay in the normal lane. In the final years of elementary school and the high school equivalent they ran tests to see and compare nation wide in various subjects but mainly math and languages. This is what later became or was replaced by PISA. But they are not IQ tests.
There is an SAT equivalent here but it's voluntary and it's only available when you are 15-16 years old (and older, there is no real upper age for it you could pay and take it when you are 90 if you want) and it's not really an IQ test either. It's more of an aptitude test to see if you have what it takes for higher learning, college and university. It acts more as a supplement to your normal grades. There is a math and/or logic part but most of it is reading comprehension, there is a mini-essay part and there is a word part with lots of words they ask what they mean.
I think the first somewhat IQ-ish test one here was for military service. It was heavy on the pattern recognition, that is common with IQ testing, with figures and number series. There was also multiple questions asking you to rotate figures in your mind to see what it would look like on the other side etc.
Question might be how you would perform the comparison or control group for such as a study. Would you hold some "special" or gifted students back to see if they later became happier (highly subjective)? I guess the best you could do is follow up on all the gifted children and see if they later became gifted adults or they eventually turned normal. It would probably be an ethical nightmare to run that study if you had to leave children behind so to speak.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday May 30 2021, @12:34PM (2 children)
That first one I mentioned was run by the National Educational Development Test company or corporation, or whatever. It was a development test, but it purported to measure IQ as well. We, the kids, weren't supposed to have access to all the crap behind the test, but, I read everything sent to my parents, as well as a lot of the stuff the teachers got. Believe me, they stressed strongly how all their work and assessment correlated to intelligence quotients.
Testing covered things we had been taught, with sections for spelling, math, English, and there were sections for things we had never been taught at that point in our education. Among the various sections, there was a test for the geometrical recognition you mention. Whatever else might be said about the tests, they were comprehensive, and I had no idea when, where, or how I learned the concepts needed to solve some of the problems. Algebra, geometry, and coding - for third grade kids? But it was all there.
As for holding some kids back - some of that was done by parents. My father, for instance, resented the idea that one of his kids might be smarter than he was. "No, you're not running off to some home for super smart kids. You're no genius, you're just barely smart enough to come in out of the rain!" So, whatever opportunities were available in those early years were shut off by my father. Of course, I would be just one data point in such a study. Having millions of data points to work with would be interesting.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 31 2021, @04:02AM (1 child)
I've always wanted my kids to be smarter than me. I'm 3 to 4 standard deviations above the mean, clearly above the 1-in-1000 level, with an IQ that is probably somewhere in the 145 to 180 range. (points per standard deviation varies by test) It is really not easy to get that in the next generation. Average the parents, throw away 40% of the distance from the mean, apply a standard deviation of 12 IQ points, and that predicts the IQ distribution of any children.
I really tried. I found a woman who seemed to be smarter than me. Unfortunately, despite her small-town Catholic background, she wasted her amazing DNA. Instead of ending up with me, she ended up with advanced degrees (wasting 7 fertile years) and experience doing software development in Europe (wasting 13 fertile years). She comes back to the USA with baby fever, compromises or abandons her faith to try conceiving with a boyfriend at age 40, miscarries at age 42, and ends up barren. Why do smart women screw up like this?
Meanwhile, I have to settle for a woman from a broken home in the ghetto. She was at least pretty, with a barely-smart IQ of 120, and very Catholic. I got 13 kids out of her. The prediction for my kids is one genius, one kid at IQ 100, and the distribution centered on IQ 123. (very roughly) It's not terrible, but it hurts. I'm feeling r-selected, not K-selected. I think about the introductory monologue to the movie Idiocracy a lot.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R/K_selection_theory [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 31 2021, @10:38PM
So-called smart women do not reproduce for all the stupid reasons you gave.
Turns out excessive intelligence in women is maladaptive. Intelligence in men on the other hand is more positive. Women just aren't meant to compete with men, and this "smart" woman saw that as her goal: be a man, not a woman. It doesn't get any dumber than this from a reproductive perspective.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Sunday May 30 2021, @02:53AM (2 children)
Yep. And I suspect what she's exhibiting is not remarkable intelligence for a 2 year old (or even more than slightly above average IQ) but rather, an eidetic memory, which isn't all that unique in young children.
And if she's so smart.... why is she still wearing diapers? I was completely housebroken at 10 months.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday May 30 2021, @03:23AM (1 child)
Potty training equates to intelligence? Maybe, but I'm not convinced of that. If it were that simple to predict a kid's intelligence, women would have figured that out long ago, I think. Some of the kids I've known might support your idea, others not so much. There are probably stronger correlations between early potty training and social skills, and potty training and mental health.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Sunday May 30 2021, @04:10AM
Maybe, maybe not, but potty training seems like a rather obvious thing to do with a kid supposedly that smart.
As to the rest...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eidetic_memory#Prevalence [wikipedia.org]
===
Eidetic memory is typically found only in young children, as it is virtually nonexistent in adults.[5][6] Hudmon stated, "Children possess far more capacity for eidetic imagery than adults, suggesting that a developmental change (such as acquiring language skills) may disrupt the potential for eidetic imagery."[6] Eidetic memory has been found in 2 to 10 percent of children aged 6 to 12. It has been hypothesized that language acquisition and verbal skills allow older children to think more abstractly and thus rely less on visual memory systems. Extensive research has failed to demonstrate consistent correlations between the presence of eidetic imagery and any cognitive, intellectual, neurological or emotional measure.[13]
===
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by knarf on Sunday May 30 2021, @06:48PM
> Just let the kid be a kid for a couple more years.
Fully agree, she'll have to develop her social skills just as much as she needs to develop her analytical skills.
> At least let her get into elementary school
Yes, but better make sure that this school does not try to suppress her curiosity, does not try to foist any of those newfangled critical theory-related racist theories and practices like "critical race theory" on her. Especially given that these people live in California since schools in that state have really turned into racist training camps.
> Mensa
Means "table" in Latin and is most useful in that sense - table, canteen, student cafeteria, etc. Mensa-the-organisation has never appealed to me, probably because I do not like ivory towers. I like to converse with smart people but I prefer "normal" smart people over self-selected smart people.
(Score: 1) by In hydraulis on Monday May 31 2021, @05:52AM
Look at her shirt in the linked article. They're politicizing her. CNN and her parents acting in concert to play the race card.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @02:34PM (6 children)
There goes any credibility mensa had left. A 2 year old? Oh and she is "diverse", gee golly.
How to tell society wrecking communists have infiltrated your institutions....
You can gnash your teeth and scream at me if you'd like. Reality, it be like it do.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @02:47PM (5 children)
Institutions and businesses aren't even trying to hide their racism and sexism anymore.
Biden and his Democrats even excluded White farmers and White business owners from US govt covid support programs.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @04:12PM (4 children)
And they mark me troll as if you can hide the obvious. Yea a fucking 2 year old who can't read is a "genius". Oh my god, she wants to know about her surroundings! She learns! Big brain material right there.
This is OK to you? Would a 12 year old surgeon? Xir's skin color is all the medical degree xe needs. If you won't let them do your bypass surgery, you're clownist.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Saturday May 29 2021, @08:20PM (3 children)
I agree that that the troll mod was inappropriate. I would have gone with funny. Imagine being that threatened by a 2yo's skin color!
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 30 2021, @09:26PM (2 children)
Thank you savior, for explaining to me how I think and feel. The blatant agenda is just in my head and all those "compliments" and special considerations are completely genuine. I sure love getting singled out and falsely propped up due to my skin color. Can't wait for the SN race filter so I can experience it online.
The current "mensa" crowd may not see through it but I definitely can, and I'm not the only one.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 30 2021, @09:59PM
Waaa waaa waaaaaaaaa wonk numnums waaaaaaaa
(Score: 2) by Tork on Monday May 31 2021, @02:46PM
"Brittle" is rarely a word associated with strength.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 4, Interesting) by srobert on Saturday May 29 2021, @03:25PM (1 child)
I joined Mensa when I was about 40. Actively met with a local group for a few years. The experience showed me that IQ's don't correspond very well to intelligence. But she's obviously very smart. As I recall Mensa has a scholarship program. At the rate she's going she might be able to take advantage of that before she's 10.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 30 2021, @08:01PM
Wisdom and intelligence are not the same thing.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @03:49PM (1 child)
The front page says zero comments for the last few articles even tho there are clearly comments. Is the DB crashing again?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 29 2021, @04:13PM
>> Is the DB crashing again?
No. Two-year old Kashe Quest has taken up hacking... we're all doomed!
(Score: 3, Informative) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Saturday May 29 2021, @06:27PM
If they've got a seriously gifted kid on their hands, they should go to people who know how to meet such childrens's needs. Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted is probably better than Mensa and certainly better than CNN.
If she's 98th percentile, then when she gets to a high school of 700 people there will be 14 comparably intelligent people to talk to. But if it's much more, there are all sorts of issues that need to be handled just right.
(Score: 2) by sgleysti on Saturday May 29 2021, @06:33PM (3 children)
The fact that this bright youngster was raised in California shows that proposition 65 is improving human capability by removing neurotoxins from the environment. Pretty soon every youngster raised in California will be this smart.
We're finally reversing the terrible legacy of Thomas Midgely Jr.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 30 2021, @12:26AM (2 children)
Can’t tell if sarcastic, perhaps I can write a comment the can apply to both interpretations :
Still not going to match lake Wobegon
(Score: 2) by sgleysti on Sunday May 30 2021, @02:45AM
I have a very weird sense of humor. This kid just seems like an outlier.
I do think putting tetraethyl lead in gasoline was a disaster, and I do think it's a good idea to keep neurotoxins out of our environment.
Prop 65 might go a little too far, but I actually don't know enough about it to say with any certainty.
(Score: 2) by sgleysti on Sunday May 30 2021, @02:47AM
Love the Lake Wobegon quote, by the way. Thanks for that.
(Score: 2, Offtopic) by sgleysti on Saturday May 29 2021, @10:08PM
Can this bright youngster count the number of comments posted in reply to the main page stories of today? This website sure can't; they're all reading zero.