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I understand that there are two kinds of intelligence, and I had figured that out even without learning about it in Psychology. One that you pick-up or learn from your experiences and education etc...and one that coordinates how you pick up that experience and how it shapes your understanding. This is to mean, that an intrinsic intelligence inherited from ancestors guides what aspect of the experience of an event is picked-up and how we react to it.

That said, I also always believed that the distinction was not concrete. I always thought that it is not possible to tell them apart concretely. Both sort of diffuse into each other or to put it in another have a fuzzy or changing line that seperates the two.

Recently, I've read that the two kinds of intelligence- Fluid and Crystallize - are there. Former is independent of experience and learning while latter is not.

Is this something (the distinction) that can be established concretely ?

How can we say that the problem solving, sort of intuitive skills are truly independent of experiences or learning?

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  • $\begingroup$ well its tricky to question because what you "acquire" is dependent on either your inherent intelligence or your new understanding and its difficult to differentiate what part comes from (pre-trained behaviour from millions of years of evolution) and what part comes from newly learned stuff. So in your example "problem solving" could be your natural predisposition to act in certain way or perhaps you saw your dad solving it in certain way and your picked it up! I $\endgroup$
    – gfdsal
    Feb 21 at 16:23
  • $\begingroup$ Exactly! Isn't it misleading to say then that fluid intelligence involves reasoning and abstract problem-solving which is minimally reliant on learning? This is mentioned in wikipedia and other places. To me there seems to be no clear way to clearly distinguish between fluid and crystallized intelligence and therefore no clear way to associate mental tasks to them. ( like reasoning to fluid intelligence) $\endgroup$
    – Lost
    Feb 21 at 17:02
  • $\begingroup$ yes correct, but also remember the termininology arises from theories/experiments. Eventhought we cant concretely say what part of the problem solving skills falls between the two, but I can imagine a hypothetical experiment where two twins or siblings are seperated say decades apart and one could analyse the problem solving traits to see what is inherited from ancestral genes and what is acquired from experience $\endgroup$
    – gfdsal
    Feb 21 at 20:32
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How can we say that the problem solving, sort of intuitive skills are truly independent of experiences or learning?

This is an old question but I'll answer it in the hopes you're still interested. Problem-solving doesn't require experience or knowledge because you are making deductions from any knowledge, whether it's new or old.

Personally, I don't believe that the distinction between fluid and crystallized intelligence is unfounded. There is no physiological or psychological basis for it. It's a concept popularized by Raymond Cattell a long time ago, who simply relied on inductive reasoning. In other words, it was simply a guess on how the brain works. Unfortunately, Psychology students just learn it without ever questioning whether there is a legitimate basis for it. And, now it's an established fact by the Psychology community.

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  • $\begingroup$ I didn't vote this answer down, but there are a lot of bold claims in your answer without corroborated evidence. We work differently to many SE sites, where we have a strict policy that all answers should be backed up with reliable references so that the answer can be independently verified, regardless of the reader's/answerer's background. If you still have trouble with this, feel free to visit the help center or Psychology & Neuroscience Meta. Unreferenced claims can be challenged and lead to deletion of your answer. $\endgroup$
    – Chris Rogers
    Aug 21 at 4:44

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