Setting the Scene:

At school I was what would have been termed a nerd. In the 1970s the preferred insult was “swot.” I was socially awkward — these were the days before people were routinely placed somewhere on a spectrum — and I found refuge in study.

I aced my O-levels and A-levels, received a first at university, and later took a MENSA test and passed the threshold. By conventional standards, I was intelligent.

But was I?

I certainly possessed certain skills: information retention, pattern recognition, an ability to navigate conceptual problems. But as a functional human being? Barely.

Jump forward half a century and I now find myself writing essays about relational intelligence. And suddenly I realised something slightly embarrassing: I was using the word intelligence constantly without ever really stopping to examine what I actually meant by it.

Am 'I' Intelligent?