Salt Lake Telegram | 1935-04-18 | Page 4 | When the Profs Flunk

When the Profs Flunk undoubtedly r read a with glee the theother vJ 4 other day that a group of twenty five twenty five Princeton Princeton Prince Prince- ton professors while at a tea party parry decided to give themselves a general intelligence test ant and I that very few of them came caine even close to a passing grade They asked themselves 41 l ques ques- One of the professors managed to answer 19 of them corre correctly No other did that well I But before we crow too much over professorial professorial professorial frailty we might remember that those questions were really tough For instance Did Die or originate the fabulae Has the four-dimensional four of a cube 12 comers corners Are the roots of a general polynomial of degree higher than four complex numbers Now though they called this an intelligence test this seems far more to be a test of ot knowl knowl- edge Getting to the bottom of it it was even more a test of memory There are a lot of thi things gs learned in life not alone in college that men and women fail to keep fresh in their minds If f they ever have had the knowledge though thought lit it t is difficult to lose absolutely In such cases if f one manages to re remember nem where to go to tp refresh re- re resh fresh memory memory this is almost as good as remembering remembering bering jering it In n the end it is the application of knowledge that counts counts The whiz who re remembers remembers re- re members everything wit without out looking it up now and then and is able to use what he wants in instantly instantly in- in is the lucky exception in this world But the chap who has has' to look it up can can manage manage manage man man- age pretty well if Jf he has not also forgotten where to go for what h he lacks lacks- So though it is always very vey amusing to see seea a professor stub his toe toc just as it is to see a chair collapse as a fat man tries to sit down there here are a lot of bright people who would flunk ingloriously on a set of questions such as these wise men themselves