Conversation with Dong Geon Lee on Living a Life Rightly, Being an Atheist, and IQ Tests: Member, CIVIQ Society (1)
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2021/01/22
Abstract
This is an interview with Dong Geon Lee in South Korea. He discusses: growing up; a sense of an extended self; the family background; experience with peers and schoolmates; the purpose of intelligence tests; high intelligence; wide-ranging reactions to geniuses; the greatest geniuses; a genius from a profoundly intelligent person; profound intelligence necessary for genius; the gifted and geniuses; God; science; the tests taken and scores earned (with standard deviations); the range of the scores; ethical philosophy; social philosophy; economic philosophy; political philosophy; metaphysics; philosophical system; meaning in life; meaning; an afterlife; the mystery and transience of life; and love.
Keywords: atheist, Dong Geon Lee, intelligence, life, love, South Korea.
Conversation with Dong Geon Lee on Living a Life Rightly, Being an Atheist, and IQ Tests: Member, CIVIQ Society (1)
*Please see the footnotes, bibliography, and citation style listing after the interview.*
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: When you were growing up, what were some of the prominent family stories being told over time?
Dong Geon Lee[1],[2]*: There was nothing like that, and he told me to live the right life rather than just being nice.
Jacobsen: Have these stories helped provide a sense of an extended self or a sense of the family legacy?
Lee: In fact, I’ve come to live the right life, and the people around me are aware of it.
Jacobsen: What was the family background, e.g., geography, culture, language, and religion or lack thereof?
Lee: I grew up in a religiously free family, and now I am an atheist. Language used my native language, Korean.
Jacobsen: How has the experience with peers and schoolmates been for you?
Lee: About half of my classmates expressed hostility from jealousy to me, and some respected me. However, my close friend and I spent time discussing together.
Jacobsen: What is the purpose of intelligence tests to you?
Lee: At first, I got to know where I am now by IQ test, and now I use it to relieve my mood or to kill time. The IQ test also gave me pride.
Jacobsen: When was high intelligence discovered for you?
Lee: A year after I was born, I knew how to write words. And I started reading books when I was 4 years old, and now I make my own mathematical rules and make physical theories. And it was about a year ago that I found out that I was a high-IQ person.
Jacobsen: What do you think of such wide-ranging reactions to geniuses?
Geon: Unfortunately, I have no idea.
Jacobsen: Who seem like the greatest geniuses in history to you, even today?
Lee: I think Johann Carl Friedrich Gauß is the best genius.
Jacobsen: What differentiates a genius from a profoundly intelligent person?
Lee: I think it is a matter of achievement and popularity. And thinking is also a way to tell them apart.
Jacobsen: Is profound intelligence necessary for genius?
Lee: Not all geniuses are intelligent, but there are many geniuses among those with high intelligence.
Jacobsen: What are some of the more important aspects of the idea of the gifted and geniuses? Those myths that pervade the cultures of the world. What are those myths? What truths dispel them?
Lee: I think the method is a scientific fact. However, if they make people good, that belief is not bad.
Jacobsen: Any thoughts on the God concept or the gods idea and philosophy, theology, and religion?
Lee: Essentially wrong, but as I said earlier, I don’t want to get rid of it to make people good.
Jacobsen: How much does science play into the worldview for you?
Lee: Everything about me is science.
Jacobsen: What have been some of the tests taken and scores earned (with standard deviations) for you?
Lee: WISC 4 was 150(sd15) FIQURE was 150(sd15), IQhaven test was 166(sd15)
Jacobsen: What is the range of the scores for you? The scores earned on alternative intelligence tests tend to produce a wide smattering of data points rather than clusters, typically.
Geon: The range of the scores is between 147 to 166.
Jacobsen: What ethical philosophy makes some sense, even the most workable sense to you?
Lee: I think it is a philosophy of science.
Jacobsen: What social philosophy makes some sense, even the most workable sense to you?
Lee: I think science and Buddhism.
Jacobsen: What economic philosophy makes some sense, even the most workable sense to you?
Lee: I think it is liberalism.
Jacobsen: What political philosophy makes some sense, even the most workable sense to you?
Lee: I think it is social liberalism.
Jacobsen: What metaphysics makes some sense to you, even the most workable sense to you?
Lee: I have no idea.
Jacobsen: What worldview-encompassing philosophical system makes some sense, even th
most workable sense to you?
Lee: I think it is liberalism.
Jacobsen: What provides meaning in life for you?
Lee: Researching about physics and mathematics.
Jacobsen: Is meaning externally derived, internally generated, both, or something else?
Lee: Both.
Jacobsen: Do you believe in an afterlife? If so, why, and what form? If not, why not?
Lee: Nope. It can’t be explained by science.
Jacobsen: What do you make the mystery and transience of life?
Lee: By everything that is good.
Jacobsen: What is love to you?
Lee: It is primitive feeling of everything.
Appendix I: Footnotes
[1] Member, CIVIQ Society.
[2] Individual Publication Date: January 22, 2021: http://www.in-sightjournal.com/lee-1; Full Issue Publication Date: May 1, 2021: https://in-sightjournal.com/insight-issues/.
*High range testing (HRT) should be taken with honest skepticism grounded in the limited empirical development of the field at present, even in spite of honest and sincere efforts. If a higher general intelligence score, then the greater the variability in, and margin of error in, the general intelligence scores because of the greater rarity in the population.
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