Emotional Intelligence

[Political_Chucky]

Has anyone ever read this book? I'm still in the process of reading it, but its very interesting. http://www.danielgoleman.info/ei/index.html

The book talks about how the IQ is not what defines our intelligence, but our emotional intelligence ( EI) which is categorized by our social lives and our intellect together. It argues that it isn't neccessarily the smartest people who become successful, but people who have the social aspects of life. It also argues that our IQ(which can be defined by tests) cannot determine who will be more successful as people of lower IQs that show better social interaction are the ones who come up on top.

I really don't know the authors politics, but he does have some good ideas in his introduction such as having EI taught in schools, or the teaching of social and emotional learning(SEL). In simpler terms, it would teach students about empathy, how to interact with others, and why our body reacts differently when we feel different emotions. According to the book(which is updated in a 2005 version), these educational programs have been taught more in private schools. What does everyone else think?

[Mariam]

Sounds interesting..

It might be useful after all,coz EI is another major fuck up of my life.

[BlessedBesse]

In all fairness, I haven't read the book. But I was a psych major in college, and one of my professors mentioned EI in a class discussing psychometric rating. She seemed to think that EI was pop-psych drivel with little to no real-world validity. But she thought that about IQ too, so go figure.

[Faux Real]

Originally posted by [email protected] 08, 2007 05:22 am
It might be useful after all,coz EI is another major fuck up of my life.
:huh: I find that hard to believe...

Standard IQ's don't mean shit, other than how well you've memorized and been successfully indoctrinated into a laughable excuse for an education system.

This E-IQ does sound interesting, and like the more appropriate of the two tests to measure one's ability to fit into society as a whole. Though of course the workplace needs no emotions as of now, we're nothing more than resources. Nobody seems to care here in the US about another's personal issues, resulting a very alienated population.

Maybe it'll be implemented in a post-capitalist society...

[Political_Chucky]

Exactly. IQ tests are shit.

One part I like about this book is how Daniel Goleman(the author) explains how we actually have two types of mindsets that spawn our personalities.


"These two fundamentaly different ways of knowing interact to construct our mental life. One, the rational mind, is the mode of comprehension we are typically conscious of: more prominent in awareness, thoughtful, able to ponder and reflect. But alongside that there is another system of knowning impulsive and powerful, if sometimes illogical-the emotional mind.

The emotional/rational dichotomy approximates the folk distinction between "heat" and "head"; knowing something is right "in your heart" is a different order of conviction--somehow a deeper kind of certainty--than thinking so with your rational mind. There is a steady gradient in the ratio of rational to emotional control over the mind; the more intense the feeling, the more dominant the emotional mind becomes-- and the more ineffectual the rational..This is an arrangement that seems to stem from eons of evolutionary advantage to having emotions and intuitions guide our instantaneous responce in situations where our lives are in peril--and where pausing to think over what to do could cost us our lives."


I recommend everyone to take a look at this book though. It can really make you take a look at yourself and help you with your own social problems.