by Wayne Ramsey

Created on: March 24, 2007   Last Updated: April 30, 2007

Intelligence plays a major role in a variety of facets of the modern world. Intelligence however has a variety of different meanings, which all revolve around the concept of knowledge, but have quite different meanings, regardless.

One of the biggest concepts of Intelligence in my world, is when we talk about the intelligence gained by spying on other countries. Since I am military, it is very important to know what is happening in another country to know whether or not we are at risk. Also so that we know how to invade another country if we need to retaliate against them. Iraq is an area where intelligence is extremely important. Without this knowledge of our enemy, we would be fighting blind, without any real success. With our intelligence, however flawed it may be at times in regards to Iraq, we are still able to win major battles, and take on substantially fewer casualties, because we know far more about our enemy than they actually know about us. Sometimes of course, it doesn't appear this way, but it definitely is.

The other form of intelligence is that which we relate to computers and technology. While they don't have a physical capacity for intelligence, intelligent people have created these machines to allow us to process our knowledge and learn more efficiently. With these machines we are now more capable than ever of learning and retaining material in a much shorter period of time. We also don't necessarily have to learn everything that we previously would have had to know. This is because we can allow computer programs to process this information for us. This is true in the world of math, accounting, business, and a variety of other industries. While it is important that we have a background, we don't have to know everything anymore.

Then there is stand intelligence and education. Education is now transforming the way in which we are paid. We are expected to know more, to have more schooling, and to be a professional in the industry without having any true experience. This intelligence has pushed many people to work harder to obtain the money required to gain the education that is needed to make decent wage. Because of this change, it is also obvious that we are becoming much more of a service based economy than ever before, with most of our manufacturing jobs disappearing in favor of those jobs that require far more education and knowledge in order to be successful in that industry.

Overall, knowledge and intelligence are everywhere. A few hundred years ago it wasn't even necessary to have any formal schooling in order to make money as a merchant or to obtain power. It took quite some time before education became important and before jobs even required an education for even the more entry level positions. Now even the entry positions are requiring that college is required especially if you ever want to move above that position.

It is quite obvious how important intelligence is in modern society as those with the most status and power seem to be those that were the most inventive and intelligent. They found ways to achieve that put them ahead of their peers and allowed them to step outside of the crowd. In the modern world, we are virtually invisible without our intelligence.

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