And here we have empirical (zeal) evidence that should make you reconsider calling someone a "dumb jock". Rugland calculated in his head what a PhD in Physics worked out on paper. We call it coordination. I look at it as another facet of intelligence.
> Rugland calculated in his head what a PhD in Physics worked out on paper.
Besides that the problem doesn't begin to approach PhD-level...
You could probably say the same thing of me when I'm running or cycling. But whatever calculations my brain performs, the results are not accessible to myself or to anyone else; and I can't tell my brain what calculations to perform, so I can't tell anyone else what angle to lean at, and if I go to the moon I will have to let it work out for itself that gravity is not a universal constant.
You could also say the same thing when a cat twists in midair to land on its feet, "using" the principles of angular momentum. (Scare quotes because the cat has no idea what angular momentum is.)
Rugland's feat is certainly impressive. (And in a different class to my examples, in that he doesn't get constant feedback; if my balance is wrong I can adjust, if he kicks wrong the ball misses. But you could describe my feedback-integration using complicated physics as well, so I don't think that invalidates my point. I'm pretty sure "knife throwing" and "blindfold juggling" would have been suitable examples, but I don't personally possess those skills.) And I'm certainly not saying he's stupid.
But to call this intelligence, seems to be extending the word far beyond its usual boundaries.
I wonder if there is a way to make the results of those calculations visible? i.e. you can't calculate an intersection of two arcs, but if a VR environment showed you a ball and said "Throw another ball to hit it", could you then get a good approximation? Just thinking out loud.
> The main lesson of thirty-five years of AI research is that the hard problems are easy and the easy problems are hard. The mental abilities of a four-year-old that we take for granted – recognizing a face, lifting a pencil, walking across a room, answering a question – in fact solve some of the hardest engineering problems ever conceived. ... the most difficult human skills to reverse engineer are those that are unconscious.
Perhaps you should contemplate the phrase and its usage. The term "dumb jock" is always referring to dumbness, or a lack of care for, academic and intellectual pursuits. That's it. Your pedantism is confounding.
