Let’s come back to that question.

In the title I make the statement that Intelligent does not mean Smart. We often conflate the two — understandably, since they overlap — but they are not the same.

Why Is This Important?

You might wonder why, on a blog about enjoying life, mindfulness, health, and generally getting the best out of life, I’m suddenly diving into definitions of intelligence.

You’ll see in a moment – because it is something I believe is fundamental in the way our world is evolving and will become key for all of us in the way we need to evolve with it.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock (or perhaps you’re a Quaker — more on that later), AI is touching almost everything. Some of us actively use tools like ChatGPT or other LLMs (Large Language Models). Others encounter AI in more subtle ways — like thinking you’re chatting to a customer service agent when, in fact, you’re speaking to an AI bot designed to sound convincingly human.

Intelligence Is Not Smartness

Smartness generally refers to how well someone performs: getting things right, answering quickly, seeming clever, sounding polished.

Intelligence, however, is about something deeper: the capacity to absorb information, process complexity, recognize patterns, adapt to new situations, learn from experience — and, crucially, to sometimes get things wrong, recognize those errors, and self-correct.

In fact: someone can be highly intelligent while not always appearing “smart” in a particular moment.

Think of intelligence as raw cognitive ability — the engine. Smartness is about how well that engine performs in real-world situations.

“That was very smart” doesn’t mean the same as “that was very intelligent.”

Is It Intelligent To Get Things Wrong?

Surprisingly, yes — if mistakes are part of adaptation and learning.

Intelligence includes tolerance for error, provided the person (or system) can:

• recognize mistakes
• learn from them
• adjust their model of the world accordingly

In that sense, a child learning to speak is highly intelligent — making constant mistakes but refining their language quickly.

Sometimes, people who never appear to make mistakes are simply staying within very safe, familiar territory.

The Easy Mistake We Make With AI

Now we arrive at the crux of the issue — and why this distinction matters more than ever.

When AI gives us answers, we instinctively trust them. After all, these systems have access to the entire internet, vast amounts of training data, and are learning constantly — why wouldn’t they be right?

But that’s exactly the danger.

Think of what AI provides not as “knowledge” but as vast amounts of data. Data is not the same as wisdom, or even correct information.

When you ask an intelligent human a question they aren’t completely sure of, they’ll usually qualify their answer — offering caveats or shades of uncertainty. AI, by contrast, often responds with a kind of polished certainty. Many AI systems have an inherent “optimism bias” — they encourage us with phrases like “Excellent question!” or “Great point!” which builds a sense of trust and confidence. That’s good for engagement but risky for truth.

Worse still, AI may be wrong — not always wildly, glaringly wrong — but sometimes very subtly wrong. It’s those small errors that are often the most dangerous because they slip past us unnoticed.

Some Final Thoughts

1. 1. AI systems – are constantly evolving, adding reasoning and increasingly sophisticated validation to their capabilities, but for the moment, most don’t yet have this at a sufficient level to justify blindly trusting what they tell you. So don’t – use it as a tool and an enabler, not a source of truth.
   2. Context – In the world of AI, context is critical. Think GIGO – Garbage in, Garbage out. If you want an AI system to perform better (i.e. be “smarter”), give it clear, relevant context without fluff and you will get better answers.
   3. Question things — nicely, politely, openly and with curiosity — including your own views, biases, and assumptions. Now more than ever, we need to refine and challenge our understanding.
   4. Knowledge – it used to be a precious commodity. Now it’s free. Water also used to be a precious commodity. Think about that.

Intelligence is about potential and adaptation. Smartness is about results and performance.

If you take nothing else away from this article, take this: the first answer you get is not always the right answer.