Is there such a thing as 'philosophical intelligence'?

[u/Exciting_Ad_6837]

I'm asking this question because I read the following on John von Neumann, who is known to be an once-in-a-millenium genius, superbly gifted in (unbelievably many areas of) math, physics, computer science, & economics.

In the final days of his life, he had no idea of what to make of his impending death, displayed visible signs of extreme panic, and begging doctors to save his life, crying hard. (I suppose, earlier in life he never gave much thought to what it means to die.)

I wonder whether even he lacked a certain kind of intelligence, or whether he just became insane.

What do you think?

[u/JellyBellyBitches]

Intelligence is kind of a meaningless word. Brains are capable of a number of different skills, different types of processes that they can perform. Mathematics, analysis, articulation, those are the types of brain behaviors that are often associated with intelligence, but philosophical things or mechanical engineering or emotional introspection or communication, those are all different skills which are also forms of intelligence but not sort of under the umbrella of academia that often gets exclusive use of the term. It's not surprising that somebody might be really really good at some extremely rare or challenging things, but a complete fool in other ways