The IQ you are given by genetics matters... but that isn't the entire story ...

About 1 out of 250 people have an IQ over 140 (depends on the methodology used to come up with an IQ score, the subject's performance that particular day etc...)

Clearly, 1 out of 250 people do not revolutionize our understanding of the world... if that were the case, we would be in a very different world. I have known 'geniuses' that contributed nothing, or less than nothing to the world...

At a young age I realized my father, a tenured physics professor, was not very 'intelligent' compared to my mother. But in the era they grew up in, men went to college to get an education and career, women went to college to get a husband... so my mother's greater IQ was ignored and my father- with her help- succeeded. It is unfair as hell, and she was FAR more intelligent, but her dreams were frustrated by misogyny and bullshit.

Even as a child I could recognize that my father was not 'the brightest bulb in the room'... but he made up for it by working hard... pathologically hard... to make a difference, to do what he could to advance his chosen area of research... I personally think his accomplishments deserve respect- not because they were revolutionary like Einstein's, but because he had to work so damn hard to do what he did... I suppose he had an IQ above average, but he always seemed frustratingly slow... but he would work all night with full concentration to advance his research- that deserves respect, likely more respect than given the geniuses that have gifted flashes of insight and make it look easy.

Feynman revolutionized physics, my father almost certainly had to work far harder to make a small contribution to solid state physics... an area of physics I hated, and never did well at.

Feynman rightly is famous, my father's work is just a reference in other people's papers... who deserves more respect? The person that revolutionized physics, or the person that sacrificed everything, eventually his sanity and- eventually- his life, to make the small difference he could...?

Its a judgement call I guess... The point is high IQ people can contribute nothing, and low IQ people can make a difference with hard work. Obviously MOST geniuses make little difference- one out of 250 people do not succeed in revolutionizing the understanding of the world... some go into finance and maybe make a lot of money- with a little luck... others work at Burger King and waste their talent asking if 'You want fries with that?'

Never assume someone's profession defines their IQ - I once had to take a cab in the Boston area and ended up with a driver who was highly trained in artificial intelligence and wanted to discuss its applications to physics.

We had a long conversation, and I hated having to end it because I had a meeting I had to get to...

Our society wastes genius- most grow up without access to the education they could use, others are strangled by being forced to live in zip-codes poisoned by poverty or chemical waste...

If we, as a society, prioritized ensuring EVERYONE could achieve their full potential- we would live in a far different world... instead we have this shithole we have to try to navigate.