Malice's interview last week has got me thinking. I've been wondering how much the ability to easily memorize things affects IQ as rated by tests. A good friend's wife went to nursing school and she graduated near the top of her class. She was one of those who could read something and recall it later nearly word for word. But she was not what I'd call an intelligent person. She had no awareness of current events and could not talk about things outside of her field that required any thought or analysis. And she was deficient in what I'd call ordinary common sense.

Is this sort of thing normal among people who get good grades in technical fields?