Raniere ‘proved’ his highest IQ by conducting his own study

Keith Raniere took an obscure IQ test in 1988- and then did a study to prove how rare was his genius based on the results of the test.

Not only that, it was a take home IQ test, which means no one monitored for the possibility of his cheating. And the study he did to prove his genius did not have critical back-up documents, but were based on oral reports he may have fabricated to prove the results.

In other words, Keith has no proof he did not cheat on his take home IQ test and no proof his study did not use falsified data.

In order to accept his fabulous IQ story, one has to accept what no one in the scientific and scholastic community accept: That someone’s word about their own accomplishments is all that is needed as conclusive evidence.

WHAT ARE RANIERE’S BOASTS ABOUT HIS IQ?

Keith Raniere’s bio states:  “Keith Raniere was honored in 1989 by the Guinness Book of World Records in the category of highest IQ.”

Keith Raniere’s name never appeared in the US edition of the Guinness Book of World Records. His name appeared, once, for one year, in the 1989 Australian edition of the Guinness Book of Records. Keith’s name never appeared again in any edition of the Guinness Book of Records.

It might be a coincidence but all future editions of Guinness Book of Records retired the category of “highest IQ’ after Keith’s Raniere’s name appeared in one of their editions [Australian] for one year only.

SO WHAT ABOUT THE TEST? 

The IQ test Keith Raniere took was called The Mega Test. The Mega Test was offered by The Mega Society, founded in 1982, by Ronald K. Hoeflin.

It is a take home test. This means it was not monitored for cheating. It is also not timed. A person can take the test home and bring it back any time for grading. This is not standard method for serious tests and for peer review of the results.

The boast of the Mega Society is that it has no peers. The Mega test is so hard that only super-geniuses [one in a million] could score high enough on it anyway.

By self acclamation, the Mega test was the hardest IQ test in the world, offered by the most exclusive society of geniuses in the world.

None of this was proven, just stated. One had to accept them at their word.

Keith Raniere described the Mega test.

When I took the Mega Test I did so because some of the problems looked interesting. At first glance I thought 42 of the problems were trivial, the other six required a little work.

I solved 43 of the problems in about two straight hours; the other 5 problems and proofs of some of my assertions took me about eight more hours, spread out over the next 4 days.

I handed in my result sheet and found shortly thereafter I had copied one of my answers incorrectly (one of the easier problems on the test!).

I called Ron [Hoeflin] who had missed my mistake.

I scored 46 out of 48 on the mega test.

I thought 10 hours was inappropriately long (I thought I was really bending the “untimed” nature of the test), I later learned that was considered a short time.

So my quick time was likely luck of the draw and my emotional obsessive-compulsive problem solving nature made me the perfect candidate to score high on such an exam.

When Keith joined the Mega Society in the late 1980s, he assumed a large role, if not control of the Mega Society.

After Keith joined the Mega Society, the society went from 26 to three members. Keith renamed the Mega Society to The Hoeflin Research Group.

I was a member of the Old Mega society. I originally renamed it, The Hoeflin Research Group to brand it.

Since so few people had taken the Mega test, there was really no way of proving how tough it was and how rare was Keith’s score.

To solve this, Keith volunteered to conduct a study to determine how rare was his genius as proven by the results of his score on the Mega test.

Keith did not have written backup for the results of much of his study. Some of the data, he said, could not be obtained in writing. Instead, the data he included in his study was he said, received ‘orally’ by ‘Educational Testing Service officials.’

Keith’s study proved something remarkable about Keith.

According to Keith Raniere’s bio:  ‘He has an estimated problem-solving rarity of one in 425,000,000 with respect to the general population.’

His bio also states he is ‘one of the top three problem solvers in the world.’

These two are based on his own study.’

Keith has said he never mentions his super-genius IQ to impress people. He uses it to show that a high IQ means someone is good at solving problems found on IQ tests.

In his case, it is because he thinks about problem solving all the time.

VERY, few people from the non-problem-solver realm stand a chance against me on [IQ tests]– they do not have the experience, they do not have the drive, they are like not “primed” to solve problems. 

And he has the study to prove it.

Gina Hutchinson reportedly helped Keith Raniere complete his take home IQ test which, according to Keith, proved that he was one the smartest men in the world. She later committed suicide.

Frank Parlato