How to crash a MENSA party

Wikipedia's History of Mensa

Mensa is the largest, oldest, and most famous high-IQ society in the world.  The not-for-profit organization restricts its membership to people with high testable IQs. Members must score at the 98th percentile or higher of a standardized, supervised intelligence test.  Mensa is formally composed of national groups and the umbrella organization Mensa International.

Roland Berrill, an Australian barrister, and Dr. Lancelot Ware, a British scientist and lawyer, founded Mensa in the United Kingdom in 1946. They had the idea of forming a society for bright people, the only qualification for membership being a high IQ.

The aims are to create a non-political society free from all social distinctions (racial, religious, etc.). The society welcomes all people, regardless of background, whose IQs meet the criteria, with the objective of members enjoying each other’s company and participating in a wide range of social and cultural activities.

Mensa accepts individuals who score at or above the 98th percentile on certain standardized IQ tests, such as the Stanford-Binet. Because different tests are scaled differently, it is not meaningful to compare raw scores between tests, only percentiles. For example, the minimum accepted score on the Stanford-Binet is 132, while for the Cattell it is 148.

In addition to encouraging social interaction among its members, the organization is also involved with programs for gifted children, literacy, and scholarships. The name comes from mensa, the Latin word for “table”, and indicates that it is a round-table society of equals (although the logo can be seen as depicting a square table, or Parsons table).

The Goals of MENSA

Mensa’s constitution lists three purposes: to identify and foster human
intelligence for the benefit of humanity; to encourage research into the
nature, characteristics, and uses of intelligence; and to provide a stimulating
intellectual and social environment for its members.  Its constitution also states that “Mensa
encompasses members representing many points of view. Consequently, Mensa as an
organization shall not express an opinion as being that of Mensa, take any
political action other than the publication of the results of its
investigations, or have any ideological, philosophical, political, or religious
affiliations.”

Mensa has published a number of books, including Poetry Mensa (1966),
an anthology of poems by Mensans from all over the world, in which languages
other than English are represented. The Mensa Foundation, a separate charitable
U.S. Corporation, edits and publishes its own Mensa Research Journal, in which
both Mensans and non-Mensans are published on various topics surrounding the
concept and measure of intelligence. The national groups also issue
periodicals, such as Mensa Bulletin, the monthly publication of American
Mensa, and Mensa Magazine, the monthly publication of British Mensa.

At Mensa’s 50th Anniversary, Dr.
Ware, one of the founders, addressed Mensans by stating that he hoped that
“Mensa will have a role in society when it gets through the ages of infancy and
adolescence.” He also said, “I do get disappointed that so many members spend
so much time solving puzzles,” expressing his desire for Mensans instead to be solving
some of the world’s problems.