As suggested above, the first five intelligences in this book drew on Gardner’s pre-
1979 work in the Piagetian and Goodmanian traditions. The other two were the
personal intelligences. It is understandable that Gardner should wish to include further
areas of interest. The van Leer remit wanted something more comprehensive. It was
interested in human potential as a whole. Gardner focused on intellectual potential. So
he had to determine what further intellectual areas should be considered beyond the
sciences, mathematics and the arts. The result was the two personal intelligences.
In answer to his own question „why have I incorporated personal intelligences in my
survey?’, Gardner says
Chiefly because I feel that these forms of knowledge are of tremendous
importance in many, if not all, societies in the world ... (1983:241)
This is revealing. It shows him making another „first cut’. The personal intelligences
pass this „prerequisites’ test because of their huge social importance. Gardner then
sees how far they pass the second, „criteria’, test. They do not seem to me to meet the
criteria very well.
This brings me to the thought: once the personal intelligences were past the first cut,
were they not going to be included anyway in the list of intelligences? Gardner has
always emphasized that little turned for him during the van Leer Project on calling his
multiple competences „intelligences’.
I don’t remember when it happened but .... I decided to call these faculties
“multiple intelligences” rather than abilities or gifts.
Another synonym in play at that time was „forms of knowledge’.
..nothing much turns on the particular use of this term [„intelligences’], and I
would be satisfied to substitute such phrases as “intellectual competences,”
“thought processes,” cognitive capacities,” “cognitive skills,” “forms of
knowledge,” .. (1983:284)
We saw above that Gardner called the personal intelligences „forms of knowledge’.
This reinforces the idea that basically Gardner is in the same line of business as Paul
Hirst was when he carved up human understanding into its separate realms.
A further question arises here about how Gardner conceived his project in this 1979-
83 period. If his intelligences are in the same ball park as Hirst’s forms of knowledge
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