Should we be skeptical about the uses of Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences?

Howard Gardner on multiple intelligences - the initial listing

Howard Gardner viewed intelligence as 'the capacity to solve problems or to fashion products that are valued in one or more cultural setting' (Gardner & Hatch, 1989). He reviewed the literature using eight criteria or 'signs' of an intelligence:

- Potential isolation by brain damage.
- The existence of idiots savants, prodigies and other exceptional individuals.
- An identifiable core operation or set of operations.
- A distinctive development history, along with a definable set of 'end-state' performances.
- An evolutionary history and evolutionary plausibility.
- Support from experimental psychological tasks.
- Support from psychometric findings.
- Susceptibility to encoding in a symbol system. (Howard Gardner 1983: 62-69)

Read the rest at http://www.infed.org/thinkers/gardner.htm

Some Critiques of Howard Earl Gardner's Multiple Intelligences Theory:
http://www.igs.net/~cmorris/critiques.html