Earlier quoted context omitted.
I believe the underlying idea in Hawking's comment isn't that people shouldn't boast, but it's that no information of value is conveyed in the act of boasting about one's IQ. This is due to an understanding that the IQ test does not (nor was ever intended to) be a standard and fixed measure of intelligence[1] or potential. Therefore it is a moot point to boast about. [1] Any measure of intelligence that doesn't take…
(I'm interested also in many of the things that your "about" says so I will take this one step further.) What you are saying I think is that Hawking is saying "People who boast about their IQ don't understand what an IQ test is for". If that is the case I would say: a) A really poor choose of words for Hawking to be calling someone a "loser" b) Hawking doesn't realize that there are many legitimate reasons why someon…
Concerning a): I think there are very very few cases where calling someone a "loser" is a good choice of words -- I agree that Hawking's comment is most likely one of the cases where it is not a good choice of words. I would say that Hawking is most well known for things other than his speaking abilities ;).
Concerning b): Could you mention what some legitimate reasons would be? For bragging purposes I find it nearly entirely pointless in most cases, mostly due to the fact that there's a very good chance the person doesn't know what they are actually saying by referring to their IQ. The fact that the questions, "what is intelligence?" and "what does it consist of?" are such highly researched and debated topics with many established (and sometimes conflicting) viewpoints brings me to this particular viewpoint.
In actuality, personally I find it more than worthless in most cases -- and perhaps damaging -- which is what Hawking may have been referring to as well. Carol Dweck's research shows that a belief in a fixed intelligence has massive negative repercussions in many parts of life. One's IQ is often seen as a "fixed" number in the mind of a person and hence feels that it destines them to a state of inferiority to the individuals with higher IQs. Firstly it is just not true that "intelligence" (in most definitions) is fixed, and secondly, empirically it is just not true that a person with a lower IQ is capable of less (ie. is inferior, or practically is destined to accomplish less) to a person with a higher IQ.