Medicine - the pinnacle of academia?

I consider myself as being relatively bright, having studied a BSc, MSc, and a PhD in the medical sciences, all at Russell Group universities. I did my MSc at a G5 university.
Despite these achievements, l feel that students who get the top grades to get into Medicine must be as smart as heck, and they must possess intellect that even l don't have.
Do medical students attribute their extremely high intellect to good schooling from a young age, be it at school or at home? Can they absorb a lot of information quickly and understand it readily?
If it were possible to increase one's intellect, what suggestions would medical students suggest, aside from hard work? How exactly do students with high intellect approach problem solving and study?
I believe there are students with outstanding grades out there who were just taught brilliantly at a good school, and thus were well-drilled to succeed. Then there are the students who didn't go to a particularly good school, yet they excelled despite the challenges of being at a poor school. These students are of particular interest to me, as they must have either excellent genetics, or they were brought up well at home by their parents, who helped develop their curiosity and love for learning and problem solving.

Why is this important? There will always be a smarter person somewhere? I am nagging you about this because the love of knowledge in academia is often blocked by confirmation hysteria. A citation is technically just a facebook like. The text was written before the citation and the citation is therefore not relevant for the text. Still academia is boiling with rivalry and power struggles. Often it is fueled by money. They cant do what they want if they don't get funding. But not always. I am not blaming particular people, because this is what the system is like. I just wish people were more conscious of this.

Your post makes no sense.

I always got the impression the challenge with medicine was the volume of material covered, not it being especially conceptually difficult to understand. I hear some of the specialty exams can be pretty intensive once medics graduate though...?
I would think a PhD would be a much more significant contribution to human understanding and require much more involved cognitive skills to undertake original research. I would also like to think a PhD graduate would recognise this...there's a world of difference in conducting original research and in learning a huge volume of information.

What makes you think that medicine is the pinnnacle of academia? Medicine as a course is not particularly difficult to understand and the average medical student is not a genius…. I was around average in medical school but i definitely wouldn’t consider myself “smart as heck”.
Re schooling, I went to a very strong academic school up to the age of 9. After that, I was in below average to average comprehensives. No tutors or any input from parents at home. Wouldn’t say I’m particularly fast at absorbing information, but I do have good short-term memory. Problem solving (in a clinical setting) has more to do with practice and expereince than intellect, I would say.

I don't care what anyone says - l think a student who can get at least AAA in Biology, Chemistry and Physics / Maths and a good UCAT / BMAT score is smart as heck. As for medical school, they can only assess you on material covered in lectures / tutorials in the main. I know of one medical student from Imperial College who said he never even made any extra notes, and he only revised the lecture / tutorial material. He is now a qualified doctor.

My medical school assessed us on things that we were not taught in tutorials and lectures all the time. There was a lot of self-directed learning involved. We had curriculum guides of what we needed to know, and there was a lot more to know than what formal teaching included!
As an example, we were assessed on a procedure during our practical exam in 3rd year that was never directly taught to us - it was just something we were expected to have picked up during our placements. And in fact, a lot of out practical exams in later years had scenarios that were not something we were directly taught - stuff we should know, sure, but stuff that was covered in lectures. Same with clinical exams in later years - some things may have been covered in tutorials on placement but those often didn't happen for whatever reason, so we had to cover the knowledge gaps ourselves.

Is it possible that there is a variation in standards of teaching and assessment among medical schools? Which medical school did you attend?

What makes you think that medicine is the pinnnacle of academia? Medicine as a course is not particularly difficult to understand and the average medical student is not a genius…. I was around average in medical school but i definitely wouldn’t consider myself “smart as heck”.
Re schooling, I went to a very strong academic school up to the age of 9. After that, I was in below average to average comprehensives. No tutors or any input from parents at home. Wouldn’t say I’m particularly fast at absorbing information, but I do have good short-term memory. Problem solving (in a clinical setting) has more to do with practice and expereince than intellect, I would say.

Well, the medical faculties are the ones with cash, and they also have higher admissions standards than let's say English lit. But most of what happens is not Dr House, but routine. And many things in academic medicine are also routine. They change the numbers in their double blind randomized template, attach the names of four people and ship it off for publication. I would claim that very few professors make more than two or three original contributions in their career. This is the norm. And I dont think you can expect more either..from anyone.

Most medical students are not involved in research (and I don't think research is what OP is asking about).

A PHD student will normally attach himself or herself to some research group, and then start from there. But re-reading the start of the thread, you are absolutely right 🙂 Sorry.
What he says is actually that smart people study medicine and learn faster. If you need higher grades to join, this statement tells us nothing.
Let me come with a counter argument from economics. The people who become rich are the risk takers, right?
Can this be transferred to research also? I actually don't know, but original hypotheses seldom originate from centers. Science progresses "one funeral at the time".