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170 Reported

Paul Allen

NationalityAmerican
Test instrumentReported in biographical sources
DocumentationBiographies; press profiles; widely cited but not primary-sourced

Paul Allen's IQ of approximately 170 is reported across multiple biographies and press profiles but the original test record is not publicly available. He attended Lakeside School in Seattle, where his testing for school placement reportedly produced the figure.

Allen co-founded Microsoft with Bill Gates in 1975 and was the technical architect behind the early MS-DOS and Windows products. He left full-time work at Microsoft after a Hodgkin's lymphoma diagnosis in 1983 and pivoted to investment, sports ownership, and large-scale science philanthropy.

He founded the Allen Institute for Brain Science (2003), the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (2014), and the Stratolaunch program. The Allen Telescope Array searches for extraterrestrial radio signals. His estate left over $26 billion to philanthropic causes at his death.

Caveat: The 170 figure is widely circulated in biographical writing but lacks a primary-source psychometric document.

References

  • Allen, P. (2011). Idea Man
  • Wallace, J. & Erickson, J. (1992). Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire
  • Allen Institute press archives

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