> ... if you're smart you'll be good at puzzle solving There is some evidence in psychology that many seemingly unrelated types of intelligence are correlated

> ... if you're smart you'll be good at puzzle solving There is some evidence in psychology that many seemingly unrelated types of intelligence are correlated with each other. For example there is correlation between verbal and spatial reasoning ability. Sure, there might be people who can solve differential geometry problems in their head but have terrible language skills, but those people are outliers. Whether this has relevance to hiring programmers is debatable, but preferring intelligent candidates isn't an unusual idea. Law, medical, and dental schools base their selection on what is essentially a verbal reasoning test (LSAT, MCAT, DAT) though it's hard to imagine that verbal reasoning is the most important part of being a dentist. They follow the same thinking.