Do you really think that technical proficiency requires "intellectualism" as it's normally understood? Because I sure don't. How many developers have you known who were extremely fascinated by the narrow details of a technical problem, and utterly uninterested in the wider application and impact of their work? I've worked with more than a few who fit that description.

Intellectual just mean people that use their intellect a lot. It's not limited to debating and philosophy. And mathematician is an intellectual.

And yes, somebody who has the skill to craft a very low level yet highly flexible malware requires skill that goes beyong copy/paste from stackoverflow.