When I said that "real time" seems like a big deal, I didn't mean in terms of the fundamental nature of intelligence; I'm not sure that I even disagree about the whole notebook statement. But given minds of almost exactly the same speed there is huge advantage to things like answering a question first in class, bidding first on a contract, designing and carrying out an experiment fast, etc.

To the point where computation, the one place where we can speed up our thinking, is a gigantic industry that keeps expanding despite paradigm failures and quantum phenomena. People who do things faster are better off in a trade situation, so creating an intelligence that thinks faster would be a huge economic boon.

As for scenarios where speed is necessary that aren't interactive: if a meteor is heading toward your planet, the faster the timescale of your species' mind the more "time" you have to prepare for it. That's the least contrived scenario that I can think of, and it isn't of huge importance, but that was sort of tangential to my point regardless.