You haven’t at all, and in fact creating that environment seems like the key to the whole conversation. It’s Voltaire’s famous line, perhaps “one must cultivate one’s garden.” The soil of our society / soul / nature has to be fertile for beautiful and uncanny things to sprout from it
I feel you, friend. Post-anything is an intellectual red flag for me. That said, I do like the flavor of confusion Deleuze gives me. I also feel strangely creative after reading him.
Other than that I get most of my philosophical kicks with Nietzsche.
“Post-anything is an intellectual red flag.” Love the idea of you standing on the sidelines with a red flag whenever some jokester starts spewing postmodernist posturing.
I’m intrigued by Deleuze thanks to our conversations about his work … if it gets me creative that’s a win in my book, but to your point: it’s hard to not delve deeper and deeper into the Nietzschman
Feb 20, 2023·edited Feb 20, 2023Liked by Samuél Lopez-Barrantes
What does "genius" mean in the 21st Century? You hinted at the answer in your last point about where geniuses come from. Whether we're talking about people from the realms of science and mathematics or artistic spaces like music and fiction, it all comes back to original thought, or, more importantly, the perception of it.
While the structuralists you mentioned could've used a good editor, they had a point: language IS subjective. It's easy to recognize that when it comes to words like "genius." It's why we tend to shudder when people attribute the term to themselves. That doesn't make it meaningless. It means we all decide what it means together.
I made a similar point in a recent essay (https://ponytail.substack.com/p/the-things-outside-of-me), but whether we're talking about Einstein or Lamar (or in the case above, Animal Collective), geniuses don't just speak truth or see life from new angles. They have the guts to share their ideas, too. And then it's the audience that determines whether that idea is "genius."
Thanks for these wise words, Andrew ... I appreciate the idea that "genius" is a collective valuation that also transcends culture & the calcified ideas so many contemporaries have about what ti means.
Really enjoyed the above essay you referred to ^^ I am not a fan of Animal Collective but respect what they do. Such is the nature of subjectivity. And life itself.
Coming from another discipline - like data analytics and Mathematics. The term Genius in the 21st Century could be easily settled by obtaining a data set of all people who have used the term genius in all domains. It is then a simple task to make groupings of the data if they all mean the same. You will have a range of opinions and you will then see what is the dominant meaning for the genius usage.
I suspect then you will see different domains have different attributes to describe Genius. What does this mean for our overall understanding ? Scientist are easily classifiable by the results they produce and what about idea/ argument debaters - not so clear is it - it suggests the term is loosely used with no basis in fact, that can verified.
However, finding the molecular structure of benzene seemed like an intractable problem. Until Mr Kerkule fell asleep by the fireside and dreamed of a snake biting its tale. When he awoke from slumber he had a eureka moment - of course the structure is circular!
So is Kerkule a genius ? by making a connection that nobody else saw - was he just plain lucky ?
In the arts people connect dots and have surprising viewpoint all the time - are they geniuses ?
Genius is a loosely used word as I believe anyone can have a Kerkule moment.
Love the Kerkule question. Yes, I think, that’s got to be a genius moment, but whether or not we are the result of such fleeting moments is another question altogether … my inkling is not. I think the Coen Brothers are geniuses because they wrote The Big Lebowski, and because every actor in that film embodies the genius of the piece, for example, all the way down to The Dude’s landlord who pursues art for its most intrinsic value of simply being created. That’s decidedly different than Kerkule, but of the same conversation? I think what I’m finding out in these fantastic comments is there are as many definitions of the term as there are ways to experience it in life
I fear that "genius" is going, or has already gone, the way of words like "hero" and "curate," all slipping into a post-post-post miasma of the 21st century. Whether I've recovered from my grad school encounters with Derrida or Barthes or not, I tend more toward understandable statements these day. It seems the real test of genius is the ability to communicate with normies. The greater the ability, the greater the genius.
Love me some understandable statements. And to your point (which is what I was just starting to think about in my comment re: demonax comment on this thread ) is that genius these days is only really as valuable as the ability to communicate it. "Hero" is certainly a term that we need to look back to mythology to properly grasp ... then again, I watched a recent Frontline episode about the early days of the Russian invasion of Ukraine:
there was an eightysomething year old artist/musician who lived underground for 3 months to hide from the shelling, and he sang every day and even annoyed people down in the metro system with his tunes, but he did it, and as far as I can tell he keeps doing it, singing old folk songs about love and humanity and joy and connection, and it's heroic work in a way, perhaps precisely because it's meant for everyone. Hear ye hear ye to the normies!
"... why, according to almost all of us, the term "genius" remains reserved for white European men who lived during the 15th-19th centuries, and why geniuses are only usually ever considered in the worlds of science and mathematics."
There's an interesting twist going on in what you point out here.
If you were in, say, early 19th century England or Germany, the word "genius" would have positively vibrated with romantic connotations. From Coleridge and Blake to Holderlin and Schiller to Shelley and Byron and Keats, and in philosophy, through Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, genius had far more to do with artistic creativity (not to mention the affect of the "tortured artist" that remains with us today).
All of these figures were powerfully influenced by classical art and writing from ancient Greece, for whom math and science had a quite different role than they play in our time.
What's interesting here is how the romantic image, which began in Europe as a reaction to the sterile reason-and-science approach of the enlightenment, has become synonymous with gifts and talents in those very areas.
The European romantics were hardly cosmopolitans, but I think they'd have more interesting things to say about genius than the braying cultists worshiping at the feet of Dawkins, Hawking, and Neil de Grasse Tyson.
I appreciate this take ... do you think we're returning to more classical values (+ romantic?) in this era of hyper-connectivity, data-centric thinking, and result-driven-everything? I don't orbit in circles where math and science are king, so I'm not really in a position to be able to talk much about who considers who a genius in those areas. But even to your last point re: de Grasse Tyson, a lot of his wisdom--in my mind at least--comes from the fact that he *isn't* masquerading as anything other than someone who happens to know a lot about science but is able to present it in an approachable way. To that extent--and this is where maybe we're coming full circle with your thought--the artistry of *expressing* deep truths throughout our history is far more associated with "genius" than any simple knowledge of these truths. Thanks for the thoughts, now my mind is turning ...
I think there is pushback, and it is more than just mumbling at the fringes. It's hard to get a feel for "the zeitgeist" today since so much of common consciousness is filtered through impersonal institutions and Big Media. But the impression I get is that there is a lot of discontent with the over-rationalized, over-managed "culture", and it is growing. The difficulty is making that flower grow in these conditions.
The use of the term “genius” and which people the term is applied to in the majority is a relative phenomenon. In the West, whether it is Europe or North America, the term is applied primarily to white European men if white European men primarily engage in fields that attract that moniker, or if they dominate the social narrative through media. Take India as the corollary. In that country, the term “genius” is primarily reserved for Indians who excel in their given field and their white counterparts in the West are given little attention. I personally know white people who I would count as geniuses and who live in Eastern countries and struggle to gain the recognition bestowed upon the indigenous. The relativity in how language is applied to excellence really depends on where you are and how history is written by those who dominate the social narrative.
Very important and interesting take on the cultural differences in how genius is portrayed. To your point, as a quite obviously euro/anglo-centric platform (and hence community, at least for the time being), this entire conversation stemmed from the basic challenge of even defining the term and deciding on who "gets" to be considered a genius or not. There are some objective truths about genius according to many, but all it takes--to your point--is a different value system and basta! The whole idea is turned on its head. Thanks for your valuable input here.
I'll make the same point as I made in response to Erik Hoel. Genius is not just about ability. Mensa is full of exceptionally intelligent people who make no appreciable difference to human flourishing. We call someone a genius not for being smart, but for making a big difference. Genius is measured in accomplishment.
Bach was obviously exceptionally gifted, but he also came at a time when music theory and musical instrument making had made significant advances that opened up the vast musical possibilities that he explored. Mozart discovered a new vein to explore, and so did Beethoven. The other composers of the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods made significant contributions as well, but the big three explored a huge chunk of the available territory. The rest were clearing up after them and exploring the few remaining remote corners. Symphonic music today is an arrhythmic atonal mess because that's the only territory left for composers in that form, other than film music.
There may be many people of equal musical gifts today. Statistically, given our wealth and population, there should be dozens if not hundreds. But there isn't the same vast musical territory to explore. You can be a superb musician today, but music is so mature now that the chances of finding some vast unexplored territory to open up the way Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven did is remote.
There are multiple examples from history of people making the same breakthrough at almost the same time. Thus you will recognize Charles Darwin as the name of one of the great geniuses of our civilization, but Alfred Russel Wallace is probably a name you will have to Google for. Ditto for Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Gray. Genius is talent meeting opportunity, and publishing first.
So if we are a little short on geniuses today, it is probably for two reasons. One is in both the arts and sciences, we are a very mature civilization (perhaps even one doddering into madness and decay) and there are not so many great breakthroughs to be made. There are, in other words, fewer thing to be a genius about.
The second is that we are now incredibly deliberate and systematic about how we tackle almost every problem. In every field, teams drive forward the boundaries of knowledge and engineering on a factory production model. When great breakthroughs are made, therefore, they are made by teams working systematically, not individuals working alone. The team is the genius. The process is the genius. The MNRA COVID vaccine is an astonishing breakthrough. In any previous age, it would be the work of a individual genius. Today is the the work of a team for very bright people following a well designed and disciplined process. We don't know the names of any of the hundreds of people on those teams. We know the names of the companies they worked for. Pfizer and Moderna are the geniuses.
FANTASTIC point re: groups being geniuses now versus individuals. I hadn't thought about that fundamental shift, which is paradoxical, isn't it, in such an advanced individualistic age? To continue with the analogy, The Beatles are considered geniuses, but you can't even limit that "genius" to Lennon/McCartney because not only was Harrison a legend, but after all, Ringo was with them until the end ... it has to count for something.
As for the idea that there are fewer things to be genius about, I think this fits well into the theory of group genius (Genium? Geniuocracy? Shall I butcher this idea further? I think not) But I do agree with your assertion that in some sense, we are experiencing an era of decay, which shall lead to another kind of flourishing we aren't yet aware of. Out of the ashes ... well, everybody likes the story of the Phoenix.
I think the commonality for the term genius - is to see what others do not see and make connections
that others can not make. In that way the domain is not important but only the skill to apply and get results that most ever dreamed of. My opinion of course ( from sunny Melbourne Australia ! )
Yes yes yes. The old forest for the trees adage ... I've also found these days that if we can flip a painfully obvious idea on its head / refer to a truism in the inverse, it can lead to some damn interesting thoughts.
For example, I am often asked how it's possible to live a comfortable existence in a city like Paris without making much more than minimum wage. First, my answer is: I don't have kids. Second, I say that what people forget about financial "poverty" is that not having (or choosing to earn) a lot of money is only a problem if we think we want to SPEND a lot of money.
So instead of thinking about "how much money am I making?" I think about "how much money am I not spending?" Coming from the USA, the answer is easy: cost of living is a fraction of what it is over yonder when you don't have car insurance/health insurance/exploitative housing + cell phone + everything else prices. A simple flip of the switch can change the perspective quite quickly.
Feb 23, 2023·edited Feb 23, 2023Liked by Samuél Lopez-Barrantes
Just want to point out that when you click on Martha Nussbaums essay, it says it was published in February 1999, not 2000 as mentioned here.
As for how I try to be more genius like, I run a Zettelkasten where I put my notes (and link them) of what I read. Not all I read, but most of the non-fiction stuff. That takes a lot of time, but that way I remember what I read a couple of years later (without: not so long). A Zettelkasten usually helps making connections, too.
As for Erik Hoels way of raising genius: I went to a math club at university when I was 14 here in Berlin, Germany. It was the late 80s and in a math summer camp we had access to a computer there and we started coding, actually. We tried to program a text parser so we could develop text adventures, after Infocom and so.
Ahh thank you for the edit good sir! 'Tis amended.
I have never heard of a Zettelkasten before, so you've taught me something ... makes total sense re: note taking, in my best moments I will type up everything I've underlined in whichever book I've finished reading. My dream, one day, is to have an anthology of all of my "favorite" lines (each reading of a book results in noticing something different, obviously).
What a wild moment to be in the 80s and learning coding ... dare I say you live in a secret lair and have an outsized knowledge + control over the world's choose-your-own adventure novels? Sounds like a fantastic setting for a memoir/novel, in any case.
2. Merve Emre, Professor for Literature somewhere in New York (she regularly writes for The New Yorker) uses underlining to start her essays, my Zettelkasten tells me (I found that here: ➜ https://www.nybooks.com/online/2022/04/16/educate-entertain-scold-charm/). She underlines all she thinks necessary, then types up all the underlined passages, then puts these passages, lines, sentences in groups. This grouping of her underlinings then gives her almost all the structure / arguments for the essay she writes.
3. If I would have started journaling in the 80s, this would maybe make for an interesting read. I didn't, so maybe not. Never thought about incorporating that into my writing... but yeah, we had fun back then.
Thanks for these links, am going to do some delving. As a kid typing up notes was my way of thinking "maybe if I write down the exact sentences of the greats, through osmosis, I shall become a great writer." Not sure that happened. But it didn't hurt my brain.
And as for the 80s, I just watched "Blowout" for the first time. What a time to be alive, and to still believe in simple yet profound ideas.
Oh my. I see. I always think of myself as the most usual human being around, so I always assume everyone else is just like me. Now reading "what a time to be alive" strongly suggests you are not as old as I am, which I somehow assumed.
There was a Depeche Mode concert in the German Democratic Republic, shortly before the end. I did not manage to get tickets, but we went to the hotel where Depeche Mode supposedly was staying. There was a security cordon around the entrance, and we waited. A bus came, the hotel doors revolved and out came two members of the group, strolling to the bus. Me, doing swimming training 5 times a week, I was fast and agile and strong for my age, or better, for any age. I just moved through the security to shake hands with Gore and Gahan, I believe it was. But just when I ran through, a security guy tripped me and I fell on my face, in front of the two Depeche Mode guys. As I remember it, I lay there sprawling, but Gahan gave me a hand to pull me up again. Security led me away, but I was seriously considering hacking my hand off and putting it on display in a cabinet.
Haha, don't we all. I was born in 1988 so I didn't get that sweet taste of pure cocaine-laced disco / funky outfits as a mater of course / the societal terror that was nuclear war and AIDS. Surely it wasn't all fun, but Depeche Mode in the GDR, holy hell. AND you have a story about it to boot? It's like you should be a writer or something ....
Much has to be said for a simplification of a life
Unfortunately it comes down to illiteracy too - monetary and financial; thinking interest rates never go down and therefore over borrow only to regret that decision when the tide turns - but it has never happened for 10 years they say ! Belatedly, a wider lens and deeper historical economic insight
would of helped avoid that exuberant decision. History does repeat not always in the same time horizon though.
Thank you sir! Great point re: financial illiteracy. I would've really benefited from knowing what it *actually meant* to take out student loans for master's programs before I started doing so. Now I'm just American about it: "Oh, it's just a fee I'll pay back for the rest of my life." Worth it? Only each individual can make that choice. But maybe the Supreme Court will rule in my favor. Ha. I wonder how many times that hope was fulfilled ...
I hope you get a return on your Master's Investment and that you extinguish any debt or maybe the Supreme Court passes a favorable outcome.
It is interesting the etymology of the word mortgage in medieval times means " Dead Pledge". That sounds scary and somehow that message has been lost over the ages, no doubt by creative marketing by lending institutions - we can't have lazy capital laying about -we must rent it out to borrowers !
Interesting discussion thread, I must go back to my studies of Mandarin
Feb 24, 2023Liked by Elle Griffin, Samuél Lopez-Barrantes
This really struck me: "...wherein many of the most intelligent amongst us use language more as a gavel for control than as a tool for communication."
How poignant! Made me wonder how much I use language to gratify my ego...
And I'm curious about the "cultivating genius" question...
I don't know if genius can be cultivated. Genius feels like a historical term - like we give it to people who made an oversized impact in their time, but we just didn't realize how big an impact it would make. I'm not an expert, though. Did anyone call Pasteur a genius in his time?
I think the problem with "cultivating genius" is like commodifying something that best happens naturally. Synthetically creating individuals to have oversized impact in our world seems to come with a lot of issues on the darker side of social engineering. And we worship geniuses maybe too much as it is.
Thanks Zach. As a writer that question "How often do I use language to gratify my ego?" is a constant ... but even in social settings, I have grown so weary of the phrases I use to describe a semblance of my reality succinctly. "So, you live in Paris?" "Yes." "What's that like?"
Lord. If I were a politician I'd fight for the Elevation of Small Talk. Love your use of the term commodification in reference to cultivating genius ... we live in that kind of era, where there has to be a GOAL, even when it's some self-help guru telling us to forget about the past and not fret over the future. Re: social engineering, just look at a country like the USA and France and what proportion of its "leaders" come from a select few schools. I loved reading "Never Let Me Go" (Ishiguro) for a hot take on that idea. Thanks for inspiring this brain in the a.m.
hmmmm small talk is such a necessary evil for human beans. but honestly one of the worst things. (tbh i’d ask that same question about you living in Paris 🙃). but i also get that question about living in Vietnam haha.
ishiguro was already on my list, and now even more so.
Yeah [Paris] is just a placeholder for the question. a necessary evil, indeed, but in my most idealistic moments I go to a party and actively try not to engage in the emptiness that follows a night out filled with noise. Then again, alcohol helps make everyone seem a whole lot more interesting, including myself ... I wonder when the USA decides psychedelics are actually medicine if smalltalk will change for the better. A man can hope
i feel you. small talk feels like a little death every time. the worst part is when you know people for a long time and it’s their only form of conversation. 😤
Loved this. Incomprehensibility does not genius make. True geniuses not only discover and formulate new ideas and associations, but can communicate complex ideas in a way that can be understood by the rest of us.
I believe there is a tangible shift in the notion of genius and who gets to claim it, notably the MacArthur Genius Grants, which provide significant financial support to creative people in the sciences, arts, activism, and more who don't fit the old model. About the 2022 fellows, according to the website: “The 2022 MacArthur Fellows are architects of new modes of activism, artistic practice, and citizen science. They are excavators uncovering what has been overlooked, undervalued, or poorly understood..."
Love that phrase "excavators uncovering what has been overlooked." So often times when I'm thinking about essays to write / how best to present them, I am infected by that old academic brain that tells me "X # of references = SMART STATUS." And then I realize if I'm trying to actually say something useful, I have to find the words that are mine, not someone else's.
To your point, true genius these days seems to be somebody who can explain the most complex idea in simple, comprehensible language. I'm a big fan of Neil Degrasse Tyson in this regard.
Yes, I was thinking of him! And also of Stephen Hawking, who wrote so simply and beautifully. Part of his genius was translating the extreme complexity that resided in his extraordinary brain for ordinary people—and he did it without any sense of superiority or disdain.
Yesssss, the disdain is such a constant (and is in fact, at least tacitly, encouraged in the world of academia). Here's to astrophysicists sounding human--may the stars bless 'em!
You haven’t at all, and in fact creating that environment seems like the key to the whole conversation. It’s Voltaire’s famous line, perhaps “one must cultivate one’s garden.” The soil of our society / soul / nature has to be fertile for beautiful and uncanny things to sprout from it
I feel you, friend. Post-anything is an intellectual red flag for me. That said, I do like the flavor of confusion Deleuze gives me. I also feel strangely creative after reading him.
Other than that I get most of my philosophical kicks with Nietzsche.
“Post-anything is an intellectual red flag.” Love the idea of you standing on the sidelines with a red flag whenever some jokester starts spewing postmodernist posturing.
I’m intrigued by Deleuze thanks to our conversations about his work … if it gets me creative that’s a win in my book, but to your point: it’s hard to not delve deeper and deeper into the Nietzschman
What does "genius" mean in the 21st Century? You hinted at the answer in your last point about where geniuses come from. Whether we're talking about people from the realms of science and mathematics or artistic spaces like music and fiction, it all comes back to original thought, or, more importantly, the perception of it.
While the structuralists you mentioned could've used a good editor, they had a point: language IS subjective. It's easy to recognize that when it comes to words like "genius." It's why we tend to shudder when people attribute the term to themselves. That doesn't make it meaningless. It means we all decide what it means together.
I made a similar point in a recent essay (https://ponytail.substack.com/p/the-things-outside-of-me), but whether we're talking about Einstein or Lamar (or in the case above, Animal Collective), geniuses don't just speak truth or see life from new angles. They have the guts to share their ideas, too. And then it's the audience that determines whether that idea is "genius."
Thanks for these wise words, Andrew ... I appreciate the idea that "genius" is a collective valuation that also transcends culture & the calcified ideas so many contemporaries have about what ti means.
Really enjoyed the above essay you referred to ^^ I am not a fan of Animal Collective but respect what they do. Such is the nature of subjectivity. And life itself.
Here's a 1-minute long vid on the etymology of the word "genius."
https://chasholloway.substack.com/p/what-is-genius
Here's a 1-minute long vid on the etymology of the word "genius."
Coming from another discipline - like data analytics and Mathematics. The term Genius in the 21st Century could be easily settled by obtaining a data set of all people who have used the term genius in all domains. It is then a simple task to make groupings of the data if they all mean the same. You will have a range of opinions and you will then see what is the dominant meaning for the genius usage.
I suspect then you will see different domains have different attributes to describe Genius. What does this mean for our overall understanding ? Scientist are easily classifiable by the results they produce and what about idea/ argument debaters - not so clear is it - it suggests the term is loosely used with no basis in fact, that can verified.
However, finding the molecular structure of benzene seemed like an intractable problem. Until Mr Kerkule fell asleep by the fireside and dreamed of a snake biting its tale. When he awoke from slumber he had a eureka moment - of course the structure is circular!
So is Kerkule a genius ? by making a connection that nobody else saw - was he just plain lucky ?
In the arts people connect dots and have surprising viewpoint all the time - are they geniuses ?
Genius is a loosely used word as I believe anyone can have a Kerkule moment.
The data does not tell lies
Love the Kerkule question. Yes, I think, that’s got to be a genius moment, but whether or not we are the result of such fleeting moments is another question altogether … my inkling is not. I think the Coen Brothers are geniuses because they wrote The Big Lebowski, and because every actor in that film embodies the genius of the piece, for example, all the way down to The Dude’s landlord who pursues art for its most intrinsic value of simply being created. That’s decidedly different than Kerkule, but of the same conversation? I think what I’m finding out in these fantastic comments is there are as many definitions of the term as there are ways to experience it in life
I fear that "genius" is going, or has already gone, the way of words like "hero" and "curate," all slipping into a post-post-post miasma of the 21st century. Whether I've recovered from my grad school encounters with Derrida or Barthes or not, I tend more toward understandable statements these day. It seems the real test of genius is the ability to communicate with normies. The greater the ability, the greater the genius.
Love me some understandable statements. And to your point (which is what I was just starting to think about in my comment re: demonax comment on this thread ) is that genius these days is only really as valuable as the ability to communicate it. "Hero" is certainly a term that we need to look back to mythology to properly grasp ... then again, I watched a recent Frontline episode about the early days of the Russian invasion of Ukraine:
there was an eightysomething year old artist/musician who lived underground for 3 months to hide from the shelling, and he sang every day and even annoyed people down in the metro system with his tunes, but he did it, and as far as I can tell he keeps doing it, singing old folk songs about love and humanity and joy and connection, and it's heroic work in a way, perhaps precisely because it's meant for everyone. Hear ye hear ye to the normies!
"... why, according to almost all of us, the term "genius" remains reserved for white European men who lived during the 15th-19th centuries, and why geniuses are only usually ever considered in the worlds of science and mathematics."
There's an interesting twist going on in what you point out here.
If you were in, say, early 19th century England or Germany, the word "genius" would have positively vibrated with romantic connotations. From Coleridge and Blake to Holderlin and Schiller to Shelley and Byron and Keats, and in philosophy, through Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, genius had far more to do with artistic creativity (not to mention the affect of the "tortured artist" that remains with us today).
All of these figures were powerfully influenced by classical art and writing from ancient Greece, for whom math and science had a quite different role than they play in our time.
What's interesting here is how the romantic image, which began in Europe as a reaction to the sterile reason-and-science approach of the enlightenment, has become synonymous with gifts and talents in those very areas.
The European romantics were hardly cosmopolitans, but I think they'd have more interesting things to say about genius than the braying cultists worshiping at the feet of Dawkins, Hawking, and Neil de Grasse Tyson.
I appreciate this take ... do you think we're returning to more classical values (+ romantic?) in this era of hyper-connectivity, data-centric thinking, and result-driven-everything? I don't orbit in circles where math and science are king, so I'm not really in a position to be able to talk much about who considers who a genius in those areas. But even to your last point re: de Grasse Tyson, a lot of his wisdom--in my mind at least--comes from the fact that he *isn't* masquerading as anything other than someone who happens to know a lot about science but is able to present it in an approachable way. To that extent--and this is where maybe we're coming full circle with your thought--the artistry of *expressing* deep truths throughout our history is far more associated with "genius" than any simple knowledge of these truths. Thanks for the thoughts, now my mind is turning ...
I think there is pushback, and it is more than just mumbling at the fringes. It's hard to get a feel for "the zeitgeist" today since so much of common consciousness is filtered through impersonal institutions and Big Media. But the impression I get is that there is a lot of discontent with the over-rationalized, over-managed "culture", and it is growing. The difficulty is making that flower grow in these conditions.
The use of the term “genius” and which people the term is applied to in the majority is a relative phenomenon. In the West, whether it is Europe or North America, the term is applied primarily to white European men if white European men primarily engage in fields that attract that moniker, or if they dominate the social narrative through media. Take India as the corollary. In that country, the term “genius” is primarily reserved for Indians who excel in their given field and their white counterparts in the West are given little attention. I personally know white people who I would count as geniuses and who live in Eastern countries and struggle to gain the recognition bestowed upon the indigenous. The relativity in how language is applied to excellence really depends on where you are and how history is written by those who dominate the social narrative.
Very important and interesting take on the cultural differences in how genius is portrayed. To your point, as a quite obviously euro/anglo-centric platform (and hence community, at least for the time being), this entire conversation stemmed from the basic challenge of even defining the term and deciding on who "gets" to be considered a genius or not. There are some objective truths about genius according to many, but all it takes--to your point--is a different value system and basta! The whole idea is turned on its head. Thanks for your valuable input here.
I'll make the same point as I made in response to Erik Hoel. Genius is not just about ability. Mensa is full of exceptionally intelligent people who make no appreciable difference to human flourishing. We call someone a genius not for being smart, but for making a big difference. Genius is measured in accomplishment.
Bach was obviously exceptionally gifted, but he also came at a time when music theory and musical instrument making had made significant advances that opened up the vast musical possibilities that he explored. Mozart discovered a new vein to explore, and so did Beethoven. The other composers of the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods made significant contributions as well, but the big three explored a huge chunk of the available territory. The rest were clearing up after them and exploring the few remaining remote corners. Symphonic music today is an arrhythmic atonal mess because that's the only territory left for composers in that form, other than film music.
There may be many people of equal musical gifts today. Statistically, given our wealth and population, there should be dozens if not hundreds. But there isn't the same vast musical territory to explore. You can be a superb musician today, but music is so mature now that the chances of finding some vast unexplored territory to open up the way Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven did is remote.
There are multiple examples from history of people making the same breakthrough at almost the same time. Thus you will recognize Charles Darwin as the name of one of the great geniuses of our civilization, but Alfred Russel Wallace is probably a name you will have to Google for. Ditto for Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Gray. Genius is talent meeting opportunity, and publishing first.
So if we are a little short on geniuses today, it is probably for two reasons. One is in both the arts and sciences, we are a very mature civilization (perhaps even one doddering into madness and decay) and there are not so many great breakthroughs to be made. There are, in other words, fewer thing to be a genius about.
The second is that we are now incredibly deliberate and systematic about how we tackle almost every problem. In every field, teams drive forward the boundaries of knowledge and engineering on a factory production model. When great breakthroughs are made, therefore, they are made by teams working systematically, not individuals working alone. The team is the genius. The process is the genius. The MNRA COVID vaccine is an astonishing breakthrough. In any previous age, it would be the work of a individual genius. Today is the the work of a team for very bright people following a well designed and disciplined process. We don't know the names of any of the hundreds of people on those teams. We know the names of the companies they worked for. Pfizer and Moderna are the geniuses.
FANTASTIC point re: groups being geniuses now versus individuals. I hadn't thought about that fundamental shift, which is paradoxical, isn't it, in such an advanced individualistic age? To continue with the analogy, The Beatles are considered geniuses, but you can't even limit that "genius" to Lennon/McCartney because not only was Harrison a legend, but after all, Ringo was with them until the end ... it has to count for something.
As for the idea that there are fewer things to be genius about, I think this fits well into the theory of group genius (Genium? Geniuocracy? Shall I butcher this idea further? I think not) But I do agree with your assertion that in some sense, we are experiencing an era of decay, which shall lead to another kind of flourishing we aren't yet aware of. Out of the ashes ... well, everybody likes the story of the Phoenix.
Thank you. You raise several good points.
I think the commonality for the term genius - is to see what others do not see and make connections
that others can not make. In that way the domain is not important but only the skill to apply and get results that most ever dreamed of. My opinion of course ( from sunny Melbourne Australia ! )
Yes yes yes. The old forest for the trees adage ... I've also found these days that if we can flip a painfully obvious idea on its head / refer to a truism in the inverse, it can lead to some damn interesting thoughts.
For example, I am often asked how it's possible to live a comfortable existence in a city like Paris without making much more than minimum wage. First, my answer is: I don't have kids. Second, I say that what people forget about financial "poverty" is that not having (or choosing to earn) a lot of money is only a problem if we think we want to SPEND a lot of money.
So instead of thinking about "how much money am I making?" I think about "how much money am I not spending?" Coming from the USA, the answer is easy: cost of living is a fraction of what it is over yonder when you don't have car insurance/health insurance/exploitative housing + cell phone + everything else prices. A simple flip of the switch can change the perspective quite quickly.
Just want to point out that when you click on Martha Nussbaums essay, it says it was published in February 1999, not 2000 as mentioned here.
As for how I try to be more genius like, I run a Zettelkasten where I put my notes (and link them) of what I read. Not all I read, but most of the non-fiction stuff. That takes a lot of time, but that way I remember what I read a couple of years later (without: not so long). A Zettelkasten usually helps making connections, too.
As for Erik Hoels way of raising genius: I went to a math club at university when I was 14 here in Berlin, Germany. It was the late 80s and in a math summer camp we had access to a computer there and we started coding, actually. We tried to program a text parser so we could develop text adventures, after Infocom and so.
Ahh thank you for the edit good sir! 'Tis amended.
I have never heard of a Zettelkasten before, so you've taught me something ... makes total sense re: note taking, in my best moments I will type up everything I've underlined in whichever book I've finished reading. My dream, one day, is to have an anthology of all of my "favorite" lines (each reading of a book results in noticing something different, obviously).
What a wild moment to be in the 80s and learning coding ... dare I say you live in a secret lair and have an outsized knowledge + control over the world's choose-your-own adventure novels? Sounds like a fantastic setting for a memoir/novel, in any case.
1. As for Zettelkasten: look here ➜ https://zenkit.com/en/blog/a-beginners-guide-to-the-zettelkasten-method/. I run mine in Devon Think ( ➜ https://www.devontechnologies.com/de/apps/devonthink), but many people do it in Obsidian these days ( ➜ https://obsidian.md). Takes some time to set up, but is perfectly suited for getting publishing ready texts, notes, knowledge done.
2. Merve Emre, Professor for Literature somewhere in New York (she regularly writes for The New Yorker) uses underlining to start her essays, my Zettelkasten tells me (I found that here: ➜ https://www.nybooks.com/online/2022/04/16/educate-entertain-scold-charm/). She underlines all she thinks necessary, then types up all the underlined passages, then puts these passages, lines, sentences in groups. This grouping of her underlinings then gives her almost all the structure / arguments for the essay she writes.
3. If I would have started journaling in the 80s, this would maybe make for an interesting read. I didn't, so maybe not. Never thought about incorporating that into my writing... but yeah, we had fun back then.
Thanks for these links, am going to do some delving. As a kid typing up notes was my way of thinking "maybe if I write down the exact sentences of the greats, through osmosis, I shall become a great writer." Not sure that happened. But it didn't hurt my brain.
And as for the 80s, I just watched "Blowout" for the first time. What a time to be alive, and to still believe in simple yet profound ideas.
Oh my. I see. I always think of myself as the most usual human being around, so I always assume everyone else is just like me. Now reading "what a time to be alive" strongly suggests you are not as old as I am, which I somehow assumed.
There was a Depeche Mode concert in the German Democratic Republic, shortly before the end. I did not manage to get tickets, but we went to the hotel where Depeche Mode supposedly was staying. There was a security cordon around the entrance, and we waited. A bus came, the hotel doors revolved and out came two members of the group, strolling to the bus. Me, doing swimming training 5 times a week, I was fast and agile and strong for my age, or better, for any age. I just moved through the security to shake hands with Gore and Gahan, I believe it was. But just when I ran through, a security guy tripped me and I fell on my face, in front of the two Depeche Mode guys. As I remember it, I lay there sprawling, but Gahan gave me a hand to pull me up again. Security led me away, but I was seriously considering hacking my hand off and putting it on display in a cabinet.
Haha, don't we all. I was born in 1988 so I didn't get that sweet taste of pure cocaine-laced disco / funky outfits as a mater of course / the societal terror that was nuclear war and AIDS. Surely it wasn't all fun, but Depeche Mode in the GDR, holy hell. AND you have a story about it to boot? It's like you should be a writer or something ....
Excellent framework.
Much has to be said for a simplification of a life
Unfortunately it comes down to illiteracy too - monetary and financial; thinking interest rates never go down and therefore over borrow only to regret that decision when the tide turns - but it has never happened for 10 years they say ! Belatedly, a wider lens and deeper historical economic insight
would of helped avoid that exuberant decision. History does repeat not always in the same time horizon though.
Thank you sir! Great point re: financial illiteracy. I would've really benefited from knowing what it *actually meant* to take out student loans for master's programs before I started doing so. Now I'm just American about it: "Oh, it's just a fee I'll pay back for the rest of my life." Worth it? Only each individual can make that choice. But maybe the Supreme Court will rule in my favor. Ha. I wonder how many times that hope was fulfilled ...
No doubt the Ukrainian is one of Campbell's thousand faces with the superpower of song.
I'd get behind that Marvel movie. What the hell does Quantimaniamiasmamimeticmorhosis mean anyway? And since when were wasps part of the gig?
I hope you get a return on your Master's Investment and that you extinguish any debt or maybe the Supreme Court passes a favorable outcome.
It is interesting the etymology of the word mortgage in medieval times means " Dead Pledge". That sounds scary and somehow that message has been lost over the ages, no doubt by creative marketing by lending institutions - we can't have lazy capital laying about -we must rent it out to borrowers !
Interesting discussion thread, I must go back to my studies of Mandarin
cheers
Wowww hadn't considered the etymology of a mortgage before. Thanks for that illumination.
"Hello, sir. Your Dead Pledge will only be a small fraction of your income!"
"Dead Pledge?"
"Yes. Your pledge until your death."
"So it's for life?"
"Yes."
"Where do I sign?"
This really struck me: "...wherein many of the most intelligent amongst us use language more as a gavel for control than as a tool for communication."
How poignant! Made me wonder how much I use language to gratify my ego...
And I'm curious about the "cultivating genius" question...
I don't know if genius can be cultivated. Genius feels like a historical term - like we give it to people who made an oversized impact in their time, but we just didn't realize how big an impact it would make. I'm not an expert, though. Did anyone call Pasteur a genius in his time?
I think the problem with "cultivating genius" is like commodifying something that best happens naturally. Synthetically creating individuals to have oversized impact in our world seems to come with a lot of issues on the darker side of social engineering. And we worship geniuses maybe too much as it is.
Thanks Zach. As a writer that question "How often do I use language to gratify my ego?" is a constant ... but even in social settings, I have grown so weary of the phrases I use to describe a semblance of my reality succinctly. "So, you live in Paris?" "Yes." "What's that like?"
Lord. If I were a politician I'd fight for the Elevation of Small Talk. Love your use of the term commodification in reference to cultivating genius ... we live in that kind of era, where there has to be a GOAL, even when it's some self-help guru telling us to forget about the past and not fret over the future. Re: social engineering, just look at a country like the USA and France and what proportion of its "leaders" come from a select few schools. I loved reading "Never Let Me Go" (Ishiguro) for a hot take on that idea. Thanks for inspiring this brain in the a.m.
hmmmm small talk is such a necessary evil for human beans. but honestly one of the worst things. (tbh i’d ask that same question about you living in Paris 🙃). but i also get that question about living in Vietnam haha.
ishiguro was already on my list, and now even more so.
Yeah [Paris] is just a placeholder for the question. a necessary evil, indeed, but in my most idealistic moments I go to a party and actively try not to engage in the emptiness that follows a night out filled with noise. Then again, alcohol helps make everyone seem a whole lot more interesting, including myself ... I wonder when the USA decides psychedelics are actually medicine if smalltalk will change for the better. A man can hope
i feel you. small talk feels like a little death every time. the worst part is when you know people for a long time and it’s their only form of conversation. 😤
Loved this. Incomprehensibility does not genius make. True geniuses not only discover and formulate new ideas and associations, but can communicate complex ideas in a way that can be understood by the rest of us.
I believe there is a tangible shift in the notion of genius and who gets to claim it, notably the MacArthur Genius Grants, which provide significant financial support to creative people in the sciences, arts, activism, and more who don't fit the old model. About the 2022 fellows, according to the website: “The 2022 MacArthur Fellows are architects of new modes of activism, artistic practice, and citizen science. They are excavators uncovering what has been overlooked, undervalued, or poorly understood..."
Love that phrase "excavators uncovering what has been overlooked." So often times when I'm thinking about essays to write / how best to present them, I am infected by that old academic brain that tells me "X # of references = SMART STATUS." And then I realize if I'm trying to actually say something useful, I have to find the words that are mine, not someone else's.
To your point, true genius these days seems to be somebody who can explain the most complex idea in simple, comprehensible language. I'm a big fan of Neil Degrasse Tyson in this regard.
Yes, I was thinking of him! And also of Stephen Hawking, who wrote so simply and beautifully. Part of his genius was translating the extreme complexity that resided in his extraordinary brain for ordinary people—and he did it without any sense of superiority or disdain.
Yesssss, the disdain is such a constant (and is in fact, at least tacitly, encouraged in the world of academia). Here's to astrophysicists sounding human--may the stars bless 'em!
Ah, I love the idea of astrophysicists blessed by the stars:)