Talent is mostly a result of hard work, passion and sheer dumb luck. It’s more nurture than nature (genes). People who are called born-geniuses more often than not had better access to facilities at the right age while their neural connections were still forming. (~90%)
Update: OK. It seems I’ve to substantiate. Take the case of Barrack Obama. Nobody would’ve expected a black guy to become the US President 50 years ago. Or take the case of Bill Gates, Bill Joy or Steve Jobs. They just happened to have the right kind of technological exposure at an early age and were ready when the technology boom arrived. Or take the case of mathematicians like Fibonacci, Cardano, the Bernoulli brothers. They were smart. But there were other smart mathematicians as well. What separates them is the passion and the hard work and the time when they lived and did the work. A century earlier, they would’ve died in obscurity after being tried and tortured for blasphemy. Take Mozart. He didn’t start making beautiful original music until he was twenty-one by when he had enough musical exposure that there was no one to match him. Take Darwin and think what he would have become if he hadn’t boarded the Beagle. He would have been some pastor studying bugs and would’ve died in obscurity.
In short a genius is made not born. I’m not denying that good genes would help you with memory and learning, but it takes more than genes to be a genius.
I was with you right up until that second sentence. And then I thought about my sister who was speaking in full sentences by 1 and had taught herself to read by 3.
Though I should talk to others about this as it is testable, I have seen evidence of affective intelligence spirals. Faith in oneself and hard work lead to success and a work ethic, making it easier to have faith and keep working.
I would expect this hypothesis (conditional on affective genius cycles which are more readily testable) to predict MORE “geniuses of geniuses,” not fewer.
Could this be more precisely rephrased as, “for a majority of people, say 80 %, there would have been a detailed sequence of life experiences that are not extraordinarily improbable or greatly unlike what you would expect to have in a 20th century first world country, which would have resulted them becoming what is regarded as genius by adulthood”?
“For people generally regarded as geniuses, likely 100% of them, there is a set of life experiences which is not extraordinarily improbable or greatly unlikely which would have resulted in them not being regarded as geniuses by at least 99% of those who regard them as geniuses.”
Those figures might need to be adjusted for people who, for example, are regarded as geniuses by less than 100 people or more than ten million people.
I don’t see how anyone would disagree with in that formulation, since there are vastly more ways to fail than to succeed.
The debated idea is that most people, due to the genetic lottery, couldn’t aspire to genius-level achievement no matter what their (reasonable) circumstances. Yours seems to be directed at a stance which completely dismisses the “dumb luck” part, after conception, of people ending up being considered a genius. I haven’t seen anyone who thinks somewhat unusual genetics are probably a necessary precondition for genius for humans as they are today taking that stance.
I agree, thinking about my post again it is much weaker and not really useful to the discussion.
Although I did have the purpose of conflicting with some fictional evidence; for example, vampires always turn out to be rich and in “Deepness in the Sky” Pham Nuwen is said to have built up a trillion dollar fortune out of nothing after abandoned on a planet. These sorts of things tend to imply that regardless of the circumstances of a person if they are smart enough they can work their way out.
It’s somewhat distinct in that the fictional characters have a basis to build upon whereas a newborn does not, but if anyone is updating on fictional evidence they should stop.
Upvoting, even though I agree with the first sentence. But I disagree with the rest because I’m pretty sure that hard work and passion have a strong genetic component as well.
Talent is mostly a result of hard work, passion and sheer dumb luck. It’s more nurture than nature (genes). People who are called born-geniuses more often than not had better access to facilities at the right age while their neural connections were still forming. (~90%)
Update: OK. It seems I’ve to substantiate. Take the case of Barrack Obama. Nobody would’ve expected a black guy to become the US President 50 years ago. Or take the case of Bill Gates, Bill Joy or Steve Jobs. They just happened to have the right kind of technological exposure at an early age and were ready when the technology boom arrived. Or take the case of mathematicians like Fibonacci, Cardano, the Bernoulli brothers. They were smart. But there were other smart mathematicians as well. What separates them is the passion and the hard work and the time when they lived and did the work. A century earlier, they would’ve died in obscurity after being tried and tortured for blasphemy. Take Mozart. He didn’t start making beautiful original music until he was twenty-one by when he had enough musical exposure that there was no one to match him. Take Darwin and think what he would have become if he hadn’t boarded the Beagle. He would have been some pastor studying bugs and would’ve died in obscurity.
In short a genius is made not born. I’m not denying that good genes would help you with memory and learning, but it takes more than genes to be a genius.
I was with you right up until that second sentence. And then I thought about my sister who was speaking in full sentences by 1 and had taught herself to read by 3.
the level of genius of geniuses, especially the non-hardworking ones, is too high & rare to be explained entirely by this.
Though I should talk to others about this as it is testable, I have seen evidence of affective intelligence spirals. Faith in oneself and hard work lead to success and a work ethic, making it easier to have faith and keep working.
I would expect this hypothesis (conditional on affective genius cycles which are more readily testable) to predict MORE “geniuses of geniuses,” not fewer.
Could this be more precisely rephrased as, “for a majority of people, say 80 %, there would have been a detailed sequence of life experiences that are not extraordinarily improbable or greatly unlike what you would expect to have in a 20th century first world country, which would have resulted them becoming what is regarded as genius by adulthood”?
I would interpret in the other direction;
“For people generally regarded as geniuses, likely 100% of them, there is a set of life experiences which is not extraordinarily improbable or greatly unlikely which would have resulted in them not being regarded as geniuses by at least 99% of those who regard them as geniuses.”
Those figures might need to be adjusted for people who, for example, are regarded as geniuses by less than 100 people or more than ten million people.
I don’t see how anyone would disagree with in that formulation, since there are vastly more ways to fail than to succeed.
The debated idea is that most people, due to the genetic lottery, couldn’t aspire to genius-level achievement no matter what their (reasonable) circumstances. Yours seems to be directed at a stance which completely dismisses the “dumb luck” part, after conception, of people ending up being considered a genius. I haven’t seen anyone who thinks somewhat unusual genetics are probably a necessary precondition for genius for humans as they are today taking that stance.
I agree, thinking about my post again it is much weaker and not really useful to the discussion.
Although I did have the purpose of conflicting with some fictional evidence; for example, vampires always turn out to be rich and in “Deepness in the Sky” Pham Nuwen is said to have built up a trillion dollar fortune out of nothing after abandoned on a planet. These sorts of things tend to imply that regardless of the circumstances of a person if they are smart enough they can work their way out.
It’s somewhat distinct in that the fictional characters have a basis to build upon whereas a newborn does not, but if anyone is updating on fictional evidence they should stop.
Upvoting, even though I agree with the first sentence. But I disagree with the rest because I’m pretty sure that hard work and passion have a strong genetic component as well.
What does ‘sheer dumb luck’ mean?