7 ms·

I love stories about Shannon, Feynman, Weiner, Grothendeick, Turing, and others, but I've become suspicious of the idea of genius. While these and others are un

I love stories about Shannon, Feynman, Weiner, Grothendeick, Turing, and others, but I've become suspicious of the idea of genius. While these and others are undoubtedly examples, and telling their stories inspires us to follow their paths at least for a while, the underlying idea is that these people, whose minds necessarily took liberty first to make their discoveries, are somehow unreachable Others. This is where I diverge, as I think if we were to cultivate the core values of benevolence, humility, with iconoclasm in kids we could produce more minds like these. What makes genius so exceptional is less a magical quality of the person, but that they manage to achieve in spite of the rest of us in as we occupy our classrooms and offices. I suspect it's these values that are the necessary condition. Such a pleasant article about such an amazing mind.

AcademicHamster 6y ago
I like the sentiment, but I have to disagree. I believe there is something genetically different about Grothendieck that makes him possess superior intelligence. I don’t think you can cultivate a bunch of Grothendiecks in mass by teaching a bunch of children advanced mathematics at a younger age.
- musha68k 6y ago
  It’s likely due to the factors both you and the parent are mentioning – and others – not known or in worst case unknowable.
- fenderbluesjr 6y ago
  I think László Polgár would disagree with you wholeheartedly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A1szl%C3%B3_Polg%C3%A1r https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A1szl%C3%B3_Polg%C3%A1r Interesting read if you aren't already familiar
  - citrablue 6y ago
    But they were genetically related to him. I don't think this is a good example.
- stainforth 6y ago
  Off subject but on Wikipedia Grothendieck says Riemann was his only main or most admired mathematician. Do their fields match up for this to make sense?
  - btilly 6y ago
    Grothendieck did a lot of work in areas that were built off of Riemann's work. So, for example, Riemann came up with Riemann surfaces, which were the inspiration for Riemann manifolds. Finding ways to generalize that was a major starting point for algebraic geometry. Which Grothendieck did a lot of work in. As an example, Grothendieck's first famous theorem in algebraic geometry was the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grothendieck%E2%80%93Riemann%E2%80%93Roch_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grothendieck%E2%80%93Riemann%E.... Which finds an appropriate generalization of a result originally due to Riemann in a much more limited context. Side note. When the name Riemann appears on HN, it almost always is in reference to the Riemann hypothesis. Which is a conjecture in number theory. This might mislead you into thinking that Riemann was a number theorist. He was not. His total contribution to number theory was a single paper where he used his complex analysis techniques to prove the prime number theorem, and made his famous conjecture. The only other context that most on HN will know the name from was the Riemann integral. Which is the main integral that most who take Calculus will know.
- strikelaserclaw 6y ago
  I think it is partially genetic, but also the type of environment that Grothendieck was raised in. He was raised in utmost uncertainty during WW2 (he was half-jewish), and i think he gravitated towards the certainty in mathematics. He was also mostly self taught early on, so he definitely had a different way of looking at things than those who came from regular academic backgrounds like serre. I like to think of natural brain power as hardware (genetics) and the set of beliefs, interests, fundamental ways of thinking about the world as software acquired through experience. Even the best hardware can't run shitty algorithms. In any creative fields, there are an extraordinary amount of brute force paths, it takes a special type of touch to find the correct path, and this seems to be very much a function of the life experiences a person had and this is really what differentiates special creative people like einstein or grothendieck from people who are just as intelligent but haven't done nearly as much.
dimitrios1 6y ago
I used to view things this way as well. It has a lot in common with blank slate psychology. I have come to not believe things like this anymore. As I get older, I am returning more to it's more about nature than nurture: genetics matter much more than environment. I've realized just how hard it is to do some of these things, even with all the resources and tools at your disposal. I spent much time thinking of how environmental cultivation can help, and I do think it matters to a degree, but genetics matter much more, in as much that the only reason environment matters at all is that it helps bring forth expressions of your genes. Having children made me realize this even more. While they pick up on some things and mannerisms of their parents, I have no idea where their unique little personalities came from, and their tendencies towards certain subjects, hobbies, or activities. It amazes me every day I see them change and grow into their own person. Additionally, it belittles the consistent effort and energy spent by these individuals to train their minds. Genius to an extent has a lot in common with madness, in that you have to be almost mad to take ideas they did to their conclusion. We see the result of their works, but not the countless hours and sleepless nights put in to get to that point, driven by the idea of novelty and discovery.
- yrimaxi 6y ago
  > Additionally, it belittles the consistent effort and energy spent by these individuals to train their minds. If we have to choose between these two dichotomies, “nature” “belittles” it more.
- bmitc 6y ago
  > As I get older, I am returning more to it's more about nature than nurture: genetics matter much more than environment. It is my understanding that modern science supports this. I’ve seen either a book or article (none of which I can recall at the moment) that echoes this sentiment.
  - coldtea 6y ago
    Off-topic, but a book or article though could be something totally different than "modern science". Even if it mentions dozens of studies. You can find a book on every position in science. In some you can find tens, or thousands supporting a position. And they all references studies and statistics, and such. But they can still not reflect any real consensus in "modern science". Either because they cherry pick from a side far away from the consensus (e.g. there are hundreds of such books from climate change denier scientists, but the consensus is elsewhere). Or because the consensus itself is broken to 2 or more equally strong directions. I now tend to only consider "settled" science (and that's mostly "settled for now") what has been studied and distilled so long, it's in 101 university books and such.
bmitc 6y ago
I think it’s probably a little of both. On one side, I am reminded of the quote “luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity”. Many of the big discoveries happened by very intelligent people being in the right place, at the right time where a certain idea was ripe, meeting the right people, and having just enough gusto, so to speak, to push in a new direction. I think that is probably applicable to people like Einstein and Shannon. I’m not taking away from them at all because they did it with work and intelligence. It’s just they had the right preparation at the right time and place. But then there are other people that do seem to be on a totally different plane, usually in some specific field. One that comes to mind is someone like Grigori Perelman. I think that’s where the comment on genetics applies, because someone like that truly has biological horsepower that the rest of us don’t have. Then there are others who are more generalist thinkers, at a system level, that seem to see things the rest of us don’t and have the capability to sort through it all. I’m reminded of people like Stafford Beer. Someone like Noam Chomsky is probably in this category as well but also in the former, like Perelman. If you’ve ever watched Chomsky debate or speak, he seems to have a basically infinite memory and instant recall of what he has read.
TameAntelope 6y ago
> There are two types of genius. Ordinary geniuses do great things, but they leave you room to believe that you could do the same if only you worked hard enough. Then there are magicians, and you can have no idea how they do it. Feynman was a magician. - Hans Bethe I believe Feynman's "magic" was in how well he could explain things to others, and there isn't a "explain things well" gene...
- coldtea 6y ago
  >I believe Feynman's "magic" was in how well he could explain things to others, and there isn't a "explain things well" gene... How so? There are people naturally skilled with language and communication.
stagger87 6y ago
You're forgetting the most common characteristic of the prolific, financial independence.
- adolph 6y ago
  Do you mean a workplace like Bell Labs where the monopoly only had to come up with a significant game changer now and then instead of on a quarterly basis? The below podcast, a TWIML AI interview of Charles Isbell is an interesting listen overall and the above question’s assumptions about Bell Labs come from the podcast’s depiction of Bell Labs. https://twimlai.com/machine-learning-as-a-software-engineering-enterprise-with-charles-isbell/ https://twimlai.com/machine-learning-as-a-software-engineeri...
  - stagger87 6y ago
    No, I mean personal wealth.
    - benjohnson 6y ago
      Everybody here has a computer. I suspect that lack of resources isn't the thing that's holding us back.
      - stagger87 6y ago
        I personally think it goes beyond simply access to resources. Isn't having the financial freedom to pursue your interests for large portions of your life a common trait of many intelligent/polymath/achieved types?
motohagiography 6y ago
To summarize other comments on genetic component, I think survivor bias has more to do with it, as even if hypoethetically there is a genetic component, how many of those genetically "gifted" people come out the other side of our institutions and systems to be remembered as "geniuses?" One doesn't need to subscribe to tabula rasa to bet that the real incidence of a Ramanujan intelligence is orders of magnitude higher than its appearance in european universities. The more plausible explanation is that our societies are exceptionally good at suppressing these intelligences because the problems they index on and the only ways to solve them are specifically orthogonal to the skills you need to rise in a bureaucracy. Genetics might be a thing, but I'm saying any genetic component of intelligence is effectively cancelled out in all but a few celebrated instances by the leviathan mean-reversion machines we call societies. Edit to add: I think the argument should be about the best way to discover how fat tailed the distribution of human intelligence really is instead of producing explanations for why we should think it's long and thin.
- EForEndeavour 6y ago
  > even if hypoethetically there is a genetic component > Genetics might be a thing Wouldn't it be a huge surprise if genetics weren't a thing when it comes to intelligence (or imperfect attempts to quantify it)? Maybe my lay understanding is out of date or something, but research like [1] concludes that metrics of intelligence are "moderately to substantially heritable," along with "virtually all individual psychological differences." [1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12486697/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12486697/
  - meowface 6y ago
    Of course; the parent likely meant something more like "even if hypothetically there is a strong or very strong genetic component". It's undeniable there is one, but the responsibility is still hotly debated. I've seen claims between 20 - 90%. I think their point was that no matter how strong it might be, it often may not visibly materialize due to various environmental factors, including passive or active suppression and the way our societies and economies are organized. So assuming for the sake of argument it's 50% or even 90%, there are still a lot of reasons why such gifted people may not get recognized and/or reach their full potential. Ramanujan very easily could've died with almost no one remembering him if none of the letters he wrote were taken seriously. The first two mathematicians he contacted ignored him. If not for the third, G. H. Hardy, giving him a chance, we might not be talking about him. And even he initially suspected he was a fraud of some kind, until he scrutinized the work more carefully and shared it with others.
ta1234567890 6y ago
> but that they manage to achieve in spite of the rest of us This is a very important factor. Whatever things these geniuses brought to the world, were not self-evident to other people. The geniuses not only had to come up with their ideas, but (maybe even more importantly) "sell" those ideas to others. It is very hard to convince others to even pay attention to new ideas, it's even harder to get them to adopt them.
TriNetra 6y ago
I don't think anyone is genius in any field by birth. Yes, one can have some biological traits but those are mostly related to having a properly functioning brain. Then, with long, sincere effort and right environment starting early in life, one eventually attains the mastery in the given field. I read this book 'The Children of Tomorrow' [0] in which the author has mentioned about a couple Laszlo Polgar (a psychologist) and Klara who intentionally and carefully planned making their children genius chess players. The result: > Their first daughter Susan Polgar won her first Under-11 chess tournament at age four. At twelve, she won the World (Girls) Under-16 championship. At fifteen, she became the top-rated female chess player in the world. Going through the conventional Grandmaster (GM) norms applicable to men, she became a chess grandmaster at the age of twenty-two. In 1996, twenty-seven-year-old Susan Polgar was crowned the women’s chess champion. > their second daughter Sofia who, at the age of eleven, became a world Under-14 girls chess champion. > their youngest daughter, Judit, who At age twelve, had thirty-five more points in FIDE rating (world chess rating) than the erstwhile world women chess champion. At age fifteen, she became the youngest chess grandmaster, far ahead of any male chess grandmaster throughout the history of the game. Judit is generally considered the strongest female chess player of all time. At age ten, she not only took on chess grandmaster Lev Gutman, but also won against him. > All three daughters were home-schooled by Klara with a specialization in chess. They figured a long time ago – as an increasing number of parents are discovering today – that there was little sense in sending their children to a traditional school where regard for individual growth and understanding the temperament of each child was negligible. By the time most children come back home from school in the afternoon, they are tired and a whole day seems gone. To expect that they would then pursue intensive training in anything else at all is neither practical nor reasonable. 0: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07PRP4HQ4 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07PRP4HQ4
gnusty_gnurc 6y ago
I don't think this is something that you can organize or direct. I think it's precisely the people that think they can grow geniuses like corn that will potentially squash the genius that would arise naturally. It's a repeated scenario over and over again. The centralizers and their hubris, thinking they have the keys to unlock utopia - and others must obey them to realize it. For instance the Wright Brothers achieved what US scientists funded by the government couldn't. They were taunted as mere garage mechanics.

AcademicHamster 6y ago

I like the sentiment, but I have to disagree. I believe there is something genetically different about Grothendieck that makes him possess superior intelligence. I don’t think you can cultivate a bunch of Grothendiecks in mass by teaching a bunch of children advanced mathematics at a younger age.

musha68k 6y ago
It’s likely due to the factors both you and the parent are mentioning – and others – not known or in worst case unknowable.
fenderbluesjr 6y ago
I think László Polgár would disagree with you wholeheartedly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A1szl%C3%B3_Polg%C3%A1r https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A1szl%C3%B3_Polg%C3%A1r Interesting read if you aren't already familiar
- citrablue 6y ago
  But they were genetically related to him. I don't think this is a good example.
stainforth 6y ago
Off subject but on Wikipedia Grothendieck says Riemann was his only main or most admired mathematician. Do their fields match up for this to make sense?
- btilly 6y ago
  Grothendieck did a lot of work in areas that were built off of Riemann's work. So, for example, Riemann came up with Riemann surfaces, which were the inspiration for Riemann manifolds. Finding ways to generalize that was a major starting point for algebraic geometry. Which Grothendieck did a lot of work in. As an example, Grothendieck's first famous theorem in algebraic geometry was the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grothendieck%E2%80%93Riemann%E2%80%93Roch_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grothendieck%E2%80%93Riemann%E.... Which finds an appropriate generalization of a result originally due to Riemann in a much more limited context. Side note. When the name Riemann appears on HN, it almost always is in reference to the Riemann hypothesis. Which is a conjecture in number theory. This might mislead you into thinking that Riemann was a number theorist. He was not. His total contribution to number theory was a single paper where he used his complex analysis techniques to prove the prime number theorem, and made his famous conjecture. The only other context that most on HN will know the name from was the Riemann integral. Which is the main integral that most who take Calculus will know.
strikelaserclaw 6y ago
I think it is partially genetic, but also the type of environment that Grothendieck was raised in. He was raised in utmost uncertainty during WW2 (he was half-jewish), and i think he gravitated towards the certainty in mathematics. He was also mostly self taught early on, so he definitely had a different way of looking at things than those who came from regular academic backgrounds like serre. I like to think of natural brain power as hardware (genetics) and the set of beliefs, interests, fundamental ways of thinking about the world as software acquired through experience. Even the best hardware can't run shitty algorithms. In any creative fields, there are an extraordinary amount of brute force paths, it takes a special type of touch to find the correct path, and this seems to be very much a function of the life experiences a person had and this is really what differentiates special creative people like einstein or grothendieck from people who are just as intelligent but haven't done nearly as much.

dimitrios1 6y ago

I used to view things this way as well. It has a lot in common with blank slate psychology. I have come to not believe things like this anymore. As I get older, I am returning more to it's more about nature than nurture: genetics matter much more than environment. I've realized just how hard it is to do some of these things, even with all the resources and tools at your disposal. I spent much time thinking of how environmental cultivation can help, and I do think it matters to a degree, but genetics matter much more, in as much that the only reason environment matters at all is that it helps bring forth expressions of your genes. Having children made me realize this even more. While they pick up on some things and mannerisms of their parents, I have no idea where their unique little personalities came from, and their tendencies towards certain subjects, hobbies, or activities. It amazes me every day I see them change and grow into their own person. Additionally, it belittles the consistent effort and energy spent by these individuals to train their minds. Genius to an extent has a lot in common with madness, in that you have to be almost mad to take ideas they did to their conclusion. We see the result of their works, but not the countless hours and sleepless nights put in to get to that point, driven by the idea of novelty and discovery.

yrimaxi 6y ago
> Additionally, it belittles the consistent effort and energy spent by these individuals to train their minds. If we have to choose between these two dichotomies, “nature” “belittles” it more.
bmitc 6y ago
> As I get older, I am returning more to it's more about nature than nurture: genetics matter much more than environment. It is my understanding that modern science supports this. I’ve seen either a book or article (none of which I can recall at the moment) that echoes this sentiment.
- coldtea 6y ago
  Off-topic, but a book or article though could be something totally different than "modern science". Even if it mentions dozens of studies. You can find a book on every position in science. In some you can find tens, or thousands supporting a position. And they all references studies and statistics, and such. But they can still not reflect any real consensus in "modern science". Either because they cherry pick from a side far away from the consensus (e.g. there are hundreds of such books from climate change denier scientists, but the consensus is elsewhere). Or because the consensus itself is broken to 2 or more equally strong directions. I now tend to only consider "settled" science (and that's mostly "settled for now") what has been studied and distilled so long, it's in 101 university books and such.

bmitc 6y ago

I think it’s probably a little of both. On one side, I am reminded of the quote “luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity”. Many of the big discoveries happened by very intelligent people being in the right place, at the right time where a certain idea was ripe, meeting the right people, and having just enough gusto, so to speak, to push in a new direction. I think that is probably applicable to people like Einstein and Shannon. I’m not taking away from them at all because they did it with work and intelligence. It’s just they had the right preparation at the right time and place. But then there are other people that do seem to be on a totally different plane, usually in some specific field. One that comes to mind is someone like Grigori Perelman. I think that’s where the comment on genetics applies, because someone like that truly has biological horsepower that the rest of us don’t have. Then there are others who are more generalist thinkers, at a system level, that seem to see things the rest of us don’t and have the capability to sort through it all. I’m reminded of people like Stafford Beer. Someone like Noam Chomsky is probably in this category as well but also in the former, like Perelman. If you’ve ever watched Chomsky debate or speak, he seems to have a basically infinite memory and instant recall of what he has read.

TameAntelope 6y ago

> There are two types of genius. Ordinary geniuses do great things, but they leave you room to believe that you could do the same if only you worked hard enough. Then there are magicians, and you can have no idea how they do it. Feynman was a magician. - Hans Bethe I believe Feynman's "magic" was in how well he could explain things to others, and there isn't a "explain things well" gene...

coldtea 6y ago
>I believe Feynman's "magic" was in how well he could explain things to others, and there isn't a "explain things well" gene... How so? There are people naturally skilled with language and communication.

stagger87 6y ago

You're forgetting the most common characteristic of the prolific, financial independence.

adolph 6y ago
Do you mean a workplace like Bell Labs where the monopoly only had to come up with a significant game changer now and then instead of on a quarterly basis? The below podcast, a TWIML AI interview of Charles Isbell is an interesting listen overall and the above question’s assumptions about Bell Labs come from the podcast’s depiction of Bell Labs. https://twimlai.com/machine-learning-as-a-software-engineering-enterprise-with-charles-isbell/ https://twimlai.com/machine-learning-as-a-software-engineeri...
- stagger87 6y ago
  No, I mean personal wealth.
  - benjohnson 6y ago
    Everybody here has a computer. I suspect that lack of resources isn't the thing that's holding us back.
    - stagger87 6y ago
      I personally think it goes beyond simply access to resources. Isn't having the financial freedom to pursue your interests for large portions of your life a common trait of many intelligent/polymath/achieved types?

motohagiography 6y ago

To summarize other comments on genetic component, I think survivor bias has more to do with it, as even if hypoethetically there is a genetic component, how many of those genetically "gifted" people come out the other side of our institutions and systems to be remembered as "geniuses?" One doesn't need to subscribe to tabula rasa to bet that the real incidence of a Ramanujan intelligence is orders of magnitude higher than its appearance in european universities. The more plausible explanation is that our societies are exceptionally good at suppressing these intelligences because the problems they index on and the only ways to solve them are specifically orthogonal to the skills you need to rise in a bureaucracy. Genetics might be a thing, but I'm saying any genetic component of intelligence is effectively cancelled out in all but a few celebrated instances by the leviathan mean-reversion machines we call societies. Edit to add: I think the argument should be about the best way to discover how fat tailed the distribution of human intelligence really is instead of producing explanations for why we should think it's long and thin.

EForEndeavour 6y ago
> even if hypoethetically there is a genetic component > Genetics might be a thing Wouldn't it be a huge surprise if genetics weren't a thing when it comes to intelligence (or imperfect attempts to quantify it)? Maybe my lay understanding is out of date or something, but research like [1] concludes that metrics of intelligence are "moderately to substantially heritable," along with "virtually all individual psychological differences." [1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12486697/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12486697/
- meowface 6y ago
  Of course; the parent likely meant something more like "even if hypothetically there is a strong or very strong genetic component". It's undeniable there is one, but the responsibility is still hotly debated. I've seen claims between 20 - 90%. I think their point was that no matter how strong it might be, it often may not visibly materialize due to various environmental factors, including passive or active suppression and the way our societies and economies are organized. So assuming for the sake of argument it's 50% or even 90%, there are still a lot of reasons why such gifted people may not get recognized and/or reach their full potential. Ramanujan very easily could've died with almost no one remembering him if none of the letters he wrote were taken seriously. The first two mathematicians he contacted ignored him. If not for the third, G. H. Hardy, giving him a chance, we might not be talking about him. And even he initially suspected he was a fraud of some kind, until he scrutinized the work more carefully and shared it with others.

ta1234567890 6y ago

> but that they manage to achieve in spite of the rest of us This is a very important factor. Whatever things these geniuses brought to the world, were not self-evident to other people. The geniuses not only had to come up with their ideas, but (maybe even more importantly) "sell" those ideas to others. It is very hard to convince others to even pay attention to new ideas, it's even harder to get them to adopt them.

TriNetra 6y ago

I don't think anyone is genius in any field by birth. Yes, one can have some biological traits but those are mostly related to having a properly functioning brain. Then, with long, sincere effort and right environment starting early in life, one eventually attains the mastery in the given field. I read this book 'The Children of Tomorrow' [0] in which the author has mentioned about a couple Laszlo Polgar (a psychologist) and Klara who intentionally and carefully planned making their children genius chess players. The result: > Their first daughter Susan Polgar won her first Under-11 chess tournament at age four. At twelve, she won the World (Girls) Under-16 championship. At fifteen, she became the top-rated female chess player in the world. Going through the conventional Grandmaster (GM) norms applicable to men, she became a chess grandmaster at the age of twenty-two. In 1996, twenty-seven-year-old Susan Polgar was crowned the women’s chess champion. > their second daughter Sofia who, at the age of eleven, became a world Under-14 girls chess champion. > their youngest daughter, Judit, who At age twelve, had thirty-five more points in FIDE rating (world chess rating) than the erstwhile world women chess champion. At age fifteen, she became the youngest chess grandmaster, far ahead of any male chess grandmaster throughout the history of the game. Judit is generally considered the strongest female chess player of all time. At age ten, she not only took on chess grandmaster Lev Gutman, but also won against him. > All three daughters were home-schooled by Klara with a specialization in chess. They figured a long time ago – as an increasing number of parents are discovering today – that there was little sense in sending their children to a traditional school where regard for individual growth and understanding the temperament of each child was negligible. By the time most children come back home from school in the afternoon, they are tired and a whole day seems gone. To expect that they would then pursue intensive training in anything else at all is neither practical nor reasonable. 0: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07PRP4HQ4 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07PRP4HQ4

gnusty_gnurc 6y ago

I don't think this is something that you can organize or direct. I think it's precisely the people that think they can grow geniuses like corn that will potentially squash the genius that would arise naturally. It's a repeated scenario over and over again. The centralizers and their hubris, thinking they have the keys to unlock utopia - and others must obey them to realize it. For instance the Wright Brothers achieved what US scientists funded by the government couldn't. They were taunted as mere garage mechanics.