4 ms·
> aristotle i wonder if that's perhaps the best example of how 'lone genius' works, and that our dismissal of his responsibility for work cited to him is misgu
by smegcicle 5y ago
> aristotle
i wonder if that's perhaps the best example of how 'lone genius' works, and that our dismissal of his responsibility for work cited to him is misguided?
as in, the genius is in creating a framework, like that old meme about creating new boxes for other people to think inside
- handrous 5y agoIt can both be the case that some people did great things, and that better understanding the full context of how they did that, and what exactly they did personally do to achieve that end, is useful if we wish to imitate them or provide good policy, environments, teaching, and resources for others to do the same. Excessively crediting the individual, or misunderstanding their work, may lead us to believe ourselves capable of less than we actually are—"Sure, I like painting and I'm good at it, but I could never make as many great paintings as so-and-so, that would be impossible!" weeeellllll so-and-so was a great artist, true, that's not wrong, but about 3/4 of the paint on your favorite work of his was applied by his assistants, so you might not be so far off as you imagine, and also you may need to redirect some of your efforts at skill-improvement if you want to match his output—say, to selecting, and managing, and not-feeling-guilty-about-not-crediting, assistants. Which is to say, really, that I'm agreeing with you: the possibility that Aristotle may not have personally, solely, and remarkably capably, founded and written the inaugural texts for several major fields of study in Western science and academics, doesn't mean that he didn't do some great things, but it may change how one pursues imitating any part of his achievements, and the apparent attainability of doing great work of anything like the same order.