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I'm not sure the idea of genius is one we should rely on. Why is it that we think one or two great people are responsible for all progress? I'd rather think th

I'm not sure the idea of genius is one we should rely on. Why is it that we think one or two great people are responsible for all progress? I'd rather think that it's about creating an environment where someone will solve our problems, and that we merely need to nurture the environment. With pre-identified geniuses, we end up with an entitled class populated by people who had hired tutors, and a bunch of people who think they'll never amount to anything because they didn't pass the test.

nonethewiser 4y ago
Plus, geniuses tend to make a shitload of money already. And when they dont, there is a reason.
- gremlinsinc 4y ago
  Genius is also loaded. It's a fact kids in poverty have lower test grades, so the ACT of giving them UBI will in fact RAISE test scores and maybe move them up to the 'genius' level, or at least give them a better shot. It's hard to focus on schooling when you're tummy is growling, or there's a ton of stress at home, or abuse, etc.
  - wankle 4y ago
    We grew up poor in the US. We worked hard in school and had above average to excellent test scores. Being poor does not directly support bad test scores or whether society can or should bear the burden of UBI. Conflating growing up poor with growing up with abuse is incorrect.
    - akie 4y ago
      And assuming wealth and poverty do NOT correlate with test scores and professional success is equally problematic.
      - torstenvl 4y ago
        No, not when the correlation is used as an argument against such measures (see, e.g., this thread). Such arguments are perniciously classist, anti-meritocratic, and anti-poor.
        akie 4y ago
        Fair point.
    - Taywee 4y ago
      Poverty is directly statistically correlated with poorer test scores and lower IQ. Your hard work and test scores don't contradict those statistics.
- bryanrasmussen 4y ago
  ok, well one obvious reason would be environmental effects of being raised by idiots without money.
  - tomatotomato37 4y ago
    The more obvious reason would be intelligence has zero correlation with motivation to contribute to society. Your stereotypical high school educated blue collar worker will still be better for society than a NEET Mensa member who spends all their time speed running videogames
    - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
      I mean it seems like one could perhaps get some estimation of how much impact family wealth and a positive environment has one success in relation to intellectual abilities based on lots of studies over probably about half a century now. Obviously it would be a wide range of stuff to argue about but still your example sounds more to me like something we won't have that much data on, relatively speaking.
- agf 4y ago
  If you pick "high IQ" as the definition of "genius", this isn't true. Right around the point where and individual would be considered a "genius", the correlation between income and IQ breaks down. So a super-genius makes about the same amount of money as a very smart, but within the bell curve, person. I would imagine this holds true for other definitions of genius, but I haven't seen quantitative data on it.
denton-scratch 4y ago
I dislike the notion that some individuals are off the scale on cleverness. It's easy enough to arrive at the conclusion that a person who is dimmer than us is cognitively challenged; it's much harder to assess the smarts of someone who is smarter than us. Is he 1% smarter than me? 10% smarter? Hell, 100% smarter? All I know is that he understands stuff that I don't, and solves crosswords faster. But I don't believe that anyone is so much smarter than the average that they need to be paid 100x what I could earn.
- fnordpiglet 4y ago
  Ok. But since you’re walking a distribution if you keep applying that without insight into how much smarter, just smarter, you’ll understand the tail. Identify A as smarter than B A identifies A’ A’ identifies A’’ … There’s no need to know the quantified smartness, just the ordinal smartness.
- SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
  > and solves crosswords faster I like this example, especially, as we're all aware, you can get better at both crosswords and IQ tests with practice.
- bena 4y ago
  > I dislike the notion that some individuals are off the scale on cleverness. Why not? You accept that some individuals are off the scale of various physical abilities. That try as you might, you'll never be the fastest or tallest or strongest. What makes intelligence different? Why should we believe that everyone is roughly equal in intelligence? If you are mediocre in obvious ways, what's left? Everyone wants to be good at something. Everyone wants to be better at something than others. But it is fairly obvious with anything with a physical component. I am a mediocre guitar player. I am not tall. I am not fast. I am not exceptionally strong. These are things that can be sussed out fairly quickly with some basic tests. But intelligence. Well. That's not only fluid, but it's also abstract. What does it mean to have an IQ of 129 versus an IQ of 130. Especially when one could score both depending on how much sleep one has had. So you can just say IQ is bullshit. Intelligence don't real. Everyone is smart in their own way. No. That's just simply not true. Yes, one could test differently based on conditions. However, it will fall within a range. Which is why IQ is often expressed as a range. If you score a 129, you'll be within the 125-135 group or something. And it's just like with physical traits. Like right now, I will be much slower than normal because my quadriceps are fucking cooked. I overexerted myself and I'm sore as shit. Even though I am not normally fast, timing me now wouldn't give an accurate representation of my average speed. And you can tell when someone has spent any time among the truly gifted. Because running into people like this is something else. They will come into a situation blind, get what you've already gotten, and then make a realization you'd never would have. They do process on a different level. And it's not about knowledge. It's not how much they know. It's about how fast they can acquire that knowledge, understand it, and then build upon it. It's how they can relate knowledge from different areas in new and novel ways. People who have spent time with the truly gifted know there's a such thing as intelligence. People who have only spent time with people who are average to above average have never actually seen intelligence at work.
lettergram 4y ago
IQ / "intelligence" is such a BS metric to go by. It's effectively the test makers deciding who would get a free ride through life. Which, incidentally would probably make those "geniuses" less intelligent overall. I'd rather work with a random person who grew up on a farm or the streets than someone who had the best tutors and went to Harvard. People who have to work hard, who grow up hard, are hardened against the world. They learn to survive. Most of our best entrepreneurs and builders grow up building and being independent. To be independent you have to learn to survive on your own, i.e. not with UBI. I'd rather have a higher level competition, not selecting based on IQ. In way of an example, a friend of mine who worked blue collar his whole life (running large repairs & logistics operations) ended up moving up the command. Eventually, he ended up in a consulting capacity as part of an R&D team for a massive logistics company. His first day on the job he saved an average of 2 lives a year and around $5m. He was given the job of improving a warehouse with a bunch of newly hired kids from Yale, Harvard, etc. The kids spent weeks going over all the different locations, trying to optimize layout, etc. Eventually, my friend just talked to people on the floor. At one point, he noticed a fork lift operator who was having an issue picking up a pallet off a truck. He asked what the issue was and the fork life operator said they didn't know exactly where the height of the pallet is. The ivy league consultants started planning out using cameras to select the correct height(s), looked at the budget associated with hiring developers, tried to identify the costs to retrofit all the fork lifts, etc. While that went on, my friend got two magnet strips, put some bright tape on the back, measured and put the magnet at the exact height the truck bed and as the pallets were a default height he knew where to put the next strip. Every new truck that came in would just move both strips based on the new truck height. He was done that afternoon and it was a $5 retrofit. On average, 2-3 workers died a year at all their warehouses due to pallets being knocked down, losses were an estimated $5m. The point of the story is that "genius" doesn't work better than practical problem solving. Problem solving comes from learning to survive and be independent.
jhedwards 4y ago
I love the story of Faraday and Maxwell precisely for this reason. Maxwell was a bonafide genius, but Faraday was just really good at note-taking and doing experiments. Because of those talents, Faraday was able to document a lifetime of experiments with electricity. Maxwell read the entire record of those experiments and was able to derive the mathematical model of what was happening. It seems that it takes more than just "genius" for progress to occur: creativity, hard work, diligence, and passion are also required, as well as a society that supports the people engaging in such endeavors.
timka 4y ago
You're right, the 'regular' people form the base of a society. But purely biologically they aren't capable of implementing a system for governing the society. This is b/c a hard working brain consumes up to 25% of total energy which is very expensive. Therefore we tend to find shortcuts that allow us to avoid that much of brain activity. And as brain wants to be 'happy' (chemically) which biologically means good food, reproduction and dominance. Thus geniuses may be considered a biological anomaly since for some reason they act against their biological nature by stressing themselves considerably more than 'regular' people. Also see my comment above regarding detecting geniuses in a scientific evidence-based way.

nonethewiser 4y ago

Plus, geniuses tend to make a shitload of money already. And when they dont, there is a reason.

gremlinsinc 4y ago
Genius is also loaded. It's a fact kids in poverty have lower test grades, so the ACT of giving them UBI will in fact RAISE test scores and maybe move them up to the 'genius' level, or at least give them a better shot. It's hard to focus on schooling when you're tummy is growling, or there's a ton of stress at home, or abuse, etc.
- wankle 4y ago
  We grew up poor in the US. We worked hard in school and had above average to excellent test scores. Being poor does not directly support bad test scores or whether society can or should bear the burden of UBI. Conflating growing up poor with growing up with abuse is incorrect.
  - akie 4y ago
    And assuming wealth and poverty do NOT correlate with test scores and professional success is equally problematic.
    - torstenvl 4y ago
      No, not when the correlation is used as an argument against such measures (see, e.g., this thread). Such arguments are perniciously classist, anti-meritocratic, and anti-poor.
      - akie 4y ago
        Fair point.
  - Taywee 4y ago
    Poverty is directly statistically correlated with poorer test scores and lower IQ. Your hard work and test scores don't contradict those statistics.
bryanrasmussen 4y ago
ok, well one obvious reason would be environmental effects of being raised by idiots without money.
- tomatotomato37 4y ago
  The more obvious reason would be intelligence has zero correlation with motivation to contribute to society. Your stereotypical high school educated blue collar worker will still be better for society than a NEET Mensa member who spends all their time speed running videogames
  - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
    I mean it seems like one could perhaps get some estimation of how much impact family wealth and a positive environment has one success in relation to intellectual abilities based on lots of studies over probably about half a century now. Obviously it would be a wide range of stuff to argue about but still your example sounds more to me like something we won't have that much data on, relatively speaking.
agf 4y ago
If you pick "high IQ" as the definition of "genius", this isn't true. Right around the point where and individual would be considered a "genius", the correlation between income and IQ breaks down. So a super-genius makes about the same amount of money as a very smart, but within the bell curve, person. I would imagine this holds true for other definitions of genius, but I haven't seen quantitative data on it.

denton-scratch 4y ago

I dislike the notion that some individuals are off the scale on cleverness. It's easy enough to arrive at the conclusion that a person who is dimmer than us is cognitively challenged; it's much harder to assess the smarts of someone who is smarter than us. Is he 1% smarter than me? 10% smarter? Hell, 100% smarter? All I know is that he understands stuff that I don't, and solves crosswords faster. But I don't believe that anyone is so much smarter than the average that they need to be paid 100x what I could earn.

fnordpiglet 4y ago
Ok. But since you’re walking a distribution if you keep applying that without insight into how much smarter, just smarter, you’ll understand the tail. Identify A as smarter than B A identifies A’ A’ identifies A’’ … There’s no need to know the quantified smartness, just the ordinal smartness.
SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
> and solves crosswords faster I like this example, especially, as we're all aware, you can get better at both crosswords and IQ tests with practice.
bena 4y ago
> I dislike the notion that some individuals are off the scale on cleverness. Why not? You accept that some individuals are off the scale of various physical abilities. That try as you might, you'll never be the fastest or tallest or strongest. What makes intelligence different? Why should we believe that everyone is roughly equal in intelligence? If you are mediocre in obvious ways, what's left? Everyone wants to be good at something. Everyone wants to be better at something than others. But it is fairly obvious with anything with a physical component. I am a mediocre guitar player. I am not tall. I am not fast. I am not exceptionally strong. These are things that can be sussed out fairly quickly with some basic tests. But intelligence. Well. That's not only fluid, but it's also abstract. What does it mean to have an IQ of 129 versus an IQ of 130. Especially when one could score both depending on how much sleep one has had. So you can just say IQ is bullshit. Intelligence don't real. Everyone is smart in their own way. No. That's just simply not true. Yes, one could test differently based on conditions. However, it will fall within a range. Which is why IQ is often expressed as a range. If you score a 129, you'll be within the 125-135 group or something. And it's just like with physical traits. Like right now, I will be much slower than normal because my quadriceps are fucking cooked. I overexerted myself and I'm sore as shit. Even though I am not normally fast, timing me now wouldn't give an accurate representation of my average speed. And you can tell when someone has spent any time among the truly gifted. Because running into people like this is something else. They will come into a situation blind, get what you've already gotten, and then make a realization you'd never would have. They do process on a different level. And it's not about knowledge. It's not how much they know. It's about how fast they can acquire that knowledge, understand it, and then build upon it. It's how they can relate knowledge from different areas in new and novel ways. People who have spent time with the truly gifted know there's a such thing as intelligence. People who have only spent time with people who are average to above average have never actually seen intelligence at work.

lettergram 4y ago

IQ / "intelligence" is such a BS metric to go by. It's effectively the test makers deciding who would get a free ride through life. Which, incidentally would probably make those "geniuses" less intelligent overall. I'd rather work with a random person who grew up on a farm or the streets than someone who had the best tutors and went to Harvard. People who have to work hard, who grow up hard, are hardened against the world. They learn to survive. Most of our best entrepreneurs and builders grow up building and being independent. To be independent you have to learn to survive on your own, i.e. not with UBI. I'd rather have a higher level competition, not selecting based on IQ. In way of an example, a friend of mine who worked blue collar his whole life (running large repairs & logistics operations) ended up moving up the command. Eventually, he ended up in a consulting capacity as part of an R&D team for a massive logistics company. His first day on the job he saved an average of 2 lives a year and around $5m. He was given the job of improving a warehouse with a bunch of newly hired kids from Yale, Harvard, etc. The kids spent weeks going over all the different locations, trying to optimize layout, etc. Eventually, my friend just talked to people on the floor. At one point, he noticed a fork lift operator who was having an issue picking up a pallet off a truck. He asked what the issue was and the fork life operator said they didn't know exactly where the height of the pallet is. The ivy league consultants started planning out using cameras to select the correct height(s), looked at the budget associated with hiring developers, tried to identify the costs to retrofit all the fork lifts, etc. While that went on, my friend got two magnet strips, put some bright tape on the back, measured and put the magnet at the exact height the truck bed and as the pallets were a default height he knew where to put the next strip. Every new truck that came in would just move both strips based on the new truck height. He was done that afternoon and it was a $5 retrofit. On average, 2-3 workers died a year at all their warehouses due to pallets being knocked down, losses were an estimated $5m. The point of the story is that "genius" doesn't work better than practical problem solving. Problem solving comes from learning to survive and be independent.

jhedwards 4y ago

I love the story of Faraday and Maxwell precisely for this reason. Maxwell was a bonafide genius, but Faraday was just really good at note-taking and doing experiments. Because of those talents, Faraday was able to document a lifetime of experiments with electricity. Maxwell read the entire record of those experiments and was able to derive the mathematical model of what was happening. It seems that it takes more than just "genius" for progress to occur: creativity, hard work, diligence, and passion are also required, as well as a society that supports the people engaging in such endeavors.

timka 4y ago

You're right, the 'regular' people form the base of a society. But purely biologically they aren't capable of implementing a system for governing the society. This is b/c a hard working brain consumes up to 25% of total energy which is very expensive. Therefore we tend to find shortcuts that allow us to avoid that much of brain activity. And as brain wants to be 'happy' (chemically) which biologically means good food, reproduction and dominance. Thus geniuses may be considered a biological anomaly since for some reason they act against their biological nature by stressing themselves considerably more than 'regular' people. Also see my comment above regarding detecting geniuses in a scientific evidence-based way.