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Seems to be a trend nowadays attacking the fact that lone geniuses exist and tend to be outside the direct control of bankers and bureacratic corporations. Cri

Seems to be a trend nowadays attacking the fact that lone geniuses exist and tend to be outside the direct control of bankers and bureacratic corporations. Crick and Watson never claimed to be lone geniuses working in their garage alone when they decoded DNA, so debunking that they are lone geniuses is not a particularly compelling argument. However, hallucinations brought on by LSD trips were a key factor, which is interesting and seems to have contributed more to their success than working in a well funded lab at a corporation, though that certainly had its own benefits as well as disadvantages. It's also never been contested that lone geniuses do in fact build upon previous work and discoveries made throughout history, in addition to making their own contributions. So pointing that out is not debunking "the myth" of lone geniuses either. Tesla, Erastothenes, Philo Farnsworth, even Einstein in the patent office all came up with original ideas. It's interesting when there is a flurry of articles making coordinated attacks upon the very idea of creative individualism. Often when things are so coordinated there is a PR firm behind it. Who is their client is the question I ask.

troels 15y ago
I upvoted you because I agree with your main point, but I think you're veering into conspiracy teritory with that last paragraph. Who the heck would benefit from such a broad "attack" anyway? Much more likely that it's group dynamics (or trend or whatever you want to call it).
- bjornsing 15y ago
  Agree, a coordinated conspiracy seems incredibly unlikely. :) I think it may actually be very simple: a wast majority of people know they have no chance of being a "lone genius", and that it would therefore not be beneficial for them to promote geniality as a leadership quality.
  - aiscott 15y ago
    The Media are a group (or several large groups) and as such as subject to group-think like any other group. I believe a lot of conspiracy related accusations could be attributable to the natural tendency toward group-think.
bjornsing 15y ago
Yea, when it comes to ability/creativity almost everything written seems to be about how the author would prefer reality to be rather than how it is. There is of course a lot of science that a single person simply cannot do themselves, e.g. detecting the higgs boson or sequencing the human genome. But it seems to me that whenever there's something really hard that a single person can do, a "lone genius" will do it first. :)
- drawkbox 15y ago
  I think this shows even on teams. Typically on teams there is a core or 1-2 people that seem to be driving the innovation/product forward. I think it is inherent in our nature to be different and nature lends itself leading to individuals seeing things a different way and getting these ideas/inventions that they share with a group rather than teams creating things solely. For instance Jonathan Ive, you think he would be better at designing with Bob Smith also helping, design by committee? Products and innovation are individual, production of those products is a team effort. Same with the Woz, Jobs or Bill Gates/Paul Allen, all very individual or core team members or 'lone genuis'es. Creativity is just individual, it can be inspired by external but it really is more individual or unique otherwise those ideas would just be known by the masses and it wouldn't be creative.
tensor 15y ago
An idea will almost always arise in one individual before another based purely on chance. That does not make one a "lone genius." The idea of creative individualism as practiced by modern society is unrealistic and promotes marginalizing others for the sake of creating heros. The message is clear: you too can be a hero! One person can be 10000x more valuable than another! I disagree with you completely in your claim that it's well acknowledged that lone geniuses build off previous work. The general population credits lone geniuses with work they didn't even do. For example Steve Jobs and multitouch or Edison with much of Tesla's work. It's a huge problem and one that needs addressing. The majority of scientific and technological advances are the last step in a huge collective work explored by many people over decades or centuries. Even in one of the most popular examples of genius, Albert Einstein, this is the case. Consider his famous thought experiment about riding on a beam of light. Almost completely buried in history is that Camille Flammarion came up with this idea first, as well as some early ideas about space time. Einstein put the required last steps to form the theory, but still built on the work of others.

troels 15y ago

I upvoted you because I agree with your main point, but I think you're veering into conspiracy teritory with that last paragraph. Who the heck would benefit from such a broad "attack" anyway? Much more likely that it's group dynamics (or trend or whatever you want to call it).

bjornsing 15y ago
Agree, a coordinated conspiracy seems incredibly unlikely. :) I think it may actually be very simple: a wast majority of people know they have no chance of being a "lone genius", and that it would therefore not be beneficial for them to promote geniality as a leadership quality.
- aiscott 15y ago
  The Media are a group (or several large groups) and as such as subject to group-think like any other group. I believe a lot of conspiracy related accusations could be attributable to the natural tendency toward group-think.

bjornsing 15y ago

Yea, when it comes to ability/creativity almost everything written seems to be about how the author would prefer reality to be rather than how it is. There is of course a lot of science that a single person simply cannot do themselves, e.g. detecting the higgs boson or sequencing the human genome. But it seems to me that whenever there's something really hard that a single person can do, a "lone genius" will do it first. :)

drawkbox 15y ago
I think this shows even on teams. Typically on teams there is a core or 1-2 people that seem to be driving the innovation/product forward. I think it is inherent in our nature to be different and nature lends itself leading to individuals seeing things a different way and getting these ideas/inventions that they share with a group rather than teams creating things solely. For instance Jonathan Ive, you think he would be better at designing with Bob Smith also helping, design by committee? Products and innovation are individual, production of those products is a team effort. Same with the Woz, Jobs or Bill Gates/Paul Allen, all very individual or core team members or 'lone genuis'es. Creativity is just individual, it can be inspired by external but it really is more individual or unique otherwise those ideas would just be known by the masses and it wouldn't be creative.

tensor 15y ago

An idea will almost always arise in one individual before another based purely on chance. That does not make one a "lone genius." The idea of creative individualism as practiced by modern society is unrealistic and promotes marginalizing others for the sake of creating heros. The message is clear: you too can be a hero! One person can be 10000x more valuable than another! I disagree with you completely in your claim that it's well acknowledged that lone geniuses build off previous work. The general population credits lone geniuses with work they didn't even do. For example Steve Jobs and multitouch or Edison with much of Tesla's work. It's a huge problem and one that needs addressing. The majority of scientific and technological advances are the last step in a huge collective work explored by many people over decades or centuries. Even in one of the most popular examples of genius, Albert Einstein, this is the case. Consider his famous thought experiment about riding on a beam of light. Almost completely buried in history is that Camille Flammarion came up with this idea first, as well as some early ideas about space time. Einstein put the required last steps to form the theory, but still built on the work of others.