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"And what did the genius do when not teaching LSAT prep courses? Why, he worked at Target." Kafka was a clerk at an insurance company. Einstein was an assista

by gnosis 14y ago

"And what did the genius do when not teaching LSAT prep courses? Why, he worked at Target." Kafka was a clerk at an insurance company. Einstein was an assistant patent examiner. Wittgenstein was a gardener at a monastery and then a primary school teacher. Van Gogh only ever sold one painting during his life, and that was to his brother. There are hordes of other people widely regarded as "geniuses", who lived and died in dire poverty. Many others were cheated out of the fame and fortune they deserved by others who got the credit. And many more are probably still unrecognized. The cold hard fact of the matter is that the world generally does not reward intelligence, "genius", or even hard work. True, some have the temperament and luck to scale the greasy pole of "success", but many others don't -- or choose to focus their energies elsewhere.

hellrich 14y ago
Kafka and Einstein had white collar jobs when those were rare and Wittgenstein gave away his (inherited) fortune.
- gnosis 14y ago
  The OP was judging a person by his job, and implying that the person in question couldn't be a genius because he worked at a menial job. I simply provided some counterexamples. Furthermore, white collar or not, I doubt that many would contend that Kafka or Einstein were some sorts of models of "success" if judged by their jobs, and few would judge them "geniuses" solely by looking at what they did for a living. The fact that Wittgenstein gave away his inheritance is completely irrelevant. We were talking about jobs as marks of genius, not about inherited wealth. However, I will grant that being born in to a wealthy family, being given a first-rate education, and being surrounded by highly accomplished individuals (as Wittgenstein was) does usually give the beneficiary a tremendous head start over most people. I would certainly have bet on someone born in to Wittgenstein's highly privileged position making something of himself than on someone born in to poverty. That said, plenty of people born in to tremendous wealth squander it and their lives. A couple of interesting, relatively recent documentaries on the subject are "Born Rich"[1] and "The One Percent"[2]. [1] - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0342143/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0342143/ [2] - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0819791/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0819791/
  - jessedhillon 14y ago
    The OP was judging a person by his job, and implying that the person in question couldn't be a genius because he worked at a menial job. No, I was judging him by his accomplishments -- a measure by which your counterexamples shine, and the LSAT instructor falls down. All of the people you mention were successes in some way outside of their job, and they met my other criteria: they disproportionately advanced the state of the world. We were talking about jobs as marks of genius ... You were talking about that, but nobody else was.
    - bennyg 14y ago
      But still, don't you think it's a little premature to judge your Target worker? Einstein was a patent worker while he thought about and conceptualized Special Relativity. Do you know what that fella' was doing in his free time? I still agree with the main point though - IQ doesn't mean anything except another avenue of high potential. Just like being extremely physically fit and a better athlete leaves you with high potential to succeed in something physical. A high IQ gives you the potential to succeed in something mental, but you still have to put in the work and do something with it.
      - slurgfest 14y ago
        You learn a lot more about Einstein's potential by testing his IQ than by looking at his job history. If it turns out that the Target Einstein is too lazy to do any physics, that's OK, the IQ test will still tell you vastly more about what he COULD do under the right incentives.
    - gnosis 14y ago
      "No, I was judging him by his accomplishments" What made you think your LSAT instructor's accomplishments were limited to his job titles? What do you know about this man apart from those two facts? Kafka and Van Gogh were completely unknown and unappreciated during their lifetimes. Kafka even burned 90% of his work before he died. There are countless other examples of people who were only discovered and appreciated after they died -- often long after they died. Conversely, many (if not most) of those who achieved great fame and fortune during their lifetimes are largely forgotten now, or considered of minor importance. "You were talking about [jobs as marks of genius], but nobody else was." On the contrary, that seems to be exactly what you were doing. Your lack of knowledge or appreciation of someone's accomplishments and apparent eagerness to judge this person by the job they held is what I was responding to.
telemachos 14y ago
> Einstein was an assistant patent examiner. Wittgenstein was a gardener at a monastery and then a primary school teacher. I take your point, but Einstein and Wittgentsein are not good examples. You list jobs they held, but those jobs don't reasonably express the success either man had in his lifetime. Einstein was also a member of Princeton's Institute for Advanced Studies from 1933 to 1955 (when he died)[1]. Wittgenstein was also awarded a PhD at Cambridge - without having done coursework or exams - on the basis of his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and was an idolized professor for many years there[2]. Neither man was by any stretch of the imagination an unrecognized genius - they were both absolutely recognized as huge intellects with superior achievements in their respective fields when they were alive. [1] http://www.ias.edu/people/einstein/ http://www.ias.edu/people/einstein/ [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Wittgenstein#1929.E2.80.931941:_Fellowship_at_Cambridge http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Wittgenstein#1929.E2.80....
- gnosis 14y ago
  My point was the OP appeared to be judging by the jobs an individual held at one point in time. Judged by the same criteria, Einstein, Wittgenstein, and Kafka would have fared no better. The fact that Einstein and Wittgenstein held more prestigious positions at other points in their lives would not have spared them from an attitude like the OP demonstrated at the time they held the more menial jobs, and judging only by those menial jobs. Who knows what heights of glory this particular Target employee will climb to in the future? History is even more full of people who once held menial jobs but then went on to achieve vast fame and fortune (and perhaps even be judged a "genius" by many). We also don't know what this particular Target employee did before he worked at target and taught LSAT courses. Perhaps, like Wittgenstein, he'd been a lecturer at Cambridge and was awarded some prestigious degree. Ok, I know that's stretching credibility. He probably wasn't. But my point is that we don't know his past or his future. All we know are two job titles and his boast of being a genius. Should we judge him based on just those couple of facts? Or should we withhold judgment? My vote is for the latter. Finally, I never claimed that Einstein or Wittgenstein weren't recognized during their lifetimes, just that Kafka and Van Gogh weren't, and that many others who are generally considered "geniuses" now weren't either.
kahawe 14y ago
I think a far more revealing point about Kafka is his self-view and the fact that in his will he wanted all of his works burned. I don't think Kafka was ever a very happy man in his life, so you really got to wonder how much good did the "being a genius" do for HIM regardless of how much he contributed to the world and humanity and our culture.

by gnosis 14y ago

hellrich 14y ago

Kafka and Einstein had white collar jobs when those were rare and Wittgenstein gave away his (inherited) fortune.

gnosis 14y ago
The OP was judging a person by his job, and implying that the person in question couldn't be a genius because he worked at a menial job. I simply provided some counterexamples. Furthermore, white collar or not, I doubt that many would contend that Kafka or Einstein were some sorts of models of "success" if judged by their jobs, and few would judge them "geniuses" solely by looking at what they did for a living. The fact that Wittgenstein gave away his inheritance is completely irrelevant. We were talking about jobs as marks of genius, not about inherited wealth. However, I will grant that being born in to a wealthy family, being given a first-rate education, and being surrounded by highly accomplished individuals (as Wittgenstein was) does usually give the beneficiary a tremendous head start over most people. I would certainly have bet on someone born in to Wittgenstein's highly privileged position making something of himself than on someone born in to poverty. That said, plenty of people born in to tremendous wealth squander it and their lives. A couple of interesting, relatively recent documentaries on the subject are "Born Rich"[1] and "The One Percent"[2]. [1] - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0342143/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0342143/ [2] - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0819791/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0819791/
- jessedhillon 14y ago
  The OP was judging a person by his job, and implying that the person in question couldn't be a genius because he worked at a menial job. No, I was judging him by his accomplishments -- a measure by which your counterexamples shine, and the LSAT instructor falls down. All of the people you mention were successes in some way outside of their job, and they met my other criteria: they disproportionately advanced the state of the world. We were talking about jobs as marks of genius ... You were talking about that, but nobody else was.
  - bennyg 14y ago
    But still, don't you think it's a little premature to judge your Target worker? Einstein was a patent worker while he thought about and conceptualized Special Relativity. Do you know what that fella' was doing in his free time? I still agree with the main point though - IQ doesn't mean anything except another avenue of high potential. Just like being extremely physically fit and a better athlete leaves you with high potential to succeed in something physical. A high IQ gives you the potential to succeed in something mental, but you still have to put in the work and do something with it.
    - slurgfest 14y ago
      You learn a lot more about Einstein's potential by testing his IQ than by looking at his job history. If it turns out that the Target Einstein is too lazy to do any physics, that's OK, the IQ test will still tell you vastly more about what he COULD do under the right incentives.
  - gnosis 14y ago
    "No, I was judging him by his accomplishments" What made you think your LSAT instructor's accomplishments were limited to his job titles? What do you know about this man apart from those two facts? Kafka and Van Gogh were completely unknown and unappreciated during their lifetimes. Kafka even burned 90% of his work before he died. There are countless other examples of people who were only discovered and appreciated after they died -- often long after they died. Conversely, many (if not most) of those who achieved great fame and fortune during their lifetimes are largely forgotten now, or considered of minor importance. "You were talking about [jobs as marks of genius], but nobody else was." On the contrary, that seems to be exactly what you were doing. Your lack of knowledge or appreciation of someone's accomplishments and apparent eagerness to judge this person by the job they held is what I was responding to.

telemachos 14y ago

> Einstein was an assistant patent examiner. Wittgenstein was a gardener at a monastery and then a primary school teacher. I take your point, but Einstein and Wittgentsein are not good examples. You list jobs they held, but those jobs don't reasonably express the success either man had in his lifetime. Einstein was also a member of Princeton's Institute for Advanced Studies from 1933 to 1955 (when he died)[1]. Wittgenstein was also awarded a PhD at Cambridge - without having done coursework or exams - on the basis of his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and was an idolized professor for many years there[2]. Neither man was by any stretch of the imagination an unrecognized genius - they were both absolutely recognized as huge intellects with superior achievements in their respective fields when they were alive. [1] http://www.ias.edu/people/einstein/ http://www.ias.edu/people/einstein/ [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Wittgenstein#1929.E2.80.931941:_Fellowship_at_Cambridge http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Wittgenstein#1929.E2.80....

gnosis 14y ago
My point was the OP appeared to be judging by the jobs an individual held at one point in time. Judged by the same criteria, Einstein, Wittgenstein, and Kafka would have fared no better. The fact that Einstein and Wittgenstein held more prestigious positions at other points in their lives would not have spared them from an attitude like the OP demonstrated at the time they held the more menial jobs, and judging only by those menial jobs. Who knows what heights of glory this particular Target employee will climb to in the future? History is even more full of people who once held menial jobs but then went on to achieve vast fame and fortune (and perhaps even be judged a "genius" by many). We also don't know what this particular Target employee did before he worked at target and taught LSAT courses. Perhaps, like Wittgenstein, he'd been a lecturer at Cambridge and was awarded some prestigious degree. Ok, I know that's stretching credibility. He probably wasn't. But my point is that we don't know his past or his future. All we know are two job titles and his boast of being a genius. Should we judge him based on just those couple of facts? Or should we withhold judgment? My vote is for the latter. Finally, I never claimed that Einstein or Wittgenstein weren't recognized during their lifetimes, just that Kafka and Van Gogh weren't, and that many others who are generally considered "geniuses" now weren't either.

kahawe 14y ago

I think a far more revealing point about Kafka is his self-view and the fact that in his will he wanted all of his works burned. I don't think Kafka was ever a very happy man in his life, so you really got to wonder how much good did the "being a genius" do for HIM regardless of how much he contributed to the world and humanity and our culture.