Genius Exaggeration

[poxpower]

Is anyone else here tired of hearing people who think they know dick say how brilliant Mozart or Chopin must have been? Or how Da Vinci must have been some kind of super-genius with a 400 IQ or how we would have never gotten anywhere without Einstein?

It's ridiculous.

As if music composers 300 years ago really were better than the ones today. What the fuck did anyone do better 300 years ago??? Nothing. So suddenly, they'd be better at music, or art? No, it's stupid.

And if I recall, Da Vinci never actually produced anything scientific of note. As far as I can tell, Da Vinci was an artist. That's it. Generations of idiots have bowed down before him in reverence of his genius, which is probably greatly exaggerated by history. They've got him writing secret messages everywhere, guessing the future, bending horseshoes with his fingers... ridiculous.

It's the same for everything. Who's like that today? You mean to tell me that, in the 6+ billion people alive today, there's not at least a handful of super geniuses who put these old geezers to shame?

The parallel with religion is interesting: before we start checking, wow, look at that, miracles, dragons and magic at every corner! The second we start checking? Oops, no more magic. And the same with this. Before we have any way to test people: wow, geniuses left and right! History is chock-full of these mythical brilliant figures who you'd swear were to smart and talented they could just take over the world today.

So I just want to say: let's stop with this shit already. The reason these men seemed to brilliant is because everything around them was SHIT and history has exaggerated their feats and reputation. I bet you everything I own that there's 50 people alive today who are smarter and more talented than Einstein and you'll NEVER hear about them.

[Jonowales]

so why is everything better now than before?

[Tomsan]

At 2/4/09 03:18 PM, poxpower wrote: Is anyone else here tired of hearing people who think they know dick say how brilliant Mozart or Chopin must have been? Or how Da Vinci must have been some kind of super-genius with a 400 IQ or how we would have never gotten anywhere without Einstein?

never heard that

So I just want to say: let's stop with this shit already. The reason these men seemed to brilliant is because everything around them was SHIT and history has exaggerated their feats and reputation. I bet you everything I own that there's 50 people alive today who are smarter and more talented than Einstein and you'll NEVER hear about them.

probably, but its about being ahead of your time and/or inventing/writing/proposing things that mark a transition in history.

If the 50 people that are smarter and more talented are allowed to use this talent you might hear from them... hawking is a living legend.

[jonnyrules935]

Genius is simply a matter of right or wrong, if Einstein was wrong, we would consider him to ba a fool, but if Adolf Hilter had won the war, he'd be the greatest genius of all times.

Right or wrong, good or bad, genius or crazy, these are all examples of relativism caused by the consquences of actions and their exactitude over others.

[Al6200]

At 2/4/09 03:18 PM, poxpower wrote:

So I just want to say: let's stop with this shit already. The reason these men seemed to brilliant is because everything around them was SHIT and history has exaggerated their feats and reputation. I bet you everything I own that there's 50 people alive today who are smarter and more talented than Einstein and you'll NEVER hear about them.

I don't disagree with this entirely. There are probably a good number of people who are smart as Newton around today, but who don't get the attention because most of the ground breaking discoveries have already been made.

But you have to admit that discovering something like calculus is a LOT harder when you don't have Matlab or graphing calculators. Or really strong education for that matter.

[poxpower]

At 2/4/09 04:08 PM, Tomsan wrote:

At 2/4/09 03:18 PM, poxpower wrote: Is anyone else here tired of hearing people who think they know dick say how brilliant Mozart or Chopin must have been? Or how Da Vinci must have been some kind of super-genius with a 400 IQ or how we would have never gotten anywhere without Einstein?

never heard that

You've never heard people say how classical music is for the mind or how ancient art is so much better?
There was even that whole myth about how, if you played Mozart to your baby in the womb, it would increase his IQ.
Ridiculous.

At 2/4/09 05:14 PM, jonnyrules935 wrote: Genius is simply a matter of right or wrong

Good point, good point.

At 2/4/09 05:46 PM, Al6200 wrote:

But you have to admit that discovering something like calculus is a LOT harder when you don't have Matlab or graphing calculators. Or really strong education for that matter.

I have no idea.
We can't really compare. If we had 50 advanced alien civilizations to compare with, maybe we'd learn just how hard/easy it is to discover that kind of thing.

It would be really interesting, like maybe they all have someone who discovered the theory of relativity 50 years faster than Einstein. Or maybe Einstein discovered it 50 years faster than them.

Who knows.

I also suspect there's a big element of luck involved. There's tons of people who'll say crazy shit and eventually one of them is right and becomes the genius.

[jakobhummelen]

It takes a intelligent and creative person (or a crazy person) to think of ideas and concepts that go against the Zeitgeist they are living in. I agree with pox when he says that some people exaggerate when they say this and that guy is a genius but you can't deny the fact that most of the people marked 'genius' were actually very intelligent/had good cognitive skills.

Mozart for instance was a child prodigy, no matter how you turn it, he learned to play and compose music at a very young age. OF COURSE in this matter, the rigorous tutoring helped a lot but I'd see that as an enabler.

I think the people who make historic discoveries are extremely interesting and if you know a little about them, it says a lot about how and what discoveries they did.

[morefngdbs]

Pox this has got to be one of the stupidest comparison's you've ever come up with.
Especially picking on Da Vinci. He conceptualised the helicopter 500 years ago.
Invented the tank, the machine gun.
Came up with the Anemometer, using 2 different weight systems in clocks to track hours & minutes...drew plans & theorized using a pendulum for greater accuracy, something not done until the 17th century.
Designed the double ships hull, for greater safety. designed & left plans for double decked bridges, to be able to handle a large flow of two way traffic without obstructions, and to stop traffic jams.
Man you really need to sit down & read about this guy. He had his brain into so much shit, its funny it didn't just explode.
He invented the parachute over 500 years ago & in June 2006 , Adrian Nicholas dropped out of a balloon at 3000 meters & used a copy of DaVinci's parachute. The contraption built of canvas & wood weighed in at 187 lbs & despite 'experts' saying it wouldn't work, he floated gently to earth...even more gently than todays parachutes
On top of all that he was one of the greatest painters of his day.

Didn't do much, man ,that was about the BIGGEST UNDERSTATEMENT ! ! ! I have eve read.

[zephiran]

I would just like to point out that the line between brilliance and insanity is a very fine one. History is also full of nutters and complete schmucks, but a few of these nutjobs turned out to be right and today we respect them. Nobody gives a shit about the guy who invented the monowheel. But my point is that you do not need to be intelligent to be creative.

[AntiangelicAngel]

At 2/4/09 05:53 PM, poxpower wrote: You've never heard people say how classical music is for the mind or how ancient art is so much better?
There was even that whole myth about how, if you played Mozart to your baby in the womb, it would increase his IQ.
Ridiculous.

I think staying power could possibly be positively correlated with level of genius. Like in another 200 years, from our generation, most of our culture (art, poetry, literature) will be irrelevant, and only a few films and books will still be considered valuable. Those ones will be cited as "genius". In a way, they're a demonstration of creative genius.

Also, apparently the Baby Einstein DVDs actually lower IQ and may cause ADD

[Dawnslayer]

At 2/8/09 02:26 PM, morefngdbs wrote: Pox this has got to be one of the stupidest comparison's you've ever come up with.
Especially picking on Da Vinci. He conceptualised the helicopter 500 years ago.
Invented the tank, the machine gun.
Came up with the Anemometer, using 2 different weight systems in clocks to track hours & minutes...drew plans & theorized using a pendulum for greater accuracy, something not done until the 17th century.
Designed the double ships hull, for greater safety. designed & left plans for double decked bridges, to be able to handle a large flow of two way traffic without obstructions, and to stop traffic jams.
Man you really need to sit down & read about this guy. He had his brain into so much shit, its funny it didn't just explode.
He invented the parachute over 500 years ago...
On top of all that he was one of the greatest painters of his day.

Didn't do much, man ,that was about the BIGGEST UNDERSTATEMENT ! ! ! I have eve read.

You forgot a couple: a hot air balloon, an underwater oxygen tank, and the autopsy, whereupon he discovered cholesterol. (He got excommunicated for that last one.) The reason daVinci isn't credited for any of these ideas, is because his investors really didn't care, not seeing any potential in his inventions (many of which were designed for military applications).

[poxpower]

At 2/8/09 02:26 PM, morefngdbs wrote:

Especially picking on Da Vinci. He conceptualised the helicopter 500 years ago.
Invented the tank, the machine gun.
Came up with the Anemometer, using 2 different weight systems in clocks to track hours & minutes...drew plans & theorized using a pendulum for greater accuracy, something not done until the 17th century

None of his shit ever worked.
I don't even think he built any of it.

Shit, do you want me to invent you some amazing inventions? I'll make you a time machine, a space ship, a death star... And if anyone builds one later, then you can say "wow look at pox he had already invented the automatic fellator all those years ago".

Man you really need to sit down & read about this guy.

Did you watch a tv show about him or something?
I did a research on him in high school and came up with tons of shitty inventions that made no sense and would never have worked in a million years.

Did you even see his helicopter? What a piece of shit.

Great inventors ACTUALY INVENT THINGS THAT WORK. They don't sit around drawing up crazy plans for shit that obviously wouldn't work.

Did you ever see his submarine? That thing would sink like a stone, killing everyone inside. What a genius!

He invented the parachute over 500 years ago & in June 2006 , Adrian Nicholas dropped out of a balloon at 3000 meters & used a copy of DaVinci's parachute. The contraption built of canvas & wood weighed in at 187 lbs & despite 'experts' saying it wouldn't work, he floated gently to earth...even more gently than todays parachutes

"Mr Nicholas cut himself free when he reached 600m (2,000 ft) and deployed a second modern parachute. This ensured the heavy device did not crash down on top of him on landing."

haha
What a great invention! All you need is a more modern invention to make it work!

Didn't do much, man ,that was about the BIGGEST UNDERSTATEMENT ! ! ! I have eve read.

Hey he was a damn good artist and a pioneer of many things, but he wasn't some kind of ultra-mega genius with a 400 IQ who "invented" the helicopter, the tank etc. etc.
As far as I know, he never invented anything. But he sure patented tons of crazy shit. But that doesn't mean anything, if you look at patents today, there's patents for anti-gravity machines, perpetual motion machines and really irrelevant crap like spoons or ways to use a swingset.

So yeah.

[heroicspatula]

genius, at least in the way it is used today, has nothing at all to do with intelligence. It all has to do with what you discovered/invented. Sure, there are a fair number of intellectual geniuses (i.e. , MENSA), but none are seen as geniuses because they haven't done anything to separate themselves from the rest of the pack.

History also determines genius. For example, Einstein would not be considered a genius if Hitler had won the war.

[Rozner]

I say that the people were just pop icons of the time. Da Vinci was praised in the Renaissance, and so were a lot of other artists. Mozart was praised in the Classical era, and so were a lot of other artists. Einstein was praised, because he was a revolutionary and he introduced radical ideas. I say that the popular icons of the past are like the rockstars of today.

[morefngdbs]

At 2/8/09 07:01 PM, poxpower wrote: None of his shit ever worked.
I don't even think he built any of it.

Yeah he and or others built some of it. the wind speed indicator...they built & used that.
The clock...built & used it.
He had a canon with 33 barrels.
It was built in the shape of a triangle with 11 barrels ready to fire, when fired you rotated the drum & another 11 barrels were ready to fire, the first were now pointing down & cooling. When you fired again & rotated the drum another 11 barrels were ready to fire, the first 11 barrels openings are pointing str8 up & are being reloaded.
This was built & used.
He came up with a spring powered vehicle to be used on stage, for set & or prop pieces in the theatre...they built that as well.
Like I said go get a decent book on this guy...amazing stuff.
Not to mention his detailed anatomical drawing of muscle & circulatory systems, skelital structure etc.

So yeah.

;;;;
Yeah Pox.

[MortifiedPenguins]

So Pox, how many musical symphonies have you written?

I mean honestly, it can't be that hard now can it. You don't have to be a genius to do it.

And I'm still waiting to see your self portrait, whenever you want to hop on that.

[debobbins]

The people who are most notable are the ones who do somthing groundbreaking newton discovered the laws of physics at a time where religeon held strong and people wernt to think otherwise in a close minded society being able to make a discovery and see somthing in a way nobody else could is genius which is how i would define it which is what einstein did newtons ideas became the base yet he picked at it with no reason to think otherwise and saw somthing in a whole different light (excuse the pun) same for darwin why you have so much trouble finding genius today is because unlike the times they lived in we are encouraged to look outside the box we have the basis for most ideas all we can do is improve them

[kraor024]

Da Vinci did do a few things scientific he studied flight & he mapped out(?) the human body although it is true he never invented anything(except paint by numbers)

[stealthxtoons]

pox power your a prick
your arguements are futile
maybe in some senses i agree with you
i do think maybe genuis have been a bit too overly praised
but thats not a reason for downplaying them to such a pulp as you have done

[Elfer]

At 2/4/09 05:46 PM, Al6200 wrote: But you have to admit that discovering something like calculus is a LOT harder when you don't have Matlab or graphing calculators. Or really strong education for that matter.

Though there's an interesting sub-discussion here: genius is not unique or special. Two people developed calculus at the same time. It would have happened with or without them. People make things that need to be made.

[AKACCMIOF]

Hmmmmm, I have the highest IQ in my music set (161) and I kick everyone's ass at composition (full marks!) listening (almost full marks!) and performance (full marks!). I don't think its going too far to say guys like Mozart had something great going on up there. Of course your right, we can't overlook the golden age of today but you gotta love the classics man, and especially seeing how old school music was based more rigidly on maths (during the Baroque period it was heresy to use a note not in the chord as a way to get to the next not which would have to be in the chord, plus the note would have to be a maximum of one tone from the original note from the chord) I don't think its going far to say that (for sure) Bach (Baroque), Beethoven (Classical/ Romantic) and Berg (Serialism) were all probably genii.

"Maths is music, music is maths" Pythagorus.

[AKACCMIOF]

At 2/4/09 03:18 PM, poxpower wrote: So I just want to say: let's stop with this shit already. The reason these men seemed to brilliant is because everything around them was SHIT and history has exaggerated their feats and reputation.

This is what makes them so brilliant. The intuition. Hell, the only reason everything everything around them seems like it was shit was because they came along and revolutionized things! I mean, take The Prodigy. If all we had was Experience we'd think of them as mediocre. But now seeing how they stepped up the post nu rave dnb hardcore game, we can see how much harder it is to make waves then to ride them.

I bet you everything I own that there's 50 people alive today who are smarter and more talented than Einstein and you'll NEVER hear about them.

Unfalsifiable hypothesis is unfalsifiable.

[Al6200]

At 2/10/09 04:50 PM, Elfer wrote:

At 2/4/09 05:46 PM, Al6200 wrote: But you have to admit that discovering something like calculus is a LOT harder when you don't have Matlab or graphing calculators. Or really strong education for that matter.

Though there's an interesting sub-discussion here: genius is not unique or special. Two people developed calculus at the same time. It would have happened with or without them. People make things that need to be made.

That's an interesting point. I think that people with IQs from 110 to 140 probably have the biggest impact on society, because they are intelligent enough to create new technology and manage society on a large scale, and there are enough of them to make a large impact (consider that only 2% of the population has an IQ above 130).

At 2/12/09 04:17 PM, AKACCMIOF wrote:

At 2/4/09 03:18 PM, poxpower wrote:

I bet you everything I own that there's 50 people alive today who are smarter and more talented than Einstein and you'll NEVER hear about them.

Unfalsifiable hypothesis is unfalsifiable.

I wouldn't go that far. There are crude tests you could do. For example Ramanujan, the Indian math genius, made advances in fields like number theory and abstract algebra even though he only had a very basic formal education in mathematics (!!!). Likewise there are probably some gifted elementary school kids who can figure out the basics of calculus on their own.

You could do a study for this. For example, you could go to a middle school and get some bright kids to take a test where you ask them to "Try to devise a way of measuring the rate of change of graphs" or a way of "Measuring the Volume of Functions" and see if any of them can do it.

[reviewer-general]

The difference is that people nowadays build on the concepts, theories, and ideas created by those who came before them. What's so amazing about all those people is the things that they devised that we take for granted.

Look at mathematics. We can use all these complex formulas, theories, laws, and concepts to do amazing things. But those people hundreds of years ago who created the systems we use are the only reason we can do these things with such apparent ease.

Humans have also expanded our knowledge in areas that were just impossible to study hundreds of years ago. Technology has come a long way in assisting human innovation.

Those scientists, philosophers, artists, etc. all provided that basis for human knowledge, art, music, and so on as we know it.

;

[Jinzoa]

Assuming they pioneers and the "first of their kind" in terms of thinking out of the modern box in what they did and bringing a revolution of art/science and technology that was amazing for their time period then these men were geniuses of their time.

Hell if X is the father of the Y we have today then they should be held in high regard in my view in atleast being recognised for it. But that's the general thing i think these men were so ahead of their time in what they did and as said those times were pretty shit the things they produced i would think were seen as "out of this world" by the people of their era.

Things being that amazing would lead to stories and have them held in high regard by kings and peasents alike, today though our world in the art/music/science/etc scene is very amazing but also very common and average joe is alot smarter(hell even the chavs) than people a good few hundred years ago. By that i mean most people in a certain era who were poor(most people were) and such had no education and no knowledge about the world and only a few men in each shitty era who were smart would have been seen as brilliant during those times.

We have brilliant people today who gave us the basis of the internet, medicine and cures(well last thing that was cured was actually a while ago) technology and music and even artists. Thing is as the world got smarter we produced more brilliant people and instead of a rare revolution in a cartain field like a few hundred years ago each year that passes us by we have more and more of them arguably.

Let's say if 50% of the peasents and nobility so many years ago got an education through europe and america compared to say 5% or so fo the actual amount who did i would say there would be more men like darwin,davinci and many others and the things these men would produce would not be seen so alien to everyone else. They would be brilliant creations/discoveris but it would be so common that they their work would not be seen as so "godly" for their time atleast.

Most people know who the first man on the moon was in general, but do they know the brilliant man/men who designed the rocket NASA used? Who started the internet off?(most people will goggle this) or who introduced X cure for Y?

Most people probably don't know the names and such of who started a brilliant thing we all either rely on or use day to day, We have more brilliant people than back then so things seem less amazing but i do agree we these men like davinci and others are for some reason arguably held in to high regard. They may have started X and we should remember them but you have to remember we have more geniouses today than ever in the world, they were indeed a rare case but we have a ton of them around today.

Personally though whoever started each religion was a smart SoB for their time, good way to control the masses.

[AKACCMIOF]

At 2/12/09 04:17 PM, AKACCMIOF wrote:

At 2/4/09 03:18 PM, poxpower wrote: I bet you everything I own that there's 50 people alive today who are smarter and more talented than Einstein and you'll NEVER hear about them.

Unfalsifiable hypothesis is unfalsifiable.

I wouldn't go that far. There are crude tests you could do. For example Ramanujan, the Indian math genius, made advances in fields like number theory and abstract algebra even though he only had a very basic formal education in mathematics (!!!). Likewise there are probably some gifted elementary school kids who can figure out the basics of calculus on their own.

You could do a study for this. For example, you could go to a middle school and get some bright kids to take a test where you ask them to "Try to devise a way of measuring the rate of change of graphs" or a way of "Measuring the Volume of Functions" and see if any of them can do it.

True, but the problem is how could you find someone smarter than Einstein? I agree that you could find people worthy of scholarships, but how could you devote yourself to a search for an underprivileged child capable of creating a a theory of equal importance to that of the theory of general relativity who had gone previously unnoticed? You give a good example of how a field can be pioneered with little experience within its mother field, and thus a good case for PoxPower's argument for an under the radar Einstein, but could we have expected Ramanujan to have gone unnoticed? But I digress. Badly. To be more to the point, how could we expect to find fifty people capable of pioneering a new GUT without ever hearing about them? As well as improbable it is (a little more problematically) a logical paradox! But I do like your idea of how to prove that it should there be an under the radar Einstein we probably would or wouldn't know about it.

[JeremieCompNerd]

Just as a question, Pox, can you make a list of 5 things that you have thought about, that nobody in the history of EARTH has ever thought about before? They don't even have to work perfectly. Just a concept. I'll make it easy, you can include original plot lines for books/plays/tv series/whatever. I don't think you have an original bone in your body not specifically programmed for trolling.

[poxpower]

At 2/15/09 11:39 AM, JeremieCompNerd wrote: Just as a question, Pox, can you make a list of 5 things that you have thought about, that nobody in the history of EARTH has ever thought about before?

- A bunny named Jeeves who eats pickles
- A Time machine that only travels to sunday march 5th, 1954
- My awesome website
- This stupid reply
- The theory of 51 dimensions

[AapoJoki]

At 2/15/09 11:57 AM, poxpower wrote: - A Time machine that only travels to sunday march 5th, 1954

That would be quite a remarkable time machine, considering that the 5th of March, 1954, was Friday. No wonder no one ever thought of it before you.

[Alphabit]

They're geniuses because they were unusually innovative for their time. While many people can play and compose music as well (and better) than Mozart today, Mozart was a breakthrough in his time and perhaps started a new era for music and theater.

Einstein was very creative in his thinking; he was ahead of his time... He came up with some amazing, mind-boggling theories about time and space... For example, he came up with the idea that nothing could go faster than light and by that he implied that the passing of time changes as you approach the seed of light; picture this; light is said to move at 300,000 km/second and if you had a spaceship that could travel at 299,999 km/second towards the light, at what speed would the light be moving away from you? 1km/second you think? - That is wrong, light would still be moving away from you at 300,000 km/second; you might as well move away from it and it'd still be moving away from you at the same speed as if you were not following it at all. Now it's pretty hard to conceptualize this; try coming up with this in the first place!

Da-Vinci wasn't particularly smart; but he was creative and got people to think outside the square; he started a new age of invention; think of all the people that were inspired by da-vinci's ideas... While his work was somewhat trivial; it had important implications not in the actual purpose of his creations but in the process of invention itself.

I agree with you in a way though; these people are idolized above and beyond what they should be; I bet there are many fantastic researchers of the past that we haven't even heard of and yet made huge contributions in science that have gone under the radar... I guess it's human nature to need people to look up to. I think they were Geniuses nevertheless; but then there are lots of geniuses everywhere.