Not long ago, I watched that great Hollywood Movie Limitless and it reminded me of a conversation I had last year about what the best definition is for a True Genius. There are many theories on this, and I’ve enjoyed reading Howard Gardner’s stuff, and Dean Simonton’s nearly 300 research papers on the topic of creative genius eminent achievers. One thing that keeps coming back to me, is that someone of superior intellect and genius should be able to be good at many things and score well against all types of intelligence.
Oh, before I go too much farther, here, if you haven’t watched “Limitless” directed by Neil Burger and starring Bradley Cooper, Robert De Niro, and Abbie Cornish – you should go see it, and if you were the screen play writer or research team – excellent work, and I thank you for the philosophy and hard work, well done! Okay so, back to what I was saying here, it seems to me that the true genius ought to be able to adapt to anything, and that superior intellect of that kind would show up as the individual tried new things, it would be quickly obvious.
Indeed, I was discussing this with an acquaintance in India, a borderline creative genius himself, and he stated; “I agree, to a certain extent, that when you focus on a particular field of education or sport, your brain adapts to it. However, there are some cases where this does not take place.”
He gave an example of super brilliant student of his, one who was very devout and had memorized huge portions of his religious book, and yet, was unable to adapt to new things outside of school work.
Interestingly enough, I guess I’ve never had a problem adapting to anything. Maybe the individual is just unable to adapt, thus, his mind is not developed properly, or the student is not a true genius? Or maybe he bows and prays five-times per day to his god and thus, all that rocking motion is causing his brain to hit the inside of his skull, causing slight brain damage, thus he is unable to think right anymore? A damaged brain is a real problem, and although the shocks running through the brain from those motions helps in rote memorization, that brain cannot adapt, reason, or think as well as the mind of a true genius.
We then discussed Picasso and Einstein, and how great they were in their own fields and yet, would either of them have been able to swap places and do as well? My acquaintance noted; “Perhaps Picasso might understand Einstein’s field quicker than some others. I really cannot say because even though Picasso was a creative genius in the field of art, perhaps he might not have been in the field of science.”
True enough, but alas we just don’t know that do we? But this is a decent line of thought and debate point. My acquaintance also noted that Einstein and Picasso were both textbook geniuses, “they were geniuses their own field of intelligence but outside those fields generally?” He asks. Well, I bet both in the case of these two gentleman mentioned, I bet either could have mastered the other’s field faster than the average person might.
It’s too bad that we will never know since both gentleman are long gone, and yet, I still have a sneaky suspicion that the true genius is the one who can adapt to any situation and can use their mind in many different ways, as needed. Please consider all this and give it some “limitless” thought.
