Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Genius is 1% Inspiration and 99% Perspiration

An interview with Manjul Bhargava:

"Interviewer: Is math genius a product of meticulous hard work, practice, incremental gaining of knowledge and insight or is it an outcome of eidetic memory and talent?
Bhargava: You asked this question very eloquently. The answer is that while a good memory and a copious supply of talent is very helpful, there is no substitute for hard work."

While Manjul's answer resonated with the title of this post, I am of the opinion that genius being 99% perspiration etc is misleading. That "formula" and Manjul's interview seem to indicate that genius is largely about good and useful hardwork.

I do not agree. Becoming a genius may involve a tremendous amount of hard work - but NO ONE is going to become a genius any time soon with only hard work. A genius perhaps has some genes - something to do with that "1% inspiration". This inspiration or whatever one chooses to call it is what geniuses have and the rest of us do not have. And without this ingredient for inspiration you are not going to become a genius. And this ingredient is NOT hard work. 

An interesting quote from 

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2012/04/26/if-you-answer-this-math-problem-correctly-you-may-be-an-atheist/ or https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-new-brain/201204/religion-and-reason:
"people who were more analytic in thinking would tend not to believe in religion, whereas people who approach problems more intuitively would tend to be believers."
This quote seems to contradict MBTI theory - in the sense that the quote assumes that intuition and logical ability are mutually exclusive. NT's are intuitive and logical. I guess the authors refer to F(eelers) when they mention intuition. 

Another link, which talks on the same lines, refers to Einstein as an epitome of rational analytical thinking. One of Einstein's quotes (see here):

The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.
After reading all this, I am shaking my head. They don't add up. A logical mind is just a T (as in MBTI). A genius needs an N - it could be an NT OR an NF. An ST does not make a genius.

Additional reading:

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