Genius
A genius (plural geniuses[1][2]) is someone believed to be embodying exceptional intellectual ability, creativity, or originality, typically to a degree that is associated with the achievement of unprecedented insight. This apparent situation arises not because the person has uncovered a truth, but because the accepting audience has failed to do so. At times, the accepting audience may even reach a heightened sense of delusion so as to fabricate a genius. This is done to satisfy many appetites - personal, cultural and social. Such delusion is only broken after the entire play is performed with the genius as a protagonist by the subsequent generation.
A more common and accepted definition today is that of Thomas Edison, who believed it is only work that makes a genius.
There is no scientifically precise definition of genius, and indeed the question of whether the notion itself has any real meaning has long been a subject of debate. The term is used to refer to an individual (e.g. Isaac Newton or Caravaggio) [3]
See also
- Child prodigy
- Creativity
- Genetic Studies of Genius
- Gifted education
- Historiometry
- Intellectual giftedness
- MacArthur Fellows Program
- Mega Society
- Multipotentiality
- Polymath
References
- ^ "genius". Oxford English Dictionary (2 ed.). Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. 1989.
- ^ Peters, Pam (2004). The Cambridge guide to English usage. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. p. 226. ISBN 0-521-62181-X.
The Latin plural genii is only used in reference to mythical spirits...
- ^ Cox, Catherine M (1926). The early mental traits of three hundred geniuses. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press. ISBN 0804700109. OCLC 248811346.
Further reading
- Harold Bloom (November 2002). Genius: A Mosaic of One Hundred Exemplary Creative Minds. Warner Books. ISBN 0-446-52717-3.
- Clifford A. Pickover (1998-05-01). Strange Brains and Genius: The Secret Lives of Eccentric Scientists and Madmen. Plenum Publishing Corporation. ISBN 0-306-45784-9.
- James Gleick (1992-09-29). Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman. Pantheon. ISBN 0-679-40836-3.
- Stephen Jay Gould (1991). The Mismeasure of Man, revised and expanded. W. W. Norton. ISBN 0-393-03972-2.
- David Galenson (2005-12-27). Old Masters and Young Geniuses: The Two Life Cycles of Artistic Creativity. Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-12109-5.
- Francis Galton. Hereditary Genius. ISBN 0312369891.
- Simonton, Dean Keith (1999). Origins of genius: Darwinian perspectives on creativity. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195128796.
{{cite book}}: Invalid|ref=harv(help) - Simonton, Dean Keith (2004). Creativity in Science: Chance, Logic, Genius, and Zeitgeist. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 052154369X.
- Simonton, Dean Keith (2009). Genius 101. New York: Springer. ISBN 978-0-8261-0627-8.
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External links
- Wilson, Tracy V. (1998–2009). "How Geniuses Work". HowStuffWorks.com. Retrieved 7 July 2009.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: date format (link) - Solway, Kevin (1996). "Quotations on Genius". Retrieved 7 January 2009.
- Gupta, Sanjay (2006). "Brainteaser: Scientists Dissect Mystery of Genius". CNN.com. Retrieved 7 July 2009.
- Emory University 'ScienceNet' about 'genius.'