Essays

The Many Aspects of Genius

“Talent hits a target no one else can hit; genius hits a target no one else can see.” -Arthur Schopenhauer

When you become deeply enmeshed in philosophy, you eventually realize a lot of so-called “disagreements” are nothing but semantic discrepancies in meaning. That is, the definition I’m using for a particular word might be slightly different than the definition you’re using. Our “disagreement” dissipates upon the realization that we’re essentially just speaking different languages. If the words I’m saying mean something different to you than they do to me, that’s a semantic problem not a true disagreement. Keep this in mind as we proceed. We’ll be discussing various instantiaions of philosophers definitions and ideas about genius. Not all of them are compatible. But none of them are wrong, per se. That’s the tricky thing about philosophy is often times people aren’t proven wrong in the way we’re demonstrably wrong about a hypothesis in mathematics or computer science.

Genius is just a word. Words have meaning but they don’t have strong definitions. That means, words arise in the aether prior to anyone having conceived of precsisely what that word means. We still had language before Noah Webster. Genius is just a word. But it’s a word that’s an attempt to classify a recurring phenomenon we witness in the world; our attempts in philosophy are to analyze what are the commonalities of the recurring phenomena in each instantiation, and as such how should we conceive of genius? It’s sort’ve a funny thing. It’s as though we’ve created our own problem and now philosophers are working hard to solve it. We start using a word like genius and now we need to figure out “what do we mean by that?”

Our intuition is what motivates our intellect. We have correctly identified a pattern when we notice that particular people exhibit traits of “something” and we’ve given this something a name–Genius. Now, it’s our job as philosophers–building off the work of our predeccessors, and integrating previous thought with modern thought and experiments, to more deeply understand that phenomenon.

Let’s begin with the modern conception of a genius. There is a grave mistake that permeates mainstream culture: it invades movies, books, common parlance, and the way we think about exceptional people. Even the dictionary get’s it “wrong” (mind you, there’s no ‘wrong’; rather, there’s an alternative definition we prefer and the dictionary definition is incomplete). Genius is simply defined, by the dictionary, as a “person of exceptional intelligence or creativity”. [CORRECTION: Merriam Webster has both; but we prefer a “hybrid” definition]. Many people are more familiar with the latter definition.

However, what’s notable about the former definition is the following: in tracing the linguistics origins of the word, we can begin to gather clues about where super-intelligence or creativity really comes from, how we can access it for ourselves, and actually witness ourselves becoming geniuses. Many ways to skin a cat and many ways to define genius through it’s different aspects.
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A Dynamic Model of the Human Psyche: Reversal Theory

In many traditional psychological models, people are described using static traits. For example, one might be familiar with the MBTI index, very popular in South Korea. Here one’s personality is broken into 4 spectrums: extraversion vs introversion, sensing vs intuition, thinking vs feeling, and judging vs perceiving. I always thought it was stupid. But when I lived in South Korea, people asked me about my MBTI so consistently I finally caved and took the test; I took the test multiple times, in multiple different moods because I like certainty. In the majority of my tests I came out as an INTP, a “Logician” being the informal title. “These flexible thinkers enjoy taking an unconventional approach to many aspects of life. They often seek out unlikely paths, mixing willingness to experiment with personal creativity… Imaginative and curious, people wth the INTP personality type can find endless fascination in the workings of their own mind.” (INTP Personality, 16personalities.com) Other INTPs include Bill Gates, Albert Einstein, or Lord Varys from Game of Thrones. I found myself interested, and actually enjoying my identity as an INTP. My delight didn’t last long though. Soon I did some research and learned that the MBTI index isn’t accepted by psychology as a proper means of “classifying” people. On the whole, the MBTI phenomenon is a business model disguised as real science. Upon researching all the different combinations of MBTI we realize that all of them are quite flattering. It’s designed to hook you and make you feel special. A better index for classification is the OCEAN index: openness, conscientiousness, extravertion, agreeabless, and neuroticism. These are referred to as “The Big Five”.

Sometimes science tends to overcomplicate things. Anyone with a basic intuition can observe that people are dynamic creatures; our brains are malleable; our beliefs are impressionable. We are, in short, susceptible to influence.

If our goal is to obtain a generalized understanding of human behavior, a more dynamic model is necessary. This is where Reversal Theory shines. This theory, unlike the Big Five or the MBTI, operates via a more complicated system; it’s not as simple as the other models which are more or less binary. In Reversal Theory, we have to understand the key concept of meta-motivation. From that foundation point, the theory unfolds cleanly.

Meta-motivation refers to the higher order of our motives. For example, if I’m craving a hamburger, the meta-motivation would be hunger. Hunger however is not included in the theory as a meta-motivation, given that hunger, like lust, is a “base” motivation. What the theory deals with are more higher order motivations; and there are 8 of them in total, across 4 meta-motivational domains which take the form of spectrums. They are called paratelic vs telic, conforming vs rebellious, mastery vs sympathy, and autic vs alloic. Unlike the aforementioned models, in Reversal Theory we have that people aren’t innately rebellious or conforming, mastery-oriented vs sympathy-oriented, or any other fixed label. Rather, the meta-motivational domains are meant to be observed as temporary states people inhabit. A reversal occurs when the see-saw tips the other way–or even several of the 4 see-saws tip the other way. Telic vs paratelic is often described as playful vs serious; but the true defining feature of telic vs paratelic is a question of whether one is motivated by long-term goals (telic // serious) or motivated by an intrinsic enjoyment for the activity (paratelic // playful). Elon Musk is known to demonstrate both of these states, often flipping on a dime. One moment during a business meeting he’ll be extremely serious, motivated by saving humanity, extremely hardcore, ruthless, impatient, and mean; and a moment later in the same business meeting he’ll be giggling like a child, quoting Monty Python, or pulling up a video on his phone, thereby lightening the mood and allowing everyone to breathe easier. (Read Walter Isaacson’s biography of Elon Musk).

Reversal Theory brings forward a compelling claim about arousal. There is a theory called Optimal Arousal Theory which is strongly interrelated with Ciczscentmiyali’s concept of Flow. Optimum Arousal Theory suggests that to maximize performance, one should neither be too aroused nor too unaroused, there is an optimal state of arousal which yields peak performance for any given task. That is not to suggest that the same amount of arousal is ideal for writing complex computer code versus throwing punches in a street fight. Rather, it is to suggest that for each task individually there is a unique degree of arousal that is what yields peak performance. On this topic Reversal Theory offers the following: depending on whether one is in a paratelic vs telic state is what determines whether high or low arousal is better suited. If you’re in a telic state of mind (serious // motivated by long term goals) then a state of low arousal is stronger; if you’re in a paratelic state (playful // motivated by intrinsic enjoyment) a state of high arousal is stronger. This is not a criticism of Optimal Arousal Theory, but rather a deeper specification which offers more clarity on how, why, when, and where higher or lower arousal is better suited.

To utilize this practically, one should seek harmony with their state of mind and their arousal. If one is in a telic state one should seek low arousal, serenity, and peace so as to yield concentration. If one is in a paratelic state, one should seek high arousal, excitment, passion, and spontanaeity so as to yield creativity. One could also inverse the previous two statements. For example, if I’m highly aroused, I might strive to put myself in a paratelic state, and from there try to work on some of the more creative aspects of writing my novel–working out plotpoints, characters, larger themes and how to express them. Versus if I’m unaroused, I might be inclined to adopt a telic state of mind and set my work towards research, editing, planning, or responding to emails.

There is a striking difference between viewing oneself as a system of ever-changing components versus a fixed set of personality traits. If you’re an MBTI person I strongly suggest you find a different identity. If everyone’s special, then no one’s interesting.
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