Perhaps the key to genius quality work is to aim for the timeless work alluded to at the end of the piece. It may come down to the fact that if you set the bar of all your work to be genius/timeless, you won't product average work, or you won't let yourself release it.
This could lead to paralysis via analysis though. It's probably in the middle/gray areas that produces consistent "genius" work. Just like everything else, I guess.
Though a lot of geniuses leave massive quantities of both public and private work that's unremarkable - probably the price for their true contributions. I would think genius quality work doesn't mean you don't publish, etc. but that you're persistent in striving to make real contributions.
"Sporadic great men come everywhere. But for a community to get vibrating through and through with intensely active life, many geniuses coming together and in rapid succession are required. This is why great epochs are so rare, - why the sudden bloom of a Greece, an early Rome, a Renaissance, is such a mystery. Blow must follow blow so fast that no cooling can occur in the intervals. Then the mass of the nation glows incandescent, and may continue to glow by pure inertia long after the originators of its internal movement have passed away. We often hear surprise expressed that in these high tides of human affairs not only the people should be filled with stronger life, but that individual geniuses should seem so exceptionally abundant. This mystery is just about as deep as the time-honored conundrum as to why great rivers flow by great t owns. It is true that great public fermentations awaken and adopt many geniuses who in more torpid times would have had no chance to work. But over and above this there must be an exceptional concourse of genius about a time, to make the fermentation begin at all. The unlikeliness of the concourse is far greater than the unlikeliness of any particular genius; hence the rarity of these periods and the exceptional aspect which they always wear." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_James
Or Paul Graham:
"Which is an uncomfortable thought. If they were just like us, then they had to work very hard to do what they did. And that's one reason we like to believe in genius. It gives us an excuse for being lazy. If these guys were able to do what they did only because of some magic Shakespeareness or Einsteinness, then it's not our fault if we can't do something as good. ... I'm not saying there's no such thing as genius. But if you're trying to choose between two theories and one gives you an excuse for being lazy, the other one is probably right." - http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html
Seems like a worthy topic to think about to me, and lots of people doing meaningful work might take time to think about. Now, I keep meaning to go out for dinner, if I could just find where I placed my rocket shoes...
"In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. Great works of art have no more affecting lesson for us than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous impression with good-humored inflexibility then most when the whole cry of voices is on the other side. Else, to-morrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another." - http://www.emersoncentral.com/selfreliance.htm
He focuses on the internal, personal implications of our thoughts rather than others' opinions of our thoughts. That is, it's more important to be true to yourself than to be true to what others think you should be about.
Speaking of Shakespeare, one more I have to call out from Self Reliance:
"Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another, you have only an extemporaneous, half possession... Where is the master who could have taught Shakspeare? Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great man is a unique. The Scipionism of Scipio is precisely that part he could not borrow. Shakspeare will never be made by the study of Shakspeare. Do that which is assigned you, and you cannot hope too much or dare too much." (emphasis mine)
Not necessarily. Timeless implies that time has no effect on it - it remains as important as it was when it was first invented. For instance, I'd say Euclid's work was timeless. Freud's work is permanent. It had a permanent impact on the field of psychology, but had to be built upon by other people to be effective.
What about genius quality work that's unrecognized? It seems to me that focusing on some big important question that is sure to get a lot of attention is a luxury afforded to people in the right fields of academia. A lot of the things that drive progress are smaller more mundane issues and battles that are fought, won and forgotten. Is the quality of the work ascribed by its notoriety?
"But genius quality work? Large, permanent impact on important fields? I think we’re in the easiest era of history to do that. There’s so much low hanging fruit to do – just cross-reference two important disciplines that haven’t talked to each other enough yet, BAM, genius quality work."
I'm not sure how this logic works. If you have low-hanging fruit, you don't need genius-quality work. But then again, I'm skeptical of anyone that claims that genius is easy. Plus, I do believe that there's more to it than hard work. Anyone can work hard, and I know plenty of hard workers who definitely don't do genius quality work.
> I'm not sure how this logic works. If you have low-hanging fruit, you don't need genius-quality work.
One of the things that got me thinking about this originally was reading that there were massive improvements in safety and efficiency in surgery when they started adopting processes and checklists from engineering.
Whoever adopted, tested, and perfected that made a genius quality contribution to medicine, but it was (relatively) low hanging fruit. I think it's more possible to make that sort of high impact, important contribution now than ever before.
> But then again, I'm skeptical of anyone that claims that genius is easy.
I wrote - "But honestly, I don’t think it’s very hard to do genius-quality work, if you decide to try. Most people don’t try. But if you did try, I think you could do some."
So I wouldn't say it's easy, but I don't think it's so hard either.
My feeling is that almost anyone could produce some really important works if they decided to try. How many people are trying, really? Everyone I know that's trying to do really important stuff is generally doing really important stuff.
> Plus, I do believe that there's more to it than hard work. Anyone can work hard, and I know plenty of hard workers who definitely don't do genius quality work.
But are they specifically trying to make large, permanent impacts on important fields? Repeatedly, persistently trying? Putting in hard work in boring, safe areas is unlikely to produce genius quality work. But looking at really hard problems or not-yet-done things and trying to do them? I think if you keep trying, you're likely to produce something of significant value.
Or maybe I'm mistaken, I don't know. But I generally see people who plant a flag and say, "I will try to do things that are massively important" - those people I see eventually making breakthroughs and contributions. I think a lot of people just don't plant that flag.
I say this fully aware of how hokey it sounds, but I'm going to say it anyway. Being a genius isn't a decision; it's a lifestyle. Maybe you are a genius, so it seems trivial to you. But the person who connected medicine to engineering probably did a lot more than say "hey, I wonder what would happen if I connected this to this". He probably had a good knowledge of both engineering and medicine. That takes a lot more than making a decision to do something smart. That's why I don't think that the average person is capable of doing genius-quality work. It's not that they don't want to change things. It's just that they don't want to dedicate their lives to it. And that is definitely understandable.
In end, maybe you and I really agree more than we disagree. It's just that I feel that there's more to doing genius-quality work than the post presents.
Everyone wants to be a genius. And if they can't be, they want the comfort that it's because they're not trying hard enough.
I've met some people who were just anomalies, whose brains worked in "genius mode" naturally, without much of what we would consider "effort." Srinivasa Ramanujan would fall into this category (not saying I met him :). Pretending I could think like them is like pretending I could have synesthesia if I really wanted to.
And yes, this article is about doing genius-quality work and not genius-quality thought, but give a single monkey a typewriter and let him have at it...and he'll eventually produce the works of Shakespeare too. Genius lies in the ability to produce relatively "genius-quality" work in less time and fewer resources than it would take the average man. The author seems to want to normalize time and effort across the board for everyone.
One can't make genius quality work, but society can do it.
An army of researchers can visit any single idea in a field, and then one of then makes a great discovery, one that is the source of a great revolution, that is a genius is born, so we (society) can make genius quality work.
15 comments
[ 0.25 ms ] story [ 52.4 ms ] threadThis could lead to paralysis via analysis though. It's probably in the middle/gray areas that produces consistent "genius" work. Just like everything else, I guess.
"Sporadic great men come everywhere. But for a community to get vibrating through and through with intensely active life, many geniuses coming together and in rapid succession are required. This is why great epochs are so rare, - why the sudden bloom of a Greece, an early Rome, a Renaissance, is such a mystery. Blow must follow blow so fast that no cooling can occur in the intervals. Then the mass of the nation glows incandescent, and may continue to glow by pure inertia long after the originators of its internal movement have passed away. We often hear surprise expressed that in these high tides of human affairs not only the people should be filled with stronger life, but that individual geniuses should seem so exceptionally abundant. This mystery is just about as deep as the time-honored conundrum as to why great rivers flow by great t owns. It is true that great public fermentations awaken and adopt many geniuses who in more torpid times would have had no chance to work. But over and above this there must be an exceptional concourse of genius about a time, to make the fermentation begin at all. The unlikeliness of the concourse is far greater than the unlikeliness of any particular genius; hence the rarity of these periods and the exceptional aspect which they always wear." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_James
Or Paul Graham:
"Which is an uncomfortable thought. If they were just like us, then they had to work very hard to do what they did. And that's one reason we like to believe in genius. It gives us an excuse for being lazy. If these guys were able to do what they did only because of some magic Shakespeareness or Einsteinness, then it's not our fault if we can't do something as good. ... I'm not saying there's no such thing as genius. But if you're trying to choose between two theories and one gives you an excuse for being lazy, the other one is probably right." - http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html
Seems like a worthy topic to think about to me, and lots of people doing meaningful work might take time to think about. Now, I keep meaning to go out for dinner, if I could just find where I placed my rocket shoes...
"In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. Great works of art have no more affecting lesson for us than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous impression with good-humored inflexibility then most when the whole cry of voices is on the other side. Else, to-morrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another." - http://www.emersoncentral.com/selfreliance.htm
He focuses on the internal, personal implications of our thoughts rather than others' opinions of our thoughts. That is, it's more important to be true to yourself than to be true to what others think you should be about.
Speaking of Shakespeare, one more I have to call out from Self Reliance:
"Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another, you have only an extemporaneous, half possession... Where is the master who could have taught Shakspeare? Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great man is a unique. The Scipionism of Scipio is precisely that part he could not borrow. Shakspeare will never be made by the study of Shakspeare. Do that which is assigned you, and you cannot hope too much or dare too much." (emphasis mine)
As for me, I can do genus quality work, and occasionally I can even do species quality work. ;)
I'm not sure how this logic works. If you have low-hanging fruit, you don't need genius-quality work. But then again, I'm skeptical of anyone that claims that genius is easy. Plus, I do believe that there's more to it than hard work. Anyone can work hard, and I know plenty of hard workers who definitely don't do genius quality work.
One of the things that got me thinking about this originally was reading that there were massive improvements in safety and efficiency in surgery when they started adopting processes and checklists from engineering.
Whoever adopted, tested, and perfected that made a genius quality contribution to medicine, but it was (relatively) low hanging fruit. I think it's more possible to make that sort of high impact, important contribution now than ever before.
> But then again, I'm skeptical of anyone that claims that genius is easy.
I wrote - "But honestly, I don’t think it’s very hard to do genius-quality work, if you decide to try. Most people don’t try. But if you did try, I think you could do some."
So I wouldn't say it's easy, but I don't think it's so hard either.
My feeling is that almost anyone could produce some really important works if they decided to try. How many people are trying, really? Everyone I know that's trying to do really important stuff is generally doing really important stuff.
> Plus, I do believe that there's more to it than hard work. Anyone can work hard, and I know plenty of hard workers who definitely don't do genius quality work.
But are they specifically trying to make large, permanent impacts on important fields? Repeatedly, persistently trying? Putting in hard work in boring, safe areas is unlikely to produce genius quality work. But looking at really hard problems or not-yet-done things and trying to do them? I think if you keep trying, you're likely to produce something of significant value.
Or maybe I'm mistaken, I don't know. But I generally see people who plant a flag and say, "I will try to do things that are massively important" - those people I see eventually making breakthroughs and contributions. I think a lot of people just don't plant that flag.
In end, maybe you and I really agree more than we disagree. It's just that I feel that there's more to doing genius-quality work than the post presents.
I've met some people who were just anomalies, whose brains worked in "genius mode" naturally, without much of what we would consider "effort." Srinivasa Ramanujan would fall into this category (not saying I met him :). Pretending I could think like them is like pretending I could have synesthesia if I really wanted to.
And yes, this article is about doing genius-quality work and not genius-quality thought, but give a single monkey a typewriter and let him have at it...and he'll eventually produce the works of Shakespeare too. Genius lies in the ability to produce relatively "genius-quality" work in less time and fewer resources than it would take the average man. The author seems to want to normalize time and effort across the board for everyone.
An army of researchers can visit any single idea in a field, and then one of then makes a great discovery, one that is the source of a great revolution, that is a genius is born, so we (society) can make genius quality work.