Earlier quoted context omitted.
This, my friend, is the well-worn path to the rabbit hole.
And down the Rabbit Hole lies a Templar Cave!
How I wish someone would discover an actual Templar Cave!
Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
161–170 of 208 posts
Re: Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
Great comment. What do you think can be done to cope with this? Maybe empathy and emotions can be learned?
Something that should be verified is whether the subject isn't capable of empathy and emotions or assume it as a way to cope with the pain implied by their existence.
Interestingly enough, it's both.
With Psychopathy someone is born without the capacity for empathy with no environmental trigger necessary to "activate" psychopathy.
With Sociopathy it's generally that childhood trauma "triggers" the lack of empathy.
In both cases, the manifestations of the disorders (manipulation, ego-centrism, grandeur, deceit) are there to cope with the lack of empathy and connection with other people.
Re: Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
#163Every time I read one of these articles about genius and madness, I become smug for a little while, then I get depressed because I realize that I haven't accomplished anything noteworthy, then I'm mildly reassured because occasionally my wife will spontaneously aver (contrary to all expectation) that I am a genius, then I get distracted and start chasing some ideas, then I get depressed again because, well, shit, I s…
I think having a wife who loves you and supports you is a noteworthy accomplishment.
The path to get here has been rocky, to put it mildly. The dividends of long-term relationships, especially marriage, are like compound interest. At first, sometimes it hardly seems worth it. Decades later, it's amazing how much little things done years earlier pay back to the enterprise.
Re: Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
#164When I pondered if I was a genius I realized the list of things I will not know will always be vastly larger than that which I do. Anyone swathed in that much ignorance cant be a genius IMO. To me its a battle to be less ignorant.
Re: Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
Could just as well be inactive
You're right. I'm also afraid of what the answer would be.
One had the loveliest wife you'd ever want to meet, a great match for each other, yet he couldn't stop himself from having serial affairs. He even asked me and others for help 15 years ago, but couldn't stop. He is now a lonely middle-aged guy striving to paper over the self-inflicted pain. (I know this, despite his denials, because I've known him for over 30 years.)
One has been completely inactive as far as I can tell, but the sense of "repression" has always been strong. I have no idea what the root of this is, but mutual friends have all commented on it at some point.
As for the remainder, it is best to draw the curtain of modesty over the scene.
Re: Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't have anything constructive to say, except that you sound like a quite special and definitely very perceptive person. It is random meetings in meatspace with people like you seem to be (I am likely projecting, but near with me) that light up my life. That is no recognition in a public sense, and perhaps not bona fide genius either, but I'm sure that you contribute more than you realise to more people's experie…
The sense I get from him is that he enjoys storytelling, and the stories should not be mistaken for literal truth.
I do enjoy storytelling. The story above is literal truth, unlike some that I tell. The problem with drinking is that I'm more likely to share literal truth about myself than when I'm sober, when "myself" is rightly seen as a very dull topic. (How embarrassing all of this is in the morning light.)
Re: Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
#167The article attacks the idea that genius is normal, and it maybe suggests that it would be hard to be normal and genius. Taking the title at face value, Your not a genius if you think you are. I will say that dealing with people who don't have basic math, science, logic, physics, chemistry and philosophy understanding it's pretty easy to convince yourself that your both genius and crazy.
There are tons of geniuses that are perfectly normal. What his article was talking about was eccentric geniuses.
That's a contradiction in terms. Genius is exceptional by definition, if you're a genius you're not normal.
Most of the smart people I know struggle with some form of depression or existential issues. The really smart ones are invariably a bit odd.
Re: Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are numerous examples of families in which talents seem to persist across two or more generations. The Bachs and Mozarts come immediately to mind. Myrna Gopnik and her children Adam, Sarah, and Blake. The Huxleys. The Darwins. Multiple acting and performing dynasties: the Barrymores, Ravi Shankar and daughter Norah Jones, Woody and Arlo Guthrie. The Assads: brothers Sergio and Odair, sister Badi. That's just of…
It's easier to understand if it's thought in a negative way. For "genius" you need the confluence of maybe a dozen genes. The moment one of them is not present, you don't get the whole potential. A genius' child could be very talented, but not quite the same as parent. There is also the "nurture" component, but people tend to underestimate or even discard genetics because it isn't just a single gene.
I understand that. The point remains that there are areas in which some level of innate talent does in fact seem to track family lineages.
Re: Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
#169Truthfully, I've found that the real difference in intelligence between people isn't so large as many people think it is. People don't generally come along and solve "intractable" problems because they're so much smarter than all the people who've tacked the problem prior to them. Instead, they approach the problem in a way that is fundamentally different. This is why outsiders are so frequently the people who make m…
> Truthfully, I've found that the real difference in intelligence between people isn't so large as many people think it is. Well, I've read many very convincing arguments that it is (including statistics pertaining to how children perform in school, with which I have my own problems, but which nonetheless need to be accounted for), how have you found that it is not?
First off, IQ has been shown to potentially change quite significantly over long periods of time. Second, IQ is a very specific measure, it basically only deals with how good you are at performing symbol manipulation in working memory. Creative intelligence is far more important in my opinion but that isn't measured because we don't really have any idea how to do so.
We all have a fairly similar brains, some people's are organized slightly more efficiently for certain tasks, but that doesn't mean they're more efficient for everything, in fact it is quite like likely the opposite. Additionally, the brain is incredibly plastic, so you're not completely stuck with the architecture you have.
Re: Both geniuses and madmen pay attention to what others ignore
#170As a public figure, it wasn't worth burning my reputation to type this out, but I think that speaks to the state of discourse around mental health today. The article is uses the word "psychopathology" which is a general term for the study of mental disorders. However I want to talk specifically about Psychopathy as a disorder, because I recently came to understand that I am a psychopath. My guess is that there are pr…
This relates to me on many levels, thank you for taking the time to write this out it really resonated with me and I'm sure with a lot more people on HN as well. Do you think it might be worth to test for autism even later in life? like 30+?