World Science Festival Online Starting Tomorrow

The World Science Festival is taking place starting today in New York City, but the good news is you can watch quite a few of the sessions online here.

I'm particularly interested in "Beautiful Minds: The Enigma of Genius" which will air on Saturday at 8:00 pm EST.

In ancient Rome, the genius (plural genii) was the guiding spirit or tutelary deity of a person, family (gens), or place (genius loci). The noun is related to the Latin verb gigno, genui, genitus, "to bring into being, create, produce." Because the achievements of exceptional individuals seemed to indicate the presence of a particularly powerful genius, by the time of Augustus the word began to acquire its secondary meaning of "inspiration, talent."

I'm hoping they're going to discuss all types of genius and more about recent scientific advancements on determining how genius develops - whether it is inherited genetically and if they will discuss the long-running "Genetic Studies of Genius" which started in 1921 at Stanford University which is now the oldest and longest running longitudinal study in the world.

The link for this particular session at the World Science Fair mentions Immanuel Kant, famous for coining the phrase genius in the 1700's in his work Critique of Judgement. Kant believed that genius is the ability to independently arrive at and understand concepts that would normally have t be taught by another person and originality is the essential character of genius. Arthur Schopenhauer goes one step further:

"Talent hits the target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see."

Schopenhauer believed that a genius is someone in whom intellect predominates over "will" much more than in the other average person.  In his aesthetics, the predominance of the intellect over the will of the "genius" allows him (or her) to create artistic or academic works that are objects of pure disinterested contemplation, the chief criterion of the aesthetic experience for Schopenhauer. In Schopenhauer's words, "they fall into the mire while gazing at the stars", which is an allusion to Plato's dialogue Theaetetus in which Socrates tells of Thales (the world's first philosopher) being made fun of for falling while trying to studying the stars.

In this dialogue Socrates asks his friend Theodorus if he knows of any geometry students who show particular promise and is told to seek out Theaetetus who is "intelligent, virile, and an orphan". Socrates and Theaetetus discuss three definitions of knowledge: knowledge as nothing but perception; knowledge as true judgement; and knowledge as a true judgement with an account - all of which are found to be unsatisfactory and ends with Socrates announcement that he has to go to to see the judge to answer to charges that he has been corruptinng the young and failing to worship the gods.

When Socrates asks Theaetetus to venture a guess as to what knowledge is, Theaetetus suggest that "knowledge is nothing but sense perception".

In the end of the dialogue, Socrates compares the human mind to a birdcage. He says it is one thing to possess knowledge and another to have it about one, on hand. He later discards his birdcage analogy (something Socrates does often, but hey, he was a philosopher) and concludes the dialgoue by announcing he again has to go to court, but this time he will be on trial, and we all know how that ended.

For me personally I philosophically adhere to both Schopenhauer and Kant's statements about genius, but I think it is a rather strict definition. I've been in the company of many people whom would be considered "geniuses". My mother was a math a prodigy who could do geometry despite never having been taught any maths beyond adding and subtraction. My best friend is also a math prodigy who has a spatial intelligence on par with Einstein. But there are other sorts of genius that aren't given as much credit as they deserve. I hope that the non-traditional aspects of genius will be given due consideration during this particular session of the World Science Festival because in many ways non-traditional genius, which I define as "being good at things that cannot be measured", is far more rare in society than most people realise.

A beautiful mind today has become synonymous with John Forbes Nash Jr. the Nobel Prize winning economist and mathematician portrayed by Russell Crowe. But what is a beautiful mind? In Nash's case he "hit the target no one else" could "see". I think it is easier and more justifiable to say a beautiful mind is any mind that allows itself to be led by creativity, imagination, and curiosity and that the modern day definition of "genius" must be adapted for those who are not simply skilled in maths or sciences because by defining it as such it limits of abilities as human beings.

By my definition every child has the potential for genius, but then again I've always believed that in the war of "Nature vs. Nuture", nuture is far more important, but I do firmly believe this. Find out what a child is naturally curious about, give them the right tools and encouragement, and perhaps that child's curiosity will find their target and perhaps it may turn out to be simply a "talent" as opposed to "genius", but being talented at anything is not to be scoffed at either. If you don't think so, you should meet my goddaughter who can music on any instrument she's given and then listen to me try to play the guitar!

Will you tune in for the WSF sessions? If you do, be sure to post your thoughts.