What Is A Genius Anyway?

by Robert L Gisel



The article "24 Qualities That Geniuses Have In Common" I had seen before so I did a search to find it again. This is a very popular article republished a lot so I am not going to re-post it yet again just yet. Since I can really relate to it and these qualities though I highly recommend the article you can see in full here.

What fascinated me the most is responses to it particularly from a number of individuals of the Mensa group. One lady said these couldn't be the common traits as she was a Mensa and only had about 16 of the traits. Another gal said she was a Mensa but didn't really think of herself as a genius just as one with exceptional memory. One guy said he was a Mensa and he just gave a heavy sigh. Others have said that there are geniuses who decidedly do not manifest these traits.

The name Bobby Fisher came up as one not exhibiting the 24 qualities, such as outgoing, saying he was rather reclusive. This was not an issue in his earlier life going to competitions and exhibitions but certainly when his competition chess was held up as the symbolic win or lose of the Cold War with Russia he became quirky to say the least. You probably would too if your every move was intensively scrutinized and monitored by banks of the press as well as the diplomatic front men for several nations.

That is not about genius though. That is about suppression. The goal of Suppressive Persons is that others will have less reach out.

Mensa is a group that requires an IQ in the top 2% and then one is said to be a genius. This would a score of 130 or 132 depending on which test you take at least per the children's page. Personally I have no particular impulse to become a Mensa, never knew what was required. Now I see I have tested regularly well above the minimum for the past 3 decades so I can talk from the position of experience.

Perhaps we are talking about 2 different things here, Geniuses and Geniuses Manifest. Having a genius IQ is one thing. Using it to push inspiration into real life manifestations is quite another thing.

IQ is the ability to distinguish between things and interrelate things, to see likenesses or dissimilarities. It means that one could invent the light bulb but it is no guarantee that one will, left alone, carry through and get it made. The Rain Man from the movie of that title would no doubt test out very high on an IQ test but we won't see a string of inventions coming out of him into households.

Edison, inventor of the incandescent light bulb, said it the best, "Genius is one percent inspiration and 99% perspiration." You would be hard pressed to find a place in the world today where you wouldn't find a light bulb. Edison could easily be put into "24 Qualities That Geniuses Have In Common" and stand up to the test.

Benjamin Franklin would also make the grade. His industry and inspiration provided a number of well known inventions as well as resulting in his becoming one of the most internationally renown Americans and as a Founding Father of the new nation. That he later sometimes demonstrated lessor attributes such as vanity and lust on occasion only shows that he was humanoid and does not demean his greatness as a genius.

Scholastic achievement itself does not make a genius. Henry Ford had only a third grade formal education, but look what he produced in the Ford Motor Company. This became an issue when he felt he had been slandered by someone calling him stupid and Ford sued him for this. The Judge in trying to understand this pointed out that automotive engineering was a highly technical subject, so how could he handle this without an education. Ford pointed out that he had a row of 10 buttons on his desk, each one for a person of expertise. Whenever he needed any one of those areas of knowledge he just pushed a button and the expert came running.

Ford certainly did know how to put people and things together into very workable combinations and dynamically engineer his dreams.

In the neighborhood where I am staying currently the street names are those of the well known inventors: Watt, Edison, Howe, Bell, Marconi, Fulton, Whitney and Morse. Those men brought us in the main the steam engine, filament light bulb, sewing machine, telephone, submarine, cotton gin and the telegraph, just to mention only the one most well known of their inventions. One could place these men into the genius category as well examples of the 24 genius qualities.

These pioneers in development are well known by their accomplishment, or as Edison said, their 98% perspiration. It could thus could be said it isn't enough to simply be smart. One has to to do.

Using "24 Qualities That Geniuses Have In Common" as stimulating factors to focus on anyone can increase their own genius. There are some tools and techniques beyond that that can be utilized to develop and expand each of those characteristics, but therein are the subjects of my upcoming posts on this blog.

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