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How Geniuses Work
Without a doubt, Einstein was a genius. So was Isaac Newton, who invented Physics. He also played a big role in the development of Calculus (微积分学), which some people have trouble comprehending even after extensive classroom study. Another genius, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, started composing music when he was 5 years old. Mozart wrote hundreds of pieces before his death in 1760 at age 35.
The understanding of genius
According to conventional wisdom, geniuses are different from everyone else. They can think faster and better than other people. In addition, many people think that all that extra brainpower leads to strange behavior. And although geniuses are fairly easy to spot, defining exactly what makes one person a genius is a little trickier. Figuring out how that person became a genius is harder still.
There are two big things that make it difficult to study genius. First, the genius label is subjective. Some people insist that anyone with an intelligence quotient (IQ) higher than a certain value be a genius. Others feel that IQ tests measure only a limited part of a person’s total intelligence. Some believe high test scores have little to do with real genius. Second, genius is a big picture concept. Most scientific and medical inquiries, on the other hand, examine details. A concept as subjective as genius isn’t easy to quantify, analyze or study.
So, when exploring how geniuses work, it’s a good idea to start by defining precisely what a genius is. A genius isn’t simply someone with an exceptionally high IQ. Instead, a genius is an extraordinarily intelligent person who breaks new ground with discoveries, inventions or works of art. Usually, a genius’ work changes the way people view the world or the field in which the work took place. In other words, a genius must be both intelligent and able to use that intelligence in a productive or impressive way.
Genius and the brain
The cerebral cortex (大脑皮层), the outermost part of your brain, is where thought and reasoning happen. These are your brain’s higher functions, which relate to basic survival, take place deeper in the brain. Your cerebral cortex is the largest part of your brain, and it’s full of wrinkles and folds. If you removed and stretched out an adult human’s cerebral cortex, it would be about as large as a few pages of a newspaper. It’s divided into several lobes (圆形的突起), and different regions within these lobes handle specific tasks related to how you think.
Researchers have so far only figured out a few things about how the brain affects intelligence. A 2004 study at the University of California found that the volume of gray matter in parts of the cerebral cortex had a greater impact on intelligence than the brain’s total volume. The findings suggest that the physical attributes of many parts of the brain determine how smart a person is.
A 2006 paper in the journal Nature theorized that the way the brain develops is more important than the size of the brain itself. A person’s cerebral cortex gets thicker during childhood and thinner during youth, According to the study, the brains of children with higher IQs thickened faster than those of other children. Studies also suggest that, to some extent, children inherit intelligence from their parents. Some researchers theorize that this is because the physical structure of the brain can be an inherited trait. In addition, the process of becoming really good at something both requires and encourages your brain to wire itself to handle that particular task better.
Genius and intelligence
Like genius, intelligence can be difficult to quantify. Psychologists study intelligence extensively. An entire field of study, known as psychometrics (心理测验学), is devoted to studying and measuring intelligence. But even within that field, experts don’t always agree on exactly what it is or how best to analyze it. And while intelligence is central to genius, not all geniuses score well on intelligence tests or perform well in school.
Intelligence testing has existed for thousands of years. The best known IQ tests started near the end of the 19th century. Today, IQ tests generally measure a person’s memory, language and mathematical abilities. IQ tests are also standardized so that most people score between 90 and 110. A common perception is that anyone scoring above a certain number—often 140—is automatically a genius. But in spite of the existence of high IQ organizations, many scientists caution that there is no such thing as a genius level IQ.
Many educators and researchers feel that, in general, standardized IQ tests do a good job of predicting how well a child will perform in school. Schools often use these tests to determine which children to place in gifted or special education classes. Most colleges and universities and some employers also use standardized tests as part of their application processes.
However, in spite of their prevalence, these tests are not safe enough. In general, some minorities and people with lower income levels tend to score lower than people from other racial and economic groups. Critics contend that this makes IQ tests invalid. In addition, some researchers argue that the concept of IQ is too limiting and doesn’t really give a full view of a person’s intelligence. They feel that intelligence is a combination of many factors.
Genius and creativity
There’s a big difference between being really smart and being a genius. While geniuses tend to be exceptionally intelligent, they also use imagination and creativity to invent, discover or create something new within their field of interest. They break new ground rather than simply remembering existing information.
Geniuses do not usually operate in isolation, either. Nearly all of them analyze the work of other great minds and use that information to make new discoveries. Self taught geniuses, on the other hand, often explore information in unexpected ways, due in part to their lack of formal training. In either case, the ability to imagine new possibilities is as important as general intelligence.
Like intelligence, creativity and imagination can be difficult to isolate, quantify or explain. Some researchers believe that creative people have less potential inhibition than other people. Potential inhibition is the unconscious ability to ignore unimportant stimuli. Researchers think that creative people either receive more stimuli from the world around them or ignore less of it. This may also explain why creative people seem to be more prone to mental illness.
The creativity of geniuses also relates to productivity and hard work. Sometimes, the most dramatic examples of genius involve people who produce their best work at a very young age. However, not every genius produces exceptional work early in life the way Einstein and Mozart did. Some, like Ludwig yon Beethoven, do their best work later in life.
We may never know precisely where creativity comes from, why some people use their creativity more than others or why some people are most creative during specific times in their lives. We may not learn how one person ends up with the right balance of brainpower, intelligence and creativity to become a genius. But it’s clear that geniuses are central to advancements in science, technology and understanding. Without geniuses, our understanding of mathematics, literature and music would be completely different. Concepts that we now take for granted, like gravity, planetary orbits and black holes, might still he undiscovered. The study at the University of California in 2004 made a discovery that ______ .