Genius

I was just reading a brief news article about a man from the UK who, since a knock on the head as a child, has had an IQ greater than Einstein and Hawking, is able to solve complex mathematical problems in his mind, but is working as a window cleaner because he can’t find anyone to make use of his mental abilities.

I read a few comments on the story and see that most people feel that mathematical ability is insufficient by itself for genius.  But what makes true genius?  They say true genius is tinged with madness.  Perhaps that’s where he’s going wrong – he’s not barking mad.  But then, what is madness?

When I let my mind run off by itself chasing tangents and abstracts, telling stories to itself to build an abstract into a concept and turning an insignificant idea into its own microcosm where anything might happen, people tell me I’m mad.  I don’t have the IQ of a genius though, so I can only be a reasonably intelligent madwoman.  I certainly can’t work out complex mathematical problems in my head.  I can just about work them out with a pencil and paper, but really I prefer to use Excel to figure it out.  I apply my madness to the things I do though, and it usually gives them a uniqueness and personality all of their own.  I write with madness, I make things with madness.  I even cook with madness.  I use madness to translate the work of people with enormous IQs into something that everyone can understand and things that everyone can understand into something the huge IQs can relate to and work with.  I sometimes have some really good ideas through madness.  But I’m no genius.

So what makes a mind truly brilliant?  Is it an acute intelligence that sees too much and becomes mad?  Or is it a madness that develops an acute intelligence to try and make sense of itself? 

I tried to make sense of myself.  It made me depressed.  My madness is what sparks my creativity and gives me the whim to invent something that’s really quite cool.  To me anyway.  It might just look like the creation of a lunatic to anyone else, but it pleases me.  If I had an IQ a few points higher, would I be an actual genius, though?

Probably not.  A true genius, my madness tells me, needs the drive and ambition to do something truly amazing.  A true genius must have an incredible IQ, drive, and ambition, the ability to conceptualise and turn the abstract into the tangible, and the madness to believe it.  Self-belief is fundamental to true genius.  You can’t be a true genius and doubt your theories and inventions.  Perhaps if I underwent some hypnotherapy to give me the self-belief I lack, I could be a true genius.  I have all of the building blocks except the IQ and maybe with practice I could open up those neural pathways I know so much about but don’t use and hit that target too.

Does anyone really want to be a true genius though?  It must be a very lonely existence.  There can’t be many people who would relate to or understand a true genius.  They might get the basis of some of your thoughts, but would they ever know how to really reach you in your own crazy world of ideas and concepts?  It’s probably much easier to be a slightly mad normal person, or a hyper intelligent normal person than to package it all up into a true genius.  All most of us want is an easy life and we let those that are brave enough to have true genius solve all the big problems so that we can carry on with minimal effort.

By my own logic, there shouldn’t be anything stopping me boosting my IQ, having those ideas that make me a true genius and the acumen to make them a reality.  I’m certainly not too concerned about having an easy life and I’m certainly used to being separate from most of the world.  It wouldn’t bother me too much to have a few fewer people understand what I’m on about.  So why not try?  Well, because unlike the window cleaner who wants more than being average with a phenomenal IQ, I quite like being average with a bit of madness.  This way I can laugh at myself and I can laugh at the absurdities of the world, but not feel obliged to put things right.  Is that apathy?  Well maybe it is.  If I change my mind (quite literally if I even hope to unlock all that potential), I can almost guarantee I’ll write about it.  What I can’t guarantee is that anyone will have the vaguest idea what I’m talking about.