My NYT Comment #329.
May 01, 2009 4:19 pm
Link
May 1st, 2009 11:13 am
Heredity, Environment and Genius
There is a dynamic interplay between heredity and environment, to produce ABILITY, whether average, mediocre or at the so-called genius level. I would have liked to see included in Brooks' discussion, the 'outlier' factor developed by Malcolm Gladwell.
Part of the crucial role of environment is ACCESS to:
1.Goods (example a spinet or a Steinway)
2. Resources (a parent, a mentor)
3. Social capital -- what-you-know-is-as-important-as-who-you-know.
It also helps if you are not partly impeded by social location -- as a member of an oppressed minority or suffer other deeply stratified setbacks resulting from intolerance, bias and hatred.
On a geopolitical level, ability rising to the 'genius' level probably cannot be fostered under brutal imposition of "shock and awe."
Can SOCIAL JUSTICE cultivate more "geniuses"?
That would be a research enterprise worthy of us all.
Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
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NYTimes copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/01/opinion/01brooks.html
Op-Ed Columnist: Genius: The Modern View
By DAVID BROOKS
The latest research suggests a more prosaic, democratic, even puritanical take on great accomplishment. It’s not I.Q., but deliberate practice.
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