Intro

This is extracted from my replies regarding genius (among engineers) on Telegram. While it’s not a serious writing, it does shed some lights on my thoughts of genius, hence the inclusion. I also did not try to persuade someone or prove something, so this may seem to lack main argument, or just…random nonsense.

Quote

ℹ️ Note

how software actually works for 99% of engineers: someone way smarter than you solved a really hard problem and now you build on top of their solution like adult legos and think you’re a genius

Well, I am a verified genius as soon as I can understand their solution.

To use the thing you need only to understand what it does, not how it does it.

Agreed, but I’m indeed talking about the underlying theories. That’s what we call knowledge.

Below I misred the reply by omitting the not before necessarily, which makes the meaning completely the opposite…

ℹ️ Note

you’re not necessarily not a genius if you don’t have a desire to understand how every single thing works.

I have to say there are many kinds of genius and curiosity is definitely a great personality but not a must-have. If I can understand everything after learning it does not matter whether I really have the desire. Tbh I think one would be more of a genius if one can even understand things one’s NOT interested in.

It just sounds like you argue that you have to understand every single convoluted thing you come across just to prove yourself that you can. You don’t. You can allow yourself to have a purpose for the analysing of things and not go deeper if it doesn’t serve it. Your time in this world is quite finite.

Not necessarily everything since time is finite as you said. But when one ever needs to understand something, a genius always can.

The fact that a genius does not understand something simply means it’s not needed (for now). (sounds quite similar to your argument though)

Note

To wrap up my thoughts on this (well, not exactly, not the same topic at all):

• we all rely on knowledge inherited from our ancestors
• some ancestors are really smart and called genius, and they discover/invent things that would significantly improve our lives even to this day
• they are and should be appreciated, but losing anyone of them would not necessarily make human beings disappear. Human kind would still discover/invent those things without them, sooner or later, as close as 2 weeks, or as far as 200 years, it does not really matter. Sure, they advanced human society way forward, but there will be another one if they are not born. Just a matter of time.

To expand it, there is a silly question asking history is made up of either heroes or vast majority (aka. people):

• Of course people are important and even if you can slay 1k Spartan without taking damage, you still cannot conquer Peloponnesos alone, but most of them are just silent majority.
• And sort of contrary to my thoughts above, heroes are important too! Without a few (20-) great minds, human society could just be left 1000 years behind. And that’s a HUGE number. Society is that fragile, and you cannot just deny this and claim that history is made up of people, even if it’s mostly true.