[lit-ideas] Re: Einstein
- From: "Andy Amago" <aamago@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 30 Oct 2005 09:01:34 -0500
----- Original Message -----
From:
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: 10/30/2005 12:14:39 AM
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Einstein
In a message dated 10/29/2005 8:18:56 A.M. Central Daylight Time,
aamago@xxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
I'm disappointed in him, not in his accomplishments
Hi, Andy,
I'm also a bit perplexed here.
Why in the world would you be disappointed in someone's learning/creative
style. . . especially when it had the outcome that it did?
A.A. Because I along with everyone else I always considered Einstein a
"genius". The word Einstein is synonymous with the word "genius". Then I
learned that he is no more a genius than anyone who spends years working on a
problem and has a breakthrough. Maybe my standards are too high, but to me a
genius is a genius, someone gifted who doesn't work hard at something but still
gets a profound result. Einstein does not fit that description. He's no
different from Thomas Edison or any other dedicated researcher, a little
insight, lots of hard work. At the same time, Einstein has been mythologized
into a demigod, where Edison is all but forgotten except as the guy who
invented the lightbulb. You're satisfied with that state of affairs?
Andy Amago
If you actually read all sorts of interesting thoughts on both learning and
creativity and how to get the most of what and who one is. (and you can on the
internet, even, if you don't like to go to the library and ask for some titles
on the topic)
What Einstein did is actually very critical. I'm not sure why you would be
disappointed in him...though I know a number of parents who are disappointed
when their kids learn by reading instead of hearing or by hearing instead of
reading.
(Or, like the article once in Fortune Magazine that I posted one talks about
the bunch of CEOs who are all dyslexic and who were willing to be studied by
the physicians at Yale doing a study on their brains. Sure--they all learned to
compensate for not using parts of their brains--and they all have had those in
their companies who couldn't understand how they made decisions [they are all
using a part of their brain that we regular folk are not] Many of them, I
suppose, had people in their lives who were 'disappointed' in them, too, for
not learning as others did.)
People learn and create in all sorts of ways. (I wish I was one of the people
who got paid to go into the companies to assist with helping their top people
learn how to be creative. Or, even, the top level companies who actually are
doing innovative things [I was just reading about Koch Industries the other
night] spend a lot of time/money/investment in their people to provide the
synergy of many creative minds working on problems/creative energy/etc. in
order to let them have those opportunities to pool information and take lines
of thought\inventions to new levels.
Instead of considering it 'obsessing' over a problem/puzzle, maybe you could
soften that belief statement to something like
'determined/curious/dedicated/continuing despite difficulties/persistent.
If you think of him having those qualities, do you like him better? (What do
you think a genius is? Someone who just wakes up someday and "knows" something?
or someone who ponders, mulls over, thoughtfully reflects, gets other opinions,
collects data and sifts through it looking for new ways of thinking about
something, or ?)
I suppose you are also disappointed in Edison, too, right? After all, in spite
of his taking his inventions to new levels and so forth, he had gobs of
inventions which didn't pan out. He was constantly working on several ideas all
at the same time--and though what worked, worked wonders, many of them did not.
He, like Einstein, had persistence and curiousity, though.
Waiting for ten years from now when Andy will have taken Einstein's thought to
the next level (presuming he takes up his own challenge and has the persistence
to do it as well as the intelligence),
Marlena in Missouri
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