Aswad
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Joined: 4/4/2007
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quote:
ORIGINAL: ChatteParfaitt
Although I agree that lack of socialization plays a part, I don't fully buy into your theory.
It's not a theory, or even a hypothesis, just a talking point.
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I have an IQ that tests out anywhere from 130 to 140, I say this not b/c I am so bought into IQ tests, but to demonstrate that I am above average in intelligence, though not a genius by any standard.
That's what I used to think about myself, too.
Technically speaking, that's genius range by normal standards.
I prefer the definitions given by Hume, Kant and Schopenhauer, all mentioned on the WP page on genius.
Schopenhauer put it very nicely: «Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.»
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I did not have the world's best childhood and more or less raised myself and socialized myself. See, I was smart enough to realize what my parents weren't doing, and I did it myself.
That's the defining characteristic of genius, according to Kant: understanding substantial things without imitation.
It's why even a moderately retarded person can be taught to use a door knob (though they're unlikely to be able to figure it out on their own), that humans have the capacity to learn by imitation, even to the point of imitating without sense or reason, as demonstrated with studies on children across cultures and backgrounds, as well as studies of animals (ravens, for instance, lack this capacity for mimicking behaviors that don't make sense, but are otherwise equivalent to an average 8 year old in terms of intelligence).
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I remember in school being smarter than most of my teachers, and correcting them when they made mistakes.
From my experience, around here, if you do that here, you're punished until you stop doing it, which is as encouraging as it gets.
[quoteIt didn't take me long to learn that they didn't like that, though my schoolmates loved it.
Yeah, when I got to high school, it became a boon.
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So I found ways to relate to my peers despite my intelligence.
And you still reach for the word "despite", which I also do.
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But then my intelligence is highly verbal, it's not mathematical.
It's not the verbal which distinguishes this part, I think.
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I have known many highly intelligent and highly gifted children who, by high school age, learned how to relate to others just fine.
Absolutely. By high school age, I related fine.
It could be better, though, with a different environment, in which one doesn't have a lot of catching up to do to get to fine.
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Naturally, raging hormones and being attracted to others sexually played a huge part in this.
This sounds familiar... a problem worth sticking with until it's solved. 
But what if another motivation than sex had been present, one that occured earlier on?
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So although I agree the stereotype is the geeky socially misfit genius who can only relate to his computer, many do manage to overcome this early lack of socialization.
Overcoming doesn't refute that there's something to overcome, which is the essence of my talking point.
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I think one thing I was *trying* to say (though I did a piss poor job) was that this lack of socialization is more prominent in those who have a highly mathematical and theoretical brain.
I wouldn't agree with your claim that you did a piss poor job, as I actually read you as saying precisely that.
The more you see, the more you can guess at, the further you get from the environment; it aggravates the problem, at least.
IWYW,
— Aswad.
_____________________________
"If God saw what any of us did that night, he didn't seem to mind.
From then on I knew: God doesn't make the world this way.
We do." -- Rorschack, Watchmen.
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RE: Mental balance as humans - 
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