Aug 28, 2006
Talentless Hackery
I’m a firm believer in the very human responsibility of hacking one’s own way out of stupidity. Natural talent is a myth, an excuse of sheer sloth, or a repressive cultural tool to punish under-achievers and create a virtual caste system. That means I also despise the age myth, that we become so naturally incapacitated with age that we can’t do things like learn new languages, musical instruments, etc. Somehow mushy infant brains are more accommodating…excuses. Ever pay attention to how long it takes children to learn how to speak their native language properly? Maybe 10 years (properly), and they have 24×7 tutoring going on. Is that impressive? Whatever, kid.
There’s no evidence that (talented people) have a different brain structure or different wiring than the rest of us initially, although we do know that becoming an expert in anything — like chess or race-car driving or journalism — does change the brain and creates circuitry that’s more efficient at doing what you’re an expert at.
Note that this does not mean that everyone can perfect their dance moves in the same amount of time. If you are a slow learner, I implore you to practice in private.
I believe in the ideology behind what you’re saying (although it is essentially rightist: ‘up by your own bootstraps’ mentality) but will say: what about your own natural talents? Of course everyone has to work/discipline to get better, but take drumming for example, some on this earth could work at it every day and never get to the ‘Ringo’ level, other’s can start ‘Ringo’ and get ‘Peart’ relatively easily. There is such a thing as natural aptitude. But yes, if you work really hard and apply yourself, you can ‘fake it til you make it’ at most anything you want to.
Age is another issue. The synaptic pathways actually do atrophi (see I can still make up new words and spellings in my mid 30′s! [at-tro-fi]) and new ones may not burn as easily. But again this is a matter of mental exercise. Alzhiemers still isn’t completely understood, but general senility is worse in humans who weren’t in the habit of exercising their brains. Yeah, the main problem is in attitude: the old dog/new tricks cliche, people figure ‘I worked hard enough at this other stuff, I’m allowed to be lazy in this’ and their brain goes ‘OK, now we’re lazy, and soon I’ll barely be working’
Who needs functional synapses? That’s what I’m saying man, forget the limitations of science, if you think you can fly, if you truly believe…screw physics!
I understand the inclination point, and I think that is ultimately rooted in the talent medium of choice, and in music there may be those with that golden disposition, but that’s little more than a head start. Peart is great because he’s a driven mo-fo, who probably practiced every waking hour of the day and then some. Would others end up the same? I think the results would be surprising. That said, Lance Armstrong has inhuman lung capacity. Obvious tangible advantage. But that’s an extreme exception. And obviously there is intelligence involved, to some degree, someone with a 70 IQ wouldn’t be able to get there, but if you take the sample from a population of similar levels of intelligence I think a lot would.
Chi-li: You Can Dooooooo it.
Then there’s the ‘John Holmes’ talent, but that’s just plain too big for some ladies-
Correction – essentially leftist. You want rightists, come to abominable Austria. Especially ever since their wonderful Konrad Lorenz won the Nobel for discovering “ínstinct” (right before he joined the Nazi party). “Instinct” is popular here. It justifies people´s born positions, “scientifically proven” Karma.
See, MUS is mixin it up, a regular font of creativity. Assumptions don´t apply.
Thanx for ‘outing’ yourself aeb-
And you’ve opened another aspect I was going to comment on before, but didn’t want to come off as pedantic:
When some afro-Americans talk about ‘reporations for slavery’ I scoff, but must admit when a black male in this country today is born – it is not onto a level playing field, statistic are definitely stacked against him. It’s an excuse for nothing, but it’s a fact.
And I stand by ‘pull yourself up by your own bootstraps’ being a cliche of the Right ideology. The Left version is ‘scrape the shit off your own Tevas’-
But I agree, I’ve often admired MUS’s ‘font of creativity’ (..ahem) myself-