# Are there still multidisciplinary super geniuses **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 14, 2006, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392 "2006-02-14T02:36:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2006, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/21 "2006-02-17T16:04:20Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Richard Feynman made his biggest mark as a physicist, of course, but he was also an accomplished painter, drummer, safecracker, and bloodhound, among many other dalliances. You forgot cryptoarcheologist (he translated portions of the Dresden Codex and debunked a second fabricated one), precussion ballet composer, lothario, radio repairman, fluent speaker of Portugese, sketch artist, computer scientist, and of course, famous author and raconteur. I imagine he’d contest the label “super genius”, but definitely an archtypical Renaissance Man. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Ol\_Gaffer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Ol\_Gaffer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ol_Gaffer)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2006, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/22 "2006-02-17T17:32:41Z")
> [@Spectre of Pithecanthropus](#): > > Impressive indeed, but remember that all the science there is pretty typical of astronauts; extensive background in science and/or engineering is a standard requirement for being an astronaut. IMO the MBA is probably more impressive because it stands out as representing a truly different field. And the M.A. from U. of Houston is in Literature. He probably just picked it up in his downtime between shuttle flights. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2006, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/23 "2006-02-17T19:12:19Z")
How’s’about Wile E. Coyote, super genius? ---
**Author:** ![Margeuerite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Margeuerite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Margeuerite)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2006, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/24 "2006-02-17T19:54:19Z")
Doesn’t anyone else find it interesting that all the Renaissance men mentioned above are, well, \*men? \* I can’t recall ever hearing or reading about a female polymath. Is there something structurally different about men’s brains which allows them to excel in all these different disciplines? Surely the gifts of these men go beyond breeding, education, and opportunity. I can’t think of a woman whose background even comes close to what these men have done. I am truly in awe of the accomplishments of these men because personally I can’t imagine having such a deep interest in so many subjects, never mind _excelling_ in those fields. How do these men maintain their interests for so long? Hard work? A good memory? A single-minded devotion to a discipline (during the time they’re interested in it, anyway) that rivals life itself? I have no allegiance to either gender, so the answer won’t affect me personally. I ask this as a serious question and with no intent to offend anyone. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2006, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/25 "2006-02-17T20:10:36Z")
> [@Margeuerite](#): > > Doesn’t anyone else find it interesting that all the Renaissance men mentioned above are, well, \*men? \* I can’t recall ever hearing or reading about a female polymath. Is there something structurally different about men’s brains which allows them to excel in all these different disciplines? Surely the gifts of these men go beyond breeding, education, and opportunity. I can’t think of a woman whose background even comes close to what these men have done. > > I am truly in awe of the accomplishments of these men because personally I can’t imagine having such a deep interest in so many subjects, never mind _excelling_ in those fields. How do these men maintain their interests for so long? Hard work? A good memory? A single-minded devotion to a discipline (during the time they’re interested in it, anyway) that rivals life itself? > > I have no allegiance to either gender, so the answer won’t affect me personally. I ask this as a serious question and with no intent to offend anyone. It is an honest question. Males show wider variation in intellectual skills in general. If you make a bell-curve of the results of most intellectual tasks, you will find that both the very high and very low ends are dominated by males. It is a consistent pattern. This says little about typical male and female intellectual ability although there are smaller sex differences if you break it down by cognitive processes (verbal versus spatial skills for example). I was once in a PhD program in behavioral neuroscience focusing on sexual differentiation. Sex differences pop up all over the brain and exploring that is a large and hot subfield in neuroscience. Unfortunately, general understanding about how the brain works is still pretty poor. Scientists are good at making small discoveries but good, arching theories are still largely missing. I would say that polymaths are exceptional people among exceptional people. It is simply more rare for females to rise to the absolute highest levels of most academic pursuits let alone more than one of them. I don’t know why that is. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2006, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/26 "2006-02-17T22:49:09Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > Like him or hate him, I think Noam Chomsky qualifies: he’s possibly the most important figure in linguistics in the last hundred years, in addition to being an extremely prolific political philosopher. Especially considering that his linguistics work spills over into formal logic and algorithms. ---
**Author:** ![Kevbo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e47774/32.png) [@Kevbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kevbo)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2006, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/27 "2006-02-17T23:32:04Z")
> [@Margeuerite](#): > > Doesn’t anyone else find it interesting that all the Renaissance men mentioned above are, well, \*men? \* I can’t recall ever hearing or reading about a female polymath. . I’d nominate Heddie Lamar…The actress who worked out spread-spectrum radio. For most of the time since the middle ages, it has been discourged, if not outlawed for women to excel in science. ---
**Author:** ![E.Thorp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@E.Thorp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E.Thorp)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/28 "2006-02-18T07:40:15Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Robert Fulghum has been a minister, teacher, author, philosophizer, story teller and more recently an artist. Learned 'em all in kindergarten, too. ---
**Author:** ![uglybeech](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/82dd89/32.png) [@uglybeech](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/uglybeech)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 8:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/29 "2006-02-18T08:19:11Z")
I second Jared Diamond. There are geniuses in one area that do other areas very well. But Diamond seems to end up at or near the top of his field regardless of what he’s doing. ---
**Author:** ![Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/30 "2006-02-18T11:15:00Z")
I think that there’s a difference between being at the top of a field and being a genius. Does Jared Diamond really qualify as a multidisciplanary genius? A lot of what is written in “Guns, Germs and Steel” is obvious to anyone with a basic grip of biology; the explanation for the domestication of the almond tree is a good example: at some time in the past there must have been a mutation causing a tree to cease being harmful. No shit. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/31 "2006-02-18T17:26:58Z")
Margeuerite writes: \> Doesn’t anyone else find it interesting that all the Renaissance men mentioned \> above are, well, men? Did you read the names in the Wiki list that’s linked to in post #3? It gives a number of women there: Hildegard of Bingen James Tiptree, Jr. (Alice Sheldon) Marilyn Vos Savant Zora Neal Hurston Pamela Hansford Johnson G. E. M. Anscombe etc. Now, some of those are dubious to me, but then many of the men on the list are dubious to me. (Steven Seagal?) It’s about the same proportion of women among these supposed polymaths as you would find if you created a list of famous women in history, no more than one in ten. That’s the way society worked anytime before about a hundred years ago (indeed, perhaps before about fifty years ago). What would the proportion be if there were no restraints in society? Who knows? ---
**Author:** ![Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carnac_the_Magnificent)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/32 "2006-02-18T18:14:23Z")
> [@Dominic Mulligan](#): > > I think that there’s a difference between being at the top of a field and being a genius. Does Jared Diamond really qualify as a multidisciplanary genius? A lot of what is written in “Guns, Germs and Steel” is obvious to anyone with a basic grip of biology; the explanation for the domestication of the almond tree is a good example: at some time in the past there must have been a mutation causing a tree to cease being harmful. No shit. Diamond’s cherry picked his observations from numerous other scholars, but his synthesis was brilliant. Not to say his central argument isn’t flawless. ---
**Author:** ![Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Carnac\_the\_Magnificent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carnac_the_Magnificent)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/33 "2006-02-18T18:17:49Z")
> [@Stranger On A Train](#): > > You forgot cryptoarcheologist (he translated portions of the Dresden Codex and debunked a second fabricated one), precussion ballet composer, lothario, radio repairman, fluent speaker of Portugese, sketch artist, computer scientist, and of course, famous author and raconteur. > > I imagine he’d contest the label “super genius”, but definitely an archtypical Renaissance Man. > > Stranger Not bad for a 127 IQ. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![alterego](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/6bbea6/32.png) [@alterego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alterego)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/34 "2006-02-18T22:16:15Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Richard Feynman made his biggest mark as a physicist, of course, but he was also an accomplished painter, drummer, safecracker, and bloodhound, among many other dalliances. Yes! And although he only knew a basic-like language, he was also quite the computer scientist. He came up with highly efficient ways of doing logarithm-related calculations which are still used today. Also, he did some of the principle research into implementing neural networks (into hardware nodes, no less). ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2006, 7:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/35 "2006-02-20T07:20:09Z")
> [@Kevbo](#): > > I’d nominate Heddie Lamar…The actress who worked out spread-spectrum radio. > > For most of the time since the middle ages, it has been discourged, if not outlawed for women to excel in science. Hedley! Sorry. No, really, she was something: [Hedy Lamarr, inventor](http://www.inventions.org/culture/female/lamarr.html) Hedy and her buddy George Antheil, who is also a fascinating person, inventor/composer. [Schirmer: George Antheil](http://www.schirmer.com/default.aspx?TabId=2419&State_2872=2&ComposerId_2872=35) TubaDiva ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2006, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/36 "2006-02-20T17:11:01Z")
Kevbo writes: \> For most of the time since the middle ages, it has been discourged, if not \> outlawed for women to excel in science. While I agree that it was made difficult for women to succeed in almost any intellectual endeavor until about a hundred years ago, it was not “outlawed for women to excel in science.” First of all, there was no such career path as “scientist” until the mid-ninteenth century. The word didn’t even exist until then. It wasn’t necessary to outlaw something to discourage it. Also, there wasn’t any more repression of women in intellectual endeavor in the Middle Ages than there was before it. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2006, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/37 "2006-02-20T18:15:01Z")
How about [Albert Schweitzer](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Schweitzer)? Although the physical sciences are the one thing he didn’t do, and he’s now 41 years dead, I’d say he qualifies. > [@Wikipedia](#): > > Albert Schweitzer, OM, (January 14, 1875 – September 4, 1965) was a German theologian, musician, philosopher, and physician. He was born in Kaysersberg, Elsass-Lothringen, Germany (now in Haut-Rhin, Alsace, France). He received the 1952 Nobel Peace Prize in 1953. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2006, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/38 "2006-02-20T18:55:18Z")
Maybe [Noam Elkies](http://abel.math.harvard.edu/~elkies/)? Youngest full professor _ever_ at Harvard (mathematics). Plus true originality in both chess and music. (As an aside, the triad - math, chess, and music - seems to have a disproportionately large number of prodigies and ‘polymaths’.) ---
**Author:** ![Epimetheus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c4cdca/32.png) [@Epimetheus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Epimetheus)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2006, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/39 "2006-02-20T19:31:26Z")
I think it is possible, likely even, that women do not typically excel in ways men do, not due to physiological differences, though they may exist, but through sociological differences. Not only has it been relatively recent in which women are socially accepted into many career fields (though many would point out there is still some resistance), many hobbies and the like are discouraged for women to do. It is also doubly hard for women because they are the ones that must bear the young. Social pressure as well as physiological and psychological pressures to procreate make having the younger years free to devote to acedemic or physical endevors. Women, I think, have less social pressure to stand out in a variety of ways as well. My observations, however minimal they may be, suggest that women that persue things not womanly are ostracized in most circles. Rare is it a woman has a hobby of racing cars, parachuting, or any number of percieved “male” hobbies, let alone a wide variety of said hobbies. Give it time, I say. I think women in general will eventually find a way around the social differences, and when society sees women more equal, more women will become polymaths. ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2006, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392/40 "2006-02-20T19:44:16Z")
What about Dr. Sam Beckett? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-still-multidisciplinary-super-geniuses/344392.md?page=3)