# Traits of Personhood (and Economics)

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/traits-of-personhood-and-economics/614231>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [February 28, 2012, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/traits-of-personhood-and-economics/614231 "2012-02-28T05:39:05Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\
**Post date:** [February 28, 2012, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/traits-of-personhood-and-economics/614231/21 "2012-02-28T22:39:37Z")

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> [@Odesio](#):
>
> I don’t think it’s possible to practice something for 10,000 hours without getting good at it. Not unless there’s something wrong with the training methods or the person practicing. Someone with 10,000 hours of practice is going to beat out someone with “natural talent” who has no practice.
> 
> Anyway, I don’t doubt that some people have natural talents. I just think it’s silly to point to someone who is at the top of their game and claim that it’s natural talent rather than effort that put them there. Being smart doesn’t mean you can earn a PhD and being a natural athlete doesn’t mean you’re going to dominate a sport.

I’m not disputing that people get better with practice. But we have natural limits on all sorts of things, and practice doesn’t get us above our limits. That’s why most kids shooting hoops for hours don’t make it into the NBA. I also suspect people with natural talent enjoy practicing a lot more.

I think that with a few thousand hours practice I could teach my fingers to play piano adequately - but I’d never be good at it, and never be Mozart for sure. Though he did get made to practice - but so did his sister, who was never Wolfgang.

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**Author:** ![The\_Bith\_Shuffle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ce73a5/32.png) [@The\_Bith\_Shuffle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Bith_Shuffle)\
**Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/traits-of-personhood-and-economics/614231/22 "2012-03-01T05:35:15Z")

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The person who thinks some people are really good without practice is a straw man. Nobody thinks that, and it is tiresome to have to denounce such an idea. What most people do think–because it’s true–is that different people get better with practice at different rates and to different extents. Magnus Carlsen has probably practiced chess less than has Alexei Shirov, but Carlsen is obviously better. It goes without saying that Shirov would cream Carlsen if Carlsen had never practiced. But that doesn’t mean it’s all just a matter of how hard you work.

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