

The Myth of the Abrasive Genius - zkz
http://scienceblogs.com/principles/2009/06/the_myth_of_the_abrasive_geniu.php

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carterschonwald
I think the only example of the insightful outsider was the fellow who ~ 80
years ago who went around espousing the continental drift theory (
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Wegener> ) though his ideas weren't
necessarily a complete model, which may have been the crux of the issue

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pj
Of course this guy is going to disagree with the abrasive genius idea, because
he himself is one of the conscientious and agreeable types, as evidence by his
dismissal of IQ as disagreeable.

I don't know why scientists think they are immune to all the social rules that
govern every other aspect of life. One of those is agreeableness. People like
to be agreed with - right or wrong. This is true in science too. Scientists
are humans. They make mistakes. They are biased.

Look at the scientists who have disagreed with the idea that humans are
responsible for and can stop Global Warming. Their voice has been repeatedly
stamped out by the rest of the scientific community.

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travisjeffery
You're not a Scientist if you don't go by anything under than what you
observes from systematic study/experiment or logically deduce.

Proper Scientists can oppose each other not difference in subjective bias but
through different objective experimental data.

There are plenty of other so-called abrasive or odd Mathematicians/Scientists
in history. My main areas of study are Mathematics and Computer Science so I
name more in those areas (though not all listed are necessarily
Mathematicians): Kurt Godel, Grigori Perelman, John Nash, Theodore Kaczynski,
Nikola Tesla, ...

I could keep going but the bottom line is not the abrasive/"whatever you what
to call or define them" genius is not all that odd, certainly not the majority
I would think.

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dinkumthinkum
I'm glad someone else is really taking the original article to task. However,
I will say there is one particular Monte Carlo Methods researcher, who shall
remain nameless, that _definitely_ fits this mold!

