
 Can everyone be an Einstein?  - prakash
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article5139606.ece
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bloch
"Jaeggi’s fluid-intelligence game works, but it’s lab-based at the moment and
has yet to be adapted for general use."

You can try it right now at cognitivefun.net created by whacked_new:

<http://cognitivefun.net/> <http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=whacked_new>

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MaysonL
PDF link to the original research, well worth looking at:

[http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2008/04/25/0801268105.full...](http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2008/04/25/0801268105.full.pdf)

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LPTS
What if einstein was just a dumb dumb compared to most of what humanity could
evolve into? What if people like Einstein are like the first monkeys who spend
most time on two legs and were missing fur, and our concept of intelligence in
too narrow and limited to recognize that what we call genius is the lower end
of the bell curve our species will evolve to occupy?

~~~
litewulf
Thats like asking if what if DSL is slow compared to FIOS or something when
everyone else is on dial up.

Sure, I guess you can always find someone smarter. But really, Einstein had a
particular "smartness" and existed at a certain point in time that made him
notable. To say that someone sometime could come along and be better is pretty
meaningless.

Just because the local maximum is not the global maximum does not imply the
local maxima are meaningless.

~~~
LPTS
It seems to me that if the local maximum in 1940 was lower than the global
minimum in 2140, interesting things would happen, and that's worth wondering
about.

How to best give people nutrition, love, security and education and everything
they need to develop to their full potential are all tractable problems. How
to manipulate human brains to enhance performance is something we learn more
about every day. A guy in australia is unlocking savant abilities is some
people with TMS. It's quite possible as these ideas blend with each other, a
revolution in living could happen where the average person was functioning at
a higher cognitive level then einstein. It may in fact be the only way we
don't all kill ourselves by blowing up the planet.

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litewulf
I doubt the global minimum is going to change too much in the short term.
There are people with philosophical objections against say genetic treatment
for diseases, and I think certain developmental disabilities will remain with
us for a long time.

(Plus, oftentimes people who are immensely smart in one respect are lacking in
others, so perhaps there will always be room for, say, math savants who can do
little else.)

~~~
LPTS
I should of said global average rather then minimum. Too late to edit.

The world has changed that drastically that fast before. It only takes one
generation.

Figure out how to really educate kids to a maximal degree. Post-religion anti-
indoctrination memetic inoculation. Get everyone on the planet food. No
anxiety around sex. Pain medication for anyone who needed it. Smarter
technology. Less people living lives of quiet desperation. If all that stuff
happens, people could get smart fast.

I think another shift the scale of widespread literacy is possible, and it
might push the average center of gravity above the geniuses of the 20th
century. Not the minimum. Oops.

~~~
litewulf
"Post-religion anti-indoctrination memetic inoculation"

Those words all make sense in my head, but not really together. I really don't
understand the anti-religious dogma, I think that there is a gradient in the
beliefs of religious people and while there are definitely some reactionary
elements, I don't think people who are "anti-progress" are united by religion.

Anyway, global average makes a great deal more sense, and I'd be willing to
believe it'd work, but have my doubts on how fast most modern nations are
willing to transform themselves into seas of highly educated citizenry. (Not
to mention its hardly known at this point what the "best" education method is,
so I'd imagine even such a fundamental retooling would involve lots of split
testing at first ;))

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LPTS
Post Religion anti indoctrination memetic innoculation is Kids saying:

Jesus Christ is maybe the son of god. Allah is God, maybe, and maybe mohommed
was his prophet. Maybe you should kill Buddha on the path if you meet him.
Maybe the world will change in 2012. Maybe the pope is the rock Christ built
his church on. Maybe there is no God. Maybe earth has a soul and we are all
parts of it as our neurons are parts of our brain. Maybe there was a virgin
birth.

And then learning how to repeat any word the same way they chant "Allah" or
"ohm" and get the same neurological effect.

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mellow
Probably not, but I've met some people with incredibly high innate
intelligence and poor formal education. Really amazing/scary at the same time.

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gnaritas
Why would that be scary? Most people still don't attend college; attendance
certainly has no bearing on innate intelligence.

