Today I saw several
episodes of "Hjernevask" (Brainwash), a Norwegian TV-series
on the debate nature vs. nurture, and the heavy political pressure
towards the nurture side. I wanted to do a short discussion on
Talent, whether it exists and what we can do about it.
When I was younger I did
not believe in Talent. I thought everyone was a blank slate, and that
everyone had the capacity to do anything. When the time came to
choose which high-school I wanted to go to, I had to choose between
studying science and music. Ironically I spent a lot of time doing
research to figure out what was the best choice for me.
I talked with several
people to find out who were the most satisfied with their job/career.
Those who studied science/engineering/economics had the jobs they
wanted, even though they did not consider themselves to be especially
talented at their respective fields. Most of them hadn't even been
passionately obsessed by their subject. When I talked to those who
studied music I found that most of them had not, I repeat, had not,
gotten the job they wanted. Many of them considered themselves
talented in music, and most of them enjoyed it and obsessed over it,
it was their work and their hobby. So they had more than average
talent and had even spent a lot more effort. What went wrong?
Most people agree that
music is something you can be talented in. If there's a shadow of a
doubt I recommend [somecountry]'s got talent, like thisawe-inspiring-incredible 11 years old. So to do well in music you
have to be (exceptionally lucky or) talented and obsessed (in my
vocabulary obsessed is a positive word).
Luckily I went with
science (my music teacher actually told me that I was good enough to
study music, but if I could find something else I was equally good
at, it would probably be a better choice).
At the university I found
that it was possible to have a talent for science. What happened was
that I started to work vigorously, and my talent for mathematics came
to the fore. Some of the things I have learned in one semester of
hard work would take the average student at least a year (I guess). I
tell you this not to show off, but to point out how extreme a
contribution a talent can be.
People I talk with often
agree that one can have a talent for music, but that it's impossible
to have a talent for more 'normal' things, like studying calculus (undergraduate mathematics).
Or some say that talent is pure nurture (that it's something you get
from the environment, like teaching and parenting) as opposed to
nature (the genes).
Taking the last point
first, look at 'hjernevask' (For English subtitles follow theinstructions below the video.), or any of the research, or look at
the youtube video I mentioned about the 11 years old girl Anna
Graceman. I know several hard working singers in their twenties who
don't have half the voice she has. When I was young my parents
actually told me not to sing too loud. Tell me what Anna's parents
have done, so that we can have more singers of her calibre. Frankly
it's ridiculous to suggest that this has been caused by some random
events in her environment, and that theory has no explanatory (or
predicting) value whatsoever.
The other counterargument
was that one can have a talent for music or sports, but not for
studying science or philosophy, nor a talent for human interaction.
This is true in some sense. Firstly, these fields require more talent
to be successful in. There is a limit to how many football players
and violinists we need in the world, and at least for the time being
it seems there are a lot more candidates than jobs. Secondly, a
talent for music and sports is a lot easier to see and measure, while a talent for philosophy would be hard to spot.
But why would you assume
that one can be talented in a range of mental activities, but
suddenly you draw a line between being talented at painting and being
talented at understanding abstract concepts? It seems contrived to
me, but I may have an explanation for why we (especially politicians)
sometimes do this. This I will talk about now.
Before we continue let me
agree that talent is not a yes/no question. You can have a little
talent (the most common form), slightly more talent, a lot, etcetera.
You can even have anti-talent in some sense. For some people
anti-talent is a taboo, and for others a convenient excuse.
Why is it bad for you to
tell someone they are not talented at, say, chemistry? Because they
will become worse at it, it's sometimes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
And sometimes you just don't know. Perhaps they are poor at it for
some other reason; they don't work hard, they don't know whatever
they should have learned before, they don't have the motor skills to
do the experiments, they don't have a sufficiently good memory to
remember all the different names.
Why is it bad for you NOT
to tell someone they are not talented at chemistry? If someone spends
obscene amounts of time at it, and gives all their effort, and still
cannot manage, how do you think it feels when you tell them: "You
don't work hard enough, give more effort."? And how do you think
it will work out when they go for a university degree in chemistry?
It might turn around, but then, it might not. In any case one should
spend time looking for some other talent.
Why do you tell people
that they can do anything they want? The main problem is that people
are ridiculously happy in their comfort zone. If you tell people:
"You probably won't be able to do that", then they don't
even try! You have to say over and over "you can do anything"
just to get them thinking slightly outside the box. But then, maybe
there is a time when we ought to give a little guidance: "Have
you tested your talent in anything else?".
The last strong objective
that I see (while sitting here in my comfy chair this evening) is
that your array of talents is highly connected to your self-esteem.
Is the world fair? Is everyone good at something? Perhaps the world
is unfairly kind, and gives some people exceptional talent, but at
least it's not so unfair that there is someone out there with only
poor talents? Right? And not one is born unable to use their right arm,
right? But is this the basis on which we judge our fellow humans?
Have we sunk so low that the only thing we care about is how good you
are at doing [whatever it is that you do]? Doesn't trying hard and
doing the best you can under the circumstances count anymore? Doesn't
how much you care, your selflessness, and your humanity count? Why do we connect the worthiness of a person to their array of talents? And if we don't, why do people believe we do?
So what's the truth?
Should we say, there is talent, or not? Do you make an educational
system that assumes everyone is equal, or not?
I only know two things for
certain. Even though it might not be wise to always communicate it,
Talent is an important concept. The second thing is that we should
have an educational system that searches for the talents in every
child, so that after ten years of education, everyone can write down
a list of things they are good at.
Addendum: The extent of this talent might be a bit easier to appreciate.
Addendum: The extent of this talent might be a bit easier to appreciate.
Good job. I agree with mostly everything you write, and I am of the opinion that this topic is worth discussing, despite our view being generally unpopular.
ReplyDeleteMy only real gripe with your post is a much too great focus on argument and presentation. Nobody wants to be convinced by an argument, though, I suppose, part of your intentions in writing here is to organize and structure your own thoughts. People tend to have very resilient skin and minds when it comes to conflicting worldviews. The sort of people I think can be convinced and those I actually care the most about discussing with are the sort who are able to make up their own minds when they get the straight facts. If they cannot themselves connect from facts to my conclusion, then I think it would be dishonest of them to simply submit to my arguments.
So, I figure I will do some of the work of heaping on the data here. However, I have to make a minor concession; I am not sure if facts themselves are sufficient. People, presented with facts, tend to reduce the extent to which they claim everybody are born equal and that talent does not really exist. For instance, they make allowance for our height being mostly genetic. However, they -protect- their ideas by instead emphasizing how true it is in each and every one of those domains where facts are hard to come by. As such, people are born equal is taken to be true until the opposite is extremely conclusively proven, and while the whole nonsense is being torn apart everywhere we actually are able to give science a foot in the door, such as physical traits, aptitude for sports and music, extreme conditions such as autism, savantism, perfect pitch etc, people -refuse- to take this as an indication that the whole idea might be falling apart. I find it trivial that tendencies to murder, lie, cheat and rape are largely strategies we are born with. This is controversial in the open fora, even though it is not at all in the sciences which study these things, and for some reason, this is a topic of discussion where gut feelings and what we want to be true will trump actual science and statistics for a long time to come.
As such, I think some of the valuable points you make are to emphasize that we have to at least allow discussion on these topics, and we have to open to study whatever evidence can be produced. Silencing the different at birth as an explanation, not with counterevidence and reason, but with a panicked fear that these ideas are too dangerous, wrong or disgusting and that we corrupt ourselves merely by taking them serious: people want to claim this to be a symptom of good morals, when in fact, it is nothing else than a telltale indicator of weak reason.
Okay, so I guess, here I wound up rambling about twice as much as you did. I will step down from my personal soapbox for a while now and lay most of the meta-discussion to rest, and instead just regurgiate the facts which I find it necessarry to explain by the born different-hypothesis, and which I find unreconciliable with the naive dream that people are born equal.
Autism and savantism:
Admittedly, this is one of my weaker arugments, becuase my opponents in this discussion are a bunch of hipocrites. They do not deny that people in general are born different but they are unwilling to explore what range these differences they span. Instead, they surrender when they have to and admit that, yes, people with autism, Down's syndrome and various savant talents are born that way, but that this is just an exception which proves the rule, that everybody else are born equal. Let uss nonetheless establish what extreme differences people can be born with, though it is defined away as medical conditions. Also, please note how exotic these conditions can be; they do not simply reflect an across the board increase or decrease in mental aptitude, but extremely specific strengths and weaknesses.