Encouraging Genius

I'm dissatisfied with lost human potential. Whether because of poverty, unemployment, bias or complacency, there is little doubt that there is a loss of potential in our society. Measures that might increase our production and decrease lost potential include redefining production. For too long, production has been conceived as products and goods, as a measurement of economic growth. But this definition far too often overlooks the importance of ideas, of education, and social progress that contribute to better quality of life or increased efficiency in non-economic areas. I believe we should be encouraging genius throughout our society. Education should be re-tooled to empower communities to encourage genius, and the workplace should be restructured to do so as well.


Genius is not a product in and of itself. It is not quantifiable and it's value is nearly impossible to ascertain, but it's importance to human history is indisputable. Invention is the most distinguishing feature of the human race when compared to other living creatures. Tools and concepts once developed lead to better tools and concepts and so we progress from ancient animals to modern humans. But rather than socialize our collective advances capitalist society privatizes progress which provides an incentive to profit privately by preventing social progress. 


So much emphasis on the mundane leads to a mundane world where genius is an exception and rarely a common aspiration. The debasing of the human spirit occurs in the near arbitrary designation of some humans as capitalists and others as labor (workers.) Ironically, these designations affect both groups in ways that prevent most members of either group to achieve and/or demonstrate genius. The highly compartmentalized mentality that dominates modern society denies the implications of a more connected existence between the living beings of our planet and the Universe of which we are a product. 


Our modern individualistic selves want to ignore the overwhelming evidence that we owe everything we are and have to each other, to our parents. our societies, our history, and to countless members of society who will only be known in their own circles. For hundreds of years now we have built interdependencies that weave the fabric of our society, but we rarely study and accept this reality, favoring our ideological apologies for the haves and the have-nots. And at the root of it all is a willing suppression of genius and an unwillingness to encourage genius. 


Because genius and invention have the capacity to change the status quo, they are the enemy of private capital. Imagine a better electrical distribution method introduced a decade or two after huge investments are made into wired distribution. The competitive nature of capitalism often prevents progress and impedes or delays good ideas. Naturally, as new venues for access and exchange of information and knowledge emerge and flourish, so does the opportunity for genius and invention. We often see this in the rapid expansion and growth in information technology and the Internet. The collective human mind is growing in size and power and this will be the foundation for encouraging genius now and in the future.