the thread that can't be derailed....

[Kevin Peña]

You guys are really pushing my English skills here. Alright, let's see what I can do...

Genius is intelligence, as in the ability to perform above average cognitive processes, whereas madness is the tendency to deviate from the norm not with intelligence, but through sheer disregard for reason and common welfare. One who is a genius can be mad, just like how someone who is mad can also be a genius. They are two independent character traits that involve the commonality of deviation from the average. What is being deviated from, however, is the critical difference. A genius is someone who is very skilled at a particular field: someone who is intelligent and can find ways to use his/her intelligence in a constructive and useful manner. One who is mad, however, is someone who suffers from mental instability. The degree of madness can often vary just as the way the aforementioned madness can reveal itself differently. Someone who can play Beethoven's 3rd on the piano while blindfolded is a musical genius. A scientific genius can perform difficult physics problems in his/her head. One could say the my having jumped off of a cliff into wavy waters below was madness. One could also argue that Hitler was mad because of his genocide.

Essentially, geniuses and mad people are both within the population of the exceptional. The difference is that a genius is simply one that has intelligence and the ability to use it, whereas one who is mad is simply someone who deviates from sensibility.

How did I do?  🙂 Not bad for my second year using English, huh?

[Brooke777]

You guys are really pushing my English skills here. Alright, let's see what I can do...

Genius is intelligence, as in the ability to perform above average cognitive processes, whereas madness is the tendency to deviate from the norm not with intelligence, but through sheer disregard for reason and common welfare. One who is a genius can be mad, just like how someone who is mad can also be a genius. They are two independent character traits that involve the commonality of deviation from the average. What is being deviated from, however, is the critical difference. A genius is someone who is very skilled at a particular field: someone who is intelligent and can find ways to use his/her intelligence in a constructive and useful manner. One who is mad, however, is someone who suffers from mental instability. The degree of madness can often vary just as the way the aforementioned madness can reveal itself differently. Someone who can play Beethoven's 3rd on the piano while blindfolded is a musical genius. A scientific genius can perform difficult physics problems in his/her head. One could say the my having jumped off of a cliff into wavy waters below was madness. One could also argue that Hitler was mad because of his genocide.

Essentially, geniuses and mad people are both within the population of the exceptional. The difference is that a genius is simply one that has intelligence and the ability to use it, whereas one who is mad is simply someone who deviates from sensibility.

How did I do?  🙂 Not bad for my second year using English, huh?

Your english is very good. I am glad I could help push it 

But, who determines what is sensible?

[Isabelle]

How did I do?   Not bad for my second year using English, huh?

Really nicely put. Your English is great. Better than a lot of native speakers.

[Kevin Peña]

But, who determines what is sensible?

Sensibility is defined by humans; it isn't an absolute. There are several uses of the word "sensible" in daily context, yet it all boils down to one thing: optimization. Sensibility is all wrapped up in optimization, particularly in that of resource expenditure and risk. Taking unnecessary risks and devoting excessive effort, time, etc. into a particular task that could have been accomplished more efficiently and easily is madness. One who performs excessively for no logical reason at all is mad. What you quoted me on was an example of madness. I could have been much more succinct, yet chose to say the same thing with more for no practical reason. That is madness, albeit a very tame incarnation of it.

Really nicely put. Your English is great. Better than a lot of native speakers.

Thank you.  I tried really hard to learn it. The grammar was simple enough, but I had to read the dictionary and 3 thesauruses 4 times to bolster my vocabulary. The funny thing is that in writing, I sound smart, but when I talk in English, people think I'm stupid because I could not have hoped to pronounce 80% of what I said there. 

[Brooke777]

Well, I think you do an excellent job. You structure the arguments quite well. And, as Isabelle said, it is better than a lot of native English speakers. I think your hard work has paid off.

I could continue with this line of questions for quite a while, but fear you would get irritated. I used to use this style of argument to tick off my know it all philosophy professor. 

[Padma]

'sensible' vs 'insane' can be decided on the basis of something as subjective as politics or morality, however - so one person's genius is another's madness. Sometimes. Galileo comes to mind...

[Kevin Peña]

I could continue with this line of questions for quite a while, but fear you would get irritated.

I would just respond later when I had time. 

'sensible' vs 'insane' can be decided on the basis of something as subjective as politics or morality.

That's why I broke it down to optimization.  😛

[Padma]

And who gets to decide what behaviour is 'optimal'? . Most difficulties I see between people (and countries, religions, etc. etc.) revolve around that very difference of 'opinion' as to what's optimal in a given situation.

I'm not disputing that there's a distinction, by the way, I just dispute that it's possible to come up with absolute rules that determine it. I tend to think my ethical rules are absolute (who doesn't?) but they're not the same as the next person's, it turns out a lot of the time...

[Brooke777]

And who gets to decide what behaviour is 'optimal'? . Most difficulties I see between people (and countries, religions, etc. etc.) revolve around that very difference of 'opinion' as to what's optimal in a given situation.

I'm not disputing that there's a distinction, by the way, I just dispute that it's possible to come up with absolute rules that determine it. I tend to think my ethical rules are absolute (who doesn't?) but they're not the same as the next person's, it turns out a lot of the time...

I am not sure that a true absolute exists...anywhere.

[ativan]

There are studies and findings that do correlate the two.
Bringing it down to their simplest definitions is quite easy and has a certain lack of creativity and intelligence in itself.
Finding and understanding how the correlation works is evidence of a level of creativity and a sign of intelligence.
Genius can also be simply put as above average common sense.
Creativity can be simply seen as artistic.
Madness is simply wherever the social constructs of society wants to set the bar at. This varies and is dependent on the society itself that sets that bar.
Simply Googling the words madness, creativity and genius will bring you many hours of reading.
None of which will change an individual's level of madness, creativity or genius.
But it may change your level of intelligence.
It is also something that if you live in it, it is quite simple to understand.
But is is for that reason, living in it, that it is hard to explain in a simplistic form, if you haven't been there.
As simply living really isn't living at all, it's quite a complicated affair in a world that strives to be sane, yet creative simultaneously.
Along with expectations of a certain level of intelligence that is deemed to be appropriate in whatever society you happen to live in.
I know some very creative people who I wouldn't call genius' and vice versa.
But I know and worked with some of the most highly intelligent crazies this side of the Psyche Units.
The very term, 'thinking outside the box' implies going beyond the norms of both.
It is from a vantage point outside of the so called normal, that one truly becomes a creative genius with one foot in madness, simply by virtue of being there. And vice versa.
Although one is not dependent on the other, it helps.

Ativan

[Kevin Peña]

I am not sure that a true absolute exists...anywhere.

And who gets to decide what behaviour is 'optimal'? . Most difficulties I see between people (and countries, religions, etc. etc.) revolve around that very difference of 'opinion' as to what's optimal in a given situation.

I'm not disputing that there's a distinction, by the way, I just dispute that it's possible to come up with absolute rules that determine it. I tend to think my ethical rules are absolute (who doesn't?) but they're not the same as the next person's, it turns out a lot of the time...

Great, now you're copying Brooke's strategy? I don't think my behavior is absolute.  😛 Everything has a gray area, except for one rule. --> Every rule has an exception. I know what you're thinking: "But, Diana, that rule has no exceptions...." EXACTLY, by having no exceptions, it is the exception to the rule that dictates that everything has an exception, thus proving itself. So, Padma and Brooke, I just found an absolute. In the spirit of perpetual sassyness...  😛 😛 😛

[ativan]

Donkey's...

[Isabelle]

I am not sure that a true absolute exists...anywhere.

Isn't the fundamental position of Christian apologists that absolutes do, in fact, exist?

[ativan]

Such as absolute zero degrees?
Oh wait, that has science in it.
Never mind.

[Kevin Peña]

Well, technically, absolute zero has never been reached yet. People have come to a billionth of a degree to it, but there is spin in molecules that scientists don't know how to slow down. Laser cooling, using light's momentum to slow down particles, doesn't stop spinning, only lateral motion.

[Padma]

I believe there are absolutes, I just can't prove it, so I don't bother trying . That doesn't make me a relativist, it just makes me... nope, can't think of a word!

[Isabelle]

Science only deals in probabilities, uncertainties and measurement. It has little to do with absolutes. Absolute zero is simply a theoretical energy state in a system. It's not a philosophical statement on the nature of the universe (unless of course you want to get into the philosophy of physics and, or, metaphysics)

[Brooke777]

Science only deals in probabilities, uncertainties and measurement. It has little to do with absolutes. Absolute zero is simply a theoretical energy state in a system. It's not a philosophical statement on the nature of the universe (unless of course you want to get into the philosophy of physics and, or, metaphysics)

Depending which Christian faith you follow, there are a number of absolutes. But, since we do not know as much as the creator, can we really ever know if there is an absolute, and what it is? We can hypothesise about it.

[Padma]

I'm absolutely sure there's no creator, but I refer you to my aforementioned certainty that the next person along from me believes differently .

[Isabelle]

My point was just that all Christians are absolutists to the degree they believe absolutly that a god or gods created the universe and made people.