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JJD's avatar

It's good that you realized that cognitive ability is multi-faceted and that the capacity to be creative with abstract problems is not dependent on being quick-witted as you describe. I had the good luck to have a very high powered thesis supervisor (math), one of the top people in his field, and initially suffered from "imposter syndrome," feeling that I was unqualified to be his (or anyone's) grad student. I coped with that by adopting the attitude that I would hang in there until they threw me out. Of course, it never came to that, and I worked out my own ways of coping and using the abilities I had, eventually doing very well. One of my private requirements turned out to be working out extremely simple examples of difficult abstractions until I developed an intuitive understanding of them. My boss was annoyed and surprised at that but allowed me to work that way as long as I kept it to myself.

It was very amazing one day to see my own boss in the role of dunce when we were visited by the legendary number theorist Paul Erdös. Erdös was a very humble guy, ready to talk math with anyone. He was discussing some esoterica with my supervisor while simultaneously playing two chess games with math grad students, scribbling on the blackboard and not not looking at the chess boards. His opponents would call out a move, like "pawn to QB5”, and he would call out his answering move without missing a beat in the technical conversation. He won both games while teaching my boss some number theory. After witnessing all that, I realized that "genius" is relative and that I was bloody fortunate to be there as a member of that group, as were my boss and Erdös himself.

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CasualPhysicsEnjoyer's avatar

Thanks for this comment, I get the vibe you are hearing what I am saying in the way I am trying to say it. I am grateful for that :)

And that is a great story about Erdos!

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Luis Castro's avatar

Just the title and image are worthy of launching a thousand ships

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Mark Tyson's avatar

I wonder if it could be relative. Sounds like you’re accustomed to being around bright and brilliant people and you’re comparing yourself to them? I don’t think that great sports people think a lot. They begin with natural ability, hand eye coordination for example, then they train and play a lot, they instinctively know how to deal with situations in the game. In art and other fields people hide their technique so that they seem natural. I was surprised when I heard an interview with the quick witted comedienne Joan Rivers who admitted that when she was invited to a dinner party, she made sure to prepare some anecdotes in advance. In any case as the saying goes you have to play the hand you’re dealt.

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CasualPhysicsEnjoyer's avatar

Haha, i've never heard that nugget about Joan Rivers before, thank you for sharing

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Science with Serena's avatar

I once had a case interview with a consulting firm before I knew what that was. They asked me a bunch of weird math questions, so naturally I picked up my calculator. They looked at me weird, and I felt weird using it, but I answered what they wanted. I found out later what I did wrong. Still annoyed.

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Sada S. Sodangi's avatar

Indeed, I am also a slow or average speed thinker. Like Joan rivers I have an archive of maxims which I go over every now and then, most of my quick witted responses come from this war-chest. Just as you I am better off communicating through writing, as it avails me the luxury of playing around with words and phrases until it sounds right. I am glad to know that I am not alone on this boat. I am also a procrastinator like Di Vinci with a lot of incomplete works, I am wondering if you have a solution for that in your bag of tricks ….

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