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At this point I reveal myself in my true colours as a stick-in-the-mud. I hold a number of beliefs that have been repudiated by the liveliest intellects of our time. I believe that order is better than chaos. Creation better than destruction. I prefer gentleness to violence. Forgiveness to vendetta. On the whole I think that knowledge is preferable to ignorance. And I am sure that human sympathy is more valuable than an ideology. I believe that in spite of recent triumphs of science men haven’t changed much in the last two thousand years. And in consequence we must still try to learn from history: history is ourselves ... I believe in courtesy ... And I think we should remember that we are part of a great whole, which for convenience we call nature. All living things are our brothers and sisters. Above all, I believe in the God-given genius of certain individuals. And I value a society that makes their existence possible. Kenneth Clark, Civilisation 13/13: Heroic Materialism, BBC 1969
The Great Man ... is colder, harder, less hesitating, and without fear of ‘opinion’; he lacks the virtues that accompany respect and ‘responsibility’, and altogether that is the ‘virtue of the herd’. If he cannot lead, he goes alone ... He knows he is incommunicable: he finds it tasteless to be familiar ... When not speaking to himself, he wears a mask. There is a solitude within him that is inaccessible to praise or blame. Friedrich Nietzsche
I am convinced all of humanity is born with more gifts than we know. Most are born geniuses and just get de-geniused rapidly. Richard Buckminster Fuller
The only geniuses produced by the chaos of society are those who do something about it. Chaos breeds geniuses. It offers a man something to be a genius about. B F Skinner, Walden Two
True genius resides in the capacity for evaluation of uncertain, hazardous, and conflicting information. Winston Churchill
Steve Jobs was a genius of the modern age. He gave us tools to change our lives and the way we communicate. Steve Jobs: iChanged the World, Channel 4 2011
Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do. Apple Inc
Genius is the ability to renew one’s emotions in daily experience. Paul Cézanne
Delacroix was passionately in love with passion, and coldly determined to seek the means of expressing passion in the most visible manner. In this dual character, be it said in passing, we find the two distinguishing marks of the most substantial geniuses, extreme geniuses. Charles Baudelaire
Genius … is the child of imitation. Joshua Reynolds, Discourses on Art December, 1769
Klee’s idiosyncrasies always remained somewhat beyond the law, as it were. For ‘genius is the defect in the system’, stated the conscientious system builder, who knew that genius was the only thing that could neither be taught nor learned. Karl Ruhrberg, in Art of the 20th century I 2000
No-one appreciates genius any more. Shadowman 2006 starring Steven Seagal & Eva Pope & Imelda Staunton & Vincent Riotta & Michael Elwun & Skye Bennett & Garrick Hagon & Alex Ferns, director Michael Keusch, CIA guy to hero
The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success. Tomorrow Never Dies 1997 starring Pierce Brosnan & Judi Dench & Jonathan Pryce & Michaelle Yeoh & Teri Hatcher & Ricky Jay & Gotz Otto & Joe Don Baker & Vincent Schiavelli & Samantha Bond et al, director Roger Spottiswoode, Elliot Carver, viz Bruce Feirstein
I don’t consider myself to be a genius at chess, I consider myself more to be a genius who just happens to play chess. Bobby Fischer
But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. Carl Sagan, Broca’s Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science
The labours of men of genius, however erroneously directed, scarcely ever fail in ultimately turning to the solid advantage of mankind. Mary Shelley
Genius is one per cent inspiration, ninety-nine per cent perspiration. Author Unknown, attributions & variations inc Thomas Edison & Kate Sanborn
No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness. Aristotle, attributed
Genius is an African who dreams up snow. Vladimir Nabokov
Genius is only a greater aptitude for patience. Comte de Buffon
When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him. Jonathan Swift
These are times in which a genius would wish to live ... Great necessities call out great virtues. Abigail Adams, wife of John Adams & mother of John Quincy Adams
‘Eccentricities of genius, Sam,’ said Mr Pickwick. Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers
Genius does what it must, and Talent does what it can. Owen Meredith, Last Words of a Sensitive Second-Rate Poet,1868
The true genius is a mind of large general powers, accidentally determined to some particular direction. Samuel Johnson, Lives of the English Poets
It’s a question science struggles with as much as anyone else. Professor Marcus du Sautoy, Horizon: What Makes a Genius? BBC 2010
My name is Robert Clarke Graham. And I had a dream. To single-handedly save the human race one child at a time. In the 1970s I secretly set up the world’s first genius sperm bank. Dr Robert Clarke Graham, Horizon: The Genius Sperm Bank, BBC 2006
We were trying to have outstanding genes, and Nobel Prize winners possessed them. ibid.
We are favouring the possibility of making geniuses. ibid.
This is germinal choice. ibid.
What we are doing is exploring the possibility of genetics. ibid.
What did Nabokov and Joyce have in common, apart from the poor teeth and the great prose? Exile, and decades of near pauperism. A compulsive tendency to overtip. An uxoriousness that their wives deservedly inspired. More than that, they both lived their lives ‘beautifully’ – not in any Jamesian sense (where, besides, ferocious solvency would have been a prerequisite), but in the droll fortitude of their perseverance. They got the work done, with style. Martin Amis, Experience: A Memoir
Many a genius has been slow of growth. G H Lewes, The Spanish Drama, 1846
We can think about the mini-columns as the micro-processor of our computer. And you can accommodate all the certain number of them within the cortex, and what we found what that the brains of the super-normals or these individuals with special skills they had more of them, because the columns were actually smaller. Professor Manuel Casanova, University of Louisville