Genius instead of geniuses

A self-portrait of Florence Henri

I was standing at the counter waiting for my coffee when I was approached by a man my age. He started talking to me and we ended up chatting for quite a bit while drinking our coffee. He told me he was interested in Steve Jobs, a ‘genius’ according to him. Coincidentally at that moment the latest text on Thought Magicians was written by Max on geniuses. Max wrote his text driven by his interest in them, and reading that left me with nothing but a strange taste of perplexity. Personally I do not feel any specific admiration or interest for ‘geniuses’. Of course, I certainly admire particular people, also those that are extremely good at certain things, but not because I think their lives corresponds with a certain identity that we are collectively refering to as ‘a genius’. In fact, I do not even think there are such things as ‘geniuses’. Rather, I prefer to think in ‘genius.’ Moreover, the idea of individual geniuses only functions on the basis of certain apparatuses, like the rigid distinction between object and subject, and the authorship apparatus, which have already been shown to have many undesirable effects.

To get straight to business: the idea of an individual genius only functions due to a strong subject-object distinction. The genius is, variably implicit or explicit, seen as the subjectivity most succesful in ruling the realm of objects: the genius is the absolute master, the highest subject. Max describes this status of the genius as a more advanced subjectivity as well, but without emphasizing that this concerns the image of a subject (as opposed to objects): “It seems as if the bluriness and confusion that many people experience when they try to truly understand things does not occur for geniuses, as if they have a more direct acces to the world. For the genius there is no obstructing noice; he takes shortcuts that remain forever hidden for the rest of us.” The idea of the genius is nothing but the human ideal that belongs to understanding the world as consisting of subjects and objects. After the succes of the movie, Descartes would have undoubtedly been Oppenheimer’s number one fan. The succes of these stories therefore also needs to be read through these ideas. Instead of asking what a genius is, or whether they are real or not, or whether they should be defined like this or that, much more interesting and urgent questions would be why there is a need for us to keep on revitalizing the object-subject distinction despite all the scientific evidence that such a simple distinction does not correspond to reality, and why is this process manifesting itself today so strongly in the form of the portrayal of ‘geniuses’ and the romanticizing narration of their lives? And, what I would like to specifically focus on, why does ‘isolation’ and ‘loneliness’ play such a big role in these narrations, why do we focus on that aspect so much, as if there is a causal and necessary relation between it and the being-a-genius of the supposed genius?

Questions like these can never be answered completely; they are neverending. We can only leave their inquiry, never finish it. They can also be answered in many different ways. Hence, any answer that will be given is incomplete. For now, however, I would like to zoom in on an issue which I think can be particularly enlightening for this discussion: authorship. Just like the genius, the author is a “specification of the subject”. In Qu'est-ce qu'un auteur ?, Michel Foucault showed in 1969 the discursive function of the notion of the author. Foucault discusses how the name of an author does not function in the same way as any proper name. The name of the author has a specific function, which Foucault describes as such:

we can say that in our culture, the name of an author is a variable that accompanies only certain texts to the exclusion of others: a private letter may have a signatory, but it does not have an author; a contract can have an underwriter, but not an author; and, similarly, an anonymous poster attached to a wall may have a writer, but he cannot be an author. In this sense, the function of an author is to characterize the existence, circulation, and operation of certain discourses within a society.

The name of an author is first of all the categorizing of certain texts, of including some while excluding all others. And this ‘author-function’, Foucault emphasizes, has not always been around:

the 'author-function' is not universal or constant in all discourse. Even within our civilization, the same types of texts have not always required authors; there was a time when those texts which we now call 'literary' (stories, folk tales, epics, and tragedies) were accepted, circulated, and valorized without any question about the identity of their author.

We should think about the idea of the genius in the same manner: the genius, and the very specific way in which we understand that notion today, is a historically contingent category that fulfills a certain function within a certain context. The rise of the author-fuction, Foucault writes, is bound to the “social order of property which governs our culture”. The author function was an answer to the need to hold certain people accountable for certain texts, either for economic reasons (copyright and property) or legal ones (transgression and punishment).

Like the author-function, which still reigns today, the genius-function also attributes certain works to certain individuals. But while the author-function is first of all a discursive phenomenon, insofar it is first of all the ordering of discursive entities in a certain way, the genius-function works on a different level. It is not the categorization of works that is most important here, but rather the fact that the attribution of these works, and, extremely important, the way in which these works have been produced (through isolation and accompanied by mental difficulties), changes the status of the individual. Differently put, the notion of genius and the way it circulates and embodies itself today expresses something about the possibility of the individual and the human being more general. And not just the individual, but a certain type of individual. Or rather, the individual in a certain type of context.

Today, two widespread phenomena in society are, especially in the economically and technologically most prosperous countries, social isolation and depression. First concerning isolation, Guy Debord already wrote in 1989, in Panégyrique, the following about the workings of capitalism:

The economic system founded on isolation is a circular production of isolation. The technology is based on isolation, and the technical process isolates in turn. From the automobile to television, all the goods selected by the spectacular system are also its weapons for a constant reinforcement of the conditions of isolation of 'lonely crowds.' . . . 'With the present means of long-distance mass communication, sprawling isolation has proved an even more effective method of keeping a population under control,' says Lewis Mumford in The City in History, describing 'henceforth a one-way world.' But the general movement of isolation, which is the reality of urbanism, must also include a controlled reintegration of workers depending on the needs of production and consumption that can be planned. Integration into the system requires that isolated individuals be recaptured and isolated together: factories and halls of culture, tourist resorts and housing developments are expressly organized to serve this pseudo-community that follows the isolated individual right into the family cell. The widespread use of receivers of the spectacular message enables the individual to fill his isolation with the dominant images―images which derive their power precisely from this isolation.

The accuracy of this statement has only increased today. As I also described in this text, the current state of society and the widespread use of all types of communication technologies, first and foremost the smartphone, has led to mass isolation and loneliness. Because so much has become accessible and possible at all times at all places – not just social contact but also many services – actual real-life social interactions have gradually lost their place in our day-to-day existence as they are no longer necessary. As Debord writes ‘The widespread use of receivers of the spectacular message enables the individual to fill his isolation with the dominant images – images which derive their power precisely from this isolation’: isolation is one of the sources that gives power to certain ‘dominant images’, of which that of ‘the genius’ clearly is one today.

A second widespread phenomenon in contemporary society is the steady increase of neurological illnesses like depression and burnout. As Byung-Chul Han has shown in his book Müdigkeitsgesellschaft (2010), this fact cannot be seen separate from the glorification of work and self-exploitation that circulates popular discourse: “Twenty-first-century society is no longer a disciplinary society, but rather an achievement society [Leistungsgesellschaft ]. Also, its inhabitants are no longer ‘obedience-subjects’ but ‘achieve ment-subjects.’ They are entrepreneurs of themselves.” In Psychopolitik (2014), Han further elaborates this phenomenon of self-exploitation and its roots in neoliberalism. He writes that “neoliberalism … has discovered the psyche as a productive force”, which is connected to the fact that “Now, immaterial and non-physical forms of production are what determine the course of capitalism. What gets produced are not material objects, but immaterial ones – for instance, information and programs”. The neoliberal regime and narrative is alive and well, and can be found in some of the most dominant ideas online: ideas such as the ‘grindset’, ‘locking in,’ and rendering yourself exceptional through working hard day and night, etcetera. Although Psychopolitik was written ten years ago, Han’s description of the self-exploiting individual is clearly more accurate than ever:

the neoliberal regime utterly claims the technology of the self for its own purposes: perpetual self-optimization – as the exemplary neoliberal technology of the self represents nothing so much as a highly efficient mode of domination and exploitation. As an ‘entrepreneur of himself’, the neoliberal achievement-subject engages in auto-exploitation willingly – and even passionately.

So, we are living in times characterized by isolation and depression, which are both fueled by technologies that have made isolation possible, and the neoliberalist ideas that have turned us into entrepreneurs of the self, telling us to lock ourselves in and work and improve ourselves perpetually. The success of ‘the genius’ in popular media cannot be seen separate from these phenomena.

Like I already said earlier, the notion of the genius, the genius-function, expresses a certain idea about the possibility of the – any – individual in a certain context. As such, the genius-function is first of all a renunciation: this specific situation (i.e. with these attributes), might just indicate my potential for being, or similarity with, the ideal subject that has absolute control over the objects that make up the world, the genius. The context, the situation of the genius is that of isolation and neurological illness, in other words, those properties that are so characteristically widespread today. The pathology of the genius has become mainstream. Here the function of the notion of the genius becomes clearer: by connecting the notion of ideal subject, the genius, to isolation and mental illness, it becomes possible to tell ourselves: everything is fine right now, my loneliness and mental struggles are only a sign of my upcoming success! It is not a problem that I am alone, it will help me realize my goals, my desire to be just like the genius I admire (the admiration that Max explicitly expresses in his text). And even if one does not think of oneself as a potential genius, at least the romanticization of its struggles helps to renunciate and normalize the loneliness and neurological illness that are part of this image. The idea of the genius and our admiration for the genius are a product of, and help to keep the neoliberal machine of self-exploitation running. It is for this reason that I feel frustrated at times when I hear people talk about ‘geniuses’, that is, when they uncrictically accept this categorization, and do so in admiration.

The fact that the genius is inherently exceptional is not an obstruction for its functioning and universal application to each individual. Here we only have to think about Calvinism, the theology of Johannes Calvijn advanced in 16th century Europe. According to Calvinism, God has already decided from the start who will go to heaven and who will not. As such, the individual cannot do anything in their lifetime to change this fact (in this sense Calvinism differs from Catholicism and even the theology of Maarten Luther). This is similar to the idea of the genius: one simply has the disposition of a genius or not; it is biologically determined (which, obviously, does not mean that we do not believe that the genius does not have to work hard to actualize this potential). One might think that this will lead to an unmotivated fatalism. However, as Erich Fromm argues in Escape from Freedom (1941), the opposite is true. To quote him at length:

Calvinism emphasized the necessity of unceasing human effort. Man must constantly try to live according to God's word and never lapse in his effort to do so. This doctrine appears to be a contradiction of the doctrine that human effort is of no avail with regard to man's salvation. The fatalistic attitude of not making any effort might seem like a much more appropriate response. Some psychological considerations, however, show that this is not so. The state of anxiety, the feeling of powerless-ness and insignificance, and especially the doubt concerning one's future after death, represent a state of mind which is practically unbearable for anybody. Almost no one stricken with this fear would be able to relax, enjoy life, and be indifferent as to what happened afterwards. One possible way to escape this unbearable state of uncertainty and the paralysing feeling of one's own insignificance is the very trait which became so prominent in Calvinism: the development of a frantic activity and a striving to do something. Activity in this sense assumes a compulsory quality: the individual has to be active in order to overcome his feeling of doubt and powerlessness. This kind of effort and activity is not the result of inner strength and self-confidence; it is a desperate escape from anxiety.

Obviously, our lives are not filled with the exact same fear for hell as those of the early Calvinists. However, we are living in times of extreme individualism and the need to obtain a unique identity, to be exceptional. The advent of social media, and even something as simple as the front camera of our phones and the ability to make selfies stimulate this hegemony of identity (it is well known that the invention of the mirror completely changed our experience of self-identity, as nobody before that invention had ever seen themselves properly on a regular basis). It is no coincidence that Max Weber connected the work ethic of Calvinism to that of capitalism, and that Debord traces isolation back to the logic of capitalism, and that Han points at neoliberalism (“a further development – indeed, a mutated form – of capitalism”) as the blame for the ‘burnout society.’ Because, just like in Calvinism there is the inability to know whether one belongs to the chosen ones or not, it is completely unknown whether one is granted with the biological disposition to be a 'genius' (whether this be in sports, science, the arts, etcetera), with the potential to be truly exceptional, the capitalist and now neoliberalist work ethic of self-exploitation (resulting in collective isolation and neurological illness) is the main response to this psychological precarity. No genius can reach their levels of greatness without massive amounts of work, and in a world in which I might be a genius, and where being a genius is the greatest way of living up to the societal imperative (silently internalized) to be impactful, important and above all exceptional, I should work as hard as I can not to waste any of the potential I might have for such exceptionality. And the chance of reaching such heights does not even have to be realistically present, as coming as close as possible to genius-like heights suffices in a Zeitgeist signed by the ideals of uniqueness, exceptionality and individualism (or, one just has to image one’s being-a-genius misunderstood or unrecognized, living the life of a Kafka that did, in the end, burn all his books before death and was never discovered).

The genius is the absolute subject, the one that controls or understands the objects the most, and therefore is admirable. The impossibility of control, the control implied in the subject-object distinction, results in the increasing desire for this control. The admiration of the genius is only one of the many expressions of this dynamic.

We are living today in a highly complex constellation or web of different types of apparatuses that are subjugating the individual towards certain behaviors, ideas, thoughts, allowing only for certain possibilities to be visible or thinkable to us, and hence excluding and rendering invisible other potential lives to live. I in no way want to argue that the mass isolation, loneliness and neurological illness of our times are the causal result of the image and idea of the genius, nor the other way around. It is not that A follows from B or that B follows from A. Rather, the popular image and admiration of the genius and the isolation and mental struggles that characterize our contemporary condition exist in a symbiotic relationship that results from a process of co-evolution in which both (or, all) phenomena strengthen one another over time. Understanding the cultural phenomenon of ‘the genius’ can only be done by looking at this symbiotic relationship, and therefore the broader societal developments like the neoliberalist work-ethic, the loneliness pandemic and psychopolitics should be studied by looking at these concrete and graspable expressions.

Alright, let me take a few steps back. Are there not simply certain individuals that are very good at one, a few or many thing(s) and can we not just admire them? Does that admiration not help us get the best out of ourselves? All I wanted to show is that this line of reasoning is historically contingent and is connected to certain broader ideas, such as mind-body dualism, and certain societal dynamics like the ‘lonely crowds’ of which Debord spoke. And, as there is plenty of philosophical literature that has shown the incredibly diverse set of negative effects of dualism, plenty of scientific knowledge that undermines dualism, and the simple fact that loneliness and burnout are not desirable, I believe we might want to start thinking and admiring differently when it comes to genius. Therefore, I will here briefly try to express how I personally prefer to think about genius.

The current idea of the genius tends to hint towards the way I believe it would be preferable to think about genius. In his text, Max writes the following: “In other words, genius is not only a personal qualification, but also a story about specialness and sublimity, about something greater than ourselves.” And in the text written by Joost de Vries that Max refers to, it is written that, for the genius, “His genius overwhelms him, is a power greater than himself. He has no choice but to follow his instincts and go where no one has gone before him” (it should also be noted how the genius, as in both these texts, is constantly referred to as ‘he’, but this deserves a critique by itself). So, geniuses are transmitting something greater than themselves, but this something is never really defined. And, remaining undefined yet fulfilling a major function in the narrative of ‘the genius’, it is nothing but a metaphysical category, equal to ‘God’ in the major monotheistic religions (it is, to speak in Derrida’s terms, a transcendental signifier). As such, we can even think about the notion of the genius in relation to the divine right of kings, or Jezus as the earthly incarnation of God.

Yet, to talk about genius as something greater than the individual is exactly what I think we should try to think. In other words, elaborating this greater something that the genius transmits is what needs to be done. As such, the switch that needs to be made from geniuses to genius is somewhat similar to the switch that Spinoza’s thought offers concerning the category of God, a switch from metaphysics to an ontology of immanence (which still remains to be the most important job of philosophy today). This can obviously be done in many ways. My preferred approach or interest concerns life, the ecological, from the cellular to the human. There is no difficulty in this switch, it is something very simple. Although I think this is an area that can and should be elaborated in many different ways (and which I will definitely do in the future), I will keep it simple and straightforward here, no big theories to explain or grand philosophers to quote (also because this text is reaching maximum length and weight I think is most suitable for Thought Magicians… ).

I took a long walk today, as it was unusually warm in the season of coldness. I was wondering about the brown and orange leaves falling from the trees into the field, thinking about how they will dissolve into the ground and feed it with new resources. Genius, isn’t it? How these resources just go around different life forms, and how each life form is able to take the most out of their environment (and, what should also be mentioned here, is that all these life forms are capable of making mistakes, in contrast to atoms and molecules, but as promised I will keep this for another text). I hear the birds singing, and I cannot but feel inspired by the unmatched beauty of their songs. And talking about birds, I know that you have also at least once been impressed by a flock of birds floating through the air as one substance, as a dancing drop of oil in a glass of water. Oh, and if you really want to see genius, look up ‘squirting cucumber’ on the internet.

All of the phenomena are what they are because they relate to all other things in the world the way they do. They are what they are because they are part of a big family of others. There is something genius about how the phenomenon of bird migration was discovered due to a bird that survived an arrow (which I discussed in this text). Everything that exists displays genius in the way it exists because all other things are what they are. And sometimes, at certain moments, we are in a place where we are able to see that, that something is so unlikely, so creative, so complex, or so simple yet so smart. In those moments we are witness of genius. And is this not really one of the greatest joys of human existence? That we have such a great ability to be aware of complexity and creativity? I feel the same admiration and awe when I think about the snout of an anteater as when I am listening to Kendrick Lamar’s music. When I think about the genius of the anteater, I also think about the ant hill, and similarly I do not see Kendrick Lamar as the absolute source of To Pimp A Butterfly; I have to think about Tupac that inspired him, about Compton, about the specific household that he grew up in, in that specific neighborhood, with those specific friends, eating that specific food and how those specific nutrients determined his mood and decisions, his mother and father and their specific stories, all of it. In fact, is that not in a way what his song DUCKWORTH is about? I recommend you to listen to it, as it does a much better job at explaining genius than I do. The last sentence of this song says it all: "Whoever thought the greatest rapper would be from coincidence? Because if Anthony killed Ducky, Top Dawg could be servin' life, while I grew up without a father and die in a gunfight".

Aristotle and Plato could not have been Aristotle and Plato if it was not for the slaves that allowed them to spend time pondering about the world, if it was not for the state of Athens and its democracy at that time, or for Socrates that inspired them to question. When we are impressed by someone’s speech, we do not just admire their mouths from which the speech came, but that whole person. But, that imaginary line between mouth and individual is not more random than the line between individual and all the rest. Again, I prefer to think in genius rather than geniuses, just as Spinoza preferred to think about substance rather than substances. When I think about genius, I think about evolution, about cells, about Picasso but also about Françoise Gilot, I think about how auntie Ye, who runs a dumpling restaurant in her apartment in Chengdu, adds salt to ginger to distract a juice that she uses to flavor pork, and how her cooking belongs to a tradition of flavors and recipes.