Are you genius?

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Albert Einstein, pop icon and archetype of genius

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A genius is a person with great intelligence. The term also applies to one who is a polymath, or someone skilled in many mental areas. The term specifically applies to mental skills rather than anything else, although it is also colloquially used to denote the possession of a superior talent in any field; e.g., Pelé or Jose Macia may be said to have a genius for soccer, or Winston Churchill for statesmanship.

Appearance

Artistic genius may show itself in early childhood or later in life; either way, geniuses eventually differentiate themselves from the others through great originality. It is thought intellectual geniuses have crisp, clear-eyed visions of given situations, in which interpretation is unnecessary, and they build or act on the basis of those facts, usually with tremendous energy. Here too, accomplished geniuses in intellectual fields start out in many cases as child prodigies, gifted with superior memory or understanding.

The classic skill of the musical genius is the capability of holding many different melodies in one's head at once and knowing how they interact together. It is said that the great classical composers (Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, etc.) could hold five, six or even seven different melodies in their minds at once. They could write complicated music with many different parts all at once without having to hear it played. In comparison, the average person can only hold one melody in memory. Mozart, who apparently completed his musical compositions in his head and simply wrote them down when he was done, often while drinking or conversing with friends, is supposed to have said, "I write music as a sow pisses."

A hypothesis put forth by Harvard professor Howard Gardner in his 1983 book Frames of Mind states there are many kinds of intelligences (at least seven, he argues), each with its own type of genius. This theory, however, is rejected by most psychologists. See theory of multiple intelligences for more on this view.

Intelligence is exceptionally difficult to determine. The standard measurement in the United States is via the I.Q. test. It is suggested that genius cannot be determined by I.Q. alone, where it falls into various domains. It is generally recognized that those who are transcendent in one or more fields (though again, this term is difficult to measure) can be considered geniuses.