Let’s Compare Geniuses Shall We?

Let’s Compare Geniuses Shall We?

Al Ritter

When I say geniuses, let’s not brand them as all good for humanity, shall we? You can say a genius for what they accomplished as in changing mankind for better or for worse.

For instance you could say Hitler, Stalin, Mao, or Lenin for that matter were geniuses for how they led their people.

You could say that Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs, or Jeff Bezos were geniuses on how they amassed personal fortunes on business success.

I hold my personal judgment on these individuals in a different light. They all have shown an ability to shape a formative world around them.

Whether by force or coercion they all have made a change on humanity.

We already know about the detrimental effects that Hitler, Stalin, Lenin, and Mao had on their population.

As I have read articles in the past on the later day geniuses, they all seem to touch on specific traits of the group Dorsey, Zuckerberg, Jobs, Bezos etc.

They all seem to be driven to the point of obsession, their work hours are horrendous by normal standards and they all think that if they spend 100 hours a week working that they accomplish in 4 months what take others a year to do.

Now I’m taking a step out on the ledge here but they all seem to be as psychologists consider “within the spectrum,” almost in the savant stage.

When recently asked of Elon Musk, “who do you think you are most like, Ben Franklin or Leonardo Da Vinci?” He replied, “probably Ben Franklin.”

I think he picked Ben for his rather outgoing life style shall we say.

Listening to Musk speak is almost a torture, his jerky speech, is hard to follow but it only confirms his sometimes inability to string together his thoughts before he engages his mouth.

One of his employees compared him to Howard Hughes, but I think his personality goes much deeper than that, I really don’t think Howard Hughes ever obtained in his lifetime what Elon Musk has already accomplished.

Maybe obsession is what both of them have in common almost to a fault, but Elon is different.

If I had to compare him to anyone whom I have considered a genius it would be Nikola Tesla.  They were both thinkers beyond the realm of what is considered a normal person.

I don’t think either Musk or Tesla were on the level of say Albert Einstein, nor will they ever but they are both closer together in their thinking than anyone else, thus Musk’s reverence to his car’s name.

Let’s hope he doesn’t end up the same way that Hughes and Tesla did.

Listen to this interview:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1f4_ygCCaE