GENERATION: POLYMATH. Get Used to It.

Ah, things were simpler in the ancient times. For instance, men were able to study in mathematics, science, music and GOD, all at the same time. Philosophers gained notoriety by being well-learned in many subjects. It was thought that knowing a lot about a lot of things would generally increase your knowledge exponentially, as each area of study was thought to inherently bleed over into the next.

NEVERMORE!!!

Telling somebody that I have a “Bachelor of Arts” from a “Liberal Arts College” is silly. “You got what, now?” they say. It’s true, I went to college to learn a whole lot about a whole bunch of different stuff. Most of what I learned I can’t remember specifically. Rather, I learned to think and act a certain way; to be analytical and informed and interested. In these modern times, my liberal arts degree is both completely relevant and completely unhelpful. I have this unsavory taste in my mouth that I get from feeling like I don’t know how to do everything… like acid-reflux from an unsatisfying meal. It’s weird though, because I know how to do TONS OF FUCKIN’ SHIT! When I sit down to think about it, my skill set is really terrific. Not to toot my own horn (toot toot!), but seriously. I feel competent. At computers.

UNFORTUNATELY, THAT’S NOT WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS RIGHT NOW!!!

I just watched a very intense documentary about this plane filled with Uruguayans on their way to a rugby match in Chile. When their plane crashed in the Andes, they ended up being stranded for more than two months with no food aside from the bodies of those who died in the crash. Now, imagine that: needing to eat your frozen dead friend in order to live. NOW THAT’S A SKILL!!!

The Internet has allowed our culture to progress/digress into a very weird place. Telecommuting and the ability for people to work remotely via Gchat (rather than in an office space) has made the world feel very small and very large at the same time. People can now go anywhere virtually, but they don’t need to go anywhere physically. I seriously spent about 30 minutes the other day just looking at Google Maps street view of weird mid-Western states I’ve never been to. Why? Because I have no reason to go there if I can see how fucking terrible it is, right from the comfort of San Francisco!

I started this post because I wanted to write about polymaths. Here’s a good quote from Robert Heinlein’s Time Enough for Love:

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

I totally stole that quote from Wikipedia’s amazing entry on “Competent Man.” I like the final line, because specialization IS for insects, and that’s why I kill those bastards with 409 every day! Oh my God, the “competent man” post is just such a good read! It also brings up the good point about age in the equation of the polymath:

The competent man, more often than not, is written without explaining how he achieved his wide range of skills and abilities, especially as true expertise typically suggests practical experience instead of learning through books or formalized education alone. While not implausible with older or unusually long lived characters, when such characters are young it is often not adequately explained as to how they acquired so many skills at an early age.

Yes! Yes! This is exactly it. Being young and being an übermensch at the same time is nearly impossible, except of course in cartoons or in this current economy. Nietzsche believed that one day an “OVERMAN” would come and evolve over man, take man’s stuff and constantly beat him up. Um, white collar/blue collar much? I don’t even want to get into that right now, ‘cuz the gist of it all would blow this blog out of the PYRAMIDROMING realm and far, far away into another whole time and dimension. Basically I’m trying to say that my fine-art education and degree in “thinking about stuff” have caused me to evolve into a very strange non-humanoid. I have machine skills, but my survival skills are wobbly like a baby deer’s knobby legs.

As our culture pushes its educated elite further and further from the animal physicality of the real humanoids, emotions and food and pooping become taboo. Is this really a world we want to live in? I say NO! But then again, here I sit blogging the night away. Oh pyramidrome, you nasty beast you!