Is being gentle a characteristic of genius?

Question

If you google the phrase "gentle genius" you see that it is used to describe different people, so it seems like the traits of being gentle and of being a genius are related. By extension, meanness is a characteristic of people with lower intelligence. What do you think? How are they related?

Answer 1

<<By extension, meanness is a characteristic of people with lower intelligence.>>

Despite being astonishingly narrow, Hitler was highly intelligent.  You can say the same with confidence about Mao, Pol Pot and Stalin.  Despite much competition and in a relatively short time, each of those people was clever enough to rise from obscurity to supreme political power within a few decades or less, and was then able to hold on to power.  If they'd been stupid, that wouldn't have happened.

The entire leadership of n**i Germany wasn't of low intelligence.  Goebells was superb at propaganda.  Himmler was an excellent administrator...  These were clever people, and extremely nasty pieces of scum.

The answer to that question is no.

<<Is being gentle a characteristic of genius?>>

Isaac Newton was famous for physics and his willingness to have people hung during his work as the warden of the Royal Mint.  His sheer nastiness, displayed during his character assassination efforts against Leibniz, makes that detail relatively unsurprising.  As with lots of geniuses, he was extremely unpleasant if crossed.

Gentleness isn't a characteristic of genius.

Update

<<So you have given some examples to the contrary. What about my examples?>>

You didn't state any examples.

Answer 2

Mana's absolutely correct....and this IS coming from a genius...well, child prodigy at least....-wendy

Answer 3

*sigh*  no.

manatees are quite gentle.   and far from geniuses.

in addition, when applied to people, it's not true either.

i can absolutely guarantee that from personal experience.

more than once.

Answer 4

It certainly can be.

Artistic geniuses - the Sylvia Plaths, Tennessee Williams, Virginia Woolfs, Anthony Minghellas, Nicole Kidmans of the world tend to be deeply emphatic, passionate, observant & intuitive. In order to be a writer or an actor you must have the ability to identify with the human emotions & needs of the others. You are required to think and to feel as your character would. Otherwise.....your performance or story will not be believable. A painter sees the world more vibrantly and notices what others might walk past. They turn the ordinary into the extraordinary. When your antennae is so attuned to humanity......it can cave your heart in, make you vulnerable or sensitive or insane or fragile, and it can definitely make you a gentle person. You are always thinking. You are aware of flower in the field so you are mindful of your step, you can feel the way a harsh word can hurt someone, so you are careful with your tongue. I'm not suggesting that all geniuses are like this at all....but I'm saying that these traits are not uncommon.

Military, mathematical, and scientific geniuses tend to think quite differently than an artistic genius would, but both types of geniuses tend to be more absorbent than the average person. They retain more, and as you've heard, knowledge is power. Whether they used their knowledge for good or evil is their free will.

I definitely don't think that meanness is a characteristic of people with lower intelligence. Ignorance might be, and that could lead to meanness for some people. I used to volunteer with Down Syndrome people, and their IQ is significantly lower than average, and they were some of the loveliest, most kind-hearted and innocent people I've ever known.

PAX

: )

Answer 5

I diagaree. Genius may be gentle.Its added beauty.to a personality.

Answer 6

No, not at all. The two aren't related. It's like being a, "gentle giant". Being giant is generally not associated with being gentle, which is why people go through the trouble of saying both. Genius(ses?) are often aloof or short tempered, at least, in my experience.