Females and Genius

[thelonelyunicorn]

Does anybody else find it strange that so many beliefs about genius say females are really incapable of it? I mean is it not ironic that Weininger, for example, should claim genius to include all possible persons, but he should think women nothing at all? He clearly thought he was a genius (and he probably was), but could he imagine himself capable of creating beautiful art without seeing in women all the humanity one finds in men? There is no life, or genius, without the union of the genders. Genius is no more masculine than it is feminine. Women may be different to men, but that difference is a hair's breadth. And to know it must certainly be genius. What are everybody's thoughts on the subject? Mind you I don't think any gender is better than the other, just the exclusivity seems to contradict the very gist of what people say genius is.

Also what is it with sterility and genius (particularly in women)? It's like they go hand in hand.

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Welcome. You have asked a very good question.

(I am breaking my own 'rule' by stepping off my current thread. Oh well.)

Feminist theory recognised, pretty clearly and with an awareness of a certain 'tragedy', that women for all of human history have been burdened to an extreme degree with the whole childrearing program. Second wave feminism (postwar feminism and 60s and 70s feminism) became acutely aware that woman's physical structure, and nature's commandment over woman's body, created a woman who was a slave not only to Nature but to society and the men she bred for. As you may or may not know feminism around that time, though it began earlier certainly, became doctrinally charged with a form of liberation theology with Marxist strains which placed much emphasis on the 'captive' aspect, the 'slave of patriarchy' aspect. The idea that patriarchal systems, and men, had to be overthrown came to be accepted. Too, it became evident that chemical and other technologies could be brought to bear on the 'problem' and for the first time in history the possibility of woman's independence from man and male culture emerged. Second Wave feminism went a little nuts in the 60s, 70s, and 80s as it experimented with all the possibilities for a woman's 'liberation' from a role assigned, essentially, by Nature and 'enforced' as it were by male-culture.

Feminist women recognised that to achieve what they envisioned for themselves that they'd have to get out from under the burden of childbearing and childrearing, and so pursue careers and university degrees. The 'bloodless revolution' of feminism achieved very significant, and volunteered, cooperation in this from men. There may have been and there likely was not any similar handing-over of power in history as has occurred in the 20th Century.

Otto Weininger is a figure of the late 19th Century. His notion of women is rooted in a late 19th Century vision of what woman is and can be. His notion of women was superceded by another wave of envisioning what women are or can be.

That Sex & Character became so influential to those who began this forum is a whole topic in itself, and is positively and negatively revealing. In my own view they seemed to seek and also to require boldly reductionist idea-sets in order to construct a platform to challenge and to rebel against trends in modern culture, in advertising and entertainment culture, in a cultural environment where a bona fide religious structure was falling apart, and where too 'tools' of self-construction were needed, and needed to be put on line in service against the identified enemies. It is easy to designate the 'feminisation of culture' as that enemy. The question is What is that? What does that mean?

One source to investigate the issue and problem of female identity is Camille Paglia. She always has surprising things to say.

One of my favourite ones:

If civilisation had been left in female hands we would still be living in grass huts.

She has a very different take on woman's power, and it is not necessarily favourable to the view you have expressed!

Women may be different to men, but that difference is a hair's breadth.

Evolutionary biology has also made some discoveries about sexual difference that has not been well received by PC culture ... It is contested and another battleground but some/numerous in that field do not support your notion of a hair's breadth. Women are conditioned differently biologically. It is something more than just 'a hair'.

The whole topic is a little complex. But super interesting.

[Bobo]

I think that one of the problems of 'genius' is that the genius is in some way the ideal or idealized human for humanity, in comparing 'concrete' geniuses one wouldn't find what makes them genius only what makes them human, generalizations instead of characteristics. So maybe genius is better compared to ideals and ideas rather than people.

And the problem with gender is that it depends on how usual or unusual your definitions and views of what genders are, and that will vary in societies, time, place, maybe with hormone levels in an individual, and in languages, and while languages can change over time the I/You/He/She/It are grammatical rules, they're laws inviolable in some sense.

Feminist women recognised that to achieve what they envisioned for themselves that they'd have to get out from under the burden of childbearing and childrearing, and so pursue careers and university degrees. The 'bloodless revolution' of feminism achieved very significant, and volunteered, cooperation in this from men. There may have been and there likely was not any similar handing-over of power in history as has occurred in the 20th Century.

So the power was handed by who (that had that power) to who?

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Should have written:

There may not have been and there likely was not any similar handing-over of power in history as has occurred in the 20th Century.

Men to women.

I think that one of the problems of 'genius' is that the genius is in some way the ideal or idealized human for humanity.

'Genius' as a term, and a core term used on GF, is a term that has to be unpacked before real sense can be made of it. Undertaking this, will place one both in opposition to and on the same side as those who coined the term in this context. Yet without the unpacking there is no way to really understand what it means. (And the same is true for all of the main terms they coin).

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Yet without the unpacking there is no way to really understand what it means. (And the same is true for all of the main terms they coin).

And the same is obviously true for all terms of a certain gravity. Perhaps it takes a genius to unpack anything at all? Then those incapable of unpacking are by definition those who are existing merely as packing material: the "made up" senses of ego. Woman then becomes just "cultural fiction" in the words of David Quinn, especially in the age of self.

Hence the idea that it takes a genius to unwrap the meaning of genius and a wise man to discover and grasp any available wisdom. Bootstrapping!

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Well well well. Recently there has been an increased use of the term 'dog-whistle'. Strange how these terms come up in one place and then spread to others. So, someone might include an innocuous word, or might inflect a word in a sentence written or spoken, that functions as a 'dog-whistle' functions: only those geared to hear it will hear it. I've seen it come up when progressives wish to point out that a text or statement is 'dog-whistling' a certain message to certain hearers, for example a racist tone or warning, as racism has been in the news certainly in the US of A.

I said that the term 'genius' has to be unpacked. But apparently there are higher frequencies in what I said that only sensitive ears can hear. You heard.

The meta-audial ...

But surely there is a meta-audial hearer who can dog-whistle more subtle frequencies even!

Suddenly, the whole frequency of Creation is 'heard' and then perhaps 'deciphered'.

And the same is obviously true for all terms of a certain gravity.

And levity!

Genius is no more masculine than it is feminine.

Before you can say that you have to have arrived at a definition of 'genius', or you have to have selected on that is favoured.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

I said that the term 'genius' has to be unpacked. But apparently there are higher frequencies in what I said that only sensitive ears can hear. You heard. The meta-audial ...

It's not difficult: your remark on unpacking can easily be applied to any philosophical term anywhere which indicates you're not actually saying anything.

But surely there is a meta-audial hearer who can dog-whistle more subtle frequencies even!

The genius hearer indeed.

Suddenly, the whole frequency of Creation is 'heard' and then perhaps 'deciphered'.

Genius is what genius does: the Earth whisperer!

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Yes, but you and I both know that what I mean is the following: The various terms used by our friends QR and S have meaning of which they are unconscious. In other words, they have to be 'unpacked' in the sense of 'exposed'. What they are---what they *mean*---is in fact somewhat different from what they meant by them.

Shall we begin to unpack what QRS mean by Woman?

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Yes, but you and I both know that what I mean is the following: The various terms used by our friends QR and S have meaning of which they are unconscious. In other words, they have to be 'unpacked' in the sense of 'exposed'. What they are---what they *mean*---is in fact somewhat different from what they meant by them.

Again, that holds true for nearly everything anyone would say, in terms of linguistics. Your terms and posts could be picked apart just the same. But for what purpose? Why not work with the surface meaning as described? And in any process of exposition, being it yours or Quinn's, various other "unpacked" elements will always play out again. All one does is starting with some presupposition that there are "certain factors" in the unconscious active which leads then to certain choices of words, literature and intonations. The problem is that one will always find exactly what one is looking for.

It's a game, Gustav. A ritual one can invoke. A power trip. And it doesn't need much audience, just asserting it might already be enough. Hence 3000 posts while you could have gotten your sociology or anthropology degree in the mean time....

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

What degree might any one of us have gotten here were it not for our service to mankind here on GF?

The purpose, you ask? The purpose?! The purpose is---or did I get this wrong?---the discovery of or the approximation to Truth.

Why not take life and Reality at a surface level?

It is not true that 'one finds only what one is looking for'. That is I think an incorrect statement on your part. One might indeed find something other than what one set out to find. But that depends too on the person.

When you say It's a game, I am inclined to ask for more explanation. What exactly is a game? Wisdom? Genius? Masculinity? Definitions? Or what we do here in lieu of advanced degrees?

A ritual one can invoke. A power trip. And it doesn't need much audience, just asserting it might already be enough.

Again, I really think this requires more explication.

You desire the ritual? And the power? Why not also include an audience? Myself, I shall dance for the lonely unicorn ...

It has been said that I am a romantic at heart ... ;-)

[Diebert van Rhijn]

I really think this requires more explication.

Which will invoke more words and phrases needing even more! It's better to just stick with accepting or rejecting with what I repeated already twice.

Which was that saying that "Genius" would be a "core term" that has "to be unpacked before real sense can be made of it" remains meaningless as statement because that qualification would be valid for each and every important term anyone brings up in any discussion. A red herring of some kind? And there are already many pages and discussions devoted on exploring the term, already on this site alone. Nobody ever complained it was not clear what was meant by it or that it needed something more. It's not something exact just like life, love, god, etc. But also not completely obscure either.

Your second statement of the terms "having meaning of which they are unconscious" is another statement without value. It cannot be denied or accepted. It's just that, a statement. It's rather common in linguistic studies to assume many factors which provide meaning: contexts, moods, expectations, bias, culture -- most of which people are hardly conscious of. But it's not like meaning grows when digging into the causal web. Actually the reverse. It's deconstruction, more like post-modern analysis but then applied only when convenient and resisted when it's not...

Lets not make this discussion become another demonstration about feminine types of reasoning versus the masculine way :-)

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Nobody ever complained it was not clear what was meant by it or that it needed something more. It's not something exact just like life, love, god, etc. But also not completely obscure either.

That is too bad. That is perhaps a mistake? A new examination, in a new 'temporal modality', may lead to new discoveries.

Which was that saying that "Genius" would be a "core term" that has "to be unpacked before real sense can be made of it" remains meaningless as statement because that qualification would be valid for each and every important term anyone brings up in any discussion.

Great! We shall discuss all of them.

Is it that you want me to desist? I say that the term Woman as well as Genius requires a certain amount of unpacking before one can begin to discuss the different levels of meaning. I am not hostile to the known, accepted, or surface meaning, and I have some ideas that dovetail with the QRS definitions. So, what do you want? Shall I crawl back to my own thread?

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Please do carry on exploring the meaning of genius and femininity in the context of the forum: spirituality, reason and the sensible. It doesn't need exploring hidden motives of anyone discussing a topic, now or in the past. And I've nothing more to add right now!

PS welcome Unicorn! Why call yourself lonely? Like the rhinoceros?

[Gustav Bjornstrand]

Under that condition I cannot participate.

[Bobo]

So, Gustav, men had this power and handed to women, if this was what happened I want to know how, why? What did they gained with it? Cui bono. Was it just a wave of altruism that lead them to do it? Or maybe, it must be, it was a conspiracy, it must be that, it's not like you don't know...

[Bobo]

Since genius should be compared to ideals instead of things, comparing the ideal of genius to the ideal of woman, I think that in Weininger's definition Woman has no/zero memory and by contrast Man must have a perfect memory, so Woman stand for ignorance (or innocence) and Man would stand for knowledge, Woman is the otherworldly and Man is worldly. In sexual attraction Man would be attracted to this ideal of outside of the world and Woman would be attracted to the worldly ideal. So somehow Genius is more comparable to the masculine side of things than not, trying to reach something, doing philosophy though seems more like the feminine side, gaining knowledge from as if it were innate ideas.

[jupiviv]

Under that condition I cannot participate.

I disagree with that vehemently. I for one would love to hear your recommendations for a studio Ring. The Solti is of course considered the definitive one, and for "immolation and ash" it is indeed unparalleled by any recording made since. However, in my view, it heavily disappoints with the first two, and one is almost forced to like them by virtue of the scherzo and finale.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

So ... men had this power and handed to women, if this was what happened I want to know how, why? What did they gained with it? Cui bono. Was it just a wave of altruism that lead them to do it?

Perhaps it's more like men as the perpetual seduced gender? Not by women as much but by image, power and promises of the sense of the eternal?

Since genius should be compared to ideals instead of things, comparing the ideal of genius to the ideal of woman, I think that in Weininger's definition Woman has no/zero memory and by contrast Man must have a perfect memory, so Woman stand for ignorance (or innocence) and Man would stand for knowledge, Woman is the otherworldly and Man is worldly. In sexual attraction Man would be attracted to this ideal of outside of the world and Woman would be attracted to the worldly ideal. So somehow Genius is more comparable to the masculine side of things than not, trying to reach something, doing philosophy though seems more like the feminine side, gaining knowledge from as if it were innate ideas.

Man projects his "otherworldly" ideals upon the objects of his desire. This opens up whole avenues of manipulation. Used historically by the weak (who is not strong should become smart, manipulative and devious to fulfill certain biological prerogatives: food, offspring, protection). In modern times this role is best visible in advertisement, which is making a living by manipulating the dreams of the spenders, even to provide whole new dreams to project the desire for meaning and immortality on. The gender gap would collapse simply because there's now a new class of people arising which only can exist and survive by steering a population by their dreams. The media-political complex?

[Pam Seeback]

It is the fallacious idea of self that is perpetually seduced as it is the idea of self that perpetuates the illusion of a divided reality, i.e., one gender versus another gender. How else can the illusory communicate except by the use of illusion, aka seduction and manipulation? The self has no choice but to fool itself. In relation to the idea of genius, a genius would be one who has wisdom of the fallacious self and is actively eliminating its foolish ways within their consciousness.

[Bobo]

I can see how women could go on a sex strike, but if men went on a strike they would just be substituted by women. Probably there was a "women can't do this" reaction to it too. But the answer is that the model that increases profits wins and becomes the norm. Marketing and lower shelf life are parts of it, the class that rose was of the financial capital again that treats people and the rest only as numbers. (If you look at the WW women were already being employed on men's jobs that were lower classes jobs, and at some point they start getting the higher positions in power too.)

[Diebert van Rhijn]

It is the fallacious idea of self that is perpetually seduced as it is the idea of self that perpetuates the illusion of a divided reality, i.e., one gender versus another gender. How else can the illusory communicate except by the use of illusion, aka seduction and manipulation? The self has no choice but to fool itself. In relation to the idea of genius, a genius would be one who has wisdom of the fallacious self and is actively eliminating its foolish ways within their consciousness.

The self is perpetually seduced -- even your genius will still propel a self as he's being seduced by this idea of elimination, true selves and undivided realities.

I can see how women could go on a sex strike, but if men went on a strike they would just be substituted by women. Probably there was a "women can't do this" reaction to it too. But the answer is that the model that increases profits wins and becomes the norm. Marketing and lower shelf life are parts of it, the class that rose was of the financial capital again that treats people and the rest only as numbers. (If you look at the WW women were already being employed on men's jobs that were lower classes jobs, and at some point they start getting the higher positions in power too.)

Sex can be replaced by so many other things. It's after all the various hormonal releases which provide reward, no matter if it's love, lust or intimacy. The problem with modern economies is that the coinage is emotion, desire -- perceived values. Even sexuality and gender relationships become product, itemized into a life style of choice. But from the philosophical point of view that is the feminization of society. As Baudrillard wrote: "Femininity ...is not the pole opposed to masculinity, but what abolishes the differential opposition, and thus sexuality itself ... "

And I quoted her before here:

• "There is only one sex, the masculine, that elaborates itself in and through the production of the Other".
  -- Luce Irigaray

[Bobo]

Sex sells. The question is why the model that was sold post war as the apex of capitalist production in the US didin't stick. The fact is that the middle class in the US only eroded since. By what the model was you could say that there was a feminization of society or even a niggerization. It is more difficult to blame women (wife, sister, daughters) for the precarization of social relations than feminism, it was probably easier in the 19th century since it concerned politics, the right to vote, etc.

By my earlier interpretation of Weininger's view on genders anything worldly would be masculine, the positive existence in the world, so the view of woman as a fiction could have a place in it. Woman as sexuality though would only work if you view masculinity as the phallic, the other is the other of the phallus.

[Pam Seeback]

Diebert van Rhijn wrote:

movingalways wrote:
It is the fallacious idea of self that is perpetually seduced as it is the idea of self that perpetuates the illusion of a divided reality, i.e., one gender versus another gender. How else can the illusory communicate except by the use of illusion, aka seduction and manipulation? The self has no choice but to fool itself. In relation to the idea of genius, a genius would be one who has wisdom of the fallacious self and is actively eliminating its foolish ways within their consciousness.

The self is perpetually seduced -- even your genius will still propel a self as he's being seduced by this idea of elimination, true selves and undivided realities.

I never used the concept of true selves or undivided realities (plural). Were you not suggesting the idea of elimination when you posted this in the "An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment" thread? "Doubt is fundamental but even the average nihilist doesn't take it really that far. The certainties of ones own mind should not be discarded but instead fully understood: to arrive beyond certainties and doubts. But it's unlikely anyone could come that far without tremendous trust in the abilities of the mind, the power of logic and the application of absolute truth in the most simple, natural way. But this is like all wisdom, it appears only in contrast with ignorance like certainty works in contrast with doubt. The absolute cannot be successfully doubted simply because it's not knowledge to own or capture. For that reason doubt should be encouraged, because as long it's still possible to raise any, the subject is not absolute yet."

It is true that a self is propelled during the process of "arriving beyond" to realize the absolute but it is a self of necessity (the parable of the raft attributed to the Buddha comes to mind).

[ardy]

Does anybody else find it strange that so many beliefs about genius say females are really incapable of it? I mean is it not ironic that Weininger, for example, should claim genius to include all possible persons, but he should think women nothing at all? He clearly thought he was a genius (and he probably was), but could he imagine himself capable of creating beautiful art without seeing in women all the humanity one finds in men? There is no life, or genius, without the union of the genders. Genius is no more masculine than it is feminine. Women may be different to men, but that difference is a hair's breadth. And to know it must certainly be genius. What are everybody's thoughts on the subject? Mind you I don't think any gender is better than the other, just the exclusivity seems to contradict the very gist of what people say genius is.

Also what is it with sterility and genius (particularly in women)? It's like they go hand in hand.

To my understanding there is no impediment to women as geniuses (more of a rare intelligence to my mind) and there are many examples in history. Most of what I think is stated better than I could by Gustav.

[Bobo]

I've re-read Diebert and I agree with a lot of what you wrote. The strong may be identified as the creators of new values and they will be attacked by the weak as the destructors of value, as a threat to their biological imperatives. Advertisement, emotions, are forms that are geared to be meaningless exchanges, as money, that bonds the herd and enforces their values. I don't think there is a new class per se, what we see are the effects of mechanization on a process that is based on the threat and submission of biological imperatives towards embodiment and promises of value.