Before answering this question, I will share an anecdote that will shed light on my response. During one of my talks, I told the audience that it would be interesting to see how brilliant we could make a human by starting when the child was an infant and feeding it only when it solved a problem. Over time, the difficulty of the problems would increase, building the child’s tolerance for failure and (hopefully) developing a voracious appetite for solving problems. Such an experiment might give us some insights into how much an environment can foster the development of problem solving ability. Before moving forward in my presentation, I overhead a woman in one of the front rows say, “I’d hate to be his kid.” She didn’t realize that I was proposing a Gedanken (thought only) experiment, and hadn’t inflicted such torture on any of my offspring.
Many parents wonder whether they can provide an environment that will endow their children with exceptional intelligence. Research suggests that our fluid intelligence, as measured by IQ sets an upper limit on our cognitive skills and providing fertile environments for learning can only yield positive results up to that limit. Since genius in most fields requires a very high IQ, it is unlikely that any interventions will transform even a high IQ person into a genius.
True genius usually requires, in addition to a very high IQ, certain personality qualities such as social detachment, introversion, and a “driven” passion to achieve something. These characteristics have been outlined in a variety of books including Melissa Schilling’s Quirky (2018) in which she highlights the foibles of several acknowledged geniuses such as Ben Franklin, Albert Einstein, Steve Jobs, and Elon Musk.
However, by providing an enlightened environment that encourages reading, exploration and robust discussion, a parent can significantly increase what psychologists call “crystallized intelligence.” These are the acquired skills such as language facility, people skills, and mathematical knowledge that will increase their children’s total intelligence.
Genius, however, requires a chemical compound composed of the right proportions of personality traits, high IQ, and environment. We control only one of these variables.
