https://youtu.be/N7hGW9wybbA
Of course I don't think Trump is, but a lot of people think ones ability to make money makes them smart.
https://youtu.be/q2-Xh_G2tXw
I agree with this, but in no way was Edison a genius, he was a tinkerer, and nothing more, who probably stole ideas from his employees. He was a truly horrible greedy person----the Ugly American.
Quote from: Solitary on July 26, 2015, 02:19:31 PM
https://youtu.be/N7hGW9wybbA
Of course I don't think Trump is, but a lot of people think ones ability to make money makes them smart.
After all his comments about Mexicans being drug-addicted rapists and disparaging POWs he is somehow ahead of all the other GOP candidates. I don’t know if that speaks more about GOP voters or the other GOP candidates. Whether or not you support troops or war or America, I think anyone with half a brain knows that making fun of former POWs isn't akin to political suicide; it's closer to a political suicide bombing. He might as well have taken a shit on the Bible, wiped with the American flag, and thrown it at a black guy and told him that’s all he was worth. His campaign is like a caricature of the film The Campaign, and how people think he's still a good idea is beyond me. Seriously, the list of things I'd vote for before him includes a stray dog and a gold-plated Toyota Corolla.
The one thing trump hasn't thrown out is religion. Maybe there is some sanity to the madness.
Didn't he say something about the Pope should stay out of science? I know, it was another Republican moron. It's like they are making sure the Democrats win. Are we being hoodwinked by the Illuminati to make sure their guy gets elected---or should I say a woman? :lol: :axe:
Aristotle is supposedly the all time winner (loser?) of this contest.
I believe Thomas Edison would win second place.
Michaelangelo was a bit of a brooder, but I think misunderstood.
Same with Mozart who was a bit egocentric, and Beethoven who was a bit neurotic.
Nobody really liked Newton, which is kind of too bad considering how much he contributed.
Galileo had balls and a parodic sense of humor, but with that he tended to rub the wrong people the wrong way.
That being said I'd love to meet any of those guys, (well, most of them) I'm sure they would be thrilled to see how they have influenced our world.
I know I must be missing at least a couple dozen prime examples though.
Michelangelo was a religious nutjob.
I'm not so sure about that, because the Pope criticized a painting of his where he had slippers on the angels, and Michelangelo asked him if anyone has ever seen them without slippers? You didn't dare let it be known you were a skeptic or atheist during that time.
It's hard to want to criticize people for being too religious in a time where not being religious enough might have gotten you tortured until you agreed to be religious and then were mercifully executed.
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Quote from: Cocoa Beware on July 26, 2015, 10:35:59 PM
Nobody really liked Newton, which is kind of too bad considering how much he contributed.
Actually, Newton
was something of a rampaging asshole. Look up his actions during the conflict with Leibniz over who invented the calculus -- Newton, as head of the Royal Society, appointed a panel stacked with his men to "study" the matter, then wrote the report for them and essentially accusing Leibniz of plagiarism.
I've been told many times that I was a jerk, so….that would mean...
Quote from: aitm on August 17, 2015, 09:55:00 PM
I've been told many times that I was a jerk, so….that would mean...
Non-Sequitur, though today there might be an exception. :smile:
Quote from: trdsf on August 17, 2015, 08:08:51 PM
Actually, Newton was something of a rampaging asshole. Look up his actions during the conflict with Leibniz over who invented the calculus -- Newton, as head of the Royal Society, appointed a panel stacked with his men to "study" the matter, then wrote the report for them and essentially accusing Leibniz of plagiarism.
He was so crazy I'm amazed he was able to accomplish what he did when he wasn't being crazy.
He actually took alchemy as seriously as he did physics for one thing. A very strange life, definitely mixed reviews.
Why Michelangelo should be considered as religious?
First of all, Michelangelo was not the man on the street. He was under protection of a tyrant who admired profane life and encouraged-inspired everyone around him to understand a life and knowledge out of heavy middle ages religious version of life.
We know that Michelangelo was a great fan of Savanarola that he was very impressed by him when he first listened to him preaching when he was 19. Although he was gone under Medici patronage younger. He was born in 1475, he went to Medici in 1489. He was also considerably ignorant compared to other apprentices around him, he wasn't interested in classic education when his father forced him. He got an education it later.
I always think that his family, specifically his father played a lot of role for him not to be able to break through from some sort of stuck between opposites status. Between religiously money greedy, vulgar father wanted to go upper class and a more educated, art loving mother; his humble worker of god in dust nature with aristocratic, glorious life he had to survive. He was not an aristocrat in nature, couldn't act politically when needed and actually his life is pretty much sad behind that gorly of a genius thing. The nature of classical sculpting could have had a lot to do with this.
In those times, probably you know that there is no such thing as being an artist, but just successful craftsmans of certain guilds working for aristocrats, rulers and cardinals and popes. Well also generally in that culture occupations are defined as 'dirty' and 'clean', the best, higher or lower. Sculpting in this sense always caused conflicts among artists and their patronage through time. Considered lowest and dirtiest of arts, because it is technically about chipping stones in dust, playing with mud, while drawing and painting is more 'intelligent' and a 'clean' job. (There is a reason why Leonardo didn't do traditional sculpting, but cast bronze sculptures. Probably even them just because he had to.) Which sounds so funny to us now. It's also much more expensive, takes a lot of time and it comes and goes out of fashion very fast. (There is also a general 'fear', conflicted feelings against 'sculpture' you can observe through history. Never treated as some ordinary art like others.)
It always felt to me like Michelangelo resented this judgement. When you read about him he is always presented as 'painter and architect' as it should be, but it's obvious he disliked painting and as a reaction he saw it as a 'lower' art because it is not 3 dimensional. There was god's creatures, life in stone. He helped them to get out by removing the excess. What is there in painting?
So his prudence or what I expressed with a hyperbolic way, his religiousness is also related about his place among other artists; as a sculptor working with stone (flesh) like god made man. Direct material to work with. Painting is a reflection and very undirect. He worked in life size or bigger. People who commisioned him certain style of works to celebrate a specific culture. While the reason Lorenzo chose him for his ability of producing art works resembling classical beauty -which conflicts christian understanding of aesthetics of that time, it is just about to be born- Michelangelo sculpted those with a simpler understanding of god's truth of man's nature. Yes, later he did got educated in that culture, but he has always been loyal to stone and reflecting god with it other than making progress to some simple style. Because like Dürer, Mcihelangelo didn't need to study neoplatonism to promote that artistic style. He already had it, it was what he saw when look around.
The only reasons Michelangelo accepted to paint Sistine Chapel is that he was responsible for sending money to his father -who basically did nothing but badger him for money- he was ordered by a pope and because the pope promised him the greatest sculpture garden ever made -pope's tomb-. It didn't happen. He also almost got blind painting that stupid ceiling because of an accident.
His latest pietas are designed to show himself as the 'altar' holding christ after taken down from the crucifix, while his most famous pieta of young years is presenting a christ in the altar like a sacrifice to God -held by the Virgin, who he depicted as beautiful and young woman because he believed women didn't get old or ugly when they remained virgins.
That's a big gap. Most of the artists saw themselves as a medium between god and people, carrying, visualising his word. He saw himself as a part of that divinity, that ability to 'create'. What he did was sacred to him far more than others. He is a different sort of fanatic.
E: PS: Was Michelangelo a 'jerk'? He certainly was. He got his nose broken, because he heavily insulted a work of a close friend (Caracci? don't remember) in the workshop. It was blasphemy to him not to be able to depict 'man' as god created him. He is also known for his strong grumpiness and stubbornness.
Quote from: drunkenshoe on July 27, 2015, 03:00:15 AM
Michelangelo was a religious nutjob.
On account of his religious paintings, which kept him employed and alive as an artist in a time where free artistic expression would get most artists killed?
Quote from: peacewithoutgod on August 18, 2015, 08:00:39 AM
On account of his religious paintings, which kept him employed and alive as an artist in a time where free artistic expression would get most artists killed?
No, on account of the interpretation of his time, Medici, the movement of Renaissance, his acts described by Vasari -along with others- and his works. There is a post just above this one.
Michelangelo didn't use a 'free artistic expression', he was apprenticed at 13 and then given to Lorenzo de Medici by Ghirlandaio who were looking for apprentices to produce work of arts in a certain 'new exciting style' (ancient Roman) as he saw the examples getting dug out from earth. Ghirlandaio gave the best apprentice he thought was suitable to be a sculptor. It's a conscious demand and supply. He tried many of them, Michelangelo did the best job and rest is history. The tradition of sculpture as art was dead and Lorenzo tried specifically to revive it, to revive ancient Roman culture. Because he was rich and powerful enough.
There are no 'artists' in 15 or 16th centuries that would get 'influenced' from some untraditional painting to spread around and get killed. There is no market for art as we have today. Only production of religious images. There are craftsman working for guilds. Michelangelo didn't have/use any 'free artistic expression'. 'Free artistic expression' is something belong to time of hundreds of years later. There is no such thing as 'free artistic expression' in 15 or 16 century nor the understanding of it. Michelangelo or let's say Leonardo cannot even comprehend 'the idea of free artistic expression' or the movements and the concept of art that caused its existence.
Artists used nude figures after a certain style and culture is established solely under the protection of patrons; powerful tyrants rich enough to lend money to Vatican and military power to over run a city state. Only after that imitating ancient art works become the norm in time, then it became art. Also the sign of mastery of natural art, hence they judged art according to its resemblance of nature. Something we look at today just as a 'primitive' period art had to go through. Imitation of nature. (I don't mean specific taste people have or the styles they use in their art.)
This has nothing to do with people or the art works' influence on them to spread around people to get them killed. I don't mean nobody got killed or got in trouble because of art. I mean there is NO USE for it in this sense. The works are done for tyrants, aristocrats, popes and kings and their desire to promote themselves and their politics after they discovered that culture is something that can be transformed in to politics.
I really dont see why it matters what Michaelangelo was or wasn't religion wise, but given the time he lived in... the "burden of proof", if we want to use that, is on the person claiming he was an anomaly and not religious. There is no reason to believe he didn't fit the cultural norms of his time, other than you want to claim him as part of your camp. That's all fine and well if you have any proof, but there is none.
There is a common understanding or let's say a belief among Westerners and Easterners that certain figures from Western History -famous writers, 'humanists', philosophers and artists- are secular. I don't think people are to blame.
There are various reasons for this, but I'm so tired and it's a long post for another time. Just got a cold beer. It's so fucking hot here and I have 351 pages left. :sad2:
Thomas Edison,he and Tesla were huge rivals,I think they may have captured a bit of it in the movie the prestige.
Steve Jobs. Just putting that here because the thread is titled geniuses that were jerks and I'm pretty sure that if we made it to three pages without any mention of him, we'd be breaking some sort of internet law.
Quote from: Marlo on October 12, 2016, 01:22:01 AM
Thomas Edison,he and Tesla were huge rivals,I think they may have captured a bit of it in the movie the prestige.
Did you read or see the bit, where J P Morgan goaded Edison into inventing the electric chair, to try to discredit Tesla? Until then, sure I admired Edison, not much afterward ;-(
If memory serves right, Oppenheimer tried to kill someone. One of his professors? Not sure who he was. But he was 'excused' because he is a genius.
It's something more than being a jerk though.
Quote from: drunkenshoe on October 13, 2016, 03:42:02 AM
If memory serves right, Oppenheimer tried to kill someone. One of his professors? Not sure who he was. But he was 'excused' because he is a genius.
It's something more than being a jerk though.
Well that sure gives a whole new context to him saying, "Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds."
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Do all Hindu Jews try to kill their professors? Jesus' transfiguration on Mt Tabor was stolen from the Gita, where Krishna fully reveals himself to Arjuna.
On the other hand, you can disagree about the existence or necessity of using something as horrible as a nuclear weapon ... but I don't think that was Dr Oppenheimer's call.
Well he tried to poison him...that's all I remember. Can't be bothered to google. Somebody do it, lol.
At the risk of seeming crude, most geniuses are jerks in the eyes of regular society. They don't fit in. That doesn't mean they are mean or rude (deliberately anyway), just misunderstrood... ;) Obsessed, focused, whatever.