An Argument for Analogies—Polymaths 1/3

The following is a link-post to a series about polymathy (..ism?) and makes a case for arguing by analogy as opposed to first principles (most of the time). It also has embedded audio, read by me, if you prefer to listen.Renaissance Men*I’ve always been fascinated by polymaths—people who thrive in different domains of expertise, like Leonardo Da Vinci who excelled at art alongside engineering and hydraulics, anatomy, optics, and architecture or Benjamin Franklin who, while developing many of the foundational ideas of modern democracy, was also busily inventing new scientific technologies like bi-focal lenses.These “Renaissance Men” seem to have been able to do the impossible—to explore both broadly and deeply.Cross-PollinatorsThis ability was no doubt due to a prodigious intelligence and curiosity, but it was also about their methodology. By becoming experts in multiple fields, polymaths are able to create breakthroughs in one domain through their understanding of another. Leonardo’s art was informed by his knowledge of anatomy and opticsBenjamin Franklin’s broad political understanding of society’s needs, made him better able to cater to those needs through invention.Polymaths TodayBut polymaths are not merely a relic of a past age—when it was possible for one person to “know everything”, as was reputed of John Stuart Mill (1815–1873) the last man to know everything there was to know in the world .Kurzweil is a name synonymous with the Kurzweil brand of electric keyboards which were the first to synthesise accurate acoustic sound, and introduced weighted keys to complement the true sound with the true feel of a real piano. But Ray Kurzweil also combined his understanding of sound with linguistics and neuroscience to pioneer speech recognition technology, and to become a leading voice in futurism today.And then there’s our potentially problematic polymath Elon Musk, who also has his pinkies in a plethora of pies: from e-commerce to electric cars, rockets, batteries,