Is scientific genius a thing of the past?

A Natureessay argues society can no longer produce Einsteins. Scary thought, right?

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Einstein, Darwin, Galileo, Mendeleev: the names of the great scientific minds throughout history inspire awe in those of us who love science. However, according to Dean Keith Simonton, a psychology professor at UC Davis, the era of the scientific genius may be over. In a comment paper published in Nature last week, he explains why.

The “scientific genius” Simonton refers to is a particular type of scientist; their contributions “are not just extensions of already-established, domain-specific expertise." Instead, “the scientific genius conceives of a novel expertise.” Simonton uses words like “groundbreaking” and “overthrow” to illustrate the work of these individuals, explaining that they each contributed to science in one of two major ways: either by founding an entirely new field or by revolutionizing an already-existing discipline.

Today, according to Simonton, there just isn’t room to create new disciplines or overthrow the old ones. “It is difficult to imagine that scientists have overlooked some phenomenon worthy of its own discipline,” he writes. Furthermore, most scientific fields aren’t in the type of crisis that would enable paradigm shifts, according to Thomas Kuhn’s classic view of scientific revolutions. Simonton argues that instead of finding big new ideas, scientists currently work on the details in increasingly specialized and precise ways.