What is talent? How do you know you're musically talented?

[faulty_damper]

So here's a question: would having a cognitive disability mean that a person is less talented?  I've purposefully avoided this because it would complicate the topic because there are many types of cognitive disabilities.  But having worked in special education, I've had many students claim fervently that they couldn't do something due to their disability.  They either wouldn't try or quickly give up.  But usually all it takes is for me to sit down with them and provide specific instruction before they get it.  But the moment I leave, they go back to not trying.  Now, these were teenagers who've been demoralized over many years and experiencing a couple of successes isn't going to change the way they feel about themselves.  They still think of themselves as less capable than their peers even if their disability had nothing to do with the subject.  Just thinking they were stupid made them act stupid by not trying or giving up.

Part of talent is the ability to cope with the stresses of failure.  Anyone who plays an instrument and has had good success knows that success is measured in fractions of a single percentage.  You will fail hundreds of times before getting it right once.  And even if you get it right once, that doesn't guarantee that it will stick.  The untalented person will think that getting it right once is enough.

In my culture if you try and fail, you should move on to another activity to "find what you're good at."  Unfortunately, this mindset hinders those who have to put in more effort than the rest, like those with intellectual or developmental disabilities.  I've never met one student with ID who didn't compare him or herself to their "normal" peers.  They see that their peers get it quickly and they try to act the same, sabotaging their own potential success, and becoming demoralized in the process.  Even amongst the "normal" crowd, this behavior can be seen.  And those who are successful often hide or downplay the fact that they do study and put in more effort than the rest  Somehow, being smart (at least in American culture) is seen as a negative attribute because no one wants to be labelled a "geek" or a "nerd".

[dima_76557]

So here's a question: would having a cognitive disability mean that a person is less talented?

Overall you mean? Not necessarily if that person can find a way around the problem. The others who don't have that disability do have a headstart, of course, if we assume that both work hard to prepare for a test in the same way and with the same time limit imposed upon them. I think the time limit is the crucial limiting factor most of the time for good performance in standardized tests.
P.S.: Very "talented" people seem to have slower alpha brain waves while performing and focus on the set task only, while the "less prepared" (I deliberatly avoid the word "untalented") people's brains work like crazy, not necessarily focusing on the set task alone and thus wasting lots of energy into nowhere.

[outin]

So here's a question: would having a cognitive disability mean that a person is less talented? 

Yes, to me that's exactly what it means (assuming that the disability affects the task in question), because of the way I define talent.

That should not lead to the conclusion that it's not worth trying to learn or that one is completely untalented. But understanding and accepting the limitations give one the freedom to study and learn in a different way than what is the norm, instead of trying to hammer something into the head in a way that is useless. That's what special  education should be about, accepting the differences and inventing and applying individual learning strategies. It won't do much to just offer more tutoring if the tutoring is just the same as with an average student. One reason why the students "stop trying" after an intervention may as well be because the intervention was not really effective, it only worked temporarily. The students must understand themselves (that they learn differently and how they learn) for them to continue having good results. Some manage to do it on their own, but many never do and just accept their faith as being unable to learn.

I think the instructor must understand that when the student says "I cannot do it" what they really should be saying (and often also really mean) is "I cannot do it THAT WAY".

[dima_76557]

I think the instructor must understand that when the student says "I cannot do it" what they really should be saying (and often also really mean) is "I cannot do it THAT WAY".

Yes. If we limit this again to piano playing, then a person with very poor body memory is not helped by sending him/her to a teacher that focuses on "listening" because the frustration will grow, the results will stay poor (may even become worse) and the student will only be confirmed in the idea that he/she is "untalented" overall.

[faulty_damper]

That's what special  education should be about, accepting the differences and inventing and applying individual learning strategies.

BwaHAHAHAHA!!!!
I'm being sarcastic but that's not what special education is about, at least no here in America.  Special education here is about dumbing down the work, letting them do less work, telling teachers to pass students even if they don't do the work or come to class... e.g. one student showed up to class ONCE on the first day and never came back.  He passed history with a D-.  This same student, in another class, showed up but didn't do any work at all passed English with a C-.  The teacher asked his special education counselor what grade he should receive and that was the grade he was told to give him.  While this example seems a bit extreme, it highlights just how big the bones are tossed for them.  Real instruction, for most students with cognitive disabilities, is non-existent.

[outin]

BwaHAHAHAHA!!!!
I'm being sarcastic but that's not what special education is about, at least no here in America. 

I am not in America...It's not always working here either, but I wouldn't say it's that bad.

[faulty_damper]

There is an incredible divide between cognitive research and educators.  It seems like it takes 10-20 years for research to even knock on educators' doors.  Unfortunately when that happens, if it happens at all, that research can sometime be outdated but it's taught like it's new to aspiring teachers.  These teachers get their teaching license and practice what they learned only to realize it doesn't work and think they're doing something wrong.

Worst still is that teacher training programs still rely on the principles of pedagogy, not science, to instruct students.  This means that instruction techniques are taught without any understanding of why it works.  Often times, new teachers who try these techniques fail at using them.  Why? Because a teacher's personality strongly influences the manner in which he instructs and using tools from another teacher's toolbox may not work for him.

I am very harsh on teachers for these and other reasons.  Teachers should be the epitome of knowledge but they are incredibly ignorant, at least here in the states.  When I think of a teacher, I think of a poorly educated person who earns too much, even though he thinks he doen't earn enough.

[dima_76557]

@ faulty_damper

In the context of this thread, it is good to point out that GOOD teachers are born. It is something someone has a TALENT/APTITUDE for and it cannot be learned, really. No amount of scientific progress and or quality improvement in teacher training programs is going to change that.

[outin]

Worst still is that teacher training programs still rely on the principles of pedagogy, not science, to instruct students.  This means that instruction techniques are taught without any understanding of why it works. 

Obviously you only talk about the system you know about. A masters degree from a university is required for teachers here. Knowledge and some methodological training in scientific reaserch is included in their degree. How well they incorporate that in their work is of course depending in the individual teacher. The same people who teach the future teachers are doing scientific research. Special education teachers usually have a degree for that special field.

Our school system is not as perfect as it is sometimes presented, but that is mostly to financial cutbacks, not because the teachers are not competent.

[dima_76557]

Knowledge and some methodological training in scientific reaserch is included in their degree.

The problem is that to become a GOOD teacher, you need not only knowledge and skills, but also supernatural intuition and great wisdom to decide what's right in a certain situation for a certain student. This is not included in a teacher training program and science does not (yet) give clues on how to do this. You can't teach non-standard people with standardized methods.

P.S.: Neuhaus did not "touch" Richter because he realized he would have ruined a precious stone if he had done so. At the same time, Neuhaus did not recognize anything special in Gilels except for the latter's tendency to play everything very loudly and very fast, so, instead of sacking him for "lack of talent", he simply let him transfer back to Berta Reingbald, who did what was necessary to help Gilels develop into the giant we know. So, a certain kind of humility is also a requirement for a really good Teacher.

[outin]

The problem is that to become a GOOD teacher, you need not only knowledge and skills, but also supernatural intuition and great wisdom to decide what's right in a certain situation for a certain student. This is not included in a teacher training program and science does not (yet) give clues on how to do this. You can't teach non-standard people with standardized methods.

But when we talk about the general school system, there's no way that we could have only teachers with "supernatural intuition".
I don't completely agree about the science part. Those who study to be special education teachers are being trained to assess what's right in a certain situation for a certain student and scientific discoveries have changed the way teachers are taught. Knowledge and skills will go a long way even if there's no supernatural intuition.
Of course my detailed knowledge of teacher training is limited to the local system here (with which I interact quite frequently) so that is what I can talk about. I know very well that the requirements for becoming a teacher and the quality of teacher education can be really low in some parts of the world...

If we go back to piano, many piano teachers have no teacher training at all, so for them the natural intuition and great wisdom is of course important.

[faulty_damper]

In the context of this thread, it is good to point out that GOOD teachers are born. It is something someone has a TALENT/APTITUDE for and it cannot be learned, really. No amount of scientific progress and or quality improvement in teacher training programs is going to change that.

In the literature, instructional interventions for teachers almost always result in a student performance increase.  In other words, when teachers are given feedback on their instruction, they improve their teaching skills and as a result, their students' test scores increase.  This performance increase is permanent because the teachers' skills have improved.

Teaching requires highly specialized skill sets that, when utilized in the correct context, can significantly improve student learning.  I've never met any teacher who was "naturally" good at it though others have made this comment about me.  However, they were completely ignorant of my teaching history and assumed I was new when I've actually had several years of screwing up.  My teaching skills are the result of learning from my mistakes and my lack of fear in trying new things, but most especially my knowledge of how the human mind works.

[faulty_damper]

Those who study to be special education teachers are being trained to assess what's right in a certain situation for a certain student and scientific discoveries have changed the way teachers are taught. Knowledge and skills will go a long way even if there's no supernatural intuition.

This is highly dependent on how accurate the research knowledge is.  But like I mentioned before, sometimes, findings are overturned.  And unfortunately, there is still a lot of pedagogical methodology that influences the interpretation of the scientific literature.  Add to this the fact that it's rare for teachers to be up to date in their field so we end up having dinosaurs teaching our children with outdated practice methods.

If you delve into the educational psychological research, the literature is overfilled with observations that, at least in the US, teachers are often doing more harm than good.  I only did a surface review of the literature because I became so disgusted with what I read.  The only good thing that teachers have going for them is something teacher unions oft repeat: "teachers make a difference."  However, the literature is more specific than that: Some teachers make a difference some of the time.  The rest do nothing or harm their students but are keen to ride on the wave of some of these teachers' successes.

[j_menz]

we end up having dinosaurs teaching our children

Cooooolll!! 

[dima_76557]

@ faulty_damper

I did not mean to say that teachers do not need specialized skills they can learn in teacher training programs. What I am saying is that if you get results where most other teachers fail, you HAVE TO admit to yourself that you are at least a little bit more talented teacher in that field than all the others, and that what you can give to your students is not just based on skills anybody can learn.

For some reason, some people find it frightening, unfair, etc. to admit that some people are different from others, that some are more or less talented than others, that some are tall and others are not so tall, that some have a big nose and others a small one, etc. That is a mistake from the hippie time, I guess. In an attempt to be fair and just, they close their eyes, distort the truth, inhibit the really gifted and destroy the little talent the not-so-gifted have by giving them inappropriate methods based on data for average people. Mediocrity is the result and it is just unfair to the ones that fall outside the category "average" at both sides of the spectrum.

P.S.: How lucky we are that Chopin did not enter Kalkbrenner's 3-year "Virtuoso Factory". We would have missed a lot and Kalkbrenner would have killed the Polish genius, I'm sure.

[faulty_damper]

I don't consider what I've achieved "talent".  I had to study material no teacher, either in training or in occupation, ever reads.  And I spent an incredible amount of time trying to understand it and apply it.  I've never met any teacher who does what I do: invest in so much effort to become better.  That's what makes me different from everyone else: seeing other teachers' OK-plateau and knowing that's not where I want to be.

Is having far higher standards than everyone else a talent?  No.  Is putting in effort that no one else would put in a talent?  No.  But the results appear, to everyone else, that I'm "talented".  In my opinion, I'm not lazy; or, when others choose to do the easy thing, I choose to do the hard thing.  You learn more by doing the hard thing than the easy thing.  And I've achieved a lot more than most everyone else because I chose to do the hard things.

"Talent" is a word that the lazy use as an excuse for their mental laziness.  It takes the focus off them and onto someone else.

[dima_76557]

"Talent" is a word that the lazy use as an excuse for their mental laziness.  It takes the focus off them and onto someone else.

In order to reevaluate this topic, you should try to do the reverse of what you have been doing up to now. Let's say you have always worked with the less talented. Visit an institution for the specially gifted and you will see that they are a special breed that need a different non-standardized approach, each his/her own.
P.S.: Not everybody with equal skills can become a heart surgeon, not everybody can become a wine taster. If you are tall, it works well for you in basketball and volleyball, but it may work against you in table tennis. Why is that so difficult to accept?

[j_menz]

In my opinion, I'm not lazy; or, when others choose to do the easy thing, I choose to do the hard thing.  You learn more by doing the hard thing than the easy thing. 

You do rather need to be careful, though, that you're not actually just doing the easy thing the hard way.

My definition of talent would be an aptitude for finding the easy way to do the hard thing.

[outin]

My definition of talent would be an aptitude for finding the easy way to do the hard thing.

You do have a point there.
I guess the challenge for someone with talent is to find the balance between that and just avoiding hard work altogether because one usually can. Talented children often suffer from not being exposed to any real challenges in early school years. They may waste their time trying to find ways not to do the easy thing at all...

[j_menz]

Talented children often suffer from not being exposed to any real challenges in early school years. They may waste their time trying to find ways not to do the easy thing at all...

Not just in early school years, either.

Of course, the time they are "wasting" on avoiding the easy things may actually be being spent on finding ways to do the impossible things. It can be deceptively difficult to tell the difference.

[outin]

Not just in early school years, either.

Of course, the time they are "wasting" on avoiding the easy things may actually be being spent on finding ways to do the impossible things. It can be deceptively difficult to tell the difference.

Yes, but what I meant is they may spend their time inventing ways to avoid assignments that are too easy/meaningless for them...
I think the pattern gets pretty fixed in the early years and is difficult to break later.

[j_menz]

Yes, but what I meant is they may spend their time inventing ways to avoid assignments that are too easy/meaningless for them...
I think the pattern gets pretty fixed in the early years and is difficult to break later.

Why would you want to break it. Getting out of doing pointless tasks seems a useful skill.

[dima_76557]

My definition of talent would be an aptitude for finding the easy way to do the hard thing.

I would add "on their own" without anybody helping them.

[j_menz]

I would add "on their own" without anybody helping them.

Possibly in most cases and certainly in some, but I wouldn't make it a requirement. Sometimes the easiest way to solve something is to ask someone who knows the solution.

[outin]

Why would you want to break it. Getting out of doing pointless tasks seems a useful skill.

Mostly I think you are right...I think I learned some very important life skills during my school years, like how to lie convincingly and how to manipulate people  

But sometimes one does not assess correctly whether the task is pointless or not, because no-one has bothered to give it any context. And when the majority of the tasks are pointless the ones that are not will be missed in the crowd.

[dima_76557]

Possibly in most cases and certainly in some, but I wouldn't make it a requirement. Sometimes the easiest way to solve something is to ask someone who knows the solution.

Sometimes that is a solution, yes, but it has something of "artificial intelligence", not inborn talent. I am very, very grateful I got SYSTEMATIC and NON-STANDARDIZED help at the right time, don't get me wrong. This allows me now to solve similar kinds of problems at higher levels and has opened a new world of possibilities I did not know I had, but I still have to admit that if I hadn't received that help, I wouldn't have been where I am now. Initially, something really essential was lacking, something that had nothing to do with "skills".

[ted]

You can't teach non-standard people with standardized methods.

This is one of the most important truths I have read on the forums for a long time. Of course it applies, not just to music and art, but also to the sciences and everything else. It is why real teachers are so very rare. In fact, looking back over my life, I think I had only three or four real teachers. I was amazingly lucky that two of these remarkable individuals were the only music and piano teachers I have ever had. When, as a kid, I auditioned with the New Zealand composer, pianist, jazz pianist, conductor, Llewelyn Jones, my technique was all wrong and highly individual (still is !) and my measurable musical abilities were substandard (still are!). He took me because he thought I had music in me, and might use improvisation to get it out. Ten years later he was proved correct, but how on earth did he know within one hour on a first meeting ? It is still a mystery to me today. To be able to see into someone so deeply and so quickly is the mark of a real teacher, but alas, it is so rare.

[j_menz]

how on earth did he know within one hour on a first meeting ?

A candle is easy to spot in the darkness.

[rachmaninoff_forever]

A candle is easy to spot in the darkness.

No, you're wrong.

A LIT candle is easy to spot in the darkness.   
 

[j_menz]

No, you're wrong.

A LIT candle is easy to spot in the darkness.   
 

If it's lit, it's not darkness. 

[rachmaninoff_forever]

If it's lit, it's not darkness. 

Then how the heck is a candle easy to spot in the darkness if it's not lit?!

[j_menz]

Then how the heck is a candle easy to spot in the darkness if it's not lit?!

Talent. And practice.

And carrots.

[rachmaninoff_forever]

Talent. And practice.

And carrots.

In other words, it's not easy to spot unless it's lit in the darkness. 

You see, there are different degrees of dark! 

Even if you can only see a tiny bit, it's still dark!

[j_menz]

In other words, it's not easy to spot unless it's lit in the darkness. 

There's always these:

[dima_76557]

A quote from another topic that pertains to this one. It illustrates that "hard work beats talent" as a formula for success is a fallacy to some extent because it assumes that 1) not-so-talented people do not work hard enough and that 2) talented people tend not to work so hard, so you can surpass them by simply following this formula of "hard work". To ajspiano's statement that he can manage juggling with 3 balls, timothy42b replies the following:

I heard Sergei Ignatov (famous Russian circus juggler) speak at an IJA convention.

He said there was a level everyone could achieve with effort, but beyond that you had to be born with talent.

That point that everyone could reach?   8 balls.

don't sell yourself short.

https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?topic=51818.msg563217#msg563217

EDIT: If there is no passion (also a talent), any person in his right mind will just stop beating his/her head against the wall if they can't do more than 8. That sounds more like it.

[j_menz]

EDIT: If there is no passion (also a talent), any person in his right mind will just stop beating his/her head against the wall if they can't do more than 8. That sounds more like it.

I stopped when one didn't go so well. Not sure it's called "juggling" at that point though.

[dima_76557]

I stopped when one didn't go so well. Not sure it's called "juggling" at that point though.

OMG, no! You were just being lazy! You do know that is a deadly sin, don't you?
P.S.: That's actually why they established those formulas for success: "hard work beats talent", "anybody can learn it", etc. Half-truths to some extent.

[j_menz]

OMG, no! You were just being lazy! You do know that is a deadly sin, don't you?
P.S.: That's actually why they established those formulas for success: "hard work beats talent", "anybody can learn it", etc. Half-truths to some extent.

I'm reminded of a poem:

Go to the ant, O thou Sluggard:
Consider her ways and be wise;
Well I've been to the ant and I'm buggered
If I think she's one up on us guys.
All that running about is damn silly
And uneconomic I bet.
I'd rather consider the lily;
It's got Solomon beat and no sweat.

 

[lostinidlewonder]

Talent is either rate of learning or quality of production. I have met many talented students who can learn music very fast but play not at an exceptional level. Then I have met those who play at an exceptional level but learn quite slow. Sometimes you come across those who have both rate and quality at a superior level, that is REAL talent imo, the whole package.

[ted]

Yes, that is true, although I had not thought of it in those terms before. In the creative aspect, improvisation and composition, I am not lucky enough to have personally known anybody in the third category. My teacher lay in the first group, with astonishing musical gifts but a tendency not to think profoundly about anything. I have always been an abominably slow learner, not just in music, with a compulsion to ponder everything to death for long periods and come up with bizarre, original solutions to problems, of little use to anyone. It took me ten years before I could improvise at all, and a further thirty years to say anything at the instrument that was really my own. Not so much talent of either type really, but just a remorseless imperative to create which will not take no for an answer.

[faulty_damper]

There needs to be made an explicit distinction between static traits and malleable ones.  There doesn't seem to be any distinction being made and static ones are being confused for malleable ones and vice versa.

A static trait is anything that cannot be changed such as height, pelvis width, leg length, etc.  A malleable trait is one that can be changed such as weight, strength, mental processing speed, flexibility, lung capacity, etc.

Now something like musical "talent" is a malleable trait.  You are born with the ability to learn music if it's part of the experiences you grow up in.  Culture biases you to the kind of music you prefer. E.g. Chinese people prefer Chopin because his music is melodic and Chinese music is also melodic.  It also biases you against certain kinds of music. E.g. Classical musicians don't usually like pop or jazz.

When static traits are being compared, everyone will be different.  As such, it's not fair to compare them as if they are the same, even if sports do exactly this.  This is why all basketball players are tall because 1) the taller a player is, the easier it is to play the game, and 2) it closely equalizes static traits amongst players.  The difference, then, between players will be mostly in skill, which is a malleable trait.  Some players will be more determined and will make as much effort needed to surpass others.  Some players will do it the smart way (personal trainers, coaches, dietary changes, learning related activities [e.g. dance]) while most others will do it the hard way (practicing more, working out more) and some don't do anything to improve their game.

In piano playing, there are certain static traits that will limit a person's ability to play certain repertoire such as reach.  Reach can be increased, more especially so if the player is new, but an experienced player will already have stretched it as much as s/he can.  If repertoire demands a stretch of a tenth, and the maximum reach is only an octave, then the player must either a) accommodate by rolling it or condensing it to an octave, etc., or b) play something else.

Is the person who chooses to accommodate by rolling it any less talented than a person who can easily make the reach?  Well, couldn't we also argue that the person who chooses to make the accommodation more talented than a person who could easily make the reach?  After all, it requires more skill and creativity to accommodate a physical limitation, e.g. the no-armed pianist or the no-armed writer.

[dima_76557]

The difference, then, between players will be mostly in skill, which is a malleable trait.  Some players will be more determined and will make as much effort needed to surpass others.  Some players will do it the smart way (personal trainers, coaches, dietary changes, learning related activities [e.g. dance]) while most others will do it the hard way (practicing more, working out more) and some don't do anything to improve their game.

It's not as simple as that. Determination and good guidance may go a long way, but there is the following problem: Malleable traits in people are limited in how far they can be developed, especially if you have a time limit imposed upon you. Speed, quick reflexes, coordination (especially for multitasking), peripheral vision, and intuition about how the ball moves, how distance works, how the body (re)acts when you do not interfere, etc. can only be learned to a certain level. If the trainer pushes and presses to develop something a person is really not capable of, the results will go down, not up.

The same goes for reproducing a complicated Bach fugue on the piano (talk about multitasking!) with all its requirements for articulation and intonation in all those voices. If I'm lucky, I'll be 95 before I can do that really well. By that time, people may applaud because I'm 95, not because I'm supposedly such a great talent. For now, I can fake my way out of it somehow, sure, but the real requirements are still far beyond me and I know that better than anybody else. My Bach playing is relatively poor (not really bad) and I can therefore not be considered a talent because I am being compared to my peers who can do it much better with less training. On the other hand, I seem to have a knack for elementary stuff like octave playing, etc., something others have to work a 100 years on and still get nowhere with.

Adding insult to injury:

A very entertaining clip about the workings of our brain's hemispheres by the renowned psychiatrist and writer Iain McGilchrist. Especially the conclusion is worth noting. He quotes Einstein as saying:
"The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift."
That's exactly why researchers get so far as stating that talent is a myth. How sad.

[brogers70]

A quote from another topic that pertains to this one. It illustrates that "hard work beats talent" as a formula for success is a fallacy to some extent because it assumes that 1) not-so-talented people do not work hard enough and that 2) talented people tend not to work so hard, so you can surpass them by simply following this formula of "hard work".

I think it is not useful to compare a hard-working average person to a lazy genius. You can't quantify anything you'd need to quantify to make a real comparison. But there is one comparison that contains its own control, yourself working hard versus yourself not working hard. [And by working hard, I mean working hard and intelligently and with appropriate guidance.] It's pretty safe to say that the hard-working you will outperform the lazy you. And you can just keep working hard until its obvious that you've reached some kind of limit. But the odds are that it will take a long time to reach a real, firm limit. If you hit diminishing returns you can always stop. You just shouldn't use the talent issue as a way to talk yourself out of trying hard. [And by trying hard, I mean trying hard to reach a personal goal for your own satisfaction - if you were deciding whether to make a career out of it, you would need to compare yourself to others].

[dima_76557]

@ brogers70

Good post, and I agree with most of it.

There is one problem, though, in the context of this topic: It's not WE who label ourselves as "talented" or "hard-working", "untalented" or "lazy". It's mostly the System and the ones who believe it is supposed to be like that. It's all about organizing standardized tests of all kinds and comparing our results to other people's results over a certain period and within a certain, very restricted, time frame, often against our will.

[j_menz]

There is one problem, though, in the context of this topic: It's not WE who label ourselves as "talented" or "hard-working", "untalented" or "lazy". It's mostly the System and the ones who believe it is supposed to be like that. It's all about organizing standardized tests of all kinds and comparing our results to other people's results over a certain period and within a certain, very restricted, time frame, often against our will.

One can always take Churchill's approach:

History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.

[faulty_damper]

Determination and good guidance may go a long way, but there is the following problem: Malleable traits in people are limited in how far they can be developed, especially if you have a time limit imposed upon you. Speed, quick reflexes, coordination (especially for multitasking), peripheral vision, and intuition about how the ball moves, how distance works, how the body (re)acts when you do not interfere, etc. can only be learned to a certain level. If the trainer pushes and presses to develop something a person is really not capable of, the results will go down, not up.
...

You have no evidence that malleable traits can only be molded up to a point.  You're making an assumption here.  You also can't use yourself as an example and then generalize your experiences to everyone else.  You are projecting your implicit beliefs of intelligence here.  That's almost dogma.  Again, most people think the bar is high when it's actually very low.  Just because you cannot achieve something doesn't mean you can not.

[dima_76557]

You have no evidence that malleable traits can only be molded up to a point.  You're making an assumption here.  You also can't use yourself as an example and then generalize your experiences to everyone else.  You are projecting your implicit beliefs of intelligence here.  That's almost dogma.  Again, most people think the bar is high when it's actually very low.  Just because you cannot achieve something doesn't mean you can not.

Yes, I shouldn't have introduced my own experience because that has a tendency to confuse the topic. Maybe you are willing to read this, coming from real, experienced, trainers?

Genes, innate ability and talent? Or practice makes perfect? Is it all in the training?

EDIT: The issue is a very complex one and to get at least a reasonable clue to an answer we will never get, one should ask why SOME succeed (= excellence), rather than try to explain why MOST (with a more or less equal background, under that same high-quality program and within the same time frame) fail (= mediocrity, standard).

[dima_76557]

@ faulty_damper

Although I realize that you will not recognize this as "evidence", here is just another thought that came up with regards to the "talent" issue.

Even the Polgar experiment is not proof that the "nurture-is-more-important-than-nature" idea can be generalized. L. Polgar, the father himself, is a chess teacher and both parents are outstanding pedagogues, so one cannot even rule out the genetic factor. All it proves is that with average brains and EXCESSIVE nurture ("It was chess day and night"), one can get to the rank of International Master and even Grandmaster. Also note that not all sisters were equally successful. To make it to the top, though, that is clearly not enough. With nurture and a little luck, all we get is yet another Salieri, not a Mozart. To understand this, we need to look a little deeper into asynchronous development in children, something nothing can really be done about and that has NOTHING to do with skills as such.
P.S.: I also like the rubber-band idea of talent: it comes in different sizes and you can stretch it only to a certain extent, overstretch it (certainly not good), just leave it alone, or not even notice it.

[dima_76557]

I am actually fed up a bit with all this "skills" and "evidence" talk and would like to give this thread another turn before we get to page 30 with our "yes-no - yes-no" game.

Here is my proposal: Talent is not just a bunch of skills; it is a state of mind that is not attainable for just anyone. One of the manifestations of true talent in performance is the ability to do what you do on INSTINCT, to be able to "let out the beast in you" so to speak, thereby maintaining certain minimum quality standards in what you have to do. If you can get yourself in such a trance, people will recognize that primal feeling called instinct, and you will impress virtually everyone. Others may be more skilled, but they do not impress. They just sound... "skilled" and therefore not "talented". What do you think?

[outin]

I am actually fed up a bit with all this "skills" and "evidence" talk and would like to give this thread another turn before we get to page 30 with our "yes-no - yes-no" game.

I'm really impressed by your patience so far