A Polymath’s Learning versus Specialist Learning | JOHN BARKSDALEPosted by JOHN BARKSDALE on April 21st, 2021 When considering the circumstance of AI taking over most of our specialist areas in multiple verticals being a polymath could be the future. Unfortunately, our current system has focused on teaching students and professionals to go deeply into a specific area of focus whereas the polymath’s thinking goes wide and deep. The polymath is very concerned with learning how to learn which focuses on the width factor while making the depth reality happen in a natural way as the actuality of learning and how to learn becomes the focus of the polymath. However, one can be a polymath and a specialist in one or two areas. It simply depends on the person as to how deeply they have gone in order to be called a specialist or a polymath who has acquired specialty level in multiple disciplines much like Leonardo Davinci. As a polymath who is a top sale executive, CEO and owner of a major marketing company, writer, poet, orator, inventor and general entrepreneur I previously thought I was simply a jack of all trades and a master of none. However, I reasoned that one must learn how to learn in order to achieve such high levels in a wide breadth of disciplines essentially learn about learning itself. Learning itself is a skill which must be developed on an ongoing basis throughout life. A polymath is constantly looking for new ways to creatively solve problems and learn about learning. A perfect example is a medical specialist (medical doctor in ear, nose and throat) who is updating his knowledge about a specific area (deepening his knowledge singularly) or in most cases has simply learned the medical knowledge from medical school which is quickly becomes outdated if he has not learned how to learn and continue to delve into other complex aspects of his career. These aspects could be ever changing and therefore he could face falling far behind another doctor who is a polymath and has learned how to work with the new AI Medical computer which is now taking over many surgeries worldwide. Author: John Barksdale Like it? Share it! |