Anyone Can Be a Polymath

“And that’s when we notice a huge cognitive dissonance at the centre of Western culture: a huge confusion about how new ideas, new discoveries, and new art actually come about.” (Robert Twigger) 

Many of us may remember growing up reading the adventures of Encyclopedia Brown, a boy detective nicknamed “Encyclopedia” (his real name, Leroy, being far less exciting) due to his range of knowledge and vast intelligence. Given that polymathy is defined as having “encyclopedic knowledge”, Encyclopedia Brown could be considered the poster child of this particular label.

But that’s Encyclopedia Brown, boy detective, you might say, I’m certainly no boy genius – what does polymathy have to do with me?

Poet Robert Twigger believes that we all have the potential to be polymaths. His delightful appeal in Aeon Magazine to reclaim polymathy in a world obsessed with specialists brings to mind some of my reasons for loving tutoring and test prep. (Twigger believes that the West has long prioritized success in a single field, or “monopathy,” over far-ranging academic growth.) Far from a simple hoop students need to jump through in order to attend college, the SAT and ACT (as well as other tests, like GRE) do reasonably well in assessing one’s ability to think creatively about problems in different contexts.

This creative thinking often involves mastery of a variety of skills and disciplines – hence the analogue of polymathy. In this respect, the ACT’s emphasis on the Composite score as an average, rather than a sum, is actually a better indicator of polymathy. In other words, how you do on the ACT overall says more about your aptitude for college-level coursework, which may involve a demonstration of quantitative as well as verbal reasoning in a single assignment, than how you do on any particular section.

Regardless, Twigger's point that becoming a polymath is not a matter of natural inclination as much as devotion would apply to many of my students:

Deep down I was pessimistic that I could actually learn a martial art. I thought you were either a ‘natural’ or nothing. Then I saw natural athletes fall behind when they didn’t practice enough. This, shamefully, was a great morale booster. The fact that I succeeded where others were failing also gave me an important key to the secret of learning. There was nothing special about me, but I worked at it and I got it. One reason many people shy away from polymathic activity is that they think they can’t learn new skills. I believe we all can — and at any age too — but only if we keep learning.

Similarly, performance on standardized tests is not a matter of "either you get it or you don't." Rather, with the appropriate amount of determination, all students can be polymaths, mastering not only mathematics and reading comprehension, but also English grammar, scientific principles, and writing.

Ready to become a little more like Encyclopedia Brown? Contact us today!