Do you think talent is innate or learned?
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Gokey (
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November 30th, 2009
Some people are exceptionally good at the things they do – whether they are masters of the piano, rhetorical writing, or painting, they all seem to have talent. Do you think this talent innate or learned? When I see a brilliant piece of work, I often find myself asking if the work is a product of natural talent or simply derivative of learned skill.
What are your thoughts?
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28 Answers
Talent, innate. The skill to use it, learned.
@syz: I agree, however I think everyone has talents for almost anything. Very rarely do people have no natural aptitude for something devoid of reason. I think it’s a process of reinforcement that some traits come to the forefront rather than others. Except of course for savants and whatnot.
For example, friend of mine who claimed to not be able to create an acceptable stick figure a few weeks ago and who failed high school art for ‘being terrible’, I taught how to paint. And they’re wonderful.
I think that a person might have some inborn talent, but unless they go somewhere with that (taking piano lessons, practising painting) they won’t get anywhere. I think that everyone should try a little bit of everything to see if they like it or are good at it.
I don’t think there is much reason to believe that aptitude is a form of limitation. Elsewhere we discussed the idea that it takes about ten thousand hours of work in a field to make one an expert. A mildly talented pianist who has put in the ten thousand hours can be expected to be a better pianist than a prodigy who has worked one thousand hours, but the prodigy has the capacity to outshine the expert one day, assuming he does the work.
I think it’s learned. For example, I’m told I have a great talent for crocheting. The first time I tried to learn, I was horrible. No matter how hard I tried, I could NOT get it.
The second time I tried, I don’t know why or how, but it just all of a sudden clicked and now I get so many compliments on the things I make, from people who have been crocheting longer than me. Even my grandmother, who taught me, says she’s jealous.
If it was innate, I should have gotten it the first time, I think.
I don’t know, I tend to agree with @syz. I mean, my boyfriend didn’t learn his talent for drawing. Sure, he’s improved it over the years, but it was quite remarkable to begin with without any guidance or teaching or anything. Seemed more innate to me, like it had always been there. Some people might take years of classes and guidance to reach the level that he was at without any kind of instruction from an outside source.
I suppose I don’t have any proof that talent is innate, but I do think some talents are. The ways of perfecting, improving, and effectively utilizing those talents are learned, but I think that in certain cases, the talents themselves are innate.
It’s innate. No matter how hard I practiced drawing, painting, and sketching, I still sucked. My fiancé, on the other hand, could draw ever since he was a kid. He obviously perfected it with practice but he always had the ability.
I very much agree with all of your sentiments. I believe that talent is innate, and the only way to become masterful is to practice and hone the skill and the craft. Talent is the knife, and skill is how you sharpen it.
@pdworkin: I’ve heard of this theory, but I am not so sure that I entirely agree with it. I do believe that with great determination and continual practice improvement can be made, but not necessarily to a level of greatness. I read somewhere that writers can only improve their writing by one level – lousy writers can become decent writers, decent writers can become good writers, and good writers can become great, maybe even brilliant. The leap from lousy to great is quite a leap, it’s not impossible but it is highly unlikely. Gaining skill through classes will only you give you just that – skill, People can sit in as many composition classes as they like, and go to as many workshops as they like to learn the technicalities of writing, and it certainly might improve their writing but it won’t inevitably make them great. Successful writers must be able to capture the imagination of their readers, through rhetoric and a style of prose – which is something one has to develop on their own. It isn’t something that can be taught, not even in a matter or 10,000 hours.
The same can be said for art – let’s narrow it down to photography. All the books and classes in the world can help you learn the technicalities of photography, but they can’t teach you photographic style. An amateur photographer can easily become better, maybe even good, but without a little natural talent his work will probably never amount to Ansel Adams. It’s not the type of camera the photographer is holding, or even how much technical knowledge he might have – it is the eye behind the viewfinder. And 10,000 hours of shooting pictures won’t necessarily improve that eye.
@syz hit the nail on the head
@Gokey I think what @pdworkin was trying to say is that the average person can become quite good with 10,000 hours of experience, probably even better than a talented person who practices little. However, if that talented person does the 10,000 hours of work, they will definitely surpass the average person. They’ll probably surpass the average person with less than 10,000 hours of practice.
An untalented person who works hard can be skillful, but a talented person who works hard will be more skillful.
@drdoombot: I think do understand what was trying to say. :) It seems as if I have done a lousy job of explaining my position, and I apologize for that! I do agree with what you wrote, “an untalented person who works hard can be skillful,” however @pdworkin mentioned an idea that involved talentless people being able to reach a level of expertise, not just skillfulness. And in regards to that, I do not entirely agree.
While the idea of spending an astronomical amount of time doing something would make someone an “expert” sounds plausible, I partially disagree with it. I absolutely agree that it would take an average person a long and laborious effort to achieve what someone with natural talent could do with ease. I also agree that 10,000 hours of practice will surely increase skill level, but there isn’t any certainty that someone with average skill could become masterful or an expert. I believe that people have certain boundaries and limits.
For example, and this will be my last lame example some people were born with the innate talent to run fast. I ran cross country all throughout high school, I finished my first standard 5K race with a comedic 28 minutes and after four years I whittled the time down to a slightly less comedic 23 minutes. Jenny, the fastest girl on my team ran always ran 5Ks in just under 18 minutes.
My point here is that I possessed the skill to run, I clearly made improvement after running nearly 50 miles a week, almost year round – just as much effort and practice as Jenny had. But, after four years I could only manage to improve one “level” – from lousy to mediocre. I had the skill to run, but I did not possess a natural inclination to run any faster than seven minutes per mile; I like to think limits and boundaries are what held me back. Jenny was fast as lightning from the very beginning. It takes more than just skillfulness to be something great. It starts with talent.
You have mischaracterized what I said. I make no claim that a talented person can achieve greatness. I said that a talented person who does not practice can be outperformed by a not-so-talented one who does.
The dictionary calls talent a natural ability. That makes it innate by definition. I second @syz and @pdworkin here.
I also see natural aptitudes that I would not call a talent. My son has a natural aptitude for language, and so he learns easily and masters it quickly. But I do not think it is his special talent. The reason I don’t think so is that I think he would be drawn to making it more central to his life if it were, just out of the sheer love of it. Talent gives you something more than just ability to acquire skill. It’s that magical extra ingredient that makes what you do shine with a recognizable special quality. By the definition that I am using, this is not something that everybody has or that we all have in some degree for everything.
In this thread I think there are several different definitions of “talent” in use.
In my opinion, talent is innate, and skill is learned, but you need both to be great.
Both, it’s nature and nurture. There’s even a feedback loop especially when the brain is young. The nurture part isn’t just about learning. It’s also about food and the quality of social interaction.
True talent is learned. Talent though can be directly influenced by early exposure to a particular talent or ability. Almost every musician or artist I know had experience with their art early on in life either and many had parents or relatives expert in their field which obviously enhance their experience with a particular art. But every skilled artist or musician has years and years of practice to develop their particular talent. I would though argue the patience required to develop that talent could be innate.
I think it’s innate.People can learn things,but it can be without soul.
@lucillelucillelucille I would then argue the countless “talented” musicians I see year after year who couldn’t play a soulful blues lick if it slapped them in the face like a raw steak. The blues often is learned by experiencing the “blues” in life or careful and deliberately immersing yourself in the genre and “learning” the soulful nature of a delicate musical style. There is an amazing talented blues guitarist named Stevie Ray Vaughn who is a good example of a talented musician learning and owning the Blues. You should check out his music!! ;)
@Cruiser -SRV “felt it”.There is a difference between that and robotic mimickry.
@lucillelucillelucille That is exactly my point that soulful playing can be learned if studied and practiced and if practiced enough they become their art. One common denominator I have seen in soulful blues artists is they have lived it or experienced something that sets the blues in their soul. I have seen many a child prodigy that can do amazing things with guitars that are still nowhere near and may never reach the soulful skill level of a Pinetop Perkins or Howlin Wolf…2 other great blues players you might want to check out!! ;)
Oh,Stop!I don’t necessarily think that one has to “write what they know”.If that’s the case,we wouldn’t have… ahem…“Space Odyssey”,now would we?? ;) Study and practice does not make a great artist.You could play until you are blue in the face and it doesn’t mean…sssshhh…a thing. ;)
@lucillelucillelucille I guess we will have to disagree then. One more example would be an amazing guitarist you should check out called Steve Morse named greatest guitarist 7 years in a row who even admitted he couldn’t play a his way out of a paper bag early on and just practiced and practiced, studied music through college and emerged as arguably one of the most talented guitarists ever to pick up the instrument.
@Cruiser -Why do you think he’s not well known?Would you say his style of playing is passionate or workhorse?
Talent mostly is inborn but it has to be honed with practice.
It takes a bit of both. The less talent, the more work you have to do. But even the highly talented need to strive for perfection; it isn’t handed to anyone on a silver platter (the nearest you’ll get is Mozart, but even he had to work very hard to do his work.)
Of course, if you’re totally amusiac (unable to hear tones AT ALL) it is improbable that you will be a good singer, and if you’re colorblind, it is unlikely you will be a good artist, but if you work at what you are passionate about hard enough, you will prevail at least to some degree.
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