Precisely. Any artist that thinks his mind isn't responsible for the beautiful things they create is doing himself a disservice. Perhaps you will never fully understand your mind, but that's a testament to the power of your mind, not a sign that a divine being is necessary.
Frank Zappa had an excellent quote about this. When discussing spiritualism in music with a fellow musician, he said: "Look, these are just instruments. Find out what the range is, and start writing." And that's what it is. Writing music is difficult, and requires a degree of brilliance to come out with even a comparatively mediocre song, but there's no magic to it. It takes work and thought. It doesn't take superstition.
Most historical genii I know of attribute their greatest work to something outside of them. Is there a good counter to this observation?
Even if we start with your premise, that it's only the person's brain, the brain itself is an amalgamate of many, many other things, very few we have direct responsibility for. So, even then, it doesn't make sense to take full responsibility for any genius we may possess.
No, you don't live in a vacuum. Newton was indeed standing on the shoulders of giants. But to go from there to saying you don't deserve responsibility for what you've done is a grossly illogical step to take.
You could argue that Zappa did everything because of circumstance. You could make a good and utterly meaningless case because of that, that everything is responsible for everything. It's good because it's generic enough to be obvious; it's meaningless because if everything causes everything it's the same as nothing causing anything.
In Zappa's case particularly: I know of no other musician that learned music through modernist composers and then translated that into rock music, who started off playing drums in a small band, took control of that band, taught himself guitar and became a virtuoso, and produced 90 albums in about 30 years in every genre imaginable. Nobody even comes close in that regard, and nobody has ever done anything like it. So, who's responsible for that genius? The record stores, for selling albums that caught Zappa's eye? Zappa's parents, for letting him buy records? The band members who ducked out and let Zappa take control? Those aren't genius acts. The genius is the thing that Zappa provided that came from him and him alone.
Most historical genii I know of attribute their greatest work to something outside of them. Is there a good counter to this observation?
Shakespeare didn't. Joyce didn't. Beckett didn't. The author of my favorite novel, Daniel Handler, is quoted as saying something to the effect that the only sacred thing about his writings is that he took the time to revise them. Bach wrote for the church but I've never read something saying that he was merely writing for God. The attitude stated here, that genius comes from an outside force, is incredibly rare. I've never heard anybody who's made anything truly extraordinary crediting anybody but themselves. The act of creation requires ego above anything else.
First of all, where do I say people do not deserve responsibility for genius? They just do not deserve sole responsibility. I do not think genius is without effort. Genius requires supreme effort.
But, do you think there's a difference between the deep insights we call genius and someone who achieves a lot? I do. The people who are most celebrated for such insights vs. only being prolific seem to have a common claim to a transcendent source of insight. Off the top of my head: Homer, Plato, Dante, Einstein. Plus, Bach dedicated his work to God, not the church.
Like the speaker says, people saying that they are the genius is very recent. Having read a fair amount of the Western corpus, I'd agree. Makes sense too from an etymological standpoint, since genius means some kind of spirit, like genie. Plus, the individualist attitude seems to coincide with a derth in good art, so it looks like modern artists are missing something. It also leads to the really lame idea that good art means being totally original, which actually results in no one being original and mostly just incoherent instead. Finally, for what it's worth, my own experience validates this idea. Any ideas that seem truly good to me seem to be something outside of myself that I've grasped. Haven't you had this same experience?
"Insight versus prolific" is a tough thing to debate. Zappa fans believe that the Beatles offered nothing to music. Some people think Sex Pistols are nothing but noise.
We don't know much about Homer, Plato's concept of "the gods" was one that said humans had their own free will and were not tools of the gods (brush up on Greek mythology, particularly Prometheus), Einstein gets called religious but wasn't actually. Dante you may be right about: I haven't studied him enough to know.
People claiming brilliance goes back as far as Shakespeare, who was known for being hotheaded and arrogant with his writing. It certainly goes back further, though I couldn't name specific names earlier than Shakespeare, who's pretty much the perfect null hypothesis. If Shakespeare thought he was good in and of himself, that means possibly the greatest artist of all time rejects this theory of divine inspiration.
Art isn't about originality. It's about personality. Art is partly about technical expertise, partly about artist ego. You only know yourself: the process to genius in art is the process of discovering your own standards.
For what it's worth, I've never had that experience. I know exactly what caused me to have the ideas that I do. I analyze my ideas until I understand what drives me to create them. As a result, I'm extraordinarily egotistical. It's why I thought it was worth denying the statements from the original post.
First, to clarify. By inspiration, I do not mean that someone hears a voice telling them what to do. Instead, I mean the person has a vision of something higher, outside of themselves, that they try to replicate in their art. Maybe you already think this, and we're just talking past each other.
Homer starts off the Iliad with an invocation of the muse. Read Plato's dialogue Ion, where Socrates says exactly what I'm saying. Plus, you will find the same idea in Phaedrus, Republic, and the Symposium. I'm not saying Einstein is religious. He's obviously not a theist. But, he did think his ideas were not merely constructs out of his own mind but following some higher sense of beauty.
Okay, yep! We secretly agree. I thought you were saying that all genius comes from non-humankind. I agree that there's an objectivity to taste and that we all approach it.
I'd differ, though, in saying that we are our own standard. The greatest art is that which most reflects its creator.
Frank Zappa had an excellent quote about this. When discussing spiritualism in music with a fellow musician, he said: "Look, these are just instruments. Find out what the range is, and start writing." And that's what it is. Writing music is difficult, and requires a degree of brilliance to come out with even a comparatively mediocre song, but there's no magic to it. It takes work and thought. It doesn't take superstition.