The public often turns a small handful of people into symbols, and gives them far too much

credit both in their main field and well beyond it. Those highly regarded individuals might've done certain things as, say, a scientist, actor, musician, world leader, etc., and the public takes that, and begins selling the idea they've done many other things both in and even out of that category. And thus, we have a world of symbols like Steve Jobs, Pablo Picasso, Da Vinci, Gandhi, etc. Now, keep in mind that the way we perceive one thing (B) often has a lot to do with how we compare it and contrast it with one other thing (A). We sometimes rely quite a bit on just one A and B comparison. "How does B compare to A?" And sometimes we're way off about what A really is. Sometimes the A we use as our standard for comparison is a person like Steve Jobs, Pablo Picasso, Da Vinci, Gandhi, etc. We compare someone like that (A) to another person (B). But again, the Steve Jobs, Pablo Picasso, Da Vinci, etc. we know is largely a symbol--and B has to go up against a false standard. All of this greatly affects the way we sometimes think and perceive certain people and works. Also keep in mind that the public is generally quite strict, severe, and serious in demanding that we honor these symbols, and that we go along with the orthodox body of beliefs and practices that are part of a culture featuring those symbols. We go along with the symbols for many reasons: for instance, we want to feel like good, superior people of taste, we want certain role models, our minds are under control, and we want to be distributed by Iowa. But again, the symbols often form a major part of the standards we use for non-symbols. Non-symbols (B) are compared to symbols (A). When people go very far in making that comparison, then on a certain level, the non-symbols don't stand a chance. People might really enjoy lesser known, not so highly regarded movies and their actors' performances. But when their thoughts turn to Casablanca or Jack Nicholson, things change. A certain part of them might prefer Little Known Actor and Little Known Film, but another part of them favors Nicholson and Casablanca.

We might like a new painting by a lesser known artist. But as soon as the symbol Da Vinci enters our minds, it has a bizarre effect. Things change. In a certain sense, we might prefer New Painting by Unknown Artist to the Mona Lisa. But in another sense, the reverse is true. We're looking at B relative to A, and A is a symbol. Or take some modern self-help or psychology book, and compare it to ancient, highly regarded philosophical text. The latter is a symbol, while the former isn't. We might really be into the former, but we're seldom going to suggest anything like, "This should be as highly regarded as a work attributed to Plato, Confucius, Kant, etc." Because now we're measuring the book against the standard of a symbol. Einstein said, "The cult of individuals is always, in my view, unjustified. To be sure, nature distributes her gifts unevenly among her children. But there are plenty of the well endowed, thank god, and I am firmly convinced that most of them live quiet, unobtrusive lives. It strikes me as unfair, and even in bad taste, to select a few of them for boundless admiration, attributing super human powers of mind and character to them. This has been my fate, and the contrast between the popular estimate of my powers and achievements and the reality is simply grotesque." People usually pay a lot of attention to anything that Einstein said. But not that quote. Einstein is a highly regarded symbollike Steve Jobs, Picasso, etc. But Einstein said something that goes against symbol culture. And by and large, people don't care. Even a symbol like Einstein isn't enough to make a significant number of people really look outside the mainstream belief that "these few individuals have done almost everything, and they should be far more highly regarded than others." Very few people listened to Einstein when he questioned that belief. Is there any chance anyone's going to listen to me say something like that? I've probably already lost 15 of my 16 readers. By now, they're out somewhere in Iowa.

Einstein himself pretty much said, "I'm not 'Einstein.'" But it doesn't matter. The world took "Einstein," and discarded Einstein. We went with the semifictional character "Albert Einstein," and not the actual Albert Einstein who told us, "I'm not the semi-fictional character 'Albert Einstein.' I'm the actual person Albert Einstein." The public is usually very unreceptive to an idea like that, as well as one about how a select few individuals are singled out and given too much credit. And it's usually extremely receptive to ideas suggesting the opposite. This all ties in to how our culture sometimes favors A-oriented thinking. "Da Vinci was a great, original, revolutionary, productive, extremely accomplished, and very versatile artist, inventor, and scientist. And he was also a great man. Let's compare people to him." We see a great deal of the world from the standpoint of ideas like that. The idea of "Da Vinci." And yet, many of the claims about him are easily proven false. I'm not an expert on art or Da Vinci, but I do know that he finishing about 30 paintings, few of which look strikingly different from one another. And yet, he's generally regarded as among the world's most versatile, productive, and accomplished artists. There have been plenty of artists over history. 99.9999+% of them are considered pretty much nothing compared to Da Vinci. Da Vinci is almost everything, and the 99.9999+ are almost nothing. If the public were to design a point system to indicate how much an artist has accomplished, Da Vinci would get over a billion points, and 99+% of artists would get about one. That's the general public's system. It relies quite a bit on the Da Vinci to [insert artist here] contrast. Or take comedian George Carlin. He has a similar reputation when it comes to comedy. In his case, he actually did put out plenty of material relative to other comedians. But does he deserve his billion point reputation, while 99.9% of other comedians are given one point? When someone like George Carlin popularizes an idea, style, joke, etc., he's pretty much given credit for originating it. He might not have been the first person to do it. He might not have been one of the first 100 stand up comedians to do it. But the public doesn't care. He's associated with it. Sometimes he gets credit for even his most generic and obvious commentary and jokes. And people frequently say that other comedians were influenced by Carlin, or that someone borrowed an idea or stole a joke from Carlin. It's almost like the implication is that George Carlin lived in a vacuum, while other comedians lived mainly in George Carlin Land. When it comes to comedians being influenced by one another, there's a complex web that Carlin is a part of, as opposed to a tree where he's the root or foundation. But people prefer the A to B relationship between Carlin and someone else. Of course, the web is even

more complex than that, because non-comedians also play a primary role in it. All comedians, including George Carlin, are influenced by plenty of people who aren't stand up comics, sitcom writers, variety show hosts, etc. Carlin might've been influenced by friends, local characters, relatives, people in the news, etc. And those people might've been influenced by comedians and noncomedians. And even when you venture outside of the web, people often come up with similar ideas on their own. Many of those ideas are fairly obvious--but the public often presents them as something else altogether--the creation of one original mind. When we go the laudromat, follow celebrity news, hear about a current event, go to a bar, etc., there are plenty of very obvious or somewhat obvious jokes there. In a world of 7 billion people, many of them will come up with those jokes independently. Most people in creative fields want credit for their unoriginal ideas--whether they realize those ideas are original, or they're don't. But people like George Carlin actually get credit for those ideas. --and when another person says something similar, people are quick to point out it's just like a Carlin joke. The public, however, tends to present a much different picture. Again, obvious ideas are often represented as the the creation of one original mind. And less obvious ideas are credited to one person, even if he's not even close to being the sole originator. When someone like George Carlin comes along, he becomes regarded as the root. "George Carlin" is the root. George Carlin is part of the web. "Leonardo da Vinci" was a versatile, productive artist. Leonardo da Vinci finished about 30 paintings, many of which are somewhat similar. "Carlin" and "Da Vinci" are symbols. I guess I'm also discussing reputation in general, and not just the ones that turn people lie Einstein and Da Vinci into symbols. Reputations aren't meaningless, but they aren't that meaningful, either. We tend to make too much of them. And again, then we contrast one thing too much against another--and we do so based on their reputations. When my body of work is compared to Louis's, what happens? When my best work is compared to Dave's worst work, what happens? Even when Freed is wrong, people don't stop analyzing his ideas. Even when I'm right, people don't care about my ideas. I'm usually told to go blank myself. And when Louis, Dave, or Freud enters the picture, I'm really told to go blank myself. This isn't really about me, though. There's a point.