Geniuses becoming extinct?

Wanted: a new genius is a vacancy unlikely to be filled according to an article published today in the science journal Nature. Dean Keith Simonton argues that we are unlikely ever again to find a genius of the calibre of Einstein or Newton or Galileo.

Scientific genius is extinct (like Monty Python's Dead Parrot) and he maintains he has some authority on this issue. “I have devoted more than three decades to studying scientific genius....but the very phenomenon that I investigate might have actually ceased to exist.”

Disagree and want to read more? Check out the Library's copy of Nature vol 493 (Jan 31) due in stock in the next few days. Or read the Irish Times'  summary by Dick Ahlstrom here.