There are many ways to define talent. Most of them are wrong.
Here’s how one dictionary defines talent:
| 1. | a special natural ability or aptitude: a talent for drawing. |
| 2. | a capacity for achievement or success; ability: young men of talent. |
| 3. | a talented person: The cast includes many of the theater’s major talents. |
| 4. | a group of persons with special ability: an exhibition of watercolors by the local talent. |
Natural ability? Don’t make me laugh.
A capacity for achievement? Are you saying one person has a better capacity than the other? On what basis?
Special ability? Special, why special. Does this mean no one else can do this specific task? Or have this talent?
The problem with the definition, is that no matter where you look, you find ‘talent’ or ‘creativity’ to be defined in a way that’s horribly inaccuarate. Because the real definition of talent (and I’m typing this at the top of my head—because I’m so um, ‘talented’) runs something like this:
Talent is the combination of many emotions, memories, patterns and repetitions, implemented at high speed
You see what’s happening in this definition. We’re talking about emotions, and memories and stuff that doesn’t automatically assume that one person is ‘more gifted’ than another. That one brain doesn’t necessarily have less powerful hardware than another brain. But before we go into the depths of ‘hardware and software’ of the brain, let’s look at the concepts of emotions, patterns, memories and repetition. And what high speed has to do with all of these factors.
But for now, you have a definition, at least.
Feel free to disagree 🙂