Sadie Stein contemplates the state of the modern Genius:
Somewhere in the world there exists a clip of Hugh Hefner on one talk show or another. I can neither remember what the show was nor the exact wording of the exchange, but the following paraphrase has become legendary in my family:
INTERVIEWER: Do you consider yourself a genius?
HEFNER: Genius is a difficult word to define. But by any definition, I am one.
Hef may be a law unto himself, but genius, a word that used to be the sole domain of the upper reaches of the IQ scale, is now thrown around like grass seed. Maybe it's the effect of language evolution or intelligence inflation – after all, only recently has it became compulsory for one's child to be intellectually gifted – but it can't be denied that genius no longer packs the awe-inspiring punch it once did. […]
(And yes, her essay does involve a trip to an Apple Store at one point.)
