Great story, thanks for posting. I thoroughly agree the generalist mindset is the one to aspire to, and stories like this do much to promote it.

Throughout classically known history, we seem to have lived more by competitive animal instinct, than by human collaborative logic.

A reasonably recent mistake we might have made, is to interpret the specialism and competition we see practiced so effectively by each successful species in evolution, as some kind of confirmation that it is also a good model for human society, as if each human is a competing species.

I believe we are witnessing a necessary renaissance in generalist thinking, with the result that the incidence of polymaths and aspiring polymaths seems higher than at any time previously.

I have some faith and optimism that we might be converging as a species on an optimum polymath mindset that will result in a switch in our mode of living, from one of universal specialism and competition, to one of universal collaboration.

I believe this is completely necessary for our survival, not just for humans as a species, but for life itself, of all species.

The future of life itself as we know it, now appears to depend critically on the human mindset.

Classic compulsory education might be perceived as something not particularly helpful, as it tends to promote and reward specialism and competitive practice. But I would say rather than this being a bad thing, it actually gives a stark demonstration of the limitations of classic specialist teacher mindsets, as perceived by increasingly polymath pupils.

This is a good thing!

We might even interpret the apparent explosion of “Fake news” that we see in profit driven social media as a good thing for similar reason. The new requirement for every person to be able to filter out fake news is a great exercise in the art of polymath thinking.

More power to your elbow!

(Not that I am implying that this article is in any way fake news of course, rather, I hope it is obvious I mean the opposite).