Terminology

What is a Polymath?

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Last Modified: November 11, 2020
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Our competitive modern world encourages hyper-specialization as a path to success, but throughout various periods of history individuals have aspired be multi-talented and well-rounded. If you find yourself having difficulty choosing among many interests, perhaps it’s time you embraced your identity as a polymath.

Blake Miner

Blake is a traveling social scientist (MSocSc) and entrepreneur who writes about the psychology of personal freedom, travel, and location independent business. He's the founder of Flâneur Life, an internet home for free range humans.
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What is a Polymath?

A polymath is someone who has expertise or knowledge that spans a vast number of areas. Polymaths are multi-talented, love learning, and excel in several different fields.

You can liken them to a Renaissance man (or woman) in the modern day. Although the term wasn’t used until the 20th century, it’s applied to many of the great thinkers from that period. The term comes from Greek, and means “having learned much.”

Polymaths are generalists as opposed to specialists, and solve specific problems by drawing from complex bodies of knowledge.

You could also refer to a polymath as a multipotentialite or a multipod.

Famous Polymaths

  • Leonardo da Vinci
  • Maya Angelou
  • Benjamin Franklin
  • Hildegard of Bingen
  • Henry David Thoreau
  • Stephen Hawking
  • Galileo
  • Bertrand Russell
  • Maria Gaetana Agnesi

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