What is meant by Genius? [Manga]
 

In Naruto due to translation or intent the word Genius gets thrown around a lot. It gets thrown around in this forum even more.

My question is this WHAT IS MEANT BY A GENIUS IN NARUTO???

Sasuke is termed a genius because he's Uchiha.
The Fourth because he was powerful.
The Third because he mastered so many Jutsu.
Shikamaru because his IQ is so High.
Lee because of his hard work.

The only one that seems to fall into my narrow American defintion of the word genius is Shikamaru and maybe the Third.

Extremly high natural talent/ability. Such as the advanced bloodline abilities like Hyuuga clan's and sasuke's eyes.

The one word, 天才, can mean
• genius
• prodigy
• naturally gifted
etc. etc.

so many of the translators stick with 天才 = genius
even though, to me, Neji/Saskuke/others are prodigies, rather than obviously mentally superior.

Hope that helps.

Actually that really does thanks raikage.

I figured it had to be in the translation. Because I have to agree to me Sasuke/Neji/Lee are no (intellegence wise) Geniuses.

It must be useful being able to read the real stuff. Not that I'm complaining I love Bakasan/ ANBU-Aeon.

Yup, 天才 literally means "born with talent." Now, whether that has to be intelligence is dependent on one's culture...and in Naruto's culture, it seems to indicate both intelligence and ability.

i agree with raikage, i think its the best definition we can offer.

Well, "tensai" literally applies to everyone they use it for. The implication is to be derived from the context, and for everyone except Lee, the term is applied as it should. In Lee's case, it's a bit of a stretch.

So contentually breaking down "tensai" into English:

Shikamaru is a genius.
Sasuke has lots of raw talent. A good pedigree, I suppose.
Neji is a prodigy.

Genius probably translates to talent, or inate ability.

Neji feels that people are strong because they're born that way, and people are weak for the same reason. Sasuke was born with the Sharingan, therefore, his power is inherited.

Then at the other end of the spectrum you have the "dropouts" like Lee and Naruto. Guys with no natural talent, but compensate for it in hard work.

Its like the uber talented jock that everything comes easy to, compared to the klutzy dropout who has to work his ass off to suceed.

Both Lee and Naruto *are* geniuses though, just in different ways.

Gai-Kakashi this is in no way meant to insulte you but it was that kind of talk that got me all confused in the first place. Saying that these characters are geniuses because of X, Y, and Z but then so are those characters who directly contradict.

Not after a consensus just trying to further an underastanding of what it is to be a "genius" , or at least a "tensai" in Kishiomoto's world.

Its all a question of perception.

Naruto was percieved as a dropout, he failed the academy three times.

Lee was percieved as a dropout, he had absolutely no talent at Ninjutsu, Genjutsu or Taijutsu.

Chouji was percieved as a dropout because everyone saw him as a weak fatass.

This changes because they grow and compensate for their weakness, but ignore that for now.

Sasuke was percieved as a Genius, i.e. a person with a lot of natual born ability and talent. He had the bloodlimit of the Uchia clan and was the #1 rookie at the academy.

The same for Neji, he had those spiffy peepers of his and could use the devine cyclone and 64 heavenly fists. He was also the previous #1 rookie at the academy. Neji also believes that all of his abilities, and the abilities of powerful people in general, is all decided by birth/destiny. Example: If you're born poor, then you're going to die poor and there's nothing you can do about it.

The moral that Naruto is trying to get across IMO is that untalented "dropouts" can be become better than those with bundles of talent.

Do you know what the Navy SEALs look for in recruits? Many SEAL instructors say the talented "gazelles" are among the first to drop out, where as the guy that came in last in PT, but doesn't quit, is the sort of person that they're really looking for. That what Richard Marchinko, legendary SEAL looked for anyway.

Make sense now?

Technically, Naruto was born with an ability or talent(enhanced chakra from Kyuubi).

No, Lee and Naruto are NOT geniuses. They're hard workers. There's no ability needed for hard work...there's just hard work involved.

When Guy says Lee is a "Genius of Efforts" that's the only time it stretches beyond the scope of the word tensai's definition. Hard work isn't inherited, nor is it innate. It's earned.

Naruto and Lee are NOT geniuses. To say that they are only demans the people they are, because they don't have talent, but they get by with guts. To use what you're born with...everyone can do that. To exceed the hand you were given...that is exceptional.

Hard work alone is not enough to learn Kage Bunshin in a few hours.

Naruto is definetly a genius. He just works very hard as well.

Yeah, except you're still wrong about Naruto and Lee being geniuses.

The fact of the matter is this simple comparison:

An Average Joe is weaker than a Lazy Genius.
A Lazy Genius is weaker than a Hard Worker.
A Hard Worker is less than a Hard Working Genius.

"Tensai" in Naruto and outside of it as well, is referring to anyone who has a natural gift they were born with. (Naruto isn't BORN with Kyuubi, and it can theoretically be removed from him...at least locked away.)

Hard work is NOT a natural gift. It's a personality trait that you develop. Any genius can become hard working. Eveyone who works hard cannot become a genius.

You're trying to quantify which is best. The original poster just wanted to know what genius was referring to. You're vehemently defending an argument, and then argiung a different point, and I think everyone agrees with the two basic points that precipitated out of this discussion:

1) Tensai basically equates to the English terms, "Genius" (Shikamaru), "Prodigy" (Neji, Haku), and "Talented" (Sasuke, etc.)

2) Geniuses are not necessarily better than driven individuals with strong will.

Naruto is definetly a genius. He just works very hard as well.[/QUOTE]

Ok, Naruto got the scroll for Kage Bunshin. I'm pretty sure anyone, yes, even Sakura, would be able to perform it. However, they aren't permitted to learn it. That's nothing.

Naruto rises to the occasion, and he did it at that moment. Same way he summons Gamabunta.

He's just..."exceptionally clutch".

Edit by Dranz: No manga spoilers please since this thread's name doesn't have [Spoilers] in it. I edited your post instead of deleting it this time around, but next time don't do spoilers at all. It seems dumb but bear with us for now until hopefully something good happens to this forum

Genius (in Naruto) - Born with natural strength (or other talent, like high IQ, or good mind for tactics, etc).
Im sure that has been said 3343648 already in this topic now though ^_^

So are you implying Naruto's freakish stamina and Lee's ability to open the Gates are not innate? If they are, then shouldn't the two be considered prodigies as well since they are born with those special physical traits? I just don't understand your logic; just because their innate physical talents don't have a special cool name and that they don't have a famous family known for those talents doesn't mean they aren't "tensai" by the same standards you judged Sasuke and Neji. As for how fast/efficient they learn jutsus and such, Lee probably doesn't have the mark of a genius, but Naruto definitely isn't inferior to any of the "geniuses" you've mentioned in regards to learning curve.

HUH?!?!? How did you end up with this conclusion?!
Okay, Sakura still has hope. All Tsunade needs to do is let her read every scroll Konoha has to offer, and in a matter of weeks she'll surpass Naruto + Sasuke + Kakashi but MAYBE not on par with Orochimaru! :innocent:

Well if you think about it, Kage Bunshin is nothing special. It's not harmless unless you know what you're doing and can control your Chakra well. Sakura is the best at Chakra control so she could easily pull it off. The only problem is that she doesn't have enough chakra stamina in order to makes enough clones.

Exactly right.

Sakura could have like 2-3 clones whereas Naruto can make 1,000. It would be useless for her to have that few clones, may as well just stick with the normal bunshin, and therefore it's forbidden for most.

(BTW, on the spoiler thingy, I was just putting the tags on Hiko's...he had posted it unspoilered, and when I quoted him, I had tagged it. Probably forgot to tag my own referral to it, though...my bad.)

Allow me to pull a Kerry and backtrack based on this assumption that Kage Bunshin is nothing special (I don't agree, but for the sake of argument I will): given that Naruto was horrible at bushin no jutsu in Ninja Academy, doesn't that still mean his learning ability was astounishing? My reasoning then would be: if someone who has trouble with basic differentiation/integration all year can suddenly master multivariable vector calculus in one night (same basis, just slightly more complicated), I'd say that person is a freakin' genius not because of the difficulty but because of the abnormal improvement.

Then again, I don't agree. If it's something that can be easily mastered, then it's pretty pointless to forbid others from learning it. You can always argue that its "forbidden" status may just be a device Kishimoto used to illustrate Naruto's amazing learning ability (thus supporting my initial point in this thread) as well as to make the jutsu fairly unique to Naruto, but since I've yet to read any official explanation as to why it's forbidden and how it's learned, I can just as easily "argue" that the prerequisite to learning it requires large amoung of chakra. Not enough chakra, no shadow clones for Sakura.