The Genius-Based Meritocracy of East Asian Math and Physics Students Is Naive and Ignorant

I. The Cult of Genius and Meritocracy Among East Asian Math and Physics Students Is Narrow-Minded and Immature

This is typically found in high school academic competition circles and the mathematics and physics departments of elite universities. Many East Asian kids become utterly consumed by the cult of genius and meritocracy during their most adolescent, self-dramatizing high school years. Then, gradually, in their first, second, and third years of university, their dreams of genius suffer setbacks. They marvel at “academic gods,” feel inferior and depressed, and discover that they are “not geniuses.” Their dream of following in Shing-Tung Yau’s footsteps—making a spectacular debut through sheer genius and securing a tenured position at a top university—falls apart, and they slowly keep adjusting their mindset and career plans. They switch to applied mathematics, statistics, CS, or finance. Those are the better outcomes; many others become dispirited and give up on themselves. From beginning to end, they never think about working steadily to make sure they do not leave a mountain of treasures empty-handed. The only thing they care about is the collapse of their narcissistic dreams.

First, these immature fantasies show a lack of respect for the realities and underlying principles of mathematics and physics (Hua Luogeng: “Genius comes from accumulation; intelligence lies in diligence”), as well as the realities and underlying principles of human beings and society (historical materialism and the people-centered view of history). Second, they are naturally very easy to shatter. Third, they are much like the fantasies of children such as Wang Baoqiang who study martial arts at the Shaolin Temple: imagining themselves to be martial arts prodigies who will one day defeat everyone under heaven, become the next Jet Li, and reach the pinnacle of life. In reality, Wu Jing, the actual next Jet Li, got there through *Wolf Warrior*, rather than martial arts prowess.

Many of these kids later go into AI and quantitative finance because these two fields offer, first, the “prospect of a high income” they have finally been dreaming of, salvaging the dignity of their meritocratic social Darwinism and proving that they are “a cut above everyone else.” Second, they salvage their narcissistic fantasies through “prestige” and “mystique.” The former seems to suggest becoming humanity’s god or humanity’s devil, fitting their adolescent grandiosity; the latter seems to suggest becoming tomorrow’s Soros or the next Simons with his Medallion Fund. They are also prone to becoming obsessed with concepts such as blockchain and finance.

The real world, society, the economy, and investing are not what they imagine. Their group’s actual social role and influence are not all that great. Salaries and job security in AI and quantitative finance are often not particularly good. The bureaucracy has a term, “three-door cadres”: “the door of the family home, the school gate, and the workplace entrance.” Having spent too long in an ivory tower, they have immature, presumptuous views of the world, life, and values, and are poorly socialized. This “three-door” phenomenon is especially pronounced among programmers, which is why management in China’s internet industry is generally so poor. The result is that bad money drives out good, and only the bad money can put up with it.

By comparison, computer science students generally have no lofty ambitions and few fantasies, apart from imagining themselves becoming Bill Gates or Elon Musk and making a fortune. Computer science is also on the easier side among science and engineering disciplines, yet offers the highest income, with annual salaries routinely reaching a million yuan, much to the exasperation of mathematics and physics students. Students in fields such as biology, chemistry, environmental science, and materials science also face fairly high admissions thresholds, but indulge in far less self-pity than mathematics and physics students.

II. Social Background Factors

1. The “failure” of industrial upgrading and insufficient demand for “high-end talent.” (Moreover, industrial upgrading is itself a false concept; see my earlier article, “It Is Not Industrial Upgrading, but the Downgrading of Global Industry.” The laws of capitalism dictate that so-called high-end talent is merely caught up in tournament-style involution.) This leads to greater involution, fewer opportunities, and more confusion.

1. Widespread far-right attitudes, meritocracy, social Darwinism, elitism, the cult of genius, involution, and peer pressure.

1. Individual psychology: empty-heart syndrome, adult infantilism, narcissistic fantasies, a single system of values, existential crises, anti-humanism, and entrenched straight-male chauvinism.

1. Problems with the education system itself: a tournament structure, selection rather than cultivation, intense pressure, and so on.

III. Social Impact

These people were originally a niche group, entertaining themselves and wallowing in self-pity, with little significance for the bulk of society or for workers and peasants. They are like humanities students with literary dreams, art students with dreams of becoming artists, exceptionally beautiful women with dreams of stardom, philosophy students with dreams of becoming philosophers, or sports students with dreams of becoming the GOAT. Their privately pitying themselves when these dreams go unrealized does not matter much to society. (This is an appropriate analogy: grandiose youthful fantasies shatter, and people move toward practical employment.)

But because of the niche they occupy, there are some harmful social effects:

1. A harmful influence on primary and secondary education, university science and engineering education, mathematics and physics education and popularization, and ordinary people’s efforts to learn mathematics and physics. Claims about genius, claims about IQ, claims that girls are unsuited to mathematics, and so on create a pervasive, unhealthy atmosphere of impatience, disparagement of others and oneself, pretension, and utilitarianism. China’s model relies on the dividends of training engineers en masse, a modified version of Soviet Russian education and German vocational education. This harmful influence therefore does considerable damage.

By comparison, the IT world has consistently worked to demystify programming so that ordinary engineering students and ordinary people can learn some programming to serve their own needs.

1. An influence on the ethos of higher education, general education, and pluralistic values. This attitude permeates the Chinese-language internet, including Zhihu.

1. More examples and greater support for stereotypical views of formally trained graduates that fuel claims that “studying is useless” and “elite universities are useless.”

p.s. Earlier article: “Looking Back in Middle Age at the Two Great Mountains of Mathematics and Physics, I See All the More Clearly the Irony of Being an Ordinary Person”