Conversation with Veronica Palladino on Life, Views, and Work: Member, Glia Society (1)

Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen

Publication (Outlet/Website): In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal

Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2022/04/08

Abstract

Veronica Palladino is a Member of the Glia Society. She discusses: growing up; a sense of an extended self; the family background; the experience with peers and schoolmates; some professional certifications; the purpose of intelligence tests; high intelligence discovered; the extreme reactions to and treatment of geniuses; the greatest geniuses in history; a genius from a profoundly intelligent person; profound intelligence necessary for genius; work experiences and jobs; particular job path; the gifted and geniuses; God; science; the tests taken and scores earned (with standard deviations); the range of the scores; ethical philosophy; social philosophy; economic philosophy; political philosophy; metaphysics; philosophical system; meaning in life; meaning externally derived, or internally generated; an afterlife; the mystery and transience of life; and love.

Keywords: Cechov, Glia Society, God, Great Britain, Italy, Leicester, Marconi-Tesla, medicine, Molise, Veronica Palladino.

Conversation with Veronica Palladino on Life, Views, and Work: Member, Glia Society (1)

*Please see the references, footnotes, and citations, after the interview, respectively.*

Scott Douglas Jacobsen: When you were growing up, what were some of the prominent family stories being told over time?

Veronica Palladino[1],[2]*: My parents are two ordinary people but extraordinary to my sister and me. Even though my father passed away a few years ago, his precious teaching is always in my heart and in my mind.

Jacobsen: Have these stories helped provide a sense of an extended self or a sense of the family legacy?

Palladino: My family is the pivot of my life. It is a continuous resource, it is the nourishment for the soul when it needs to be refreshed.

Jacobsen: What was the family background, e.g., geography, culture, language, and religion or lack thereof?

Palladino: My family is Italian. My mother was born in Great Britain, exactly in Leicester. I was born and I live in Italy in a small region called Molise. It is a beautiful place where nature, ancient traditions and authenticity create a jumble of good feelings and spontaneity.

Jacobsen: How was the experience with peers and schoolmates as a child and an adolescent?

Palladino: I was an extremely shy and reserved child. I preferred to invent fantastic stories full of enchanted worlds in which to take refuge to avoid relationship with others. My imposing and robust physical appearance created in me embarrassment and displeasure. I didn’t feel accepted and I kept a low profile to hide who I was. I did not want to share my ideas, thoughts and eccentricities with others for fear of not being understood. I showed a protective armor against evils. Now I know that I am what I am, simply.

Jacobsen: What have been some professional certifications, qualifications, and trainings earned by you?

Palladino: I am medical doctor and I have written four books: Il diario del Martedì, Un mondo altro, La Morte delle Afroditi bionde and Persone e lacrime.

Jacobsen: What is the purpose of intelligence tests to you?

Palladino: According to me the purpose of an intelligence test is to challenge one’s cognitive abilities to improve weaknesses and to corroborate potential. The result obtained should not be taken too seriously. It must be a track to evolve and do better.

Jacobsen: When was high intelligence discovered for you?

Palladino: After twenty, I have done a test for fun with a friend.

Jacobsen: When you think of the ways in which the geniuses of the past have either been mocked, vilified, and condemned if not killed, or praised, flattered, platformed, and revered, what seems like the reason for the extreme reactions to and treatment of geniuses? Many alive today seem camera shy – many, not all.

Palladino: Being a genius is no guarantee of success. Many factors affect the life of a brilliant mind, just think of the Marconi-Tesla comparison or the misunderstanding reserved for a great Italian writer like Svevo. The examples are numerous. Understanding the light and power of a great mind is a difficult task. Every genius has a particular and unique interaction with the world.

Jacobsen: Who seems like the greatest geniuses in history to you?

Palladino: There is not one in particular, I could say Bohr, Leibniz, Goethe, Bach, Ramanujan, Wittgenstein, Aeschylus but it is impossible for me to choose because everyone has a wonderful gift that does not admit comparison

Jacobsen: What differentiates a genius from a profoundly intelligent person?

Palladino: A highly intelligent person has cognitive abilities greater than four standard deviations from the general population. A genius is not just intelligence, it is above all an emblem of strength, determination, creativity, originality and innovation.

Jacobsen: Is profound intelligence necessary for genius?

Palladino: No I think that genius definition does not require a profound intelligence necessarily. It is an extremely complex and various concept.

Jacobsen: What have been some work experiences and jobs held by you?

Palladino: I worked as an on-call doctor. Now I am a resident.

Jacobsen: Why pursue this particular job path?

Palladino: I believe in medicine, in helping people with love and truth, in improving ourselves. I chose my career path because I want to give meaning to my work, helping to alleviate, even if in my small way, the worries of others. Moreover, scientific studies allow you to train your mind and find explanations to the many questions that concern humanity. Then I love to write. It is a necessity to travel continously in fantastic lands. Cechov said medicine is my lawful wife and literature is my mistress.

Jacobsen: What are some of the more important aspects of the idea of the gifted and geniuses? Those myths that pervade the cultures of the world. What are those myths? What truths dispel them?

Palladino: There is a lot of confusion about the concept of genius and gifted. Genius goes back to antiquity. In Roman mythology each person was born with a guardian spirit called Genius. During the Italian Renaissance the world designated something truly exceptional about the individual. Now the term “genius” is no longer in style to describe highly gifted students or adults. Giftedness is a brain-based difference that contributes to our vibrant and neurodiverse world. Those who are profoundly gifted score in the 99.9th percentile on IQ tests and have an exceptionally high level of intellectual prowess. Genius is a poetic dream, gifted is a scientific definition.

Jacobsen: Any thoughts on the God concept or gods idea and philosophy, theology, and religion?

Palladino: God is pure light, perfect science. Many do not believe in the existence of God but those who believe in it know that his existence, even if indefinable, fills life. Words do not have sufficient expressive capacity to describe what God means to those who believe. God is only total love.

Jacobsen: How much does science play into the worldview for you?

Palladino: Science is the key to knowledge because it allows you to evolve and improve by accessing higher levels of knowledge but it is also the lock because without it, the understanding of every process is denied. Our  perceptions are different, false and fragmentary but science is coherent and indivisible because it is a unifying truth that is difficult to reach and the ways that lead to it are manifold and inaccessible. Many are lost and will never be able to grasp its essence which is the ultimate basis of our life, our unique breath.

Jacobsen: What have been some of the tests taken and scores earned (with standard deviations) for you?

Palladino: Numerus 154 sd 15, Matriq 179 sd15, Fiqure 157 sd 15 Lexiq 175 sd 15, Nerve 169 sd 15, Labcube 165 sd 15, VerbaNum 178 sd 15.

Jacobsen: What ethical philosophy makes some sense, even the most workable sense to you?

Palladino:  For my professional duties I believe in the power of deontology, an ethical theory that uses rules to distinguish right from wrong. Deontology is often associated with philosopher Immanuel Kant. Kant believed that ethical actions follow universal moral laws. The word deontology derives from the Greek words for duty (deon) and science (or study) of (logos). In contemporary moral philosophy, deontology is one of those kinds of normative theories regarding which choices are morally required, forbidden, or permitted. In other words, deontology falls within the domain of moral theories that guide and assess our choices of what we ought to do (deontic theories), in contrast to those that guide and assess what kind of person we are and should be (aretaic [virtue] theories).

Jacobsen: What social philosophy makes some sense, even the most workable sense to you?

Palladino: I believe in the power of social epistemology that is the philosophical study of the relevance of communities to knowledge. Social epistemology can be done descriptively or normatively. Weinstein and Stehr have written: “ From the beginning of scientific revolution  scientists, philosophers and laypersons have been concerned about the effects of knowledge on social relations. Although views differ about the details of this knowledge…, most observers have understood that the kind of knowledge that emanates from estabilished science can indeed be quite powerful in practice.

Jacobsen: What political philosophy makes some sense, even the most workable sense to you?

Palladino: Nature is our mother and we should respect it in every political choice. Beyond the traditional ethical disputes concerning the good life for human beings and what political situation would best suit our development, others take up an alternative conception of humanity and its relationship with the living world.  “Environmentalism” is a political philosophy that does not concern itself with the rights of people or of society, but of the rights of the planet and other species. Environmentalism rejects such human-centered utilitarianism in favor of a broad ethical intrinsicism – the theory that all species possess an innate value independent of any other entity’s relationship to them.

Jacobsen: What metaphysics makes some sense to you, even the most workable sense to you?

Palladino: I believe in the priciples of Catholicism: life and dignity of the human person, solidarity, subsidiarity and respect.

Jacobsen: What worldview-encompassing philosophical system makes some sense, even the most workable sense to you?

Palladino:  I follow my philosophy of life which is unique and tailor-made for me. Each of us is unique, each of us is glowing potential and has all the tools within himself to evolve into a better form. Fears, insecurities, excesses divert our path. Respecting yourself to respect others is the most powerful philosophy of life. “Homo sum,  humani nihil a me alienum puto” (Terence)

Jacobsen: What provides meaning in life for you?

Palladino: The purpose of my life is to seek the truth, the truth of knowledge, the truth of love, the truth of affections, the truth of creation. I want to pull away the veil of appearances and artifacts that cover things.

Jacobsen: Is meaning externally derived, internally generated, both, or something else?

Palladino: The meaning is internally generated.

Jacobsen: Do you believe in an afterlife? If so, why, and what form? If not, why not?

Palladino: I believe in life after death in a form inexplicable to human understanding beyond the physical laws. I imagine a density of love so great that it creates more love that does not let anything escape.

Jacobsen: What do you make of the mystery and transience of life?

Palladino:

I would like to answer  with a succinct word: Soldiers.

It is a poem of Giuseppe Ungaretti.

We are as

In autumn

On branches

The leaves.

For me, the poem represents what is transience of life. It underlines the irrationality of the human condition and the inevitable end we must all face. It renders all men no different than leaves that in autumn fall from the branches, following the natural course of nature.

Jacobsen: What is love to you?

Palladino: In my poem “To you everything” I explain love.

To you who told me not to cry,

To you, what a genuflect, you forced me to get up,

To you who have fenced off my despair,

My whole being

All my bright dark,

Everything they don’t see and don’t know.

In every secret, in every lie, in every artifact there

is only one truth,

for you, and no one else.

They tear my flesh, moods, words, dreams … I have nothing left.

I’m already dead but I don’t admit it.

I walk in apocalyptic inertia e I don’t find acceleration.

Limbo is deadly, hell awaits me

Only in the last healthy piece of cancer-defaced tissue

the last memory snuggles up with you,

the impulse of an omnipotent happiness.

To you everything.

According to me love is like quantum entanglement. When two or more particles link up in a certain way, no matter how far apart they are in space, their states remain linked. That means they share a common, unified quantum state.  (i∂̸ – m) ψ = 0.

Footnotes

[1] Member, Glia Society.

[2] Individual Publication Date: April 8, 2022: http://www.in-sightpublishing.com/palladino-1; Full Issue Publication Date: May 1, 2022: https://in-sightpublishing.com/insight-issues/.

*High range testing (HRT) should be taken with honest skepticism grounded in the limited empirical development of the field at present, even in spite of honest and sincere efforts. If a higher general intelligence score, then the greater the variability in, and margin of error in, the general intelligence scores because of the greater rarity in the population.

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