Winston Churchill is known more as a wartime politician than as a painter and Nobel Laureate for literature. Isaac Newton, likewise, is known more for his scientific contributions than for publishing mystic and theological texts, which some would consider the exact opposite of science.
Persons of this kind were once celebrated as polymaths. Today, we might label them as having ADHD or lacking focus. We are drawn and rewarded more for specialisation than for dabbling in and possibly mastering many things, as did Robert Sobukwe, for instance. We are halved by specialisation.
I suspect, however, that the age of AI will thrust us into the abyss where meaning will be rediscovered only by dabbling in this and that and testing the thresholds of our curiosity to no end. A Renaissance might be upon us.
