The "New Vocal Talent"-thread in the Music and Media sub-forums made me think about this matter; Do you believe talent is a genetic matter or is it rather something that is learned? Do you have any talents? What are they and are they similar to skills of some relative? Do all people have talent or are some completely talentless? I personally believe skill is a combination of talent and practise - for example to become a good singer you need talent, but you also need practise to master that talent. Some people, on the other hand, are inherently tone-deaf and cannot sing at all, no matter how much they practise. Especially when it comes to sports, natural talent is very easy to detect and it is quite obvious at an early stage that the people who turn professional will do so. I completely lack co-ordination and can barely walk in a straight ine (lol) so for me it was always obvious I would not become an athlete. Cultural and/or environmental conditioning may also play an important role, but without talent you will have a much, much (much, much, much) harder time to succeed. I have very little talent in general so I do believe some people are talentless, however my interests for drawing, music and writing seems to "run in the family", at least on my mother's side. So, perhaps even interests are genetic to a certain extent?
Talent is probably environmental through a proclivity toward an ability... ... supported by instruction and practice. Gifted is more likely genetic based.
This is a nature verses nurture style of question and the answer is pretty much always “a bit of both”. Boring but true. I do think that with most tasks, it would be possible for the vast majority of people to reach a reasonable level of success with sufficient training and practice, regardless of their underlying abilities. Even with something as apparently as straight forwards as sprinting for example, there is still a lot of technique and “muscle memory” involved and a good coach could take anyone with a basic level of fitness and significantly increase their performance with a relatively short period of training. To reach the top of a field will require certain underlying talent but only combined with the time and effort committed to training and practice.
Partly, at least, genetic. My father, brother and I all shared an ability in maths. Never mind my mother, though....
