Reasonable Genius

If A is a type of situation
About which people commonly reason
Quite well, and B is a situation
About which fewer people reason well,

And C is a type of situation
About which very few people reason
Well, then this itself’s a situation
About which most people reason poorly,

Yielding to the temptation to assume
Relative difficulty’s inherent
In each situation, accurately
Revealed by the relative rarity

Of how many people can reason well
About that said type of situation.
Thus, C must be more difficult than B
And B must be more difficult than A.

This is a mistake, but it’s persistent,
As evidenced by frequent bafflement
When someone proves adept at reasoning
Through “hard” problems but fails at “easy” ones.

First, consider the possibility
That there’s nothing pyramidal about
A problem’s degree of difficulty,
With the pinnacle resting on the base.

Next, consider the possibility
That relative ease or difficulty
Of reasoning has to do with humans,
Selected for social skills, not logic.

Third, consider the possibility
That the ability to reason well
About certain types of situations
Interferes with reasoning in others.

In short, the genius of the peculiar
May often fail where most people succeed
For utterly unsurprising reasons,
If one thinks of genius reasonably.