Everyone is capable of, and can benefit from, mathematical thinking

I agree with the sentiment of this. I think our obsession with innate mathematical skill and genius is so detrimental to the growth mindset that you need to have in order to learn things.

I've been working a lot on my math skills lately (as an adult). A mindset I've had in the past is that "if it's hard, then that means you've hit your ceiling and you're wasting your time." But really, the opposite is true. If it's easy, then it means you already know this material, and you're wasting your time.

> I agree with the sentiment of this. I think our obsession with innate ~~mathematical~~ skill and genius is so detrimental to the growth mindset that you need to have in order to learn things.

I strongly believe that the average human being can be exceptional in any niche topic given enough time, dedication and focus.

The author of the book has picked out mathematics because that was what he was interested in. The reality is that this rule applies to everything.

The belief that some people have an innate skill that they are born with is deeply unhelpful. Whilst some people (mostly spectrum) do seem have an innate talent, I would argue that it is more an inbuilt ability to hyper focus on a topic, whether that topic be mathematics, Star Trek, dinosaurs or legacy console games from the 1980’s.

I think we do our children a disservice by convincing them that some of their peers are just “born with it”, because it discourages them from continuing to try.

What we should be teaching children is HOW to learn. At the moment it’s a by-product of learning about some topic. If we look at the old adage “feed a man a fish”, the same is true of learning.

“Teach someone mathematics and they will learn mathematics. Teach someone to learn and they will learn anything”.

> I strongly believe that the average human being can be exceptional in any niche topic given enough time, dedication and focus.

I respectfully, but strongly, disagree. There's a reason most NBA players are over 2 meters tall, and one does not become taller with time, dedication nor focus.

It might be different for intellectual skills but I am not that sure.

Almost anyone can become decent at almost anything though. Which is good already!

Most NBA players are under 2 meters tall. The average height is 1.99 meters.

https://www.lines.com/guides/average-height-nba-players/1519

Since we are being pedantic, your statement may be true but it is unsupported by the data you presented. To make it simple, let's talk about the imaginary basketball league with four players, of unit less heights of 4, 4, 4, and 1. The average height is 3.25, yet 3/4 the players are taller than average.

A paid promotion of International Median is not Average Association.

Most people have an above-average number of legs.

What's the average number of legs for humans ?

A bit less than two