Immortality is a superpower that doesn't tempt me, for one reason: It would mean I'd outlive all the people I care about, repeatedly, generation after generation. I can't imagine ever growing tired of living and seeing new things, but the cumulative loss and grief would be a heavy price.
In rather the same way, though I find intelligence a great gift, I'd hesitate to ask for more of it, because it would widen many existing social gaps and create some new ones.
Actually, the improvement I'd most like to have is a large boost in musical intelligence and perception, though I'm not sure that that would count as a "superpower." I really regret not being able to sing on key, or hear everything that's going on in a musical piece. I also like the linguistic superpower S.M. Stirling envisions in the recent Emberverse books, of being able to fully assimilate any language on encountering it, as if one instantly became a native speaker-that one's a true superpower, if a somewhat subtle one.
I knew someone who had that one, a Mythopoeic Society member, Alexei Kondratiev. He said he lost count of how many languages he could speak at eighty, but he said within a couple weeks of hearing a new one, he'd assimilate it and understand it. His English was perfect, he spoke Russian, and when he presented papers, he referred to original work in Latin, Greek, old French as well as modern, various German dialects, Italian, etc etc.
I met Kondratiev once or twice, back in the day, and I would have liked to see more of him. It's impressive to know how high the upper limits of human capabilities can be. . . .
There is a Kosciuszko Park in Milwaukee, where I grew up, located on the originally Polish south side of the city. It includes a fine statue of him on a horse brandishing a sword.
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In rather the same way, though I find intelligence a great gift, I'd hesitate to ask for more of it, because it would widen many existing social gaps and create some new ones.
Actually, the improvement I'd most like to have is a large boost in musical intelligence and perception, though I'm not sure that that would count as a "superpower." I really regret not being able to sing on key, or hear everything that's going on in a musical piece. I also like the linguistic superpower S.M. Stirling envisions in the recent Emberverse books, of being able to fully assimilate any language on encountering it, as if one instantly became a native speaker-that one's a true superpower, if a somewhat subtle one.
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Immortality would be an amazing super power.
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