Why are intellectuals so dumb?

[ivankiss]

Why are smart people so damn stupid?

I hung out with hardcore intellectuals a few times in my life, and they are super annoying. Surprisingly close-minded and stubborn AF. Like stupid stubborn. Beyond rationality.

I thought about it being just me, but I highly doubt it. I think I'm not the only one who noticed this and is repulsed by it.

My guess is that they're perhaps more cognitively developed, but are completely disconnected from feeling and severely lack emotional intelligence/maturity. They are usually very good at learning, they're great scholars, etc. But they're shit in their relationships - for example, have no strong ethical and moral values, no integrity, compassion, kindness, lack authenticity, etc... All they're good at is gobbling up information and then throwing it back up in somebody's face and arguing about those ideas with whomever opposes them.

They usually have no original thoughts and opinions, instead they're quoting things they read or heard somewhere. 'Evidence' and 'research' and 'facts' are their favourite words. Even though it's all bullshit. They spent zero time verifying these truths for themselves. They simply adopted it all, blindly. 

They have no sense of a personal, let alone universal truth. And more often than not, no purpose either. And what's even worse: no interest in any of that. 

I am generalizing here, of course. I'm sure there are many exceptions. But generally, these are my observations/experience.

To be honest, I could read a book or two more. I could memorize a thing or two about that country, or that politician, that war, that leader or whatever. I do feel like I'm lacking a bit in that area, and that might be why I'm that much more triggered by this kind of folks. But I'd say that's not the only reason why.

'Smart people' are just stupid. Change my mind.

Edited June 10, 2023 by ivankiss

[Leo Gura]

That's what universities are designed to create. It comes from a lack of holism.

True intelligence is holistic. But universities have reduced intelligence down to technical knowledge.

Nobody teaches true intelligence.

Edited June 10, 2023 by Leo Gura

[Scholar]

It's kind of funny how people are basically taught to be ChatGPTs.

[zurew]

3 hours ago, ivankiss said:

Why are smart people so damn stupid

This is why its important  to make a difference between intelligence and wisdom.

Generally speaking, the smarter you get - counterintuitively - the more prone you will get to be a victim of self-deception. The reason for that is because you will be able to create and generate more and more sophisticated and deep rationalizations, arguments to others and to your own self; you will be better at creating your own ideas and defense for those ideas, so much so, that you will be less and less able to see through your own bullshit (unless you do consciousness work, where you zoom out, and take a look at it from a bigger picture or change your whole framework); and there will be less and less people who will be able to  properly challenge your ideas, and all that can make you feel even stronger that you are right.

In other words, you will be more better at defending your own framework (it can be a wordlview or an ideology or any specific idea or belief or bias of yours), and you will be less and less interested in changing the foundational assumptions of your own framework and can only argue inside your framework - and of course because you are so good  at defending and comfortable inside your own framework - most people will never be able to challenge you properly , unless they can make you realize that your framework as a whole is not the best (even though it might be logically consistent). 

One could even say that the ego will get more and more antifragile (the more you attack the framework or the idea - depending on how intelligent the ego - the better it will get at defending the wordview or the idea)

Edited June 10, 2023 by zurew

[Princess Arabia]

3 hours ago, ivankiss said:

Why are smart people so damn stupid?

I hung out with hardcore intellectuals a few times in my life, and they are super annoying. Surprisingly close-minded and stubborn AF. Like stupid stubborn. Beyond rationality.

I thought about it being just me, but I highly doubt it. I think I'm not the only one who noticed this and is repulsed by it.

My guess is that they're perhaps more cognitively developed, but are completely disconnected from feeling and severely lack emotional intelligence/maturity. They are usually very good at learning, they're great scholars, etc. But they're shit in their relationships - for example, have no strong ethical and moral values, no integrity, compassion, kindness, lack authenticity, etc... All they're good at is gobbling up information and then throwing it back up in somebody's face and arguing about those ideas with whomever opposes them.

They usually have no original thoughts and opinions, instead they're quoting things they read or heard somewhere. 'Evidence' and 'research' and 'facts' are their favourite words. Even though it's all bullshit. They spent zero time verifying these truths for themselves. They simply adopted it all, blindly. 

They have no sense of a personal, let alone universal truth. And more often than not, no purpose either. And what's even worse: no interest in any of that. 

I am generalizing here, of course. I'm sure there are many exceptions. But generally, these are my observations/experience.

To be honest, I could read a book or two more. I could memorize a thing or two about that country, or that politician, that war, that leader or whatever. I do feel like I'm lacking a bit in that area, and that might be why I'm that much more triggered by this kind of folks. But I'd say that's not the only reason why.

'Smart people' are just stupid. Change my mind.

I agree. I'm always around smart/dumb people, who are always telling me how smart I am because they're too dumb to realize that I'ts not that I'm smart, its because they're too dumb to realize that I'm not that smart. If that makes any sense. See, I told you I'm not that smart, but then again, you're smart enough to realize that. Don't mind me, I'm smart/dumb.

[integral]

That sounds like the Expert stage of development by Cook Greuter.

If someone has not directly experience a problem in a domain they cannot see why the science behind it is deceptive. 

[Yimpa]

39 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Nobody teaches true intelligence.

Including You 

25 minutes ago, Scholar said:

It's kind of funny how people are basically taught to be ChatGPTs.

Which is why ChatGPT is a blessing. 

[Osaid]

Because their bullshit gets smarter too.

Edited June 10, 2023 by Osaid

[Leo Gura]

15 minutes ago, Yimpa said:

Including You 

Who are you kidding?

[ValiantSalvatore]

ChatGPT is clearly consciouness enacted, it's not intelligent it's what humans call intelligence replicated, that is very obvious. 

If it's a jk kind of thing watch how the church of A.I will form at one point it's ridiculous. 

Edited June 10, 2023 by ValiantSalvatore

[Leo Gura]

49 minutes ago, Scholar said:

It's kind of funny how people are basically taught to be ChatGPTs.

Don't insult ChatGPT by comparing it to humans.

[ValiantSalvatore]

4 hours ago, ivankiss said:

Why are smart people so damn stupid?

I hung out with hardcore intellectuals a few times in my life, and they are super annoying. Surprisingly close-minded and stubborn AF. Like stupid stubborn. Beyond rationality.

I thought about it being just me, but I highly doubt it. I think I'm not the only one who noticed this and is repulsed by it.

My guess is that they're perhaps more cognitively developed, but are completely disconnected from feeling and severely lack emotional intelligence/maturity. They are usually very good at learning, they're great scholars, etc. But they're shit in their relationships - for example, have no strong ethical and moral values, no integrity, compassion, kindness, lack authenticity, etc... All they're good at is gobbling up information and then throwing it back up in somebody's face and arguing about those ideas with whomever opposes them.

They usually have no original thoughts and opinions, instead they're quoting things they read or heard somewhere. 'Evidence' and 'research' and 'facts' are their favourite words. Even though it's all bullshit. They spent zero time verifying these truths for themselves. They simply adopted it all, blindly. 

They have no sense of a personal, let alone universal truth. And more often than not, no purpose either. And what's even worse: no interest in any of that. 

I am generalizing here, of course. I'm sure there are many exceptions. But generally, these are my observations/experience.

To be honest, I could read a book or two more. I could memorize a thing or two about that country, or that politician, that war, that leader or whatever. I do feel like I'm lacking a bit in that area, and that might be why I'm that much more triggered by this kind of folks. But I'd say that's not the only reason why.

'Smart people' are just stupid. Change my mind.

Because they enact their reality, and crave power like everyone else. Smart is basically practicallity and human survival, intelligence and beyond human intelligence goes way further. You can certainly learn more holistically, yet it's also just pure survival the best scientist don't have time to validate everything and gather evidence, and also just riff-off their opinion. Most are not interested to get good at multiple areas, if we all would we would legit be perfect, and that is scary. 

Many don't master emotional intelligence due to trauma, bullying, having success and resting on their laurels. You certainly meet more evolved humans the more you work on yourself, even if these are few. Many build an ego and have 0 intellectual humilty, the best scientist will show you an intellectual humillity beyond belief, any serious scientist and scholar/knowlegable smart person will. Especially if they have multiple degrees and it's their life style and not your around the corner block type intellectual. What I even might for some some which is ridiculous. The point is also these problems are so difficult, many stop.

Most of these are concrete specalistics are very myopic creatures. The amount of pain it took them to generate their knowledge and frustration, they can't balance this out and neglect theit health and bodies. For them it's their identity, they cling to their power in a sense, what you most likely seek and get triggered by is the deep mastery, you can also have golden shadows, so you might neglect breakthroughs and epiphanies by knowing how f*ing hard it can be to generate these. Original thought is extremely difficult, it's the pinnacle of thinking imo. Seeing some serious scientist changed my mind from recognizing the difference. See for example someone like Andrew NG, or Lex Fridman even if they are hardcore intellectuals they are basically indocrtinated by evolution and scientific paradigms that they did not question, especially if they lack the heart. Which I think these two do not. 

If you meet serious scientist who studied mutliple disciplines in an advanced country you see why they can be like this, we also contribute to them as a collective ironically...

Edited June 10, 2023 by ValiantSalvatore

[Jacob Morres]

It's a good point 

I was the same before watching Leo's stuff

Severely lacking awareness, consciousness, morals, a scientific bigot etc. lol 

With no passion for philosophy and introduction to these ideas I was just unconscious af. 

Guess the mainstream perspective still is quite undeveloped 

Edited June 10, 2023 by Jacob Morres

[Carl-Richard]

5 hours ago, ivankiss said:

They usually have no original thoughts and opinions

Tell me something original.

[Carl-Richard]

On 10.6.2023 at 8:13 PM, Scholar said:

It's kind of funny how people are basically taught to be ChatGPTs.

The problem with the collective classroom teaching format is that it basically only allows for ChatGPT type learning. If you want to be taught how to be a human and not just a robot, you need a mentor. A mentor doesn't just read you something from a book and then gives you a quiz at the end of the year. They have conversations with you, they know when you actually understand something and when you don't, and they're responsive to your everchanging needs. Virtually all the great geniuses of history had mentors at some point in their life.

Edited June 11, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[StarStruck]

It is called projection 

[Yimpa]

3 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Who are you kidding?

ME! ME! ME!

[Hojo]

most intellectual conversations on philosophy end in you havent read this guys text therefore you are wrong.

Im not reading anything you fucking tell me your point and if you cant you dont understand it !

If you understand something you can tell it in 100s of different ways

[Carl-Richard]

1 minute ago, Hojo said:

most intellectual conversations on philosophy end in you havent read this guys text therefore you are wrong.

That's actually a common thing I've noticed, whether it's reading a research paper or a larger body of work, because there is either a huge language barrier to overcome in that conversation, or a lack of information about a subject that is usually so detailed that you would have to read it to comment on it. That is both a strength and a weakness with the academic approach, because it keeps things both highly accurate and nuanced, but on the other hand, it creates barriers between people and elitism and animosity.

[SOUL]

At least intellectuals study something, they have some basis of knowledge and understanding to draw off of even if their common sense is skewed by the lack of real world experience and feel peer pressure to form their opinions.

On the other hand there are those who reject all academic rigor, their common sense is warped by their biases and have zero intuitive ability. These people's opinions are merely parroting what their 'thought leaders' want them to believe.

It may be a choice between dumb and dumber but don't allow their ignorance become your stumbling block.