I think the proportion of stupid to smart is the same as always. It is just the internet has given stupid a much bigger amplifier than it has given to smart. It is just as easier to distribute a stupid idea to billions of people than it is to distribute a smart idea.
Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
151–160 of 307 posts
Re: Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
#152I've engaged a few flat earthers to actually listen to their arguments and show them my own evidence that it's real (locating amateur radio satellites using data shared by people around the globe and demonstrating the doppler effect on them). The response strikes me as being indicative of mental illness. And I don't mean that as an insult - I mean that when confronted with that they're clearly irrational. And somethi…
I've engaged a few flat earthers... Let me rephrase that for you: "I've been trolled by a few of the world's most obvious trolls..." Really, man. The internet has been around. We've been around the internet. There's this kind of stupidity that's almost...meta stupidity, you know? Like, do you really not realize the flat earthers are putting one on? Maybe you're putting one on right now...because, how can you seriousl…
Isn't it wonderful? :)
Although, sometimes the irony seems just a bit too rich to be true...perhaps a Matryoshka troll?
Re: Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
#153Maybe the problem is that (because of multiple reasons) the way of thinking is nowadays trending more towards extremes, meaning that people are not able (or don't want) to see/admit that often something is not absolutely good/bad, white/black, etc... .
What then comes out of sticking to any sort of extreme thought/position/behaviour about something is then often wrong, and this might be seen as "stupidity".
Re: Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
> There are exactly zero people who believe the earth is flat. I don't think this is true. At any rate, if it is true, there are certainly a significant number of people who are giving an extraordinarily convincing imitation of believing that the Earth is flat. So convincing that it's hard not to allocate at least some probability to the hypothesis that they actually believe what they say they believe and aren't givi…
> I don't think this is true. At any rate, if it is true I'd be more inclined to follow this line of thought if this was about anything else. "The earth is flat" is not a claim that's false upon closer inspection of the available data, it's a claim that's prima facie false, it's in the same category of "the moon is made of cheese" rather than "we didn't land on the moon".
> "The earth is flat" is not a claim that's false upon closer inspection of the available data, it's a claim that's prima facie false
No, it isn't. We view the claim as absurd today only because we have the benefit of millennia of collection of evidence and arguments and theory that has established "the earth is round" beyond a reasonable doubt. But for a person who either does not have access to all that evidence and arguments and theory, or who simply refuses to believe them (and, as someone else upthread noted, it can be a valid heuristic strategy for some people to refuse to believe claims by other people that they can't understand for themselves, in order to avoid being taken advantage of), the claim that the earth is flat is not absurd, which means it's not prima facie false.
Re: Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
There was research last year that showed that cynicism is a way for less intelligent people to protect themselves from being taken advantage of. Basically, if you know you're not smart enough to figure out if other people are genuine or out to scam you, defaulting to assuming that all strangers are lying is a winning strategy. The same kind of logic fuels conspiracy-minded people. The one thing they all have in commo…
>There was research last year that showed that cynicism is a way for less intelligent people to protect themselves from being taken advantage of. Basically, if you know you're not smart enough to figure out if other people are genuine or out to scam you, defaulting to assuming that all strangers are lying is a winning strategy. That narrative is ridiculous - what does intelligence have to do with it ? I guarantee you…
Consider substituting some words and the argument holds. Instead of 'intelligent' say 'uninformed in relevant areas' which would work well to defend non-tech-savvy seniors.
> cynicism should be a default strategy for everything you're not an expert in
This would indeed follow, but if we allow for a small number of trusted sources can mostly be resolved.
Re: Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
#156> I am acquiring greater wisdom with age as I ought, but the average age of the typical person I encounter stays the same so they cannot keep up. I’m noticing the contrast increasing but misattributing it. My money is on this. You wouldn't typically argue with a kid, but on the internet you probably are.
That is one thing that frustrates me on discussion boards. You have no idea who is behind the nickname. Is this an adult with a college degree, corporate job, kids, mortgage, etc.? Or is this a 12 year old masquerading as someone older? Sometimes people argue against things that seem so obvious as an adult that I really really want to know who is on the other side.
I think people incorrectly assume that a child will type in a childish manner and be easy to spot.
I used to post online when I was 12. I wanted to be part of the conversation and feel like an adult. What usually happened is that people would label me a "troll" and tell others to ignore me. I would genuinely use the phrase "I'm just asking questions", and people would treat me like I was intentionally trying to inflame the situation.
Re: Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can place the irrational in a rational frame of understanding, of course. But if you use a heuristic you are saying "I will use this shortcut even though I don't fully understand why it works".
Yes, but how is that irrational? It’s not using anything that’s contrary to rationality. It’s something that rationality fails to cover — you can’t find a rationale if you have no information to input into the system of rational thinking.
I'm using the term irrational to mean "not within the domain of the rational", not as a synonym for "stupid" or "folly".
Re: Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I really think social media companies are deliberately promoting stupid and blatantly wrong beliefs. It's good for engagement. I don't think it even has to be deliberate; the algorithms social media uses, by their very nature, are going to promote stupid and blatantly wrong beliefs, since so many people will enjoy mocking them and there will always be some believers willing to argue back and keep the discussion goi…
You could make a case that optimising for engagement - and getting stupidity - is a predictable outcome and therefore itself stupid. Imagine what would happen if social media algorithms started promoting the opposite. Engagement would drop, but there might be some interesting second and third effects.
Unless these second and third order effects are more profitable than the first order ones, I don't see any incentive for social media companies to promote them.
Re: Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
#159"There is no truth, only power. What I’ve been interpreting as truth and rationality has been my own attempt to align my thinking with the political clique that was in power when I was being educated. What I’m interpreting as rising stupidity has been the collapse in power and status of that clique and the political obsolescence of the variety of “truth” and “rationality” I internalized as a child. Those pomo philoso…
A rejection of truth doesn't necessarily imply that scientific-liberalism is bad. I don't think that the post-modernists should be held responsible for encouraging anti-scientific thinking - of course unless your version of science is that science and rationality give us absolute truths of the world. Science can have lots of utility and not find us truth at all. It's a fault of some post modernists for not saying thi…
> Science can have lots of utility and not find us truth at all.
It depends how far you want to jump into the rabbit hole. 2+2=4. It does. It always will and always has. It isn't just utility that is useful for building things. It is a universal truth and until someone can prove it actually does not, then it does. No ones lived experience changes this.
And it's not just about finding facts and attaching moral or ethical considerations to them. It's about making claims of knowledge in ways that are _falsifiable_. Any claim must have a way of being proven wrong, otherwise it isn't something we should accept into the discourse of what is knowledge and what is not. 2+2=4 is a claim that is falsifiable and therefore valid to propose.
> ...but I don't think that the majority of left-wing post modernists are anti-science per say
I don't think most right wing people are either - except when it is convenient. People appeal to science until it doesn't help or in fact is detrimental to their cause. Science will make us uncomfortable and I agree that many bad things have been done because "science". But at the minimum, claims from eugenists were falsifiable and in time they have been disproven.
And yes I agree, we need to be careful how we interpret things. I love the left's idea that "race is a social construct". I 100% agree it is. Yes, there is DNA that determines race and people are therefore biologically "different" - but it's unimportant. The social constructs that exist made race into something more than it is. It's no more important than nose shape, or eye color, or fingerprint shape, etc.
Re: Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses
#160Stupidity is like charge.
Stupidity mobility, hence conductance, hence current has dramatically increased.
Stupidity mobility.