That reminds me of Flaubert saying:

Stupidity lies in wanting to draw conclusions.

As a philosophic remark, it puts the inquiry into stupidity in a difficult situation. Drowning in a ubiquity, if you will.

Well there would have been much more wisdom in a dignified silence; when I find my own stupidity, I have already transcended it. Finding it in others is a trivial pursuit.

I take your point of there being a problem of judgement involved.

I see stupidity more as an activity that flows from within and without. Castigation in either direction has limited efficacy. Developing means of protection seems wise. It is worthy of philosophical effort even though that is difficult in the framing of Flaubert. The poets have more liberty.

Well, there is a verbal resemblance between idea and ideology, though I do not know if they have share a common root meaning.

What is stupid? Well, denying evidence, for one thing is a big deal, especially if the evidence is backed up by many studies.

Yet as you mention an otherwise smart person will do something stupid, and a stupid person can say smart things. But then it seems as if calling someone "smart" or "stupid" is relative to a subject matter or a specific act.

So, it may be inaccurate to say that a person is stupid at everything, or smart at everything.

I don't know if this is stupid per se, but, a related matter that irritates me is lack of curiosity about the world. There is so much to discover and its never been easier to find information, yet we see many people completely oblivious to most of it, focusing instead on shallow things.

Which in itself is not bad, sometimes we need a break from "serious stuff" to just relax. But if that's the whole extent of your involvement in the world, then I think you are missing out on one of the most important things of being a human being, which is to take pleasure in our capacity to think and engage with problems.

The story of The Emperor's New Clothes comes to mind. The best protection is another viewpoint - a diverse community; the greatest danger the echo chamber of the party line. In this sense, one could say that taking stupid seriously is what keeps us somewhat honest, and to declare once and for all what is stupid it to stop listening to the dissenting voice. I keep meeting this circle in the topic ... Oh yes, poetry...

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born? — WB Yeats

The poem declares its title and transcends itself in its self discovery. And the blank and pitiless gaze is surely the triumph of stupidity? As if wisdom must become stupidity for lack of conviction or an excess.

Although I guess it can amount to the same thing, mutatis mutandis. — Jamal

Probably the same thing. You think that pervasive refusal is intellectual only? I've got in mind people like athletes, who learn technique and discipline. Though it's quite difficult, if such embodied skill negates stupidity.

The creature with a lion's body and the head of a man invokes the Sphinx, an ancient fusing of man and the ultimate predator. Yeats ties the yearning for a savior from our stupidity to the return of a terrible creature who had been chilling for time out of mind before the rude awakening. We don't know what we are messing with, but cruelty is involved.

I think Auden wrote a call and response to the humility invoked in the poem:

Jumbled in the common box
Of their dark stupidity,
Orchid, swan, and Caesar lie;
Time that tires of everyone
Has corroded all the locks,
Thrown away the key for fun.

In its cleft the torrent mocks
Prophets who in day gone by
Made a profit on each cry,
Persona grata now with none;
And a jackass language shocks
Poets who can only pun.

Silence settles on the clocks;
Nursing mothers point a sly
Index finger at a sky,
Crimson with the setting sun;
In the valley of the fox
Gleams the barrel of a gun.

Once we could have made the docks,
Now it is too late to fly;
Once too often you and I
Did what we should not have done;
Round the rampant rugged rocks
Rude and ragged rascals run. — WH Auden, 55, January, 1941

(I deleted my reply to this topic because the OP doesn't deserve it.)

On a separate vein, some time ago I saw interviews with Trump supporters. Most of them said they would vote for him again because of his significant achievements and his great policies. — Tom Storm

And you take their statements at face value??
Or are you just playing games?

Have you ever tried to envision what such an interview is like for those Trump supporters? What do they think of it? Do they think of it as a conversation, a discussion, a debate? Do they perhaps consider it a rude imposition?

Because how a person replies to questions depends on who is asking those questions, who that person is to them, in what setting those questions are being asked, etc..

Not one of them could name any. They just liked him.

People usually vote for those they like anyway.

Is this because they are dumb, or has the American system (education/media/corporate influence) failed people, making them rubes and willing victims of a demagogue? We can't use CBT for political stupidity can we?

Have you considered the possibility that they actually want what they are supporting and voting for? That this is about their actual values and desires?

And you take their statements at face value??
Or are you just playing games? — baker

Are you just playing games or are you really as abrasive as your response seems?

I think the people they interviewed were clueless and just following a demagogue who had the right enemies - intellectuals, liberals, do gooders, Marxists, unAmericans, politicians - the usual shit.

Have you considered the possibility that they actually want what they are supporting and voting for? — baker

Yes. And on the evidence of their bereft replies, they want to support hatred and conspiracy.

Underneath that - failures of American education, industry and employment opportunities and the abandonment of the working class by the Democrats - sure. All that is also true and I named that earlier.

Are you just playing games or are you really as abrasive as your response seems?

I think the people they interviewed were clueless and just following a demagogue who had the right enemies - intellectuals, liberals, do gooders, Marxists, unAmericans, politicians - the usual shit. — Tom Storm

And you don't think the way you speak about Trump's supporters is abrasive?

Trump's supporters or not, they are still people. Yet the way you speak about them is dehumanizing.

Can't you see you're doing the same kind of thing they're doing? You're playing the same kind of game they are, by the same rules.

And on the evidence of their bereft replies, they want to support hatred and conspiracy.

So? What does that mean for you?

Trump's supporters or not, they are still people. Yet the way you speak about them is dehumanizing.[/quote]

Spare me the holier-than-thou bullshit, Baker.

Although I guess it can amount to the same thing, mutatis mutandis. — Jamal

Aye.

I don't think much effort is required to learn. If you even just listen to someone genuinely you learn. Curiosity alone tends to suffice I think? But there's the question of exposing one's curiosity to situations that engender learning. Curiosity as an attitude vs curiosity as a practice.

Q: How to define stupidity.
A: I have a spanner. Will that help?

Well, following Immanuel Kant, this is my idea of stupidity. How would you define it? — Matias

Stupidity is a tendency to judge other peoples' intentions and characters with groundless delusional beliefs, and seeking attention, approval and self-pleasure with like-minded folks in group.

Do you know how do Discussions here normally work?

If you launch a discussion, you are supposed to respond to the replies you receive on your topic, esp. when you ask for their opinion.

In general, you are supposed to respond to messages addressed to you.

Prejudices are what fools use for reason. — Voltaire

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/853053

Hi. Just by curiosity, would you have replied to this guy if you knew that he will ignore you, like everyone else? I wouldn't. That's why I deleted my original reply and replace it with another, a personal one, expressing my utter reproval.

I believe that everyone should do the same so that this OP remains w/o replies.

You often link to your relevant past posts, any one out of 13.2k+. How do you keep track of your past posts? do you store them in a text file? Index them? Have an exceptionally good memory?

I tend to forget posts as soon as I post them. Stupid, I suppose. It's like when you see a run of the mill movie at a theater, one sometime forgets what it was about by the time your get on the bus. Or the section of a cartoon bookstore: "Books you have forgotten that you read."

I frequently use the advanced search function for relevant keywords. Almost all topics have been raised a few times before so I usually find I've contributed to those old threads. I'd rather not rewrite something unless my views on the topic at issue have changed.

Btw, if you know how I can store my entire post history as (indexed?) text files, please let me know.

Yeah, respond/don't respond? That is the question! We can but decide, act/don't act, and face the consequences. At least this adds to making life interesting Alikis.

Spare me the holier-than-thou bullshit, Baker. — Tom Storm

Really, Tom, really, this is what you see in my comment?

He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.

Really, Tom, really, this is what you see in my comment? — baker

What I see is someone who indulges in regular put downs of others, who is persistently cynical about people's motivations, then somewhat hypocritically likes to take a critical stance towards members for their perceived adverse perspectives.

He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. — baker

Why the Nietzsche? The only person I seem to be bickering with is you. Are you the monster? Can you really be concerned I will become as cynical as you?

Your point was an attempt to shoehorn me into a category. I am not suggesting all Trump voters are stupid (they might be, but I don't know that and I doubt it to be the case), I was commenting on the specific interviews. The connection between having a strong position yet lacking any substantive knowledge about that position, which is what this thread has been exploring.

Now, if you want to construct an entirely seperate, speculative narrative about behind the scenes at media interviews and suggest that in some way journalism misrepresented the Trump people, I'm not interested, since you cannot demonstrate this to be the case and you seem to be asserting it entirely for rhetorical effect.

:up: :up:

:up:

A pervasive refusal to try to learn. — fdrake

I think this is a good sense of culpable stupidity. Is all stupidity culpable?

I think this is a good sense of culpable stupidity. Is all stupidity culpable? — Leontiskos

Maybe? Can you think of an example which isn't culpable? I'm imagining that "refusal" means that stupidity is a practice of avoiding learning through habits you have (and thus someone who behaves stupidly behaves incuriously @Jamal).

I'm phrasing this in terms of "behaves stupidly" rather than "is stupid" because I very much see stupidity as something you can learn, get headfucked into, and unlearn.

What do you think?

Maybe? Can you think of an example which isn't culpable? — fdrake

Well, I think the thread branches into those two conceptions: one where stupidity is conceived as inherently culpable and one where it is not. I think Kant's description prescinds from culpability, and hence would equally apply to people with natural mental handicaps. "Stupid" seems to be one of those words that was once used to signify an actual physiological malady, but eventually came to be used as a term of opprobium. Others would include "imbecile," "retarded," etc.

What do you think? — fdrake

It sort of depends on what we are intending to talk about, but in general I would say that stupidity is a consistent failure to act rationally, or to achieve the average level of mental function. More simply, it is the opposite of intelligence. Strictly speaking, I would simply say that the stupid person is prone to err. The question is interesting because eventually one is forced to give their account of intelligence, rationality, or healthy mental functioning. For Kant it is the ability to shape sensory impressions into concepts of reason, and therefore he identifies a malfunction at that juncture as stupidity.

If this is right, then you are committed to the idea that intelligence is fundamentally a willingness to try to learn.

So generally speaking I am claiming that stupidity is a negative or privative concept, and that one must therefore ultimately provide an account of proper mental functioning if they are to give an account of stupidity.

What I see is someone who indulges in regular put downs of others, who is persistently cynical about people's motivations, then somewhat hypocritically likes to take a critical stance towards members for their perceived adverse perspectives. — Tom Storm

That's what the bad faith in which you tend to approach communication makes you see.

He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.
— baker

Why the Nietzsche?

Critics of Trump & co. often become exactly like those they criticize. Don't you see the danger in that?

When Trump or someone like him wins again, it will be at least in part because his critics were playing on his terms.

Now, if you want to construct an entirely seperate, speculative narrative about behind the scenes at media interviews and suggest that in some way journalism misrepresented the Trump people, I'm not interested, since you cannot demonstrate this to be the case and you seem to be asserting it entirely for rhetorical effect.

I'm actually expecting you to empathize with the Trumpistas.

I don't think that in some way journalism misrepresented the Trump people, but I think you here as a critic of Trump (as well as many others critics of Trump) are being too simplistic in interpreting the words, deeds, and intentions of the Trumpistas. And being so simplistic about them doesn't help in changing them of winning against them. Even though you nominally play for the opposition against Trump, you're actually helping team Trump. This is its own kind of ... well, stupidity, with horrible prospects. This is what happens when one allows one's disgust to get the upper hand.

@180 Proof
@universeness
Burning witches won't help you.