Reading Jacob's categories of stupid responses to his writing, I seems to me that all of them are indicative of prejudice. The first who reads and understands the book and then rejects it for emotive reasons is finding your words to contradict their prejudices and rejects them on that basis. The second who needs to sound intelligent has an inferiority complex mixed in with their prejudice. The third who can't even read the book has prejudice they must defend from all alternative points of view (kind of a Rush L type).
As I have progressed in my own inner spiritual journey and come to a place where I can look at myself more clearly, I have recognized myself in the second category more than the other two. My journey of releasing my prejudices has taught me that they are both responses to and causes of great emotional trauma. Where that trauma stays stored in a person's nervous system acts like a bruise in that it responds to even light stimuli with enormous waves of pain. It is pretty normal not to act rationally when one is in pain.
My best guess is that there are so many stupid people out there because there are that many people in our culture in a great deal of emotional pain. And the path of global suicide we are on now is thorough self-consistent with that explanation.
Fundamental Laws of Stupidity
Re: Fundamental Laws of Stupidity
When an oblivious X does a single action that is beneficial to Y but detrimental to Z, where will he be sorted?
It so happens that X derives an unintended serendipetious advantage from the simple action. Now is he still stupid (by motive), bandit (by effect of outcome on Z) or intelligent (by effect of outcome on Y)?
Does the answer change depending on if you are X,Y or Z?
But a person does not do just one single action nor does he does it in a vacuum with only two participants: He does hundreds of small to big actions which have negligible to monumental outcomes on him and others throughout a day (inactions and deferred actions are also actions.)
Also if we take this so called 'absolute' method and take it to its logical extreme, then we are all stupid, by definition in the OP, precisely because we don't know why we are stupid (we are unaware we have been or are being harmful to ourselves and others when or before we were being harmful.)
As for ignorance, we are all ignorant to a different degree about different subjects as time (our lifetime on earth) is a limiting factor.
This utilitarian perspective is too simplistic to be objective or useful. You might find use for them in certain very specific and narrowly defined situations but that doesn't make them 'laws' (by the definition of the word) by any stretch of imagination.
It so happens that X derives an unintended serendipetious advantage from the simple action. Now is he still stupid (by motive), bandit (by effect of outcome on Z) or intelligent (by effect of outcome on Y)?
Does the answer change depending on if you are X,Y or Z?
But a person does not do just one single action nor does he does it in a vacuum with only two participants: He does hundreds of small to big actions which have negligible to monumental outcomes on him and others throughout a day (inactions and deferred actions are also actions.)
Also if we take this so called 'absolute' method and take it to its logical extreme, then we are all stupid, by definition in the OP, precisely because we don't know why we are stupid (we are unaware we have been or are being harmful to ourselves and others when or before we were being harmful.)
As for ignorance, we are all ignorant to a different degree about different subjects as time (our lifetime on earth) is a limiting factor.
This utilitarian perspective is too simplistic to be objective or useful. You might find use for them in certain very specific and narrowly defined situations but that doesn't make them 'laws' (by the definition of the word) by any stretch of imagination.
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jacob
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Re: Fundamental Laws of Stupidity
@fiby41 - I see what you did there---trying to turn a 2-body mapping into a 3-body mapping. Now, ponder the parallels here...
viewtopic.php?p=95090#p95090
viewtopic.php?p=95004#p95004
Realizing that from a practical perspective, the rare "X hurts Z and benefits Y and also unintentionally benefits X"-case can be ignored in the name of pragmatism similar to "X benefits Y but hurts Z but then later Y's benefit helps Z to hurt Y" and so on and so forth. It's not really useful to pursue this as an exhaustive math problem or an exercise in metaphysics. Consider that the field of economics can be developed quite far by considering only 2-body transactions even as it's apparent that the real world sometimes involves 3-body and even more (but not much more). No reason to throw out the baby with the bathwater.
viewtopic.php?p=95090#p95090
viewtopic.php?p=95004#p95004
Realizing that from a practical perspective, the rare "X hurts Z and benefits Y and also unintentionally benefits X"-case can be ignored in the name of pragmatism similar to "X benefits Y but hurts Z but then later Y's benefit helps Z to hurt Y" and so on and so forth. It's not really useful to pursue this as an exhaustive math problem or an exercise in metaphysics. Consider that the field of economics can be developed quite far by considering only 2-body transactions even as it's apparent that the real world sometimes involves 3-body and even more (but not much more). No reason to throw out the baby with the bathwater.
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black_son_of_gray
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Re: Fundamental Laws of Stupidity
- Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.
- The probability that a certain person (will) be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.
- A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.
- Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. In particular non-stupid people constantly forget that at all times and places and under any circumstances to deal and/or associate with stupid people always turns out to be a costly mistake.
- A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.
OR
As per 4 ('unpredictable, unexpectedly big impact, always costly'), aren't most stupid people just black cygnets? Not quite grown up, but little mini walking disasters (In the case of heads of state, I think they can be full blown swans - cuban missile crisis anyone?). Is antifragility to stupid people possible?
Re: Fundamental Laws of Stupidity
The questions were genuine and not meant to be rhetorical or exclusively for the refutation purpose of the theory.
I'll agree that trying to understand for knowledge's own sake isn't worth the while.
So although your application helped you understand what you had trouble understanding without it (negative book reviews), it didn't help me do the same categorization for a particular case due to problem posed above.
Here, unlike in an economic transaction which can be measured, the magnitude of social impact of stupidity* or its lack thereof cannot be sufficiently measured or predicted. Also there is no denominated currency that measures it so barter would be a better analogy. My point being, there is no reason that the number of 3 participant interactions would be any less than the number of 2 participant interactions occurring. In fact the opposite is most likely true as the higher the number of current participants, the easier / cheaper it is for another person to participate. This is seen with 'well intended advice' that is actually harmful# yet regurgigated spreading like wildfire, misinformation acting on which can be detrimental to the person receiving it and also damaging the reputation of the person propagating it, unsustainable ideas+ that sway the public opinion only to fall to the detriment of the people who support it as well as those who implement it,...
*Bribery is one example where government makes a decision detrimental to both itself and citizenry for the benefit of a third party/corporation ( incidentally, it is legal in some countries under the guise of 'lobbying'), another example is vote bank / populist politics.
#eg: Follow your passion.
+ Some of which still survive. Are they anymore intelligent that those that didn't? How do we decide when to pass our judgement and categorize a person or decision?
Too early and we'll have to change categories ever so often.
If we wait until the last moment to have all the information, the judgement wouldn't be of any use then as we'd be busy dealing with the aftermath by then.
I'll agree that trying to understand for knowledge's own sake isn't worth the while.
So although your application helped you understand what you had trouble understanding without it (negative book reviews), it didn't help me do the same categorization for a particular case due to problem posed above.
Here, unlike in an economic transaction which can be measured, the magnitude of social impact of stupidity* or its lack thereof cannot be sufficiently measured or predicted. Also there is no denominated currency that measures it so barter would be a better analogy. My point being, there is no reason that the number of 3 participant interactions would be any less than the number of 2 participant interactions occurring. In fact the opposite is most likely true as the higher the number of current participants, the easier / cheaper it is for another person to participate. This is seen with 'well intended advice' that is actually harmful# yet regurgigated spreading like wildfire, misinformation acting on which can be detrimental to the person receiving it and also damaging the reputation of the person propagating it, unsustainable ideas+ that sway the public opinion only to fall to the detriment of the people who support it as well as those who implement it,...
*Bribery is one example where government makes a decision detrimental to both itself and citizenry for the benefit of a third party/corporation ( incidentally, it is legal in some countries under the guise of 'lobbying'), another example is vote bank / populist politics.
#eg: Follow your passion.
+ Some of which still survive. Are they anymore intelligent that those that didn't? How do we decide when to pass our judgement and categorize a person or decision?
Too early and we'll have to change categories ever so often.
If we wait until the last moment to have all the information, the judgement wouldn't be of any use then as we'd be busy dealing with the aftermath by then.
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jacob
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Re: Fundamental Laws of Stupidity
@fiby41 - Did you read the original text by Cipolla? Maybe that'll make it clearer.
The laws aren't meant to provide a measurably objective description of the world. They can't because impacts are subjective. However, they are a useful heuristic for understanding and dealing with the individuals and organizations that YOU run into. Is this people helpless? Helpless leaning towards intelligent or stupid? Is he a bandit? Etc. Then, how should I deal with him?
The laws aren't meant to provide a measurably objective description of the world. They can't because impacts are subjective. However, they are a useful heuristic for understanding and dealing with the individuals and organizations that YOU run into. Is this people helpless? Helpless leaning towards intelligent or stupid? Is he a bandit? Etc. Then, how should I deal with him?
Re: Fundamental Laws of Stupidity
Chanakya Niti may work as personal damage mitigation from such groups of people.
Saam: Reasoning with such people that what they are doing is harmful to you and possibly them
Daam: Alluring their sweet spots (monetary, social, cultural), so if what they are doing is of no consequence to them and damaging to you, you make your alternative is in their interest
Dand: Punishment or penalty by redirecting the consequences/costs of their actions on you back towards them
Bhed: Shunning, discriminating, dividing them amongst against themselves and leveraging information that might cause or further such divides as collateral in exchange for compliance.
Saam: Reasoning with such people that what they are doing is harmful to you and possibly them
Daam: Alluring their sweet spots (monetary, social, cultural), so if what they are doing is of no consequence to them and damaging to you, you make your alternative is in their interest
Dand: Punishment or penalty by redirecting the consequences/costs of their actions on you back towards them
Bhed: Shunning, discriminating, dividing them amongst against themselves and leveraging information that might cause or further such divides as collateral in exchange for compliance.