Jun 12, 2023·edited Jun 12, 2023Liked by Unbekoming
I think an important aspect in why people who consider themselves smart, advocate for totalitarian measures, is that erroneously they believe that others' objections to such measures are neither moral based nor based on skepticism about the value of outcomes of such measures. But that instead, people whom they consider less smart than themselves, oppose such measures only out of a mental slowness, they think the objectors just are not quick enough on their braincells to, like themselves, "openly and uninhibitedly consider all options and choosing the appropriate one for the situation unhindered by false prejudices". I think that is what they are applauding themselves on. Being intelligent enough to not (out of reflex or superstitious fear) discard unorthodox-seeming measures. They feel they are an elite club of free thinkers of the possible, surrounded by dull inhibited minds. That is how in my opinion the orchestrators catch, by their ego, a large part of professionals and middle layer elite representatives to join in and promote and implement these measures for them, sailing on a feeling of superiority while doing so. Same thing for climate-justified drastic measures, restrictions etc. The people who say "we need an eco dictatorship", they feel liberated and even exhilarated by having overcome the boundary of "thinking the seemingly impossible". While they feel that only they have the mental agility to go that step - they are unaware that what they feel to be an extra bit of intelligence or smartness that sets them apart from ordinary dimwits, is actually not an extra bit, but really a very specific _lack_ of intelligence. They lack that bit that would help them overcome their self-illuding elation, the bit that would check their ego. That bit is missing and at least some of them are blissfully unaware and thus so easy to instrumentalize.
Thank you for that, well-articulated and explained.
You're right, they paid good money for their thoughts, top dollar in fact, with shiny letters attached. How could their thoughts align with those of the simpletons, the blue collars, the stay at homers. If they did, it would mean they were fleeced.
Doesn't the "my child’s right to live" argument work both ways? When his beliefs surrounding his child's health run counter to my beliefs that my child could die or be damaged by vaccines, who's to say which is more important?
I think Ben should stick to Star Wars reviews. He does those well.
This has been one of the most jarring aspects of the Plandemonium. As someone who woke up during.
The Legion of 'smart' medical professionals who collectively threw out the rule book and did everything inverted (literally). Turns out, they were all/mostly already stealthy tyrants - something I learned well after the fact once free from the Matrix pod. They went full totalitarian darn quickly. The layers of illusion that shattered, the misplaced trust we projected, and the wisdom we endowed them with. Like the Devil's hands, the narrative managers have been busy, for centuries.
Even now they are poisoning us. Recently, they wanted to poison me, on threat of various things. They see nothing wrong with a flu jab and a C19 jab on the same day. Or jabbing pregnant women. Or jabbing of children. How anyone who believes themselves to be smart is still complying with the programming boggles the mind. With possibly millions dead around the world, with tens of millions damaged for life (at a minimum).
Good one! So true…and funny how quips like this can relieve the emotional and mental frustration….like Archie Bunker leaning over the kitchen counter with one of his snark wise cracks….LOL ~~~Okay I have it in perspective now, thanks! I can manage another day ….
Oh! Thank you! Thank you! Yes, I shall share! Refreshing and articulate, a bucket of cold water to my brain fog all these months~~~now so scary that it feels it would be easier to detach from that level of humanity than still remain caring about their dangerous medical decisions~~~I have not been able to understand how folks with triple layer degrees can turn up their nose at the common sense peepul, who see the irony, that their brainy friends have no intellectual curiosity!! Oh, after the degree, no need to ask the questions?! ~~~Why not, “oh send it over! I’d like to read that!” “No I hadn’t heard this! Thanks so much! just in time, we were going to have our first boosters!” ~~~Yet my siblings will only refer to wiki approved web sites, so fearful of all the other references I could provide ….almost three years later…..Died Suddenly, same song, second verse!! AARGHARGHG! Amen and amen!
Thank you Sharon. I think degrees kill curiosity or at least the process of getting one kills it as you hand over your attention (and curiosity) to the system, for years, and they never hand it back. It's probably collecting dust in a lost and found box at Harvard.
Are these people mentioned smart or truth pushers of their own think with varying degrees of narcissistic personality disorder on ready to argue? What may be lacking is the inability of so many to listen to their inner voice because of their constant blabbing/hectic life and listening to “smart” or just incompetent, greedy evil people.
LOL, 15 mismatched gloves, etc. ….Yes, if these last few years have been a gift, in other ways, it has informed us of the friends we have known who slide along on the general consensus and so fear disagreement. As they say, you’re over the target. ;-) ~~~ I love a good discussion, and fight for my freedom to keep everything in my own head!~~~During the last election, a friend of mine bowed down to pressure and put up a Biden poster on her deck. Never said anything then, but some months later when I accosted her, she denied it vehemently and told me I must have seen the banner somewhere else! Next time I will take a picture! Just admit it, “I got tired of their bugging me, but I didn’t vote for him”. I could understand.
Bret Weinstein (Eric’s brother) coined an excellent phrase last Saturday in his Darkhorse Podcast #177 “Everything is psyop unless proven otherwise”. It is the new standard I will aspire to. Nothing I hear will be accepted at face value until verified from known reliable sources. Of course that does involve ingesting less media because the verification process can be lengthy, but at least I have the slim possibility of living in the real world as a result.
I'm not sure this is about having smarts. A lot of current worldviews only exist because there has been an almost complete breaking of our link to nature, and with it a collapse in what you could call natural sense. Natural sense is something all humans are born with, a talent for grasping things about our place in nature without the need for explicit learning. Our techno-civilisation, which is sub, or perhaps supra nature, overwrites that innate ability both through broad culture and through formal teaching, so today you will read articles that say science has proved that walking in woodland is an anti-depressant, or that people recover from surgery quicker when surrounded by nature. Do we need science to tell us those things? No, it's natural sense. As so many have already pointed out, the higher up one goes in academe the greater the risk you will lose your natural sense, or even that you will pooh-pooh the idea that such innate talents have any value as providers of trustworthy information.
It's a hard thing to grasp, and almost impossible for the intelligentsia to do so but, like all things, the authority of science has boundaries, in reality it's scope of usefulness is far smaller than almost anyone in our technocratic culture is prepared to admit, largely through their failure to notice but I would imagine also due to their fear of seeming stupid should they mention it.)
I have to have a bit of a giggle about it because right on - that's why smart people don't ask questions either. And that's what happened during the "plandemonium", they didn't even ask to see if covid was real, such a fundamental question. But they also didn't check to see if vaccination is truly what it was purported. I notice this a lot - the reluctance to ask questions in order to not seem ignorant. When in a "natural sense" way, asking questions is what shows you are curious and curiosity is surely the most fundamental element of intelligence.
I think we humans have all sorts of intelligence; most of us have mixture of talents, some far greater than others, and that's something we brush under the carpet. Woodworkers have it in their hands, footballers in their feet (neither literally, but you get the point), yet in western culture we place academic smarts above all others, while downplaying the intelligence of empathy, or social skills, or creativity for instance when in reality, there is no hierarchy
Measuring 'smarts' has been a preoccupation of humanity forever. Look at IQ tests as a classic example. What do they measure? They measure the ability to remember verbal, mathematical and spatial rules. These can be learned and communicated but only if there is an agreed language. He who lives isolated in a Peruvian jungle would appear to be stupid because he cannot read and write. However, he would survive longer than the academic with a PhD.
Lao Tsu, who wrote the Tao Te Ching had a lot to say on the matter and then was so disillusioned with the 'smarts' he observed around him that he disappeared from society leaving only his book as testament to his wisdom.
He wrote: "“Simplicity, patience, compassion.
These three are your greatest treasures.
Simple in actions and thoughts, you return to the source of being.
Patient with both friends and enemies,
you accord with the way things are.
Compassionate toward yourself,
you reconcile all beings in the world.”
and:
"“Knowing others is intelligence;
knowing yourself is true wisdom.
Mastering others is strength;
mastering yourself is true power.”
and:
"“A good traveller has no fixed plans
and is not intent upon arriving.
A good artist lets his intuition
lead him wherever it wants.
A good scientist has freed himself of concepts
and keeps his mind open to what is.
Thus the Master is available to all people
and doesn't reject anyone.
He is ready to use all situations
and doesn't waste anything.
This is called embodying the light.
What is a good man but a bad man's teacher?
What is a bad man but a good man's job?
If you don't understand this, you will get lost,
however intelligent you are.
It is the great secret.”
When I first began reading ancient Taoist literature it hurt my brain because it did not seem to make sense. Now, fifty years later, I am beginning to get the message.... and (just like Lao Tsu) I am inclined to disappear from society for the same reasons as him!
I used to do IQ tests just for fun and you can learn them. I used to be good at them. But some years passed where I didn't do them and couldn't handle them at all. It is like using another part of the brain or another aspect of thinking. You can "get on a roll" with them and you can get out of the roll too if you lose that practice.
"Vaccines" had NOTHING to do with eradicating polio. Getting rid of DDT did. The field of viroligy is a fraud.
People become stupid when they get outside of their "discipline." You see it with "celebrities" all the time. Because Tom Hanks plays a brain surgeon doesn't inspire me to have him crack open my skull and operate.
It's in the text above, I find the middle sentence so important. Flipping ideas just based on the latest prooaganda or social acceptability nudge for instance would not be what this is about.
First time I have seen that clip of Peterson talking about taking the Vax. Although not a great fan, I had assumed (out of you and me) that someone with his medical troubles and supposed knowledge of psychological manipulation would not have touched it. You can never tell?
No, you cannot. The signs of mental independence and resilience during times of chaos have turned out to be invisible. You definitely cannot tell the book by its cover.
I have to disagree with Cipolla on the even distribution of stupidity. One group that seems to have more than its share of stupid people is college graduates. They've had several more years of obedience training than non-grads, to destroy any critical thinking skills they may have had when they entered college. Few come out the other end undamaged.
I suspect the degree of damage to the graduates between 1976 and today though is different. I suspect they were allowed to keep more of their curiosity and general critical thinking abilities back then.
College has always been an artificially safe space, physically and financially. Even without the latter day emphasis on psychological safety and coddling the mind. Those who don't go to college are bound to be more hardy.
In regards to Ben Shapiro it sounds like he's regurgitating the "established narrative", one would think that with all available to him resources he would know better. Had he taken the trouble of looking into it when he wrote that article in 2015 maybe he would think twice about taking the wonderful vaccine in
You may want to read this brand new book "A Bug in Our Thinking (and how to fix it)" by Hugh Willbourn. Willbourn is a philosopher and a therapist who uses hypnosis. He argues ( in a very light, diverting way, while nonetheless quoting Heidegger and Kant) that people in a trance respond to abstract commands. Also, policies are a form of abstractions. I quote from his book: "Whenever a person takes an abstraction as self-evidently true or fundamental to reality, their perception and understanding are inescapebly shaped by it." Meaning even smart people can be locked in a trance where they perceive policies or abstractions, as true. Of course Mr. Willbourn 's argument is much more thorough and clever than I can represent here; you will just have tot read it!
Jun 12, 2023·edited Jun 12, 2023Liked by Unbekoming
What you say he book says about abstract commands is fascinating. It fits with my observation about many cognitively highly functioning people who like complicated board games. I have often observed an affinity to conformity in them. They just love subjecting themselves to sets of rules, the more complex the better. They get mesmerized by the effort of mastering all those rules. Some, then have no energy /capacities left to assess the appropriateness of having these sets of rules (in a board game you will not ask yourself that, bit we are talking about boardgame level complex rules in reality and the type of mind or psychology that has a liking for them. All the effort goes into mastering compliance to them. they are in a way unconsciously proud of mastering complex rule sets. Some, and that is still more preoccupying because it can br exploited, are also in a way proud when submitting themselves to illogical seeming ones. Unawares. Between themselves and their brain and body it is some kind of domination game. They unconsciously feel they have dominated and triumphed over their own reason. Transcending reason, forcing their brains to reason along illogical lines must be self liberating to a part of their conscience, in the sense of "Look I have defied logic (and reality), I am not bound by it, I decide how I reason and act." It's smart people rebelling against the narcissistic humiliation of being bound by reality and forced to come to the same conclusion as any uneducated down to earth common sense person. They detest that and in order to distinguish themselves from such exoteric conclusions, they have to go esoteric. The self-liberation from being embarrassingly chained to reality based necessary conclusions, I think the same mechanism applies for any ideology I think. It really is an insurgency of the left brain against the right, no less, no more listen to Dr Iain McGilchrist on YT, he is not saying the above stuff but you need his concept of left and right brain hemisphere, I promise.
It's what I painfully observed and had plenty of leisure to ponder during lockdowns. Started from the theory that ordinary, lockdown enforcing commoners, were just so busy with overcoming their own inner aversion against being forced into un freedom, that in doing so they depleted the energy that they would have needed to address the question "Does this make sense, is its basis sound, and even if it is, do I value unfree safety over freedom?" They never even got to that question. They were deliberately kept busy on a level before that.
Language is a metaphor and so as we use it we see the world through it, regularly confusing the map with the territory. Apart from a few mystics who have 'transcended' this trap the rest of us have lost the more direct experience of living that they and other animals seem to possess.
Funny you mention that. Willbourn makes quite a similar point in vis book: he blames the problem on being literate. Literacy enables people tot think in abstractions. The risk of thinking in abstractions is that it closes the mind to what is really going on... In the book examples are given of cultures that are illiterate and they do not have that problem. They only see what is there and they are incapable of abstract thinking. They also do not worry about tomorrow.
In the Book of Enoch (which somehow lost iets rightful place in the Bible), it was the fallen angels that gave us humans writing and maths and astronomy... They werd subsequently cast into hell for 10.000 years... This always struck me as a bit unfair... Writing is good isn't it? But I guess I begin to see now why God would've done such a thing...
That's really interesting, though I would imagine that written language and mathematics could only have been developed by a species who already thought metaphorically through spoken language.
I guess one could call angels a different species... Also, there are lots of references in other cultures that it was folk from Sirius that gave us the writing... (The Sirius Mystery by Robert K.G. Temple). In the event one might think that both angels and aliens from Sirius are just figments of the imagination, I guess you indeed could call this a logical mistake...
Do you know where I can get a copy of Willbourn's book? It sounds like we may have similar thinking on what I think is one of humanities deepest problems.
Jun 12, 2023·edited Jun 12, 2023Liked by Unbekoming
This was pretty accurate. I might add that those named, Peterson, Shapiro, Weinstein and the others, self censor for a range of reasons, none of them smart or good. By doing so they are all useful idiots in a time of either put up or get out of the way and they damn well know this. Sitting on the fence waiting to see which way the wind will finally blow is the mark of a moral coward. So which are they, morally deficient cowards, useful idiots or both? Once in this category the road back to trust is one of total public repentance and I see none of this as they all obsequiously try to side with the vindicated which to me is morally repugnant! I have no use for the above named as they are not stupid but because they have chosen to be public figures are in their public and personal personas COWARDS. If I with only a high school education could see through then BS, albeit after years of reconnoitering the layers of BS the pyramid cap has foisted on humanity, then I expect more and better from the supposedly highly educated as evidenced by the relatively few during this existential time.
Per Sonnenschein's comments, self-censorship is part of a complex game Peterson, Shapiro, Weinstein and others have mastered and can't stop themselves playing.
I think an important aspect in why people who consider themselves smart, advocate for totalitarian measures, is that erroneously they believe that others' objections to such measures are neither moral based nor based on skepticism about the value of outcomes of such measures. But that instead, people whom they consider less smart than themselves, oppose such measures only out of a mental slowness, they think the objectors just are not quick enough on their braincells to, like themselves, "openly and uninhibitedly consider all options and choosing the appropriate one for the situation unhindered by false prejudices". I think that is what they are applauding themselves on. Being intelligent enough to not (out of reflex or superstitious fear) discard unorthodox-seeming measures. They feel they are an elite club of free thinkers of the possible, surrounded by dull inhibited minds. That is how in my opinion the orchestrators catch, by their ego, a large part of professionals and middle layer elite representatives to join in and promote and implement these measures for them, sailing on a feeling of superiority while doing so. Same thing for climate-justified drastic measures, restrictions etc. The people who say "we need an eco dictatorship", they feel liberated and even exhilarated by having overcome the boundary of "thinking the seemingly impossible". While they feel that only they have the mental agility to go that step - they are unaware that what they feel to be an extra bit of intelligence or smartness that sets them apart from ordinary dimwits, is actually not an extra bit, but really a very specific _lack_ of intelligence. They lack that bit that would help them overcome their self-illuding elation, the bit that would check their ego. That bit is missing and at least some of them are blissfully unaware and thus so easy to instrumentalize.
Thank you for that, well-articulated and explained.
You're right, they paid good money for their thoughts, top dollar in fact, with shiny letters attached. How could their thoughts align with those of the simpletons, the blue collars, the stay at homers. If they did, it would mean they were fleeced.
Well said, I agree with you. There seems to be a fair dose of egoistical arrogance in most of them.
Doesn't the "my child’s right to live" argument work both ways? When his beliefs surrounding his child's health run counter to my beliefs that my child could die or be damaged by vaccines, who's to say which is more important?
I think Ben should stick to Star Wars reviews. He does those well.
Nicely said!! 🤣
This has been one of the most jarring aspects of the Plandemonium. As someone who woke up during.
The Legion of 'smart' medical professionals who collectively threw out the rule book and did everything inverted (literally). Turns out, they were all/mostly already stealthy tyrants - something I learned well after the fact once free from the Matrix pod. They went full totalitarian darn quickly. The layers of illusion that shattered, the misplaced trust we projected, and the wisdom we endowed them with. Like the Devil's hands, the narrative managers have been busy, for centuries.
Even now they are poisoning us. Recently, they wanted to poison me, on threat of various things. They see nothing wrong with a flu jab and a C19 jab on the same day. Or jabbing pregnant women. Or jabbing of children. How anyone who believes themselves to be smart is still complying with the programming boggles the mind. With possibly millions dead around the world, with tens of millions damaged for life (at a minimum).
Smart, has become a simple test now.
The scary thing is how few pass it.
Peace.
They are sacraments, and you cannot have too many of them.
And yes, it has become a simple test.
Good one! So true…and funny how quips like this can relieve the emotional and mental frustration….like Archie Bunker leaning over the kitchen counter with one of his snark wise cracks….LOL ~~~Okay I have it in perspective now, thanks! I can manage another day ….
Plandemonium - priceless description!
The truly smart are unknown and very lonely. They don’t waste their time with idiots. You won’t find them on any stage of any kind.
Oh! Thank you! Thank you! Yes, I shall share! Refreshing and articulate, a bucket of cold water to my brain fog all these months~~~now so scary that it feels it would be easier to detach from that level of humanity than still remain caring about their dangerous medical decisions~~~I have not been able to understand how folks with triple layer degrees can turn up their nose at the common sense peepul, who see the irony, that their brainy friends have no intellectual curiosity!! Oh, after the degree, no need to ask the questions?! ~~~Why not, “oh send it over! I’d like to read that!” “No I hadn’t heard this! Thanks so much! just in time, we were going to have our first boosters!” ~~~Yet my siblings will only refer to wiki approved web sites, so fearful of all the other references I could provide ….almost three years later…..Died Suddenly, same song, second verse!! AARGHARGHG! Amen and amen!
Thank you Sharon. I think degrees kill curiosity or at least the process of getting one kills it as you hand over your attention (and curiosity) to the system, for years, and they never hand it back. It's probably collecting dust in a lost and found box at Harvard.
Are these people mentioned smart or truth pushers of their own think with varying degrees of narcissistic personality disorder on ready to argue? What may be lacking is the inability of so many to listen to their inner voice because of their constant blabbing/hectic life and listening to “smart” or just incompetent, greedy evil people.
LOL, 15 mismatched gloves, etc. ….Yes, if these last few years have been a gift, in other ways, it has informed us of the friends we have known who slide along on the general consensus and so fear disagreement. As they say, you’re over the target. ;-) ~~~ I love a good discussion, and fight for my freedom to keep everything in my own head!~~~During the last election, a friend of mine bowed down to pressure and put up a Biden poster on her deck. Never said anything then, but some months later when I accosted her, she denied it vehemently and told me I must have seen the banner somewhere else! Next time I will take a picture! Just admit it, “I got tired of their bugging me, but I didn’t vote for him”. I could understand.
Bret Weinstein (Eric’s brother) coined an excellent phrase last Saturday in his Darkhorse Podcast #177 “Everything is psyop unless proven otherwise”. It is the new standard I will aspire to. Nothing I hear will be accepted at face value until verified from known reliable sources. Of course that does involve ingesting less media because the verification process can be lengthy, but at least I have the slim possibility of living in the real world as a result.
I like it!
Now let's hope he and Heather call a spade a spade regarding childhood vaccines. His record to date hasn't been great.
They certainly seem to be at least beginning to correctly identify gardening tools in the discussion starting at 48 minutes into #177..
I'm not sure this is about having smarts. A lot of current worldviews only exist because there has been an almost complete breaking of our link to nature, and with it a collapse in what you could call natural sense. Natural sense is something all humans are born with, a talent for grasping things about our place in nature without the need for explicit learning. Our techno-civilisation, which is sub, or perhaps supra nature, overwrites that innate ability both through broad culture and through formal teaching, so today you will read articles that say science has proved that walking in woodland is an anti-depressant, or that people recover from surgery quicker when surrounded by nature. Do we need science to tell us those things? No, it's natural sense. As so many have already pointed out, the higher up one goes in academe the greater the risk you will lose your natural sense, or even that you will pooh-pooh the idea that such innate talents have any value as providers of trustworthy information.
Well said, thanks!
Natural sense. Yes! So much smarter to go by than "IQ".
It's a hard thing to grasp, and almost impossible for the intelligentsia to do so but, like all things, the authority of science has boundaries, in reality it's scope of usefulness is far smaller than almost anyone in our technocratic culture is prepared to admit, largely through their failure to notice but I would imagine also due to their fear of seeming stupid should they mention it.)
I have to have a bit of a giggle about it because right on - that's why smart people don't ask questions either. And that's what happened during the "plandemonium", they didn't even ask to see if covid was real, such a fundamental question. But they also didn't check to see if vaccination is truly what it was purported. I notice this a lot - the reluctance to ask questions in order to not seem ignorant. When in a "natural sense" way, asking questions is what shows you are curious and curiosity is surely the most fundamental element of intelligence.
I think we humans have all sorts of intelligence; most of us have mixture of talents, some far greater than others, and that's something we brush under the carpet. Woodworkers have it in their hands, footballers in their feet (neither literally, but you get the point), yet in western culture we place academic smarts above all others, while downplaying the intelligence of empathy, or social skills, or creativity for instance when in reality, there is no hierarchy
Exactly. The idea of hierarchy doesn't integrate with real life. We are complex, not linear as hierarchy tries to contort us into.
Measuring 'smarts' has been a preoccupation of humanity forever. Look at IQ tests as a classic example. What do they measure? They measure the ability to remember verbal, mathematical and spatial rules. These can be learned and communicated but only if there is an agreed language. He who lives isolated in a Peruvian jungle would appear to be stupid because he cannot read and write. However, he would survive longer than the academic with a PhD.
Lao Tsu, who wrote the Tao Te Ching had a lot to say on the matter and then was so disillusioned with the 'smarts' he observed around him that he disappeared from society leaving only his book as testament to his wisdom.
He wrote: "“Simplicity, patience, compassion.
These three are your greatest treasures.
Simple in actions and thoughts, you return to the source of being.
Patient with both friends and enemies,
you accord with the way things are.
Compassionate toward yourself,
you reconcile all beings in the world.”
and:
"“Knowing others is intelligence;
knowing yourself is true wisdom.
Mastering others is strength;
mastering yourself is true power.”
and:
"“A good traveller has no fixed plans
and is not intent upon arriving.
A good artist lets his intuition
lead him wherever it wants.
A good scientist has freed himself of concepts
and keeps his mind open to what is.
Thus the Master is available to all people
and doesn't reject anyone.
He is ready to use all situations
and doesn't waste anything.
This is called embodying the light.
What is a good man but a bad man's teacher?
What is a bad man but a good man's job?
If you don't understand this, you will get lost,
however intelligent you are.
It is the great secret.”
When I first began reading ancient Taoist literature it hurt my brain because it did not seem to make sense. Now, fifty years later, I am beginning to get the message.... and (just like Lao Tsu) I am inclined to disappear from society for the same reasons as him!
That's wonderful, thank you!
I used to do IQ tests just for fun and you can learn them. I used to be good at them. But some years passed where I didn't do them and couldn't handle them at all. It is like using another part of the brain or another aspect of thinking. You can "get on a roll" with them and you can get out of the roll too if you lose that practice.
"Vaccines" had NOTHING to do with eradicating polio. Getting rid of DDT did. The field of viroligy is a fraud.
People become stupid when they get outside of their "discipline." You see it with "celebrities" all the time. Because Tom Hanks plays a brain surgeon doesn't inspire me to have him crack open my skull and operate.
This is so important 👍:
"I also think that “smart” people hold their ideas lightly.
_They know the risk of a corrupted idea and the exponential damage that can cause to other layers of ideas balanced on top of it._
So, they hold their ideas lightly, and with better evidence swap them out quickly."
Hmmmmm interesting
It's in the text above, I find the middle sentence so important. Flipping ideas just based on the latest prooaganda or social acceptability nudge for instance would not be what this is about.
First time I have seen that clip of Peterson talking about taking the Vax. Although not a great fan, I had assumed (out of you and me) that someone with his medical troubles and supposed knowledge of psychological manipulation would not have touched it. You can never tell?
No, you cannot. The signs of mental independence and resilience during times of chaos have turned out to be invisible. You definitely cannot tell the book by its cover.
I have to disagree with Cipolla on the even distribution of stupidity. One group that seems to have more than its share of stupid people is college graduates. They've had several more years of obedience training than non-grads, to destroy any critical thinking skills they may have had when they entered college. Few come out the other end undamaged.
I suspect the degree of damage to the graduates between 1976 and today though is different. I suspect they were allowed to keep more of their curiosity and general critical thinking abilities back then.
That's true. The new left began acquiring teaching positions in the late sixties and early seventies, and had considerable influence by 1976.
College has always been an artificially safe space, physically and financially. Even without the latter day emphasis on psychological safety and coddling the mind. Those who don't go to college are bound to be more hardy.
In regards to Ben Shapiro it sounds like he's regurgitating the "established narrative", one would think that with all available to him resources he would know better. Had he taken the trouble of looking into it when he wrote that article in 2015 maybe he would think twice about taking the wonderful vaccine in
2021. But of course, it is maybe.
You may want to read this brand new book "A Bug in Our Thinking (and how to fix it)" by Hugh Willbourn. Willbourn is a philosopher and a therapist who uses hypnosis. He argues ( in a very light, diverting way, while nonetheless quoting Heidegger and Kant) that people in a trance respond to abstract commands. Also, policies are a form of abstractions. I quote from his book: "Whenever a person takes an abstraction as self-evidently true or fundamental to reality, their perception and understanding are inescapebly shaped by it." Meaning even smart people can be locked in a trance where they perceive policies or abstractions, as true. Of course Mr. Willbourn 's argument is much more thorough and clever than I can represent here; you will just have tot read it!
What you say he book says about abstract commands is fascinating. It fits with my observation about many cognitively highly functioning people who like complicated board games. I have often observed an affinity to conformity in them. They just love subjecting themselves to sets of rules, the more complex the better. They get mesmerized by the effort of mastering all those rules. Some, then have no energy /capacities left to assess the appropriateness of having these sets of rules (in a board game you will not ask yourself that, bit we are talking about boardgame level complex rules in reality and the type of mind or psychology that has a liking for them. All the effort goes into mastering compliance to them. they are in a way unconsciously proud of mastering complex rule sets. Some, and that is still more preoccupying because it can br exploited, are also in a way proud when submitting themselves to illogical seeming ones. Unawares. Between themselves and their brain and body it is some kind of domination game. They unconsciously feel they have dominated and triumphed over their own reason. Transcending reason, forcing their brains to reason along illogical lines must be self liberating to a part of their conscience, in the sense of "Look I have defied logic (and reality), I am not bound by it, I decide how I reason and act." It's smart people rebelling against the narcissistic humiliation of being bound by reality and forced to come to the same conclusion as any uneducated down to earth common sense person. They detest that and in order to distinguish themselves from such exoteric conclusions, they have to go esoteric. The self-liberation from being embarrassingly chained to reality based necessary conclusions, I think the same mechanism applies for any ideology I think. It really is an insurgency of the left brain against the right, no less, no more listen to Dr Iain McGilchrist on YT, he is not saying the above stuff but you need his concept of left and right brain hemisphere, I promise.
"unconsciously proud of mastering complex rule sets"
That rings so true. The complexity is a source of pleasure. The pleasure of winning the game cannot be underestimated. It is justification.
Sounds like mental masturbation.
What I describe they potentially do, or my thinking this up?
I meant the former.
But you do bring up a good point . . . 😉
It's what I painfully observed and had plenty of leisure to ponder during lockdowns. Started from the theory that ordinary, lockdown enforcing commoners, were just so busy with overcoming their own inner aversion against being forced into un freedom, that in doing so they depleted the energy that they would have needed to address the question "Does this make sense, is its basis sound, and even if it is, do I value unfree safety over freedom?" They never even got to that question. They were deliberately kept busy on a level before that.
Thanks for the tip.
Language is a metaphor and so as we use it we see the world through it, regularly confusing the map with the territory. Apart from a few mystics who have 'transcended' this trap the rest of us have lost the more direct experience of living that they and other animals seem to possess.
Funny you mention that. Willbourn makes quite a similar point in vis book: he blames the problem on being literate. Literacy enables people tot think in abstractions. The risk of thinking in abstractions is that it closes the mind to what is really going on... In the book examples are given of cultures that are illiterate and they do not have that problem. They only see what is there and they are incapable of abstract thinking. They also do not worry about tomorrow.
You can go to his website; it has a link..
https://www.hughwillbourn.com
I see metaphorical thinking as the ultimate definition of a blessing that is also a curse.
In the Book of Enoch (which somehow lost iets rightful place in the Bible), it was the fallen angels that gave us humans writing and maths and astronomy... They werd subsequently cast into hell for 10.000 years... This always struck me as a bit unfair... Writing is good isn't it? But I guess I begin to see now why God would've done such a thing...
That's really interesting, though I would imagine that written language and mathematics could only have been developed by a species who already thought metaphorically through spoken language.
I guess one could call angels a different species... Also, there are lots of references in other cultures that it was folk from Sirius that gave us the writing... (The Sirius Mystery by Robert K.G. Temple). In the event one might think that both angels and aliens from Sirius are just figments of the imagination, I guess you indeed could call this a logical mistake...
Do you know where I can get a copy of Willbourn's book? It sounds like we may have similar thinking on what I think is one of humanities deepest problems.
This was pretty accurate. I might add that those named, Peterson, Shapiro, Weinstein and the others, self censor for a range of reasons, none of them smart or good. By doing so they are all useful idiots in a time of either put up or get out of the way and they damn well know this. Sitting on the fence waiting to see which way the wind will finally blow is the mark of a moral coward. So which are they, morally deficient cowards, useful idiots or both? Once in this category the road back to trust is one of total public repentance and I see none of this as they all obsequiously try to side with the vindicated which to me is morally repugnant! I have no use for the above named as they are not stupid but because they have chosen to be public figures are in their public and personal personas COWARDS. If I with only a high school education could see through then BS, albeit after years of reconnoitering the layers of BS the pyramid cap has foisted on humanity, then I expect more and better from the supposedly highly educated as evidenced by the relatively few during this existential time.
Per Sonnenschein's comments, self-censorship is part of a complex game Peterson, Shapiro, Weinstein and others have mastered and can't stop themselves playing.
Stupid is, as stupid does.
Forrest Gump, 1994
Perfect!