The Dumb Don't Know They're Dumb

Fluke is a member of DENSA(the opposite of MENSA)

To get in Densa you have to fill a bathtub full of water....then get in it.

If it overflows your a DENSA

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Dear Abby:
Can a woman accept money for birth control from her date?

Guess I'd disagree with Mr Heinlein on this point. Ignorance (in the sense of honestly lacking information) is not a sin, but stupidity is, since stupidity is ignorance which, through laziness, arrogance, fatal lack of imagination, hatred or any other attitude which prevents one from removing his head from his rectum, is willingly maintained for purposes other than conforming to what is true. Ignorant people can be filled with information, as a starving man can be filled with food; stupid people are like starving people who either reject the food given them or, consuming it, head directly for the vomitorium. Stupid people may suspect they are stupid, or they may well not know it, but even if they suspect they are, they will never admit it, as this will mean the complete reorganization of firmly-held opinions or fantasies or hatreds that are the foundations for their stupidity.
And, unfortunately, in some professions (e.g., politics, acting, advertising) it can afford some success and a very nice living which can batten the barriers between their lives and reality, allowing them decades of damage. In fact, some professions provide stupidity with a broad, clear field to work in, and reward it handsomely, allowing the stupid to do years worth of damage to the real world before that supposedly inevitable verdict is issued by the universe.

Or maybe not.

No "not" about it - you nailed it.

We may in fact be coddling our future day laborers, leading them to believe they could some day become, say, president. Curious.

Funny you mention that. A couple of years ago Obama participated in some "first-shovelful" groundbreaking ceremony for a construction project somewhere -- women's center, vo-tech ed building, whatever. He had taken off his suit and donned overalls and workboots -- the round-toed kind you see everywhere, with or without steel-toe caps, and was standing there shovelful in hand, looking to his right. You know, he never looked so natural in his life -- like he belonged down in that pit, in overalls and steeltoes, shovel in hand. "The Real Obama Stands Up for Women's (whatever)."

[DMcS] ....but stupidity is, since stupidity is ignorance which, through laziness, arrogance, fatal lack of imagination, hatred or any other attitude which prevents one from removing his head from his rectum, is willingly maintained for purposes other than conforming to what is true.

Respectfully disagree with both of you.

Ignorance is a negative, it's the lack of knowledge, which approaches infinity in nearly all human subjects.

Stupidity is the straightforward lack of ability to think and reason and mentate. It is the thing that horses and dogs have, which flatworms lack from natural incapacity.

In people, well, it's grounds for institutionalization or eleemosynary care by significant others.

There is something about this post that kinda has a ring or a tone to it...

I have to study it some more and make sure my knee-jerk reaction to it is genuine and meaningful...

I like the statement...It flows like one of the great quotes of our time...

I could be wrong...It wold make a good “tagline” as well for a person online profile...We’ll see...

Ignorance is a negative, it's the lack of knowledge, which approaches infinity in nearly all human subjects.

No arguments here--given that we are finite creatures living in a universe that is, if not infinite, certainly transfinite (that is, finite but, like, real, real big!)the amount of what we not only don't but can't know is close enough to infinite as makes no practical difference!

Stupidity is the straightforward lack of ability to think and reason and mentate. It is the thing that horses and dogs have, which flatworms lack from natural incapacity.

The second sentence here is a little unclear to me; is the thing which horses and dogs have stupidity or the ability to reason and think and mentate? I have encountered horses and dogs that have at least a fundamental ability to solve problems, which suggests some element of reasoning in their mental make-up. If they have it but don't bother to use the abilities they have, this would make them, in my view, stupid. Flatworms, lacking these abilities, could not be called stupid any more than a snail could be blamed for not being able to gallop or hunt. Boethius (author of The Consolation of Philosophy, a rather short but very smart little book written in the sixth century AD) says that the signature quality of humans that makes us human (since nearly every physical ability we have is equaled or surpassed by other animals) is the ability to reason and make moral choices, and that we are human only insofar as we use this ability. Humans can be stupid in a way that other animals cannot be, and certainly cannot be blamed for being.

In people, well, it's grounds for institutionalization or eleemosynary care by significant others.

Agreed, particularly if there is a constitutional inability to think or behave in human ways such as Boethius outlines. But when a person has the ability but steadfastly or lazily refuses to use it because there is something he wants more than the truth, or just cannot be bothered to make the effort, then it is (as I see it) a sin, a morally blameworthy act. And if it is blameworthy, it is correctable by the person himself,

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