Will the world ever stop being anti-intellectual?
One of the most aggravating things to me in this world has to be the absolutely rampant anti-intellectualism that dominates so many conversations and debates, and its influence just seems to be expanding. Do you think there will ever actually be a time when this ends? I'd hope so once people become more educated and cultural changes eventually happen, but as of now it honestly infuriates me like few things ever have.
“In 1976, a professor of economic history at the University of California, Berkeley published an essay outlining the fundamental laws of a force he perceived as humanity’s greatest existential threat: Stupidity.
Stupid people, Carlo M. Cipolla explained, share several identifying traits: they are abundant, they are irrational, and they cause problems for others without apparent benefit to themselves, thereby lowering society’s total well-being. There are no defenses against stupidity, argued the Italian-born professor, who died in 2000. The only way a society can avoid being crushed by the burden of its idiots is if the non-stupid work even harder to offset the losses of their stupid brethren.”
https://qz.com/967554/the-five-universal-laws-of-human-stupidity
Some may argue the internet has allowed them to coordinate. Providing each other with new and more novel ideas.
I try my best to keep in check my stupidity thus offloading some of the work of the smart people. Unfortunately, I fail most of the time
The Marching Morons
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/51233/51233-h/51233-h.htm
Thanks a lot for that link. I am a hardcore science fiction nerd, yet I had never crossed paths with that one. Indeed relevant in this debate, too.
Which gives you billionaires who have the power to make decisions uninterrupted by commoners.
And then the billionaires themselves have idiots among them.
, who will lose their money quickly.
This is why I am 100% in favor of normalizing regularly having things like computer/internet literacy tests msybe every half decade to ensure you are actually smart enough to use the internet in a responsible manner. Don't pass? No internet access for you outside of things educational material, cooking recipes, or sending messages to people. No access to your social media or conspiracy theory groups or anything else that'll harm your brain.
It'll either encourage people to get better at cheating, give up on using the internet entirely, or they might actually try to learn something and better their lives.
Some will definitely complain that they're having their rights violated (USA), but if it keeps the Internet safe from stupidity even by a small margin, I'll gladly take it.
I am so sick of reading proposals like this from probably-white non-US Westerners who have probably never actually had to engage with the idea that racism exists. This might get some fascist groups off the internet, sure, but it would also likely push oppressed minority groups who do not necessarily have access to quality education out. That's the history of minimum IQ requirements for voting, mind you.
Put this proposal in front of a Proud Boy and they'll likely be in favor of it, because they believe whites are the only people smart enough to pass it. They'll stop being in favor once it goes into effect and they're included along with groups they hate in the "not allowed online" crowd, but the groups they hate, some of whom's situations may be made direly worse by the lack of unrestricted internet access, will most likely be pushed out too.
Here we have a person who has never considered the important question: Who among us is intelligent enough to decide where the line lies between good enough and not good enough?
When do we consider someone too stupid to use the Internet? Bottom 50%? Bottom 10%? If bottom 10%, what do we do about the people who score exactly with 10.1%? They're nearly indistinguishable from the bottom 10% in terms of performance, yet they still get to go online?
Who decides which sites and services are ok? The government? The ISP? The site creators? You? What happens when your approved messaging service adds short form videos? Adds group chats?
The ultimate problem: There are no good answers to any of these questions, and if you think you have one, you are almost certain to have missed something significant in your evaluation of the options.
You're basically proposing a "social IQ" test that would effectively make people social pariahs (good luck making your taxes, finding a job, etc, without the internet, nowadays) over not being educated enough.
Do you realize there's literally one step between this and advocating for eugenics? Do you measure the potential for abuse? Who gets to decide what's "smart" enough for the internet?
By eliminating critical thinking, and polarizing everyone, those in power can do whatever they want, and the rest of us won't be sufficiently organized to stop it.
I'm seeing positive signs though, labor unions getting successful settlements, and more awareness. So maybe?
It's just absurd that so many people fall into the shitter so incredibly easily without second consideration. But those who don't also need to get out of the mentality of 'I can't do anything' because even a single individual can have a massive impact in other people's lives and the world without major ambitions. Every time somebody says that, it just feels so pathetic, like they have given up attempting any responsibility and relinquished the last of their power even though so much more could have been accomplished. We collectively need to have a much stronger resistance to injustice in the world, and we are making progress, but it's so slow it's eclipsed by the amount of atrocious shit that happens almost every single day. I find it saddening how quick people are to resign themselves from doing something just because the odds are against them.
Yes, you're absolutely right. There's a lot of hopelessness and apathy, and it's only helping those who commit the atrocities.
But before you judge, I'll state that I've been a member of an activist group, progressivecoders dot org, for the last 5 years. I've worked on various projects, but overall watched the world situation get worse anyway. Even before that, I've done my best to be an activist and ally.
I've also been in the software industry for 30 years. I've watched it go from a genuinely useful and interesting information processing and delivery system, to a completely shittified ad delivery and surveillance tool. I've had to participate in it myself, I was actually part of the team that delivered the first animated GIF that made advertising that much more annoying. I worked for several of the big internet monopolies, and realized that it wasn't an accomplishment, they just crack the whip that much harder, and I have CPTSD in exchange for free lunches and massages.
So yeah, I'm starting to give up. But it's not for lack of trying.
“Just absurd” is the language of someone who doesn’t understand what’s going on.
I assure you that (which you already know but aren’t processing for some reason) people are not setting out to live their lives in an absurd way.
It just means you’re tossing your hands up at the complexity of understanding something. Not a very disciplined approach to understanding for the 1% Intellectual in the room.
I have decided that it is safe to assume that everyone is an idiot, including me, and behave accordingly: act deliberately with an open mind, making no assumptions, and remain curious.
Frank Herbert's Bene Gesserits had a tenet in which they remained mindful of the naivety of all people, including themselves, ostensibly to prevent allowing hubris to allow poor decisions.
Coming back around to my point: I think we'd all get along a lot better if we'd all agree we're all stupid, but we can get better.
These are good points and good techniques IMO, and to add on--
Humans have always been drowning in the unknown, hence our chronic set of coping mechanisms, but on top of that, in this high-tech information civilisation we currently live in, now we're drowning in information, as well. Which leads to some big problems, of course.
As in-- it takes considerable effort, honesty and openness to form a decent perspective on most subjects these days, particularly significant ones, and because of that hurdle, I fear that most people (you, I, everyone) are inclined to 'settle' for flawed understandings of topics, even with best intentions. Or at worst, some of us form whatever ludicrous opinions simply because it makes us feel better / at peace / self-righteous.
Point is-- it seems like the world just has way too much information for people to handle these days, effectively worsening our collective mental health and communal behavior, one might say.
@CobblerScholar@lemmy.world
Not to spoil a 60 year old book, but didn't they have a plan to genetically engineer a literal savior to mankind with hundreds of years of selective breeding? A little like the pot telling the kettle it's too sure of itself.
Everyone has gaps in their knowledge and errors in their thinking. A true master is an eternal student, or something like that. We can always learn. The problem here is too many people have their own ego impeding any progress.
Anti-intellectualism comes alongside alienation from others. It has to. Being an intellectual is essentially saying "I trust the findings of academics and will adopt their consensus." Nobody can learn about the whole span of the world, it's too much information. But when you are convinced that collaboration is weakness and compromise is failure, you have to keep the world in your head, and the only way to do that is to maintain a really simplified internal diorama from which your "truth" is derived.
This is such a great take. I've never considered it like this
Thanks, I'm already thinking of ways I am off the mark though, like how things like race science and eugenics have been the "academic" position in the past.
I think properly working the academic consensus into your mind involves also understanding that it's the product of people. It's not that different from having some trust in institutions outside of academia too. There were people in the sciences fighting bitterly against those trends, and in the long run their position became standard.
I think there's a point to be made here about trust vs faith
Yeah probably. I don't like the idea of having faith in science of course, considering that science is done by people, and people aren't infallible. But it's the best tool we have for preserving and interacting with past ideas and breakthroughs. I suppose the thing I'd have to have faith in is humanity's drive to understand a "truth" that holds up to scrutiny, instead of the characterization some have of human beings as creatures that wish only to satisfy existential terror incuriously.
That was very useful to people. It's not like a majority, even those disliking academia, will trust no scientific study or something, they just don't trust the ones they disagree with politically
This is an uncomfortable reality but the more recent examples of the sciences and humanities being considered progressive overall gives me hope.
I don't think there was ever really race science, I could be wrong here but to my knowledge it was basically all pseudo science. Maybe this is a flawed take but I don't remember any creditable research from it but lots of old white dudes telling everyone how they're better because they say so.
the difference between pseudo-science and science can be slight, and always better understood in hindsight. IQ was a big part of race science in the early 1900s, and it looks like science. It's objectively measured, systemic data. You've gotta take a step back to realise it's bullshit and too subjectively defined to be useful for anything. A big part of science is trying to think objective, and it's only been somewhat recently there's been a movement to remind people that they aren't actually objective, ever.
I get where you're going and I don't really disagree but people thought lots of things were objective while having no conclusive data.
thought, think, will think. But I kind of did say that already.
It's the exact opposite of that. An intellectual is someone with a lot of curiosity and typically rejects the status quo. Anti-intellectualism is the acceptance of what others say based on "stuff" (emotions, group affiliation). Intellectuals have been oppressed because they offer intelligent ideas to challenge a political party, religion, or the "adopted consensus".
I just responded to a pretty similar position below.
It is silly to conflate opposition to the status quo with intellectualism. Those visionaries whose ideas led to paradigm shifts were still building upon previous consensus. Sometimes being correct puts you at odds with the group, but so does being COMPLETELY WRONG.
Sometimes
"the world" is not anti-intellectual, you just hang out with the wrong people
Some folks can't much help who they hang out with. Any American is literally surrounded by thousands of miles of other Americans, and anti-intellectualism is rampant in the country. It's not like Sweden is going to let Americans immigrate with the justification that "I'm a sad intellectual surrounded by boorish peasants."
It's not? Assuming you could get yourself there, I mean.
No country will just let in any rando. They have to want you there. There's humanitarian programs, but largely you need to have something they want.
That's typically special skills (MD, PhD, athletics, etc.). Or money. Money will get you anywhere.
Perhaps not the whole world, but I'm many/most countries, the larger structures, like government and business, absolutely are anti-intellectual. Nice to have an academic friend group, but that doesn't change the fact that capitalism makes education less accessible in order to rely on an undereducated workforce, and then politicians push it even further for the sake of easy control.
I'm very specific about my friends, I promise you that isn't the problem. It's more of an observational thing, and it is clearly present in western society at the very least. Even with my friends, we are still an insignificant minority compared to the larger population.
Any thought or idea that begins with “people are…” is doomed.
There is no such thing as “people;" there is I only you, this person here, that person there, and so on.
Funnily enough, if as an intellectual you let go of the idea that others are dummies and start examining what they do and why and start brainstorming about what might motivate them, you might get a better idea of all the dynamics that go on when it comes to an individual's choice or motivation. Including, yes, why people are "anti-intellectual". And perhaps how to "solve" it.
I'm a bit snarky here, because I get irritated by other supposedly "smart" people looking at things through a tiny, biased and prejudged pinhole.
You're smart? Ok. Get out there, observe things, learn them, then come back and form a hypothesis that aligns with what you've observed.
I'm not sure that your statement has anything to do with stopping thinking of others as dummies. I think it's telling you to think of them that way, and you're just trying to push that under the rug to try to be nice.
You're saying to understand anti intellectualism you need to understand things from their perspective.
The lack of knowledge (especially true knowledge) and lesser ability to understand complex ideas are major aspects of that perspective.
No matter how we define or measure intelligence, we're mathematically guaranteed that it's distributed approximately on a bell curve with a small number of intelligent people at the top.
I'll never not see anti-intellectual people as stupid, even if they have their reasons. I used to be an idiot who actively did things they thought were wrong. But eventually I stopped because I realised it's completely hypocritical and morally and logically wrong. I came to that conclusion without need of others judging me through my own self-reflection, and I'll admit it was hard. Even so, I wished somebody would have called me out, but I guess animal consumption is so engrained in society people don't even question it. I had my reasons to do so, but they were by no means a justification. I still try to understand things in different ways, but eventually it becomes redundant taking each case and doing so. The reality is that anti-intellectualism is incredibly prevalent and people need to change their ways of thinking. Sometimes they are just blatantly wrong and need to stop letting their emotions do their thinking. Sometimes there is nothing to understand. I don't know why people are so bent on seeing every individual separately, it's impossible to do so. Even if we do, they are still liable for their actions. Such as choosing not to self-reflect.
Sounds like your grasp of what “reality” refers to is flawed. What kind of instrument would one use to measure whether people need to change their thinking? What units does that instrument use?
Maybe instead of bemoaning how little effort others are putting into understanding things, you should forge ahead with your own work.
Can you prove this?
The mark of an intellectual! Making bold statements without evidence then suppressing any discussion of that lack of evidence.
Gee I wonder why anti-intellectualism exists?
It couldn't possibly be because of dumbshits like you who enable them, thinking that by allowing them to dominate the conversation every single time it is brought up that you'll convince them to see the light or anything.
It couldn't possibly be people like you pushing popular misconceptions about the debate and blindly accepting every dumb personal attack they make on the rest of us as true without critically thinking about any of it or applying any of your intelligence or anything.
Nah. The problem is other people who call them out and hold them accountable. Totally everyone else.
By being skeptical I’m not enabling anything except actual intellectual honesty.
So in other words, you're just part of the problem.
How do you figure what I said means what you said?
Bruh. Bold?
I don't know why I'm dignifying this with a response.
Yeah you basically claimed that anti-intellectualism is based on stupidity. Do you have any evidence of that?
The answer is obviously no, or you’d be producing it
Anti-intellectualism is stupidity. All stupidity is is just willful ignorance. That's what the word means colloquially and we're using the colloquial meaning of the term.
Grow the fuck up and stop defending stupid people. You are literally harming our country by legitimizing them and anti-intellectualism as a whole. That kind of thinking has no place in any modern society and neither do you if you think that's the direction we should allow it to be dragged in.
Psssssst saying stuff like that doesn't make you sound very smart
I don't give a fuck how I sound. Personally attacking me doesn't work. All you anti-intellectualist dipshits have to bring to the table are dumb personal attacks, red herrings, and temper tantrums whenever you're told you need to know basic facts, and understand things you clearly don't, and the rest of us are sick of it.
Be a fucking adult for once in your lives.
Well you had me fooled, given that you seem to think what you're saying is so important
I wanna dig into this, please elaborate on your adult ideal
Oh look at that, no substantive argument defending openly rejecting learning, just more viciousness and vitriol because that's all ignorant motherfuckers like you know how to do when confronted with your own flaws. Knock me over with a feather.
Die mad. You're doing wrong being willfully ignorant and you're doubly wrong for defending something so harmful and dangerous. You're not going to bully me into shutting up simply because you don't want to hear the truth.
You have to know basic shit and most importantly, want to learn to be a meaningful participant in a fucking democracy. We're trying to run a society here. We have no time for your ignorance. You've caused enough suffering and destruction as it is.
Look at how upset you are, at something that's totally out of your control. So much anger, I could drown in it. Maybe try to focus on more positive emotions.
I wanna focus in on this statement. Do you say hurtful things like this because maybe deep down you're afraid that you'll die angry, angry at things that are completely out of your control? This is a very natural fear so don't be afraid to admit it.
Wow I didn’t even need to quote two sentences of yours to expose your hypocrisy. You managed to do it in the span of ten words.
But just to drive the point home, this was you a couple comments ago:
Like, you’re spewing vitriol. Do you really not see that?
You showed yours in four.
You showed yours the second you opened your mouth defending dumbasses in here while completely ignoring their own brand of vitriol, and offering up your own as a consequence.
You show yours when you couldn't be assed to look at my post history for five minutes like a decent concern troll. 🤦
You're literally doing it right now, looking for a cheap gotcha moment, and when you read this and find out it didn't work because I am openly an asshole, you're going to whine and complain, and I'm gonna sit here and shake my head right along with OP.
You are on the wrong side of history and you are actively helping to destroy not only the U.S. but the rest of the developed world with your garbage and you give not one single fuck as long as you can use stupid people -- and I emphasize stupid people -- to virtue signal.
Grow up.
There’s no hypocrisy indicated in the two sentences you quoted; indeed there’s no conflict between them.
Where there is a conflict is between shaming me for insulting people (Did I? Where?), in the same sentence that you insult me.
No. You have your definitions arranged sloppily. Stupidity is stupidity.
I’m not defending anyone. Like at all. You being unable to see that is another indicator of how sloppy and undisciplined your mind is.
Colloquially, anti-intellectualism is the stance that intellectualism is bad. Intellectualism is not the same as intelligence. Intellectualism is a specific relationship with the mind and knowledge. Specifically it’s the belief that articulated argument and logic is the best way to approach knowledge. Anti-intellectualism is the stance that there are other ways far more valuable to develop knowledge.
For a bunch of self-proclaimed “intellectuals” you guys have no idea what you’re talking about.
Like being an intellectual and in favor of intellectualism is one thing. It’s another thing entirely to declare yourself an intellectual without actually being one.
In my experience, skilled intellectuals don’t call themselves that, and people who call themselves intellectuals are primarily interested in being seen as special.
Just to educate you a little on what the landscape is here, alternatives to intellectual consideration of reality include:
You’ve latched onto one of those, because apparently you don’t read enough to have any awareness whatsoever of the context of this conversation. Which is ahem rather anti-intellectual of you.
Well, you got me there, Chief
Having tried this, no, it does not. People are anti-intellectual because they willfully choose to be ignorant. They're like that for several different reasons, but their choices are the same.
What actually matters is not allowing people like you to shame the rest of us who do value knowledge into submitting to the will of people like that out of a misguided notion that judging them for their stupidity is wrong or bad. It's not. It's called holding people accountable for their actions and choices, and it's a thing we have been doing far too little of in society.
Hold people accountable for not knowing basic shit and refusing to learn it. Grown adults have no excuse, barring some learning disability, for not having decent reading comprehension, or not being able to do basic math, or not having critical thinking skills. We're trying to run a democracy here and that requires having an educated public. And that means the public has to be willing to educate themselves.
For fuck's sake. I don't know everything either but if there's something I don't know, I learn it. I at least try.
You're part of the problem defending them by shaming us. You're part of the reason why anti-intellectualism is such a problem: you enable irresponsibility, indolence, and selfishness by protecting people who refuse to learn from consequences.
I don't think everyone is an idiot. It's a big assumption to say so. People have their reasons and motivations. Many people weren't given a fair chance in life, many lacked an education, many were raised to think a certain way or in a certain culture.
I'd wager I have tried arguing with the people I would categorise as 'anti-intellectual' more than 99% of people to ever have lived trying to understand them, and I did develop a level of empathy and understanding. But still it remains that just because people have reasons, they aren't necessarily valid and eventually people are responsible for their own self-reflection and decisions. 'Solving' this issue with people who already have engrained beliefs is incredibly difficult because they need to be responsible themselves. It isn't something I can actualise solely. It's far easier to start from a fresh generation, because changing is hard when you are used to something for so long. You see this in religious people especially and in people who eat meat. I know why they are/do what they do, but still it doesn't give justification. Many of them may even doubt their beliefs, but still cling to them. I know they do because I used to as well. I even still proceeded to do things I know were wrong. I don't claim to be flawless. Furthermore, I also know there is no reason to come in blaming these people ruthlessly because it will not progress anywhere and serve no purpose, what is done is done. But I cannot deny how annoying it is to see people still refuse to even attempt to learn.
The 'solution' is very complex if you want people to change because it will be an incredibly difficult task and something that would require an entire cultural shift to how people think. No doubt long term and I don't have the answer to how, and even if somebody did, it still relies on others to make a decision themselves. You can only make your own judgement of individuals for so long, soon enough you can recognise patterns and arguing every case is not possible with what time you have. I do my best.
I think you're mixing up intellectualism and morality. There are many reasons people choose not to eat meat, and some of those reasons are emotional or moral rather than intellectual. Some people only eat a vegan diet because their doctor told them they had to. Are those people somehow more intellectual than someone who researched the science and came to the conclusion that humans are omnivores?
You have already judged the outcomes of people's decisions as being objectively correct or incorrect. To you, eating meat is incorrect regardless of the reasons for doing so. That is not an intellectual stance, it is a moral one. You are ultimately judging people for having different values than you. Maybe they don't care about the environment, maybe they don't care about the safety of animals or other people. Like it or not, to care about those things is emotion. You can argue they're wrong as much as you like, but you can't prove that any human behavior is objectively "the right thing to do," meaning you are not as objectively correct as you think you are. There isn't a one-fits-all solution for how to live. The sooner you realize that, the sooner you can stop judging others for not being like you.
Intellectualism is a moral issue, and a serious one in our society.
The only way democracy works is if the population is intellectual, and when it stops being such, it falls apart. We can't afford for people to reject learning and education the way they have. It's the reason why we get dipshit wannabe dictators like Donald Trump in office and why corporations and companies have been allowed to run roughshod over everything this country claims to stand for. It's why climate collapse has been allowed to go on unabated. It's literally the root of all of our problems.
Don't stand here and try to tell us it's not a moral issue. It is. And people who refuse to learn anything are doing something wrong.
Well at least we agree on one thing. It is a moral imperative to learn about the world, to make oneself capable of solving problems.
I literally said it is a moral issue. And I get the importance of people changing. But you have to accept that you can't control this. You can lead by example or you can try to educate people. If you really want to control people, become a dictator. Judging people doesn't make the world a better place. OP said they don't like religion, but this is exactly what religion does: it declares there's one right way to live and judges anyone who dares to not live that way.
Agreed. I'd also like to add that intelligence != wisdom != experience, and you need all three to achieve real understanding.
Especially when you look at folks anti-intellectual sentiments through the lense of their Material Conditions.
Also, as an intellectual, I’d advise that understanding anti-intellectualism requires understanding what alternatives exist to intellectualism and why people might see them as more valuable (or less problematic) than intellectualism.
Anti-intellectualism is a strategy employed by some rich people that control some mass media outlets to keep people away from being class conscious.
You're absolutely fooling yourself if you think anti-intellectualism is a "rich people" thing. If rich people disappeared, anti-intellectualism would still exist
That's not what my statement posits.
What does your sTaTeMeNt PoSiT exactly?
Is your first language English? I can help explain but need to know if you didn't understand because of a language barrier or you read it too quickly.
I dislike this take. It assumes a conspiracy among a shadowy elite, which is the same tactic often employed by the anti-intellectual crowd. If we simply write off the problem with a hand-wavy solution based on a hunch, we’re no better than those we are discussing.
I know some hate this term, but class reductionism is a very apt descriptor for their take.
I dislike that term. In this context I suppose the intent was to give a simple response to a simple question.
Some professors have actually done the methodical research to find out this is, in fact, true. There's no shadowy elite there's just an elite that has a policy towards this: https://www.amazon.com/Gatekeeper-Years-Economics-According-Times/dp/1594516820
"You can never truly idiot-proof something, as there will always be a better idiot."
There's a similar line in a Douglas Adams book:
Can we start with anti-I-Need-My-Dopamine-Hit-Every-10-Minutes?
Between people's ever depleting attention span and our desire for acceptance on social media, I just don't see how you can even begin to tackle "anti-intellectualism".
Most people use these platforms to comment on a headline and never read the article. Perhaps we could all decide to use these platforms properly and use the downvote button to bury comments that, while funny or otherwise emotionally engaging, are clearly not accurate or providing value to the topic of discussion.
By upvoting funny comments and rewarding hive-mind mentality, we're partly to blame for the lack of intellectualism.
Lemmy is far better than Reddit regarding the use of downvotes, but many people still use it as an emotional disagreement button rather than something used to hide useless/irrelevant content. I only downvote when somebody says something completely fucked or starts trolling.
I don't think upvoting funny comments is necessarily wrong, but there is a lack of meaningful engagement a lot of the time.
I don't know if I'd agree at all with the idea that Lemmy is any better, in my experience, people still use the downvote button as an "I Disagree" button 99% of the time. There's less people here, so it's less pronounced (you'll get -9 instead of -300 for expressing an against-the-grain opinion), but the pattern is still just as present
I've only found people who say really stupid shit get completely downvoted to the floor on Lemmy and there are almost always extensive responses. Anecdotes aren't the best evidence, I guess my experience was very different.
However, at least you can actually see if people upvoted or downvoted and not just the total, so people are less inclined to just hop the train straight away. Depends largely on the instance though. I'm pretty sure Hexbears can't even downvote.
I believe there is an evolutionary purpose to human stupidity though, and it's the reason we've come so far as a species. Without writing a novel here, look up the concept of simulated annealing, which is conceptually related to natural selection. The short version is, when searching for a better solution to problem in a sea of functionally infinite possible solutions, if you only ever try solutions you can see that are categorically better than the solution you currently have, you will (with statistical certainty) end up in a local maxima. That is to say, without stupid people, no one would have ever looked at a cow udder and thought, "yeah, I wanna get in on that", and as a result many humans throughout history would have gone without nutrients necessary for their survival.
I have no idea who first drank cow's milk, that's not the point, don't @ me. The point is, stupid people try stupid stuff, many times it is just as stupid as it looked, but sometimes that stupid thing turns out to have previously undiscovered potential benefits which smart people notice, research, and help integrate into our society, resulting in others' lives being better.
So to further simplify, stupid people are unwitting test subjects that the rest of humanity sometimes benefit from because they do dumb shit no one else would have thought to try.
I'm reminded of an episode from Stargate when one of the Asgardians, Thor I believe, was able to stop replicators from attacking his home world with the help of one of the main Earth characters, Sam. Thor needed someone of a less evolved/"stupider" species to help with the problem after none of the Asgard scientists could find a way. He said with compliment, "It was your stupid idea," and Sam smiled back.
~Anti~ ~Commercial-AI~ ~license~ ~(CC~ ~By-NC-SA~ ~4.0~
Yeah pretty much.
I'm only using the word "stupid" here because the thread is about intelligence and anti-intelligence. But more generally, I think there is a reason that it's easy to plot political ideologies (even outside the two-party system of the US) somewhere on a progressive/conservative spectrum. I believe Progressiveism and Conservativism form the same dichotomy as Mutation and Rote Replication in the context of DNA. In the stock market and economy it's referred to as Greed and Fear. In philosophy and game theory it's called Exploration and Exploitation. These are all the same phenomenon to me, one takes a step forward the other takes a step back, sometimes you need a bit more of one to survive, other times you need a bit more of the other.
You know, the only thing that keeps smart people from trying stuff is cultural boundaries and social fitness, which in itself is something evolutionary grown and includes small progress to a local maxima? You know, that the only thing that keeps us from trying unconventional stuff is often the lack of money, which inherently comes from the state. The politics decide about money and they also cater to stupid voters or to business interests. This in itself is stupidity. The answer of stupid is evolutionary benefitting is just fine on the surface, but if you look at the complexity of issues, it is not as clear. And then there is my opinion that i would rather accept some local maxima while some scientists try unconventional stuff than have stupid people always thinking theyre right DKing all the time, because it is exhausting! I know it is not a choice, but if one thinks being and staying stupid is fine, which might be the consequence of "stupidity is evolutionary advantageous", then I would rather fight the premise, because that would not be acceptable to me.
Oh for sure, please, nobody tell the stupid people about my theory. They're smarter than they look...
the world would be a much more terrifying place if stupid people doing 'evil' (never ascribe to malice what can be explained by stupidity) stuff were instead evil and highly intelligent. I like this version better. we like to think that intelligence brings with itself high morals and every intelligent person is an agent of good. some people might just want to watch the world burn, but that's a discussion for another thread, I think.
imagine a highly intelligent musk or spez. ugh
You know that much more intelligent people are still doing evil stuff right now and more often than not, because other people do either not act intelligent or consequential. I have a few examples: grandchildren-trick in germany, which relies inherently on grandparents being naive or ignorant about technology or that they might be betrayed. They never thought about that, in that regard you might count being ignorant or naive also as stupid. Another example: some people get into magazine subscriptions and never stop them, even though they do not like it, just because unsubscribing is too inconvenient or saying no to the sales man is too hard. Another one: People go to financial advise and do not know most things about personal finances and investments. So they literally have to trust the advisor, who sometimes only works to get the most out of his customer into his own pocket, that could only be avoided through knowledge and experience, which are traits, that are also associated with smartness. Although not all those people maliciously choose to exploit those naive or lazy or ignorant people, they rely heavily on them to earn their money. If those people would not let themself get exploited, there would literally be less evil, because it could not be commercialized in that way. Hell, even corporate and governmental employees are sometimes as stupid as they could not even send a simple e-mail (there are examples), and would not even learn it, if shown.
I do not accept any answer like "those people that exploit others will find ways", as you do not know if it would be that way.
I also do not accept anything defending the exploited people, who in my opinion are not inherently stupid from the mentioned circumstence and I do not mean any harm to them. But the things that happened are literally stupid things, that could easily be avoided, so they have done something stupid, as does anyone in this world, so no evil feelings there, just improving the debate focus.
And to answer anything, that would say that some people might have a disability or illness and therefore might be easier to exploit, which could be the case. Those could also be exploited, even if everyone becomes smarter, but: there is a solution to that and that is societal support and care work. If you have a right to health care and to be supported by society to make up for your disabilities, then a judge or judgementally assigned professional might decide for you, so that you do not have any disadvantages due to those circumstances.
Oh my god. Stupidity is what people pushes us out of steady, slow, incremental progress towards a local maxima. I'm stunned. You might have something there.
It's not so simple I think. Anti-intellectualism is a symptom of the greater human condition. Part of it is the scapegoat aspect. If something has a name then it's easy to point a finger at it, easy to blame the person who named it. Part of it is envy, people trying to tear down those who they feel are superior to them. Part of it is propaganda, if not caused by certainly exacerbated by.
Like many things in life it's complicated.
You forgot laziness. Intellectualism is difficult, and letting your emotions do your thinking is super easy. Then there's the greed, or more accurately the greedy, who will use anti-intellectualism to get what they want from others, be it money, power, or something else.
I maintain that it's pretty simple, actually. Humans are animals, just like any other. That comes with irrationality baked in. We think we're so much better than, say, orangutans, but are we really? I'm not impressed. I often think about how we would behave if we didn't have language or opposable thumbs. I realized one day that all we have to do is observe traffic.
I mean, the thumbs help hold stuff, sure, but it's our large pre-frontal cortex that really comes in clutch. That and our penchant for violence. There's evidence to show that the Neanderthals were possibly more advanced than us before they "died out," but also less violent and selfish. It's those traits that led us to kill them or cut off their access to resources while we took them all.
We are still animals. Any biologist will tell you that, but that's not a negative thing, it's just a facts. It's like saying we're mammals. It really comes down to how you define "better." and "successful." Obviously, we are making those determinations from our point of view, so we tend to define them with the things only we do. But if we're defining successful by technological advancement or the ability to do advanced math, or even versatility in abilities, we're at least top 3. But those orangutans are pretty nifty with their use of twigs sometimes, so don't count them out.
Reading the comments, it seems that the take on this in a lot of highly voted comments is the highly simplistic "some people are stupid, others are not".
Let me make one thing clear: Intelligence is NOT Wisdom, and whilst the former might make it easier the get the latter, to begin down the path of growing the latter requires an ability to recognize one's lack of it and such ability is dependent on things like self-confidence, self-criticism, ability to practice introspection and possibly a reasonably varied life-experience, most of which barelly correlate with intelligence (and in some cases the correlation is actually negative).
Yes, it's emotionally satisfying for people who see themselves as intelligent (yet can't even recognize the limits of intelligence) to think their greatest quality (worse, one they're born with rather than acquired) makes them immune to that problem, which they thing is because "most people are stupid".
(Funnily enough, more intelligent people are apparently more likely to fall for scams, which would make sense if one they tended to overestimates the power of mere intelligence)
However emotionally satisfying doesn't mean right and a wise person would suspect such self-serving "I'm great because I have this characteristic and it's those who don't have it who are the problem" 'conclusions'.
Personally I think a lot of the manipulation going on nowadays is at an emotional level (just go learn about modern marketing and start playing attention at how branding in TV is mostly creating associations between the brand and certain emotional urges and impulses, for example perfumes with sex and cars with freedom) and an "indoctrinated" subconscious definitelly bypasses intelligence no mater how extraordinary (Hollywood's typical portrayal of exceptional genious is an almst superhumanly wise person - or alternativelly, nutty professor - all very unrealistic).
Also I've known some highly intelligent people who were so unable to accept that even they were non-omiscient humans who made mistakes, that they migt as well be morons (these people are rare though).
Anybody who thinks themselves above making mistakes is delusional. It's really concerning how people will live such self-centred lives without greater consideration or introspection. So many people lack self-awareness and the ability to properly process emotions without just giving in to them. Cultural conditioning and manipulation definitely plays a part in this. It took me so long to realise how wrong the consumption of animal products was because until I got around the age of 12 I thought much more highly of people and didn't believe so many people would partake, willing or ignorantly, in the abuse of animals so carelessly. Realising how selfish and narrow-minded many people are is really saddening. It's very rare for someone to break free from social conditioning, even more so by their own decisions alone.
I also have to agree the comments saying shit like 'some people are stupid, others are not' are just redundant. Similarly, the people who say 'not everyone is an idiot, you have to see it from their perspective' are also incredibly annoying. Even if people have reasons, they don't provide adequate justifications. I can understand why they may have an idea or perspective, but it doesn't make it valid. I have gone through understanding people more than most people to ever have existed will have tried, but I can't fight every single case. Too many people think their opinion matters equally to another's who has invested magnitudes more time into formulating it. I think people really need a humbling to be able to appreciate things and learn more.
Others have said it already, but anti-intellectualism at its core is alienation. It's a lack of trust in academic or professional authorities and substituting that trust for either ones own experiences or complete hallucinations. People will find alternative communities to trust, especially if they can find something that verifies their existing biases.
If you sense something's wrong with the world, but lack an ability to pinpoint it, you'll go to whoever seems most immediately relatable to you. Reactionaries like Qanon people ended up in that situation. They no longer trust authorities on information outside of cranks on Facebook.
So the question is how do you get more people to adopt a consensus of reality that's based on expertise, professional research, investigation, etc? You have to convince more people they're part of that process and that experts share their interests. America has had that before, but usually in times of conflict against a foreign enemy. The average American used to be really into space travel tech for instance.
There was also a period around the 1890s where the average American was really into electricity as a hobby, like making little circuits or trinkets. It was considered pretty normal back then to have an understanding of how simple circuits like a doorbell worked.
Often, it's trust in cult of personality figures that are saying what the alienated person already wants to believe.
If I was in college still there's a part of me that would have wanted to make it my life's work to reach the same level of "legitimacy" as PeePee Jordanson so that I could spend all my time sabotaging his reputation as publicly as possible
How do you distinguish between those two, especially if you are not intellectual.
It is tricky to get someone to recognise that they aren't knowlegable enough. Even if you say it as gently as possible, some will still hear "you're dumb" and no one likes that.
Also it's a great tool to manipulate people : "I don't need a scientist trying to explain me life from the depths of their lab !! I have commonsense !!"
I think the best way to be diplomatic about a matter like that is to emphasize that people have different fields of experience and expertise, and you just want to share information on one of the topics where you are more familiar.
Of course, if you treat them as know-nothings who should be grateful that a Knower has condescended to instructing them and they respond as though you are insulting them, it is because you are.
My favorite quip about common sense is "common sense isn't"
Drinking game: click on a random username in the comments section and take a shot every time they start talking out of their ass
My account doesn't count (although I am flattered, weirdo)
That's a good way to end up with alcohol poisoning
Add in surface level observations of 'if you are so smart you would realise not everyone is an idiot' or 'you have to understand their perspective better' and maybe 1/2 comments you are slamming a shot. I guess people don't read comments anymore. (Probably never did.)
Actually, it is not "the world". Only certain parts and groups of it. The US is quite anti-intellectual, especially where the GOP is in power, as they draw their clientele from people who think less for themselves. So, naturally, they discourage intellectual advance wherever they can - Crippling public schools and libraries, making university unaffordable, etc.
Yeah I don't think it's "the world" either!
I live in Asia, and overall I find people here give too much weight to fancy degrees and whatnot.
It feels a lot less bad than anti-intellectualism (especially for me, personally), but presents its own set of problems. Sometimes it feels people overestimate my knowledge of all subjects, just because I wrote a thesis on the behavior or one insect on a particular tree, in a tiny geographical region.
The anglosphere is anti-intellectual and some other parts are, but that does not mean the whole world is, and the influence of the anglosphere is waning fast.
wow a Hexbear user generalizing the """anglosphere""" i bet you think you're one of the smarties. which twitch streamer taught you about that one?
Insults show that he has a point. Where is your counter-argument?
how could I have a counter argument to something so solid?
Right. It is very difficult to find the couter-example to such a solid argument.
Maybe an unpopular opinion but I think a lot of anti intellectual thinking is a combination of religious and corporate influence on the world.
Religion more or less teaches that you should believe what you're told, not what you discover or learn for yourself. It's a subtle but powerful way to discourage people from seeking the truths in life because they are genuinely convinced they've found the answer for everything.
Similarly with corporate influence so heavily a part of our lives people are quick to fall into the trap of consumerism. From a young age we are being conditioned to accept that it's normal to have to pay multiple times for the same product and to replace our possessions regularly. The cost of living that way makes the time and expense of continuing education unattainable for the average person, which often leads to bitterness about their situation and anger towards those who are able to work a white collar job or live an easier life.
Both are problems without quickly enacted solutions. People have to be taught to think critically without being put off or angered when they get to topics that contradict what they want to believe.
It's not unpopular and more so true. Religion is anti-intellectual, and the main abrahamic ones double-dip hard on it. If you ever tried arguing with a religious person about faith, it's incredibly obvious how impactful it is on their critical thinking.
Capitalism also prefers anti-intellectual thinking because it makes people easier to manipulate and exploit into accepting shitty conditions and supporting the system. I think a large cause for the lack of critical thinking and self-reflection is because too many people live a very self-centred life where they consider themselves superior automatically and never take the time to question their beliefs, or if they do, refuse to face contradictions because it's harder than staying the same.
Only when people stop giving credence to the argument that you don't actually need to read or learn math or science to get a job and pay your bills.
Video calls and recordings. Chatgpt. Why will future generations need scripture and math for everybody?
Some should learn it though.
Nope. Everyone will choose not to learn, and we'll be doomed.
I think cultural anti-intelectualism to some extent comes from the belief that intelectuals don't care about their interests or wellbeing. Not helped by the historic lack of accessibility of education
I think the latter is improving somewhat
Had a discussion about hydrogen cars on Lemmy the other day
The discussion involved:
The internet has emboldened people who barely passed school because on the internet, they're anonymous and nobody knows who they are. People who know them however in real life would likely ignore their comments.
I think the problem is, its less time consuming to make up nonsense and shout over people, than actually provide accurate, well-referenced information
In a debate, the idiot will try to pull you to their level so they can beat you with experience.
idiots cite cliches
now you respond touché
telling us how you argued with another idiot on the internet doesn't really tell us much about anti-intellectualism
it honestly just looks like you're one of the emboldened.
and now me too! maybe this framing isn't the most helpful.... not the "smartest" framing
If you can provide a way to approach that example differently, I'm open to suggestions. It's an example of my experience, where my comment includes many of the common techniques they employ
Your comment is
Why isn't my experience relevant, and why can't we post our experiences? Are we required to simply say "yes" or "no" and not why?
Wow so you actually think this is evidence, okay. I'm not even sure how to approach this. I was pretty gentle with you and your character too. I was a fucking asshole to a Hexbear user in another thread.
It does come down to character though. By putting one person as "intellectual" and the other "anti" it's creating a hierarchy between perspectives. So then the question is an ethical one, is it justified to dismiss another perspective based on XYZ. I'm guessing in this case, dismissing you is the "anti", right? Based on whatever criteria you've chosen. But what happens if we select different criteria?
Congratulations on being an asshole. But being subtle doesn't change anything (even Trump tried, and got a gag order).
What criteria would you pick to change character attacks, blatant assumption, dismissal of evidence (without counter evidence), incorrect comments, or marketing nonsense (like "water battery" or "greenwashing") into intellectual arguments?
Your points dispproving hydrogen as a viable energy solution for the future are a bit silly. It's like saying the future isn't possible because what is available now. I would actually say you're being anti-intellectual because you're not being open minded and solution oriented, which are intellectual traits.
You might need to read the discussion, as I was being solution oriented (Hydrogen has many good uses, and I agreed with that based on evidence).
But, the original poster started using buzzwords (I blocked the guy, so don't remember them fully, but there was a lot), character attacks, and dismissing major evidence. Character attacks aren't a valid debating technique...
Fair I don't have enough context.
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Fascists and dictators are often supported by intellectuals. Being an intellectual doesn’t mean you’re on the right side of history.
Traditionalism vs new approaches to things will never go away until technological progress at least stops accelerating and levels out a little bit. So, a Star Trek utopia basically, where fundamental physics has largely been nailed down.
That said, education is a separate topic, and has generally been trending in a positive direction for most of the past 4000ish years. This has actually made the conflict harsher, over time imo, as the traditionalists are starting to feel threatened at an existential level. Naturally, they're going to meet that feeling of threat with traditional methods, and I'll just let you consider our human history of conflict resolution methods to consider what that might entail.
We just don't believe in our religious books anymore, though. We used to. And that's a problem for some people. Like, the biggest problem that can exist for them, its about souls and salvation, not this "crude matter" as Yoda would say.
Science is the best means by which we can understand the objective truth about the world around us. It's a shame that people are rejecting it in favour of conspiracy and superstition.
That’s just human psychology at work. Many of these BS explanations are appealing to a certain type of mind.
It's the same to people. All the interest in the latest cancer medicine, people like science. They are not anti-science, they cannot tell the difference.
No, because there are a lot of people who don't care to learn more than they need to and aren't curious to learn more, or they do not want to change their mind and are set in their beliefs.
This smells like someone who considers himself an “intellectual” and is sick of people disagreeing with him.
That may be the case but it doesn't change the strong current of anti-intellectualism in modern societies.
It's useful to those in power, for example.
No disagreement there, but simply declaring that “those who don’t see things my way are anti-intellectual” is a drastic over-simplification of how things got this way. Declaring it into Lemmy, which an echo chamber of progressives and communists (including myself) means we all know who he’s talking about, which means it’s just a progressive dog-whistle for the “them” that we want to be mad at.
There are a lot of intelligent people who hold what I’m sure OP would consider anti-intellectual stances. I live around them, work with them, play games with them, etc. it’s much more valuable to understand who they are and how they got to their beliefs than it is to simply vilify them.
I haven't seen the argument "disagreement is anti-intellectual" being used here, though I'm sure people act that way. It's hard to be disagreed with: people tend to entrench rather than change.
It's still worth noting that anti-intellectualism is pushed as a tool of division and control though. Sure it occurs naturally but weaponized at a systemic level it is much more of a threat to society.
Or someone who's seen brexit happen, or the rise of right wing populist parties everywhere that want to ban books and discount expert advice on climate, the economy, etc.
Observing democratically-elected governments being unable to address existential threats to the human race is certainly food for thought.
This smells like jumping to conclusions.
It was but OPs replies seem to confirm it.
To follow-up my snarky reply What if we’re the bad guys here?-NYTimes OpEd (non-paywall) This has a good take on how being “intellectual” is potentially an elitist take.
I somewhat agree. The world isn’t black and white. And as a society we are very much still untwined with our primitive groupthink.
The world is very complex.
What's wrong with that? Just an example, imagine living in a world where most people consume animal products without second thought, despite the absolute moral atrocity that is committed as a result of it. You'd be pathetic to not be outraged at it. People should care about the consequences of their actions, but most people hypocritically selective in what ways they are.
Is it anti-morality or anti-intellectualism you were concerned with? Now I’m confused.
Both. Most people who eat meat would say animal abuse is wrong, all while ignoring their own contribution. A lack of intellectual honesty and logical consistency that leads to moral problems is also anti-intellectual. They would say slavery is wrong because it is prejudice, and unjust for 'xyz' reasons, while also saying 'xyz' reasons aren't good enough to change their mind away from eating meat.
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As long as conservatism exists, no.
The general population is more educated now than in the past, but education alone is not what makes one an intellectual, or rather a good intellectual. Having intellectual virtues what makes one a good intellectual, imo. These virtues include intellectual humility, intellectual courage, intellectual curiosity, intellectual honesty, and intellectual responsibility.
I agree. But way too fucking many people will ignore the last 2.
As long as there are financial incentives to keep people being anti-intellectual, we will never see a world where the average person acts in good faith and with good knowledge of the subjects they're talking/debating about.
Most people don't have the capacity so it makes them angry and mistrustful of anything that's perceived to be "smart". Maybe if one is a true intellectual they can make dumb down these concepts so that they can at least get a basic understanding of them.
People will always fear that which they cannot understand.
I don't think I've ever witnessed literal "anti-intellectualism", perhaps that's a thing around you ? People not caring/understanding the value of knowledge, sure, but deliberately opposing it... that sounds terribly dumb. Not sure what anybody would get out of it
In the run up to brevity people were literally saying "were tired of listening to experts" who were saying it would be a bad idea.
Were you not around for the last 4 years when half the country decided all doctors were working together and lying?
How about our populations response to climate scientists.
Or the universally agreed on hatred for any college degree that isn't sufficiently marketable as "worthless"
The only way I can imagine saying you've never seen anti intellectualism is you don't know what you're looking for.
I don't think I've seen this in France at least.
There is absolutely some (growing?) distrust in institutional knowledge, pharmaceutical labs, etc. but it's far from being as strong as in the US (which is the country I assume you're referring to?)
Anti intellectualism is a cornerstone of right wing politics which is gaining steam in lots of countries in Europe.
may I introduce you to the very real concepts of anti-vaccine people and flat-earthers? or the people disregarding health advice during the pandemic because of some global conspiracy to kill people with masks
Ah I know the flerfs ! I "talked" with them, haha. It's depressing.
There's a loud minority, but I'm not sure it's more common than in the past. In fact, (Western) young people now tend to be highly educated and interested in things previously seen as stuffy.
You would think the Internet and access to an unprecedented amount of information would have made us smarter, more emphatic, and so on.
But it turns out people are easily misled and manipulated. Social media quickly starts to feed you more of the same crap just because you watched one video. Village idiots can now form echo chambers with like-minded individuals, e.g flat Earth believers.
Those who want power will take advantage of people who fall into all this.
I don't think this will go away completely, but there is a possibility to reduce it. By improving the education system, and also helping people communicate better, we can expect this problem's severity to reduce.
It ebbs and flows. My personal conspiracy is that it's a built-in self-destruct switch in case a species overpowers all predators, diseases, and lack of resources. Some code auto-nerfs the species so they aren't OP forever.
When resources are plentiful, vaccines have stopped most major diseases, everyone is washing their hands and decently educated ..that's when the incels, the homeschooler mommy groups who distrust science, and the religious zealots sow discord and take civilization down, lol.
I'm sure the demographics throughout history change. But the base instincts of greed, fear, and hate blow apart cultures and empires throughout time.
A lot of things in life are perpetual changing.
Some day the pendulum will swing back to pro intellectual. Once people comprehend the damage the just like me leadership has done.
No because human stupidity is infinite
Wait til AI takes prominence. What effect on intellectualism that might have remains to be seen. As long as LLMs aren't tailored to bias certain views, it may just lift humanity.
It's just gonna pollute the internet with even more bullshit. Language models don't really understand topics, they just put together words that are likely to appear with each other. Biases are inherent to this design.
Yeah, even if it worked perfectly it would only be as smart as the training data.
The bias is already there (even if those that own it and command that bias may claim otherwise and you may believe them) and the "lift humanity" pitch is marketing bullshit.
Press x to doubt on this.
Nothing about a glorified auto-fill will uplift humanity. We already see the opposite happening right now. LLMs output is already making the internet worse because its being flooded with auto-fill bullshit. And that in turn is making LLMs even worse over time, because instead of just being garbage out, now the garbage goes in and cimes out worse than the first time.
And its impossible for LLMs to not have bias, and ones claiming to not have bias are probably the worst of all.
LLMs are not the aspects of AI that are going to have the biggest impact. It will be AI based tools for evaluating data in the aid of specific tasks that has the big effect
I somehow envy your optimism.
As soon as the AIs start saying it would make the most sense to equally distribute resources and having 10 people hoarding all the wealth is bad for the economy they're going to get some adjustments real fucking fast.
Well I don't have a dog in the AI fight. I did sufficiently couch my comments as a thought experiment. I could have postulated the opposite scenario I suppose. Or none at all. I do see that there are some strong and confident predictions as to the outcomes.
I see what's already happened so far with LLMs and there is no sign of "uplifting" outside of marketing propaganda.
Yeah most people don't "couch ideas as thought experiments" they just say what they think. Although i don't think anyone replying made a prediction really. We can already see what's happening and we know that bias is inherent to the entire design of LLMs.
I'm already seeing people come into software dev support forums asking "ChatGPT said you could do this but it's not compiling" and people replying that no, that's not possible and them arguing about it because ChatGPT said it.
Once Elon Musk unleashes his "uncensored" AI chat bot, we're going to be flooded with made-up misinformation, it's going to be a bloodbath.
I think there's this idea of historical tick-tock, that goes from faith or belief to enlightenment. It swings back and forth depending upon geopolitical development.
But that aside, I believe that after the digital revolution, getting people to believe bunk en masse became easier. This has amplified the grift economy, which in turn spreads disinformation, fronts logical fallacies as a debate method and puts bad faith arguments on a pedestal.
Take for instance that guy who illegally experimented on kids because he thought he had a better vaccine than the multi-purpose vaccine that was standardised. After he lost his medical practice he has been forced to rely on financing from conspiracy theorists and socialize with flat earthers because he is now an anti-vaccine icon.
He has to do that because his name is synonymous with malpractice and needs to play the part to feed his face.
This is just one example of the grift economy. For more, seep up "savage alpha male podcasts" to see an even harder grift.
Maybe that's not what's happening to begin with. I reject the entire premise. And all the users in here humble bragging is honestly nauseating.
I think it's becoming better overall, not worse. Yes, there's a populism issue at the moment, but this is far from the first time that's happened. We're dealing with the introduction of an entire new means of communication, online media in general and social media more specifically. That brings all new hazards and benefits that need to be dealt with.
The era after the printing press was developed brought intellectual development, but it also sparked revolutions. Those didn't always wind up with that right people getting into power. It took a while for society to adapt and stabilize. I expect the same will happen with Internet communication.
I'm also hopeful because studies have shown that successive generations generally improve their abilities in abstract thinking. (I'm having trouble sourcing that statement, unfortunately). That's important for the economy because the jobs of the future will need that abstract thinking. At least in my experience, it also acts as a bulwark against bad actors because people with poorer abstract thinking abilities tend to be more gullible, at least when it comes to lies that they like.
What do I need to do, so that you will be right?
Don't panic. Think globally, act locally. Help the next generation be better than your own. Know that successive generations are likely to keep improving. Watch the arc of history instead of despairing whenever there is backsliding or push back.
I don't think anyone's anti intellectual, people use rhetoric to defend their ideas, to defend their ways, to justify what they've already done. If you used your intelligence and started to agree with people, no one would challenge you, you wouldn't run into anti-intellectual bias.
When you challenge people, or disagree with them, they're going to use rhetoric against you, and that often is portrayed as anti-intellectual. If they think you're a threat they'll attack you by any means possible
While I don't agree with OP's view that the world as a whole is anti-intellectual, I also wouldn't assume that these people don't exist at all. I've personally had interactions with people who thought less of me or others for having a higher level of education, and (at least overtly) not in the sense that they were jealous. It was more of a general antipathy against people who know things / enjoy to learn, because they saw them as arrogant etc.
But this is probably more an example of tribalism.
My dad has a PhD and he's on his third marriage. Do you think I should ask him life advise? He's dumb as hell unless you need a complex math problem solved. However, he feels like he can punch above his weight when it comes to other issues. It's like a pro football player who thinks they could compete in any Olympic sport because they're good at football.
It seems to be a rather prevalent point of view in some blue-collar circles. You'll see some of them putting down higher education jobs as "lazy", and propping their own jobs with long hours and physical work as "real" jobs. I'm thinking there's some sunken cost going on there, as those same people will complain that their bodies are destroyed by the time they hit 40, somehow not making the link that overworking yourself with 60h might not be great for anyone, them included...
Illiberal populism isn't going anywhere, unfortunately.
So true.
People are forced into school to "learn how to learn". Yeah no shit, what happens is that many dont want to learn anything anymore.
I have to live in a bubble, because I really enjoy and often have discussions with many people about all sorts of things.
The worst thing at school by far was being forced to read shit like Romeo and Juliet at school that I just didn't care about. Of course, I still enjoy reading, but it is really off-putting as an experience. Too much of the school system focuses on exams and retaining correct information, rather than the logical processes or conclusions derived from learning something and adapting it. Memory and exams are still very, very important, but without the skills to adapt the information or consider alternatives it becomes very limited in application when you are taught so strictly.
I love AI here. In germany we have "Anforderungsbereich 1, 2 and 3" which is the "level of skill"
Ironic thing here is, that even in a Gymnasium / high school, its like 50/30/20 or more. If you are pretty much unable to think by yourself, can stupidly repeat information, you have a 4.0 and you make it.
If you are bad at repeating informations, but can analyze and interpret perfectly, you get the same amount of points.
I was always suffering from that, in History for example, where 3 is the shit you should actually take home. Antifa forever.
"Will the world ever stop being anti-intellectual?"
"They really should stop teaching that dumb Shakespeare crap at schools."
Not exactly a solid foundation you've built there for the thread, OP.
I enjoy literature very much, but I don't see why they couldn't have picked something more relevant or thought-provoking. My own teachers said it was just what they did as part of the curriculum because it was the easiest to teach relative to some of the other options.
It's not. We'd still be hitting rocks if we were anti intellectual.
what a brain-dead response. Did you give it a second's thought?
Wow what a useless and toxic response that says absolutely nothing. Making hexbear look really good!
Oh I'm sorry, you misunderstood. I'm not here adverting hexbear, because I don't give a shit what you think about my platform. I'm making fun of you for having dogshit opinions.
No. Do you have anything to add?
"There are only two extreme outcomes and no other versions of events that could have possibly ever happened."
I don't think there are only 2 outcomes. I asked a question regarding a potential of one absolute outcome.
No, you wrote this:
Where is the question? You presumed an absolute outcome and now expect everyone else to go along with it, nodding sagely to your smug presumption.
People who believe they are intellectual rarely are, or they would be able to couch their points in more accessible ways.
People will remain stupid. But I'm somewhat hopeful that in the next few decades we see AI develop enough that it truly constitutes superintelligence relative to us, and that the scalability of it tips the scales of the continual standoff between intelligence and stupidity forever.
Because I have little hope for humanity overcoming its own multiplying stupidity on its own.
And if there's one thing we can all agree on, it's that such a superhuman intelligence will be used for the good of humanity and not to serve targeted ads, manupulate people against one another, and further enrich the wealthiest among us.
You seem to make a bold assumption that it will not develop the capacity for self-determination, something that companies are already struggling with in the current LLM era trying to get foundational models to follow corporate instructions and not break the rules on appeals to empathy like a dying grandma or a potential job loss.
LLMs are not self-aware. They are language prediction models. They say things real people might say because they were fed millions of permutations of real people saying things, so they're very good at mimicing that. The issue with them not staying on the rails isn't because they are developing a consciousness, its because trained models are extremely complex and difficult to debug...that's why you need to be careful with the training data you use. So when a company scrapes its training data off the internet, you end up with LLMs that will say the same stupid shit as you find on the internet now (racism for one...or appeals to empathy like you mentioned)
Not quite.
If you're actually interested in the topic, I recommend searching for the writeup on Othello GPT from the Harvard/MIT researchers earlier this year.
While the topic of 'consciousness' is ridiculous and honestly a red herring (even in neuroscience it's outside the scope of the science), the question of whether models have developed specialized 'awareness' through training is pretty much a closed topic at this point given about a half dozen studies. There was an interesting approach from Anthropic just the other day that's probably going to be very promising in looking more at features as an introspection unit over individual nodes (i.e. sets of nodes that fire when it is fed DNA sequences), and I expect over the next 12 months the "it's just statistics" is going to be put to bed once and for all.
While yes, it develops world views and specialized subnetworks based on the training data, things like the concept of self and identity are pretty broadly represented in human writing, don't you think?
So if we already know for certain a simple toy model fed only legal board game moves builds a dedicated part of its network for internal board representation and tracking of board state, just how certain are you that an exponentially more complex model fed effectively the entire Internet doesn't have parts of that resulting network dedicated to modeling ego and self-reference?
Also, FYI no one 'debugs' model weights. It's like solving a billion variable algebra equation, and the best we can do at the moment is very loose introspection of toy models we hope are effective approximations of the larger ones - direct manipulation of nodes in process to evaluate effects (i.e. debugging) is effectively a non-starter.
I'm fine with people who really just don't know stuff. But they should really listen when you try to explain something to them.
* cough cough * flat earthers?
I think the claim that the world is anti-intellectual is somewhat biased. I don't know if that's a sampling bias, a cognitive bias, or some other kind of bias. But one way or another, I feel like you're overblowing things.
.
You're talking about mostly religion. Not one specific but for all of them to work they have to dumb people down, otherwise why would you follow crazy rules if you can have your faith at home without crazyness?
I believe that in a far future, as humanity gather more and more knowledge keeping religion up will be kind of hard, but until them we will have to go through the "dark ages of christianism" where our lifes will be controled by some old conservarive people. But they will die out.
Unfortunately I don't think this is mostly religion. A lot of people are stupid. Sincere question, when was the last time you talked to a normie?
I chatted with my hairdresser yesterday. She didn't know:
For Halloween my girlfriend and I are going as SBF and Elizabeth Holmes. She commented that "no one outside [my] little circle is going to know who those people are." I started to disagree but, in a way, she's right.
Don't get me wrong, she's wonderful and hilarious and chill af. She's just a bit dumb. And that's okay but it's true.
I have a background in networking.
I know what a DMZ is.
I have no idea what these 2 are.
Yes, I heard about it at some point.
I would have thought a fair few number of people knew that. Maybe it's just your barber who doesn't care enough.
Not being able to give correct answers to these questions (one of them being fairly technical) doesn't indicate anything about her intellect though
None of those as exemples of inteligence they are exemples of ignorance, lack of information, that can happen either by lacking access to or not caring about.
From what I've heard, this is mostly a US phenomenon.
You writing that this is mostly a US phenomenon (which is not true) is weirdly appropriate, since it shows the main issue (not being informed enough about what happens around the world).
It happens everywhere.
It's an unfortunate side effect of an unequal society where people feel left behind and then see a lot of people who had the advantage and privilege to go though years of education lecturing them on how to live. This breeds resentment and makes them targets for movements and groups that oppose these ideas.
The US is much more unequal than most other developed countries though, hence why it happens much more in the US than in other places.
There's plenty of it in the UK too.
No.
It’s human nature to want to be the best, the most loved, the top dog. It helps to propagate the species.
If someone is smarter than you, it digs at the very core of that, and becomes a threat.
lol so you're saying that you think we're genetically programmed to mistrust "smart" people? I think you're really reaching here
I think 'human nature' is far too broad to define in such a way, and making objective statements about it is wrong. In my opinion, the only definite thing you can say is that humans act out of self-interest (as do all living beings), but the motivation derived from it doesn't have to be destructive.
Is the world anti-intellectual or anti-“know-it-all”-poindexter?
I haven’t noticed anti-intellectualism but the reject of disrespectful and bad-faith discourse.
This is probably inevitable because science has been politicized in America.
Only by the idiots who reject it. To the rest of us, there's nothing politicized about science.
For most of the US, knowing anything beyond basic math and literacy is "being a Poindexter".
The world:
OP's point is valid throughout for most of the white shaded counties as well
I'd like to preface this by saying I have all the vaccines, including four covid vaccines.
Until just a few years ago, I was all-in on the institutions. You see, institutions have been synonymised with science and intellectualism. Fast forward to covid and we had our healthcare professionals lying to us. "Masks are ineffective." "Sorry I lied. You'll die if you don't wear masks in public." "Except if you're a BLM looter, then racism is a public health emergency." Our leaders were locking us in our homes, closing our bank accounts, banning us from social media, shutting down free speech, and effectively forcing us to take very minimally tested vaccines, repeatedly. They gaslit us about the origin of the virus. We learned that the people who were likely responsible for the lab leak were working in collusion with the Chief Medical Adviser/Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases/Chief of the NIAID Laboratory of Immunoregulation.
Kind of alarming, right? Data suggests trust in institutions took a huge hit under covid. Not because of "misinformation," but because of dishonest and authoritarian actions by leaders.
Then we have science. Data shows that political partisanship is at an all time high in universities. Up to 20% of lecturers identify as communists. There is no equivalent on the right. In fact, the mix of liberal and conservative faculty members in universities in America is so lopsided now, it's as much as 10:1. We can all pretend like this hyper-partisanship doesn't lead to research and educational biases, but we can see that it does, in real time. For example, trans research. It would be hard to name a field receiving more funding today, nor a field less impartial. Many advocates and researchers argue vehemently that transitioning is necessary to save the lives of those with gender dysphoria. Yet there is not a single study, anywhere, which shows this. The closest researchers have come is arguing that "suicidal ideation" is a synonym for "suicide," and because self-reported ideation decreases in some studies, this means transition saves lives. Clearly this is incorrect, but such research is so widely used and misused that the President of the U.S. has endorsed it. Conversely, there are numerous reports of researchers being barred from testing hypotheses which question this premise, or outright removed from universities. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] When researchers are prevented from studying all sides of an issue, all that's left is the narrative of those in power.
For me, the question isn't "will the world ever stop being anti-intellectual?" Instead, it really should be, "what are institutions doing to mend the immense harm they have caused to trust?" I am amazed it hasn't happened sooner, and that the backlash isn't even larger.
Wow there is so much misinformation here and fear mongering and anti trans bigotry right under the surface.
If you thought this would come off as looking like a centrist take and not that you were a right wing nut bag trying to frame your misinformed biases as centrism, you utterly failed.
You need to take a long hard look at yourself before you start criticizing "institutions", there, guy.
Jas is a troll account (I sort of hope), it's obvious from their post history.
I say we should provide UBI to everyone, legalize drugs, and let the stupid ones rot on their couch doing weed, playing video games, and streaming anime or porn. Hopefully they'll be too lazy to vote or commit crimes, and the rest of us can work on creating a better society with them safely out of the way.
That's...actually acceptable to me as well. The only problem is we'll still have highly ambitious sociopaths who want to grab the reins.
Ayn Rand once said "It is not I who will die, it is the world." I will never stop being anti-intellectual personally so when I die it can't change.
Sorry, the answer is no but if you trust the quote the world will only exist for another 30-40 years so I wouldn't worry.
It's alright, Rand was wrong about that statement just like she was wrong about virtually everything she said.
Seriously. Bizarre quote to take as truth
on a communist forumtbf lemmy.ml is mostly neolib in practice.
Wait, but that's a hexbear user? What?
You're right. I just saw they were a comrade bear and made the assumption
They're a haver of interesting takes, to say the least
Nah it's a bit. No one actually unironically identifies as anti-intellectual.
I'm kinda of a Diogenes figure. Sometimes you get "behold a man" and sometimes you get a homeless man yelling at passerbys.
No. You're just being obnoxiously smug while expecting people to praise you as some sort of eccentric philosopher.
There's countless "Digoenes figures" like yourself already and they all believe they are the Main Character, too. And like you already did in the other comment chain here, they also get just as mad when their junk philosophy (such as, in your case, Ayn Rand) gets called out.
Literally describing myself as a homeless man and anti-intellectual. No one is taking it seriously but you man.
Are you seriously invoking Ayn Rand as a source of wisdom?
And that particularly solipsistic quote?
Oh look another "materialist" who relies on the pan-psychic influence of others to determine reality. How Jungian of you. Thatcher once said, "there is no society, only individuals." Do you disagree? I imagine so. Even Marx called out Commodity Fetishism but you put the greatest fetish of all on society and reality as something inherent. If reality is just an interplay of individuals, the truth proven by both Rand and Marx, then an individual is free to form their own reality away from your own.
::: spoiler You'll never know the true truth because you're still enslaved the collective unconsciousness.
:::
Also, did you really think someone was actually identifying as anti-intellectual. Come on, I know you couldn't understand the the ironic Freud in your "I want dommy mommy to step on me" thread but this is ridiculous. Looks like you got owned on two fetishes, mommy and commodity.
You believe you are the Main Character of the universe and that everything ceases to exist when you die. And you're accusing me of believing in woo bullshit.
And you're such a scratched liberal that you started foaming at the mouth with some weird personal attack you've been holding on to, apparently, for weeks.
Solipsism is a helluva drug.
Man you really don't understand when people are doing bits. You think people would just go on the internet and not mean literally everything they type?
Hexbear needs a villian, don't you understand UlyssesT? You wouldn't be having half of the enjoyment in this conversation if I just did a normal comment. But now I got to do a silly bit and you got to pretend you're arguing with someone serious.
Discussion on the internet is inherently worthless because no one ever changes their opinions. It's a black box in which no matter the inputs, the outputs remain the same. Is it really so wrong then to lay down ideas like "seriousness" if it doesn't change anything? Your answer will be of course that I'm delusional and only doing this to cope or something because that's what your opinion started as. No matter what you or I say, we cannot change.
Stop posting and touch grass if you want truth, nothing here matters.
Being obnoxious and falling back to "it was just a bit" is tiresome and belongs in the dustbin of history right alongside the "ironic" nazis of 4chan. Insincere people like you can move the goalposts all you want but I just see the obnoxious part and stop there because that's all there usually is under those pretentious masks of irony.
You first, especially because of your masturbatory "I am internet Diogenes" LARPing attempts, be they bits or ironic or whatever you want to pretend they were.
Your internet nihilism is childish and about 20 years stale. 4chan is still open if you want to go somewhere that still praises internet nihilism.
If you're not being praised for your Diogenes LARP, bit or irony or whatever, nothing matters because all you care about is being praised for your bit/irony/very-smartness!
https://existentialcomics.com/comic/125
In my experience, anti-intellectualism is a yank trait, not a worldwide trait. Ask a German, or someone from Japan, for confirmation.
Anti-intellectualism is not uniquely American. It's common in Germany - I'm not familiar enough with Japan.
It has been expressed in many different countries, cultures and times. America is far from the most extreme anti-intellectualism. In Cambodia they killed people for wearing glasses, because they were perceived as being intellectuals.
iirc there's also significant anti-intellectual sentiment in Brazil and the Middle East. Also worth noting that some of the worst anti-5G behavior was happening in the UK.
German intellectual here. I and others have been severely beaten, harassed and fired on multiple occasions for being intellectual.
Pointing out a flaw in someones plan, finding errors in reports (that are actually important to its findings) and other work related things.
It very much depends what region in germany and what class you‘re born into. If you‘re vastly different from your surroundings, you‘re in for a bad trip.
Found the anti-intellectual.
Nah, you just found the one who wasn't American. There are a lot of them here, and they go to a lot of trouble to vote anyone who knocks them down.
Xenophobia is an anti-intellectual trait.