7 ms·
good grief, yes, smart people can be arrogant, yes, smart people can be many other negative things. but my experience walking around the world is that most peo
by metacorrector 12y ago
good grief, yes, smart people can be arrogant, yes, smart people can be many other negative things.
but my experience walking around the world is that most people are too stupid. Too stupid means, for instance, that they could never begin to fathom programming a computer in C or C++. So pursuing that narrow example (doesn't mean that you can't choose quantum physics instead, if you are distracted by that re-read what I said) and restricting ourselves to the population of people who can fathom programming in C and C++: again, my experience of them is that even they are mostly too stupid to do a good job of it, these are difficult and dangerous languages, and we as a society do not have enough people who can actually use them safely.
So, from where I'm sitting, the arrogance of the world is not concentrated among the small numbers of truly exceptionally smart people, the arrogance is mostly found among all the other people--as we see in this discussion--who focus all their criticism on smart people.
Yes, we smart people are arrogant, but we are not stupid, so shut up in order for you to get what you can from us, and do not wish that we could somehow be more like you because that would entail us being more stupid. Don't be insulted; just as I am not insulted that you can't see what I can see, I'm simply saying stop complaining about this, it goes with the territory. Do you complain that the brilliant brain surgeon who saved your life is also very arrogant, or do you kiss his ass for saving your life? Would you trade the pleasure of watching Michael Jordan play basketball away because you don't like the arrogant way he acts off court? No, you wouldn't.
Yes, there can be super smart people who are also super humble, but so what? there can also be super smart people who are not humble, just as there can also be super humble people who are not very smart, and the worst of all, arrogance that is not accompanied by extreme skill, which is what I am complaining about. It is arrogant of all of you (no, not you personally, just look down the discussion) to all jump into the same discussion on the same side--ooh arrogance is bad--as if what you are saying is interesting. And this is not a topic of great interest to me, I'm simply trying to represent my side since I didn't see it represented anywhere else here.
- dreamweapon 12y agoToo stupid means, for instance, that they could never begin to fathom programming a computer in C or C++. It seems you're confusing "could never begin to fathom X" with "just not all that interested in X."