Ruminations on stupid people

Aweh dearly beloved fellow ruminants & groupies

What is a stupid person? As one does these days, I decided to consult the sensational new world oracle ChatGPT. For those of you who don’t know ChatGPT is a simple online artificial intelligence chatbot created by openAI and released at the beginning of December 2022.  Microsoft has recently made a $10 billion investment in ChatGPT. In just two months it has reached over 100 million active users.  It had this to say in answer to my question, “As a language model developed by OpenAI, I do not engage in labelling individuals with insults. It is not productive or respectful to call someone “stupid.” Intelligence is a complex and multi-faceted trait that cannot be accurately captured by a single label. People have different strengths, weaknesses, and challenges, and it is important to treat everyone with dignity and respect”. Consider me harshly and justly scolded for even asking the question.  

You are however allowed to ask what a clever person is, and the answer is, “a clever person is generally considered to be smart, astute, and quick-witted. They have a good understanding of situations and can think creatively to find solutions to problems. They are often able to understand complex ideas and concepts easily and can communicate their ideas effectively. However, it’s important to note that intelligence and cleverness can manifest in different ways, and someone may be considered clever in one aspect of their life and not in others”. A very good answer. So then someone can be clever in one respect and stupid in others I asked ChatGPT. Yes, that is correct began the answer. ChatGPT acknowledges that the concept of stupidity in people exists but declines to define it. Such is the nature of political correctness.  We acknowledge and celebrate the positive but shy away from the negative.

One of my groupies sent me an article about Bonhoeffer’s theory of stupidity which argues that we have more to fear from stupid people than evil ones. When we know someone is evil, we can take steps to fight it. With stupidity, it is much more difficult. There is the cliché that debating an idiot is like trying to play chess with a pigeon — it knocks the pieces over, craps on the board, and flies back to its flock to claim victory. The problem with stupidity, though, is that it often goes together with power. Bonhoeffer writes, “Upon closer observation, it becomes apparent that every strong upsurge of power in the public sphere, be it of a political or of a religious nature, infects a large part of humankind with stupidity.” Bonhoeffer was a Nazi dissident who was arrested for his views and later executed in a concentration camp. He said that if we want to get the better of stupidity, we must seek to understand its nature. To understand stupidity, we will need to look beyond ChatGPT.

An individual can act stupidly but much more damage is done when a group acts stupidly. Humans have evolved as social beings and following the herd is ingrained in all of us. Herd behaviour is among the pre-eminent causes of stupidity. In a famous set of experiments, Solomon Asch studied conformity in 1951. Fifty male college students from Swarthmore College in the USA participated in a ‘vision test.’ Using a line judgment task, Asch put a naive participant in a room with seven confederates/stooges. The confederates had agreed in advance on what their responses would be when presented with the line task. The actual participant did not know this and was led to believe that the other seven confederates/stooges were also actual participants like themselves. About a third of participants always conformed with clearly wrong answers and 75% conformed at least once. Only 25% of participants never conformed with wrong answers. There were no female participants and perhaps this just provides concrete evidence that men are stupider than women. Perhaps a useful definition of stupidity is conforming with the herd when it is clearly wrong. This may not lead to good outcomes for the non-conformists and their position in the herd. It did not end well for Bonhoeffer. Are non-conformists actually stupid? Perhaps the truly clever understand that their own self-interest and position in the herd has got nothing to do with the truth. The ultimate clever narcissist knows how to position themselves in the herd and become politicians or leaders.  Good politicians know how to exploit stupid people with populism. Just tell gullible people what they want to hear. The non-conformists who value truth are in the minority and are easily ostracised.

When one finds oneself in a group or organisation that starts to act stupidly it is often not in your best interests to be too critical or defiant. There are often harsh punitive measures for non-conformism and defiance. It is not always easy to leave the group and you need to find coping mechanisms.

Am I stupid or clever? What about you? Nobody likes to be labelled stupid. ChatGPT is right it is an insult. But, at times, I have been stupid perhaps even very stupid. Alcohol certainly doesn’t help. Fortunately, there are some politically incorrect people around me who will point out my stupidity. I need my critics. It also appears ChatGPT isn’t up to the job. Can I tell you if you are being stupid? Perhaps I won’t use the word stupid. ChatGPT suggests words like uninformed or inexperienced as being less harsh words than stupid. I have been called uninformed before. Now I know what they really meant.

Thank you for all the ideas and comments. I really appreciate them and please keep them coming.

Regards

Bruce