Jelani Cobb
Old Dog New Tricks@Jelaniya no surprise. Why do so many people think amassing large sums of wealth makes someone intelligent? I’ve met a number of these folks and my experience is most are bat shit crazy narcissists.
Fallon Stone@thom @Jelaniya I agree.. but I have to say.. we were taught in school that only intelligent people become rich. Whether it's "you need a college degree to make a lot of money and you have to be smart to get into a good college" or "here's a parade of wealthy men throughout history and because our system only rewards the good, smart people, they are all smart"
Patricklee@FallonStone @thom @Jelaniya life has taught me that only those who are willing to exploit become insanely rich.
@patricklee @thom @Jelaniya sounds right to me. Author Jon Ronson wrote a book examining psychopathy and found that capitalism rewards psychopathy. Psychopaths have some basic traits -- lack of empathy, difficulty distinguishing right and wrong, tendencies to lie or manipulate, a disregard for the rights of others -- all traits that benefit capitalistic pursuits towards extreme wealth. It is not just wrong to assume the rich are brilliant, it's dangerous.
@FallonStone @thom @Jelaniya there are several different kinds of intelligences as well. Being highly intelligent in manipulation doesn't make one highly intelligent in rocket science for instance.
@patricklee @thom @Jelaniya I agree but I wonder if excelling at something is enough to constitute intelligence. Do we have a clear measure of intelligence? People like Musk and Edison can call themselves geniuses because there's no definitive way to challenge that.
@FallonStone @patricklee @Jelaniya so true. Many different definitions of intelligence and an equally large number of ways to “measure” intelligence. Some times we have to take what we see and make a call. A smart grifter doesn’t make them someone we should listen to when it comes to policy decisions, especially when it comes to moving a populace.