OK - so the inability to be sure if someone is an idiot is just as fraught as trying to be sure that they are intelligent, I hear you say. Sounds like the ideal situation doesn't it! Tends to suggest that people rise only to the heights of their incompetence at understanding whether they or others are intelligent or stupid! So we are all stupid and the sand on the beach is intelligent. This is becoming very Smullyan, this bit...
So if we adopt your simple criteria of the repetition of stupidities as idiocy and the silence of the pebble as intelligence, it seems the human race is suffering a terrible toll of redundancy. I hope yours is in fact the correct definition because it means we can do something about the problem of latency with respect to the evolution of human consciousness. I mean - the idiots (if there be such) really are holding us back. They are in all the top jobs. They cannot not be idiots so where does that leave us? Flexibility and tolerance and reform are not supported by the mental software idiots use throughout their lives. I actually wasn't thinking of John Clark when I started this thread. It's amusing to me in the extreme that everyone thought that's what I was doing! John isn't an idiot. He's just taking a long time to understand. He'll get there. I love Bruno's patience with him. Nobody here is an idiot. Kim > On 13 Aug 2015, at 8:02 pm, Bruno Marchal <[email protected]> wrote: > > >> On 12 Aug 2015, at 01:42, meekerdb wrote: >> >> If you think you have a sure fire way to identify an idiot...it's you. > > It might be easy, for some class of beings. Perhaps, for the human, a simple > criteria is simply being adult, and for a computer, being not yet programmed. > > Idiocy reveals itself by, not the mistake, but by the more or less systematic > repetition of them, and the inability to change its mind, despite evidences. > Denying evidence is also a common symptom. > > Then, obviously with the theory I gave, asserting one own intelligence, or > one own idiocy is a (local) symptom. Asserting one own Intelligence/Idiocy > can be replaced with asserting someone else intelligence/idiocy. Saying that > Einstein is intelligent is either a cliché or a way to assert one's own > intelligence. > In fact idolatry, and uncritical attitude with respect to the boss, or > anyone, even a God, is also a symptom of idiocy/cowardliness. > > But there is no criteria for intelligence, except that with the definition > taken, keeping silence is a sort of local quasi-criteria (making pebble > intelligent, but why not as they rarely utters stupidities). > > Bruno > > >> >> Brent >> >>> On 8/11/2015 4:06 PM, Kim Jones wrote: >>> >>>> On 11 Aug 2015, at 10:26 pm, Bruno Marchal <[email protected]> wrote: >>>> >>>> No doubt that it would be interesting to look at. Salvia has been called a >>>> cure of ... atheism (the non agnostic one 'course). Not that it makes you >>>> believe in anything new, it just shows reasons to doubt more, and to >>>> recognize we are more ignorant that we would have been able to conceive >>>> before. >>>> >>>> Bruno >>> >>> >>> Well, that’s it, surely. The Idiot Test administered in this way has as a >>> basic assumption that only what might be called The True Public Idiot is by >>> nature incapable of changing or modifying his stated beliefs. A hallmark of >>> idiocy is absolute certainty. In this light, Richard Dawkins for example, >>> qualifies pretty much as a TPI. >>> >>> >>> The other thing about this possible theological definition of ‘idiocy’ is: >>> you will never meet an idiot who thinks the test was run fairly. This >>> person has to accept that there is now an institution-backed sanction >>> against them due to someone ticking a box marked ‘idiot’ next to their >>> name. Still, they can justify themselves by saying how ‘in the past’ they >>> changed their mind over certain matters when people whose opinions they >>> could respect convinced them otherwise. You might like to check this >>> assertion by interviewing his mother or sister instead. >>> >>> You will never, therefore, catch a certified public idiot in the act of >>> changing his beliefs. This is because he has never changed his beliefs in >>> the past and will never in the future - not because you are unlucky in the >>> matter of catching him at it. The ticking of the box marked ‘idiot’ is a >>> truly serious business. True (ie incorrigible) Public Idiots are actually >>> quite rare. Even David Icke had to kind of admit that he probably wasn’t >>> the reincarnation of JC…proving therefore that he was capable of >>> recognising the lie he was telling himself. >>> >>> This leads to further refinements of the concept: >>> >>> 1. An idiot is one who lies about core matters - but only to himself. >>> Others long since realised he enjoys playing this game with himself and >>> that any other setup would entail him in ceasing to enjoy the game. >>> >>> 2. ?? >>> >>> Please feel free to add your own refinement. >>> >>> >>> Kim >>> >>> -- >>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >>> "Everything List" group. >>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >>> email to [email protected]. >>> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >>> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. >>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >> >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Everything List" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to [email protected]. >> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > > http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ > > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. 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