The Five Universal Laws of Human Stupidity

[alwaysinasnit]

https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-five-universal-laws-of-human-stupidity?utm_source=pocket-newtab

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.

Let’s take a look at Cipolla’s five basic laws of human stupidity:

Law 1: Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.

No matter how many idiots you suspect yourself surrounded by, Cipolla wrote, you are invariably lowballing the total. This problem is compounded by biased assumptions that certain people are intelligent based on superficial factors like their job, education level, or other traits we believe to be exclusive of stupidity. They aren’t. Which takes us to:

snip...

[NewHendoLib]

1. wasn't sure if I wanted to laugh or cry, reading this!

But from my 65 years of evidence, the author is spot on!

[alwaysinasnit]

2. I hear you. If stupid people with guns weren't so dangerous, I would laugh too.

[Lithos]

3. Lithos's Corollary

It is much easier to make someone stupid than to show them they are stupid (and need to change.)

L-

[dweller]

4. dweller's addendum

A human can survive without air for ~3 minutes
without water for about 3 days
without food for about 3 weeks
and apparently a whole lifetime without an original thought

sad
✌🏻

[underpants]

5. This makes me feel smart.

Reading later.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

21. That feeling will pass. I felt smart after reading it, ...

... so I wanted to celebrate my intelligence with some iced tea. I opened the refrigerator, but forgot why I opened it. Yep, stupidity wins in the end.

But, I'm sure you are, indeed, smart.

[mountain grammy]

22. that's just a loss of memory, not conscience,

and that's what wins in the end. This is about conscience and willfull stupidity.

You ain't anywhere near that Bozo

[TreasonousBastard]

6. And the antecedent to these laws-- 50% of the population is below average.

[Initech]

7. Or as George Carlin once put it:

"Think about how stupid the average person is, then realize that half of them are stupider than that!".

We're fucked.

[Auggie]

8. +1

[hibbing]

10. Classic n/t

[yonder]

9. Good post and comments. Bookmarked for later.

[burrowowl]

11. I made my own law while having to spend 2 hours

getting two reels of 16mm film sent by another university straightened out. I mean treading these projectors was foolproof.
For every person of 150 IQ who invents a foolproof system there are at least 2 or more of a -250 IQ who can fuck the system up.

[SharonAnn]

12. You can't make something foolproof , fools are very clever people.

[MyOwnPeace]

13. THAT statement.........

should be somehow result in some serious research - plenty of material out there right now!

[krispos42]

14. Evolution breeds stupider people

By making the world safer, we allow more stupidity before it becomes fatal.

[PortTack]

17. You are correct in your statement that making the world safer creates more stupid, but

We are no longer evolving. The true definition of evolution is when a species adapts to its environment which brings about actual changes in the dna. What we are doing as you mentioned is changing the environment to be more comfortable..safer which actually halts the evolutionary process...equaling more stupid!!

[Warpy]

15. He forgot one

Every single person has the capacity to be stupid from time to time, usually as a result of hunger, sleep deprivation, or other stress. In these cases, stupidity if fixable. In the chronically stupid, it is not.

[Bayard]

16. Some people should not be allowed to procreate

I am sorry to say, I have known too many of them.

[TheBlackAdder]

18. Imagine traveling out West in 1870, reaching some dumb fuck town and saying, "I'm with my own now!"

[MichaelSoE]

19. I love the graph and want to have a t-shirt made

[nuxvomica]

20. I would add that stupid people simply don't care about intelligence

They don't aspire to it, which is the "why" of the stupid. Stupidity is first and foremost a choice. I draw a bright line between the developmentally disabled, who actually value intelligence but have to work harder to acquire it, and genuinely stupid people. The former comprise what Cipolla calls the "helpless" and I think they suffer the most at the hands of the stupid, probably less than at the hands of the "bandit", who probably doesn't see much value in exploiting them.

[mountain grammy]

23. Thank you for posting this.

Good insight. I'm saving it.