| Dear Hiveans | Liebe Hiver | Queridos Hiveanos |
|---|---|---|
| Today I'd like to share my favourite excerpts from the book "The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity" (goodreads) by Carlo M. Cipolla, who was an Italian economic historian. (wiki) | Heute meine Lieblingsauszüge aus dem Buch "The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity" (goodreads) von Carlo M. Cipolla, einem italienischen Wirtschaftshistoriker. Die 5 Prinzipien der menschlichen Dummheit findet Ihr auch hier: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlo_M._Cipolla | Hoy me gustaría compartir mis extractos favoritos del libro "Las leyes básicas de la estupidez humana" (goodreads) de Carlo M. Cipolla, que fue un historiador económico italiano. (wiki) |
After Darwin we know that we share our origin with the lower members of the animal kingdom. and worms as well as elephants have to bear their daily share of trials, predicaments, and ordeals. Human beings, however, are privileged insofar as they have to bear an extra load - an extra dose of tribulations originated daily by a group of people within the human race itself. This group is much more powerful than the Mafia, or the Military Industrial Complex" or International Communism - it is an unorganized unchartered group which has no chief, no president, no by-laws and vet manages to operate in perfect unison, as if guided by an invisible hand, in such a way that the activity of each member powerfully contributes to strengthen and amplify the effectiveness of the activity of all other members. The nature, character and behaviour of the members of this group are the subject of the following pages. Let me point out at this juncture that most emphatically this little book is neither a product of cynicism nor an exercise in defeatism - no more than a book on microbiology. The following pages are in fact the result of a constructive effort to detect, know and thus possibly neutralize one of the most powerful, dark forces which hinder the growth of human welfare and happiness.
😂
The First Basic Law of Human Stupidity asserts without ambiguity that
“Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.”
The First Basic Law prevents me from attributing a specific numerical value to the fraction of stupid people within the total population: any estimate would turn out to be an underestimate. Thus in the following pages I will denote the fraction of stupid people within a population by the symbol σ.
The Second Basic Law which states that “The probability that a certain person be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.”
In this regard, nature seems indeed to have outdone herself. It is well known that Nature manages, rather mysteriously, to keep constant the relative frequency of certain natural phenomena. For instance, whether men proliferate at the Northern Pole or at the Equator. Whether the matching couples are developed or underdeveloped, whether they are black, red, white or yellow, the female to male ratio among the newly born is a constant, with a very slight prevalence of males. We do not know how Nature achieves this remarkable result but we know that in order to achieve it Nature must operate with large numbers. The most remarkable fact about the frequency of stupidity is that Nature succeeds in making this frequency equal to the probability σ quite independently from the size of the group. Thus one finds the same percentage of stupid people whether one is considering very large groups or one is dealing with very small ones.
… Whenever I analyzed the blue-collar workers I found that the fraction σ of them were stupid. As σ's value was higher than I expected (First Law), paying my tribute to fashion I thought at first that segregation, poverty, lack of education were to be blamed. But moving up the social ladder I found that the same ratio was prevalent among the white-collar employees and among the students. More impressive still were the results among the professors. Whether I considered a large university or a small college, a famous institution or an obscure one. I found that the same fraction σ of the professors are stupid. So bewildered was I by the results, that I made a special point to extend my research to a specially selected group, to a real elite, the Nobel laureates. The result confirmed Nature's supreme powers: σ fraction of the Nobel laureates are stupid.
The Third Basic Law assumes, although it does I not state it explicitly, that human beings fall into four basic categories: the helpless, the intelligent, the bandit and the stupid. It will be easily recognized by the perspicacious reader that these four categories correspond to the four areas I, H, S, B, of the basic graph (see figure 1). If Tom takes an action and suffers a loss while producing a gain to Dick, Tom's mark will fall in field H: Tom acted helplessly. If Tom takes an action by which he makes a gain while yielding a gain also to Dick, Tom's mark will fall in area 1: Tom acted intelligently. If Tom takes an action by which he makes a gain causing Dick a loss, Tom's mark will fall in area B: Tom acted as a bandit. Stupidity is related to area S and to all positions on axis Y below point O.
As the Third Basic Law explicitly clarifies: „A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.“
Like all human creatures, also stupid people vary enormously in their capacity to affect their fellow men. Some stupid people normally cause only limited losses while others egregiously succeed in causing ghastly and widespread damages not only to one or two individuals but to entire communities or societies. The damaging potential of the stupid person depends on two major factors. First of all, it depends on the genetic factor. Some individuals inherit exceptional doses of the gene of stupidity and by virtue of inheritance they belong from birth to the elite of their group. The second factor which determines the potential of a stupid person is related to the position of power and consequence which he occupies in society. Among bureaucrats, generals, politicians and heads of state one has little difficulty in finding clear examples of basically stupid individuals whose damaging capacity was (or is) alarmingly enhanced by the position of power which they occupied (or occupv). Religious dignitaries should not be overlooked.
The question that reasonable people often raise is how and why stupid people can reach positions of power and consequence. Class and caste were the social arrangements which favoured the steady supply of stupid people to positions of power in most societies of the preindustrial world. Religion was another contributing factor. In the modern industrial world class and caste are banished both as words and as concepts and religion is fading away. But in lieu of class and caste we have political parties and bureaucracy and in lieu of religion we have democracy. Within a democratic system, general elections are a most effective instrument to insure the steady maintenance of fraction σ among the powerful. One has to keep in mind that according to the Second Basic Law, the fraction σ of the voting population are stupid people and elections offer to all of them at once a magnificent opportunity to harm everybody else without gaining anything from their action. They do so by contributing to the maintenance of the σ level among those in power.
Essentially stupid people are dangerous and damaging because reasonable people find it difficult to imagine and understand unreasonable behaviour. An intelligent person may understand the logic of a bandit. The bandit's actions follow a pattern of rationality: nasty rationality, if you like, but still rationality. The bandit wants a plus on his account. Since he is not intelligent enough to devise ways of obtaining the plus as well as providing you with a plus, he will produce his plus by causing a minus to appear on your account. All this is bad, but it is rational and if you are rational you can predict it. You can foresee a bandit's actions, his nasty manoeuvres and ugly aspirations and often can build up your defences.
A stupid creature will harass you for no reason, for no advantage, without any plan or scheme
and at the most improbable times and places. You have no rational way of telling if and when and how and why the stupid creature attacks. 'When confronted with a stupid individual you are completely at his mercy. Because the stupid person's actions do not conform to the rules of rationality, it follows that:
a) one is generally caught by surprise by the attack;
b) even when one becomes aware of the attack, one cannot organize a rational defence, because the attack itself lacks any rational structure.
The fact that the activity and movements of a stupid creature are absolutely erratic and irrational not only makes defence problematic but it also makes any counterattack extremely difficult - like trying to shoot at an object which is capable of the most improbable and unimaginable movements. This is what [...] Schiller had in mind when [...] wrote that “against stupidity the very Gods fight in vain”.
- I know these kinds of people and I avoid them as good as I can.
The truly amazing fact, however, is that also intelligent people and bandits often fail to recognize the power to damage inherent in stupidity. It is extremely difficult to explain why this should happen and one can only remark that when confronted with stupid individuals often intelligent men as well as bandits make the mistake of indulging in feelings of self-complacency and contemptuousness instead of immediately secreting adequate quantities of adrenalin and building up defences. This is clearly summarized in the Fourth Basic Law which states that „Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. In particular non-stupid people constantly forget that at all times and places and under any circumstances to deal and/or associate with stupid people infallibly turns out to be a costly mistake.“
Through centuries and millennia, in public as in private life, countless individuals have failed
to take account of the Fourth Basic Law and the failure has caused mankind incalculable losses.
The Fifth Basic Law states that „A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.“
The essential point to keep in mind is this: the result of the action of a perfect bandit is purely and simply a transfer of wealth and/or welfare. After the action of a perfect bandit, the bandit has a plus on his account which plus is exactly equivalent to the minus he has caused to another person. The society as a whole is neither better nor worse off. If all members of a society were perfect bandits the society would remain stagnant but there would be no major disaster.
All this suggests some reflection on the performance of societies. According to the Second Basic Law "the fraction of stupid people is a constant σ which is not affected by time, space, race, class or any other socio-cultural or historical variable. It would be a profound mistake to believe the number of stupid people in a declining society is greater than in a developing society. Both such societies are plagued by the same percentage of stupid people. The difference between the two societies is that in the society which performs poorly:
a) the stupid members of the society are allowed by the other members to become more active and take more actions;
b) there is a change in the composition of the non-stupid section with a relative decline of populations of areas I, H, and B [...].
This theoretical presumption is abundantly confirmed by an exhaustive analysis of historical
cases. In fact the historical analysis allows us to reformulate the theoretical conclusions in a more factual way and with more realistic detail. Whether one considers classical, or medieval, or modern or contemporary times one is impressed by the fact that any country moving uphill has its unavoidable σ fraction of stupid people. However the country moving uphill also has an unusually high fraction of intelligent people who manage to keep the σ fraction at bay and at the same time produce enough gains for themselves and the other members of the community to make progress a certainty. In a country which is moving downhill, the fraction of stupid people is still equal to σ: however in the remaining population one notices among those in power an alarming proliferation of the bandits with overtones of stupidity and among those not in power an equally alarming growth in the number of helpless individuals. Such change in the composition of the non-stupid population inevitably strengthens the destructive power of the σ fraction and makes decline a certainty. And the country goes to Hell.
| I'll close with 2 examples of stupidity | Ich schließe mit 2 Beispielen für Dummheit | Terminaré con 2 ejemplos de estupidez |
| Unjustified downvoting by hivewatchers, adm and their cronies: they damage valued-adding members of Hive, driving them from our network and drive the value of Hive down, thus damaging themselves. Stupid creatures... | Ungerechtfertigtes Downvoting durch Hivewatcher, Admins und ihre Kumpane: Sie schaden wertvollen Mitgliedern von Hive, vertreiben sie aus unserem Netzwerk und senken den Wert von Hive, wodurch sie sich selbst schaden. Dumme Kreaturen... | Los downvoting injustificados de los hivewatchers, adm y sus compinches: perjudican a los miembros valiosos de Hive, los expulsan de nuestra red y hacen bajar el valor de Hive, perjudicándose a sí mismos. Criaturas estúpidas... |
| People (there were 2) that got regular upvotes by me. After some minor disagreements they started with insults and (despite multiple warnings) started spamming by blog. Thus they got downvoted which made them cry like a baby. 🤷♂ | Leute (es gab 2), die regelmäßig Upvotes von mir bekamen. Nach kleineren Meinungsverschiedenheiten begannen sie mit Beleidigungen und (trotz mehrfacher Verwarnungen) mit Spamming meines Blogs. Daraufhin wurden sie downgevotet, was sie wie ein Baby weinen ließ. 🤷♂ | Personas (eran 2) que recibían upvotes míos regularmente. Después de algunos desacuerdos menores comenzaron con insultos y (a pesar de múltiples advertencias) comenzaron a hacer spam en el blog. Por lo tanto se downvoted que los hizo llorar como un bebé. 🤷♂ |
As stupid people are annoying, we can at least make fun of them.
Have a great day,
zuerich
P.S. more on stupidity I wrote here.
