Based on three sets of experiences, I’d say there is a strong overlap between people who do not value intelligence and people who have little of it (in three different ways).
First, I’ve worked with deaf people who are acquiring language late in life. Second, I’ve worked with young children. Third, I’ve worked with homeless people. Some of each of these are blindingly intelligent by any measure. Some are not depending on how intelligence is measured. Among the later, higher intelligence is mistrusted and seen as making trouble.
The exception in life is clergy, who are granted smarts as a good. The exception in fiction is ‘nerd on a leash’ - the doctor or navigator or smart guy kept for his use by a barbarian horde.
True. The same goes for other prestigious qualities—beautiful people value beauty, for instance. Generally people tend to acquire metrics for judging people according to which they are highly valued. Cf Nietzsche’s theory that slaves were inclined to adopt Christianity because it “reversed the values” the Romans had in a way that benefited the slaves (e.g. poverty was seen as a virtue, wealth as a vice).
I agree with this in part. But there seem to be two distinct types of dim people. Self-aware dim people go the Nietzchean route and devalue the virtue of intelligence. But there are also what you might call Dunning-Krueger dim people. These people don’t devalue intelligence; they just don’t realize how little of it they possess.
Based on three sets of experiences, I’d say there is a strong overlap between people who do not value intelligence and people who have little of it (in three different ways).
First, I’ve worked with deaf people who are acquiring language late in life. Second, I’ve worked with young children. Third, I’ve worked with homeless people. Some of each of these are blindingly intelligent by any measure. Some are not depending on how intelligence is measured. Among the later, higher intelligence is mistrusted and seen as making trouble.
The exception in life is clergy, who are granted smarts as a good. The exception in fiction is ‘nerd on a leash’ - the doctor or navigator or smart guy kept for his use by a barbarian horde.
True. The same goes for other prestigious qualities—beautiful people value beauty, for instance. Generally people tend to acquire metrics for judging people according to which they are highly valued. Cf Nietzsche’s theory that slaves were inclined to adopt Christianity because it “reversed the values” the Romans had in a way that benefited the slaves (e.g. poverty was seen as a virtue, wealth as a vice).
I agree with this in part. But there seem to be two distinct types of dim people. Self-aware dim people go the Nietzchean route and devalue the virtue of intelligence. But there are also what you might call Dunning-Krueger dim people. These people don’t devalue intelligence; they just don’t realize how little of it they possess.