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What is stupidity?

What is stupidity?

By Antonio Fernández Vicente / Let 's put it this way: we all do stupid things. We are all stupid by measure. But if humanity is in a state of misery, full of hardship and misery, it is because of general stupidity, which plots against well-being and happiness.

Stupidity is even worse than evil, because at least the wicked gain some advantage over themselves, even at the cost of someone else.

Historian Carlo Cipolla used to say about stupidity: "A fool is one who causes harm to one person or another group of people without gaining anything for himself, even without losing anything." In his essay, "Happy, But Not So Much: The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity," Cipolla attempts to develop a raucous theory of human stupidity that sees fools as a much larger group than the most powerful organizations. like the mafia or industrial lobbying groups, disorganized and without rules, without direction and without statute, but which nevertheless manages to operate with astonishing coordination and efficiency. For this reason, the essay promulgates five basic laws.

The First Basic Law: Always and inevitably each of us underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.

The Second Basic Law: The probability that a person is stupid is independent of any other characteristic of the person himself.

Third Basic Law: One is one who causes harm to one person or another group of people without gaining anything for himself, even without losing anything.

The Fourth Basic Law: Non-stupid people always underestimate the harmful potential of stupid people. In particular, non-fools constantly forget that at any time and place, and in any circumstance, the relationship and / or association with stupid individuals turns out to be a very costly mistake.

The Fifth Basic Law: The fool is the most dangerous type of man in existence. Conclusion: The fool is more dangerous than the bandit.

Now, what can be understood with stupidity?

In 1866 the philosopher Johann Erdmann defined stupidity as a mental narrowness. A fool is one who considers only one point of view: his own. The higher the perspectives, the lower the stupidity and the higher the intelligence.

That is why the Greeks coined the word "idiot" (ἰδιώτης, private man, without public office, incompetent and crude), one who considers everything only from his personal point of view. He judges everything as if his myopic vision of the world were universal, the only one that can be defended, the only and indisputable truth.

The fool suffers from intellectual selfishness. The fool is rude and boastful. It denies complexity and dogmatically disperses its simplicity. Above all, he thinks he possesses the absolute truth.

In 1937 the Austrian writer Robert Musil confronted the issue of stupidity in his book On Stupidity. At the height of totalitarian currents, it reminded us of the "barbarities of nations, states and ideological groups." To Musil, stupidity resembles progress, civilization. It arises from an exaggerated "I", but above all from an arrogant "We".

Stupidity is just as contagious and is fueled by the dispersal of great ideals, by common ground, by simplistic statements: everything is black or everything is white. The only legitimate point of view is that of a certain social group, that of a single faction: the tone.

Budallallëku lidhet me mungesën e tolerancës dhe mungesën e dialogut. Është një sekret hermetik dhe mendor. Përhapet për shkak të parrullave pa mend dhe të pathelluara, të kënduara nën të njëjtën zhurmë groteske kolektive. Të gjithë në një moment të caktuar mund të jenë budallenj. Por ajo që e dallon kokëfortin funksional, sipas Musil-it, është paaftësia e vazhdueshme për të vlerësuar kuptimin e gjërave.

Çfarë është e rëndësishme dhe çfarë jo? Në supozimin e tij, budallai këmbëngul fort në të parëndësishmet dhe aksesorët. Ai nuk është në gjendje të përcaktojë përparësitë. Siç sugjeronte Nietzsche “budallallëku më i përhapur është të harrojmë qëllimin tonë”.

Një ndër kurat për budallallëkun është modestia. Kështu që është inteligjente të vësh në dyshim çfarë bën dhe çfarë mendon. Kush jeton në “ndoshta”, në vend të konfirmimeve kategorike të forta, largohet nga marrëzia. Ajo që mendojmë se është inteligjente nuk është asgjë tjetër veçse një marrëzi. Ishte kjo çështja që Erazmi i Roterdamit ngriti në “Lavdërim i Çmendurisë”.

Dhe një kurë e mirë përulësie është një e qeshur inteligjente. Nga Aristofani te Lukiani i Samosatamit, Jonathan Swift, Mark Twain apo Groucho Marx, satira me budallallëkun e jetës sonë është gjithmonë një ushtrim i mirë kuptueshmërie. Na bën të kuptojmë se konvencionet sociale shpesh herë janë absurde dhe të ngadalta.

But stupidity is also very democratic, equal and solidary. It can strike anyone, without distinction. There are fools equally in all economic and cultural strata, in every political current and country of the world.

So stupidity has always existed, but there is also a way to end it: broadening our horizons and questioning our behavior and way of thinking will alleviate stupidity by exercising doubt and self-criticism.

Suffice it to ask: What if I am wrong?

* Antonio Fernández Vicente is a Spanish academic and philosopher. Professor of Communication Theory at the University of Castilla-La Mancha in Cuenca, he also organizes seminars on film, literature and music. He is the author of three books and a contributor to several media outlets. The article was translated into Albanian by Erjon Uka.