| Submit your comments on this article |
| -Short Attention Span Theater- |
| On the Alleged Moral Superiority of Intellectuals |
| 2022-02-21 |
| [American Thinker] The ordinary person is constantly being lectured and disparaged by intellectuals rooted in academia where Democrats massively outnumber Republicans. It is useful, lest there be some misunderstanding, to stress that I believe that intellectuals, including professors, can be a good thing. Indeed, they are essential to the development of civilization. I am one myself. There is nothing I love to do more than study the great philosophers, psychologists, social theorists, and literary figures. However, intellectuals have certain inherent limitations. First, they tend to think they know more than they do. More importantly, they tend to believe that their intellectual accomplishments make them morally superior to less educated people, hence the contempt expressed by so many in our "elites" for Hillary’s "basket of deplorable" in "flyover country". Aristotle argues that the aim of studying moral philosophy is not just to become a better thinker but to become a better person. Immanuel Kant makes similar claims in his Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals. In "On Liberty," John Stuart Mill claims that only those who think through the issues rationally, like a philosopher, can know what is morally good. But does being an intellectual, even a "philosopher" (if one can still find one), make one better suited, as Aristotle puts it, to know "the good for man" and thereby become a better person? Leo Tolstoy, the world-famous Russian novelist, was well familiar with the limitations of the intellectual elite. After having been one for a long time, he came to believe that many intellectuals, despite their elaborate programs of self-glorification, were often greedy narcissistic people of bad character. In his Confessions, Tolstoy explains that he came to believe that, ironically, the meaning of life is not understood by the people who write the celebrated books of the year on "the meaning of life" for fame and fortune, but by "the poor, the simple, and the ignorant, the pilgrims, the monks ... and the peasants." |
| Posted by:Besoeker |
| #22 In times like this, I just remind myself that 8 of the 15 participants at the Wannsee Conference had Ph.Ds. |
| Posted by: Sheter the Lesser9291 2022-02-21 15:24 |
| #21 There's actual experts, alleged experts and then people who just collect bizarrely obscure trivia. Do you know about the historical analysis of ulnar neuropathy and Benediction Hand?"" |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 14:13 |
| #20 In my day an expert was anybody more than 50 miles form home with a briefcase necktie and a sport coat with padded elbows... |
| Posted by: NoMoreBS 2022-02-21 13:19 |
| #19 Well, a person can be anywhere from chastened to embarrassed to be wrong. If they have a moral compass. Your progressive, OTOH, simply refuses to accept their elevated self might be misinformed, incorrect or willfully ignorant. They waste no time getting down to the only posture they know: hating on you for making them look bad. |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 12:28 |
| #18 It all starts with the question a true "intellectual" always asks himself/herself: What If I'm Wrong? Remarkably, almost all of the so-called intellectuals (especially "Progressives") seem utterly incapable of conceiving even the thought of being wrong, much less questioning themselves and their rigid belief system. The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wise people so full of doubts. -- Betrand Russell |
| Posted by: Chealing Chomotle4158 2022-02-21 12:15 |
| #17 Good for you if you have the patience to sit through all those boring classes at the university and you have a family that will support you while you do. But many of the rest of us decided it was better to go to work. |
| Posted by: Abu Uluque 2022-02-21 12:15 |
| #16 The smartest person in the room is the one who says "I don't know the answer to that, but I do know who to ask / where to look to find out." |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 10:43 |
| #15 When asked "What makes someone and expert?" Marilyn Vos Savant replied "An expert is someone who not only knows as much as possible about a subject, but also knows which of that stuff is wrong." Thinking about the "expert" causing much of the nation's ongoing pain right now, one Tony Fauxi, I'd have to say he fails the second part of Marilyn's definition handily. |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 10:38 |
| #14 /\ Discovering what one does 'not know' appears to increase dramatically with age. By the time you reach the age of 70, you become amazed at the longevity coefficients of both helpless and stupid. I have now reached the point where being referred to as a stupid SOB has become a jovial term of endearment. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2022-02-21 10:31 |
| #13 In my "lived experience" (did I say that right?), intelligence and moral character are independent variables, and I'd rate moral character as the more important of the two by far. In other words, if I've got to be in a foxhole, I'd rather be in a foxhole with a trustworthy guy with an IQ of 90 than with a Hahvahd PhD who'd stab me in the back for the slightest advantage. |
| Posted by: Matt 2022-02-21 10:28 |
| #12 A truly intelligent person is humble by dint of their high understanding of how much they don't know. |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 10:19 |
| #11 Lots of those who fancy themselves intellectual are merely pseudo or faux intellectual, having the patina of the thing due to a certain kind of education without having the intellectual rigour. Anyone who says, “The science is settled,” for instance. I grew up among the real thing, and they were great fun. But when I followed Mr. Wife to Cincinnati, I discovered myself happier in the somewhat more real world of corporate America. Certainly, as we saw by the complete surrender, indeed enthusiastic adoption, by the academies of fascism/Nazism and Communism in their respective countries, and of Wokism in the West in the current period, the one pedestal intellectuals as a group consistently fail to mount is moral superiority. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2022-02-21 09:49 |
| #10 Beat me to it P2k. |
| Posted by: BrerRabbit 2022-02-21 08:26 |
| #9 The Wizard of Oz: Why, anybody can have a brain. That's a very mediocre commodity. Every pusillanimous creature that crawls on the Earth or slinks through slimy seas has a brain. Back where I come from, we have universities, seats of great learning, where men go to become great thinkers. And when they come out, they think deep thoughts and with no more brains than you have. But they have one thing you haven't got: a diploma. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2022-02-21 07:06 |
| #8 I've always wondered how anyone simply designates himself as an intellectual, just because they attempt to interpret someone else's opinions and maybe write theses on thought processes of now dead men. I'd rather be smart, in the moment really, than populate my mind with conflicting, even diametrically opposed ideas of people who will never see the world again. If I can know at any given moment what God thinks about a certain thing... now that'd be something to study for. 'For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.' - Gawd |
| Posted by: Dron66046 2022-02-21 06:41 |
| #7 Extra credit: In 250 words or less, how did that work out for him? |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 04:29 |
| #6 Pop quiz: Do you think Jeffrey Epstein "believed in himself?" |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 04:28 |
| #5 Well, as I've mentioned here before, "believing in yourself" is the foundational tenet of all "self improvement" scams. Ask Liz Holmes. Ask the all-star list of "shakers and movers" on the Theranos board. It works great until it doesn't. Then the bag holders lose everything and / or go to jail. The rest scatter for the hills, to turn up later on MSLSD talking about why all Trump supporters must be shot as part of the Ukraine Liberation War to End All Wars™ / Stomp Out COVID In Our Time Crusade™. 10% discount for khaki wearers and RayBan subscription customers. |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 04:17 |
| #4 Moral Superiority of Intellectuals SB morale |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2022-02-21 04:05 |
| #3 All their favorites: Marxism, eugenics, etc. have failed, repeatedly, only because "they have never actually been tried." |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 02:47 |
| #2 Sadly, the truth is that lots of ideas are so stupid that only intellectuals will believe them, and try to enforce them on the rest of us. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2022-02-21 02:39 |
| #1 “Some ideas are so stupid that only intellectuals believe them.” ― Eric Arthur Blair, AKA George Orwell |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2022-02-21 02:23 |