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Thomas
@aviationdoctor.eth
Continuing on the theme of intellectual humility from last week’s cast. I warmly recommend this 20’ video about Bonhoeffer’s theory of functional stupidity, which is *not* the opposite of intelligence, but rather the surrender of intellectual independence under peer pressure, stress, or urgency. It’s a sociological (rather than individual) phenomenon by which even intelligent people end up suspending critical thinking and espousing group beliefs. Bonhoeffer observed functional stupidity taking hold around him in the 1930s when even the intelligent German elites surrendered to the superficially enticing, but deeply flawed tenets of nazism. The parallel with contemporary trends is unmistakable, and only exacerbated by the firehose of social media through which seductive falsehoods propagate faster than they can be critically examined. 1/2 https://youtu.be/Sfekgjfh1Rk https://farcaster.xyz/aviationdoctor.eth/0x67091196
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Thomas
@aviationdoctor.eth
The author of the video recommends that we all pick one belief we hold dear and make the conscious effort to steelman its opposite. This not only takes intellectual courage, it also requires effort and time. Which led me to realize that I don’t do anywhere near enough of that myself, even as I preach it. The busy everyday life gets in the way of deep thinking. Reading might seem like a temporary reprieve from the daily firehose, but it is also a purveyor of new ideas, which then need to be reexamined critically (after all, Mein Kampf was also a book). We should probably spend as much time annotating and critically evaluating every book as we spend reading it, and that doesn’t sound like relaxation anymore. Hence, I realize that I tend to distance myself from any belief, as a form of temporary compromise, halfway between holding them uncritically (which is functionally stupid), and investing time and effort to examine them (which is potentially stressful). 2/2
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𝑶𝒕𝒕𝒊🗿✨ pfp
𝑶𝒕𝒕𝒊🗿✨
@toyboy.eth
What’s perhaps is most dangerous is how reasonable functional stupidity may feel from the inside. It masquerades itself as pragmatism, team loyalty, or staying “on message” some people may even say it’s adaptation.
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Ed O'Shaughnessy
@eddieosh
Questioning our axioms is really hard work so we mostly avoid doing it. Much easier to just follow the crowd.
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Geisha
@geisha
Great man, Bonhoeffer, did you watch the film?? Very very powerful.
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buffets
@buffets
I think what you mentioned about distancing oneself from any belief is the most practical approach, especially considering that we live in an oversaturated information/media landscape, and applying a critical gaze to everything we encounter will be way too effortful. To me, the important thing is discernment—to be able to quickly judge whether something is worth caring about and ergo worth the energy to scrutinise. Otherwise, happy to remain default agnostic for most things I encounter, which is itself hard to achieve given the influence of emotions.
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azb
@azbest
Spot on. The problem is that we've known these patterns for generations, yet the knowledge-behavior gap has not been bridged much. Or perhaps more gaps of another type have been created; the actual knowledge is a luxury commodity lately.
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azb
@azbest
super azbestip
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