17 thoughts on “Is Stupidity Expanding? Some Hypotheses.”

  1. Nope. Just as stupid as ever. JFK murder to QAnon. Just as stupid as ever.

    Hey, remember when rich Republicans were harvesting the organs of Costa Rican children?

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    1. “As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.” ― H.L. Mencken, On Politics: A Carnival of Buncombe

      SUCCESS!

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          1. Trump is vain, thin skinned, rude, and careless in is speech, but he is not stupid or ineffective.

            I will be relieved when he leaves office in 2025, when hopefully the GOP will have a better replacement for him. (I am hoping for Rand Paul, not Pence)

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          2. I’ll be relieved when he attempts to leave the country if Biden wins. His passport should be confiscated at 1201 on Inauguration Day to prevent him running away from all of the pending criminal cases.

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          4. Who says you don’t have sense of humor? 2025! Now that’s funny.
            Trump will be lucky to be leaving his New York state prison cell by 2025.

            There you go again . . . “careless in his speech” — Translation: Pathological liar.

            Not stupid? Not ineffective? Well, leave aside his mismanagement of the country’s affairs for four years (e.g., $3.1 TRILLION deficit in ONE year), why is this not stupid and not ineffective person running the most abysmal Presidential campaign since George McGovern and dragging his party down with him? “Sleepy Joe” who – according to Trump – can hardly get out of bed is trouncing him. What is Trump’s response? Double down on ugly and, oh yeah, “What about Hunter Biden’s emails!”

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      2. And that is how we get the government we deserve, good and hard.

        Paraphrase from Mencken.

        Unfortunately, as conspiracies abound, even in the halls of Congress, the collapse of our freedoms is not that far down the yellow brick road.

        People who believe the conspiracies are too lazy to think critically, do research, or even question. Politicians who push conspiracies have nothing but contempt, deserved or not, for the electorate.

        Politicians that believe conspiracies are both ignorant and worthy of contempt at the same time.

        IMHO

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        1. RE: “People who believe the conspiracies are too lazy to think critically, do research, or even question.”

          I notice the same thing about many who dismiss or debunk conspiracy theories.

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    2. Just another version of a “final solution”.

      Overpopulation has been on the radar since the middle of the last century. “The Population Bomb” was really not wrong in concept, just in time and impact.

      We may be able to feed more folks through science, but we keep destroying our house. And it is the only house we can use.

      Most of the world’s agriculture is dependent upon climate patterns that stay pretty consistent from year to year, decade to decade. I think we are going to see some changes in rain patterns, heat waves and ice floe/glacier deterioration. I believe India is already experiencing some shifts in a land where food production is critical for 1.2 billion people, many on the margins.

      So back to “stupid”. Ignorance is not bliss, but it is useful for politicians to stay in office. Furthermore, ignorance and stupidity are not mutually exclusive. Many brilliant folks can act incredibly stupidly and some ignorant ones can do quite well within the margins of specific skills and good sense. And if they have a decent IQ, they can learn.

      (Ron White, the comedian, is famous for his line “You can’t fix stupid”. But you can learn.)

      That is my take on the post of “stupid” and Don’s SciFi classic.

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      1. I think you missed the point of the Kornbluth story, it’s not just about overpopulation, it’s about the disparate fertility of the intelligent and responsible vs the stupid and irresponsible.

        It’s about more and more people being dependent on fewer and fewer productive people, until that leads to collapse, or a shrug.

        Regarding agriculture and climate change, you forget the ability of farmers to adapt.

        I strongly recommend Bjorn Lomberg’s extremely well documented

        False Alarm

        I don’t agree with everything he believes about the degree of future change, but even accepting his projections, his analysis of the benefits of adaptation vs intervention is spot on.

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        1. At a certain IQ, we have deemed responsibility to be not something expected. 45 was the moron IQ in the short story.

          It makes me wonder why the elite did not address this issue long before it became a problem to be solved by mass extermination. In other words, if they were truly elite, brilliant and cared about our planet and its people, they would have figured some way to less the impact of “stupid” people who were so by no fault of their own.

          For example, we are still clear cutting in Indonesia and Brazil which we know is a serious problem. The elite? They are making the money. The “morons” they are stuck either getting killed to save the land or marginalized economically and politically.

          The point? Our elite aren’t worth the poop they manufacture intestinally each day unless they bring the non-elites with them.

          Or, as your story says, kill them all and start over. Just like chimps in the jungle.

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