The Book of Stupidity: a context on

stupidity and conscience

1

The Book of Stupidity: a context on

stupidity and conscience

Michael Sousa

2

© Michael Sousa

The Book of Stupidity: a context on stupidity and conscience Paper ISBN:

ISBN pdf:

All rights reserved. Except as otherwise provided by law, it is not permitted to reproduce this work in whole or in part, nor to incorporate it into a computer system, nor to transmit it in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or others) without the prior written permission of the copyright holders. Infringement of such rights entails legal sanctions and may constitute an offence against intellectual property.

3

There is no sin except stupidity – Oscar Wilde

4

Summary

- Part 1 - Stupidity

1. Prologue: Good, Bad or... Stupid?...............................................07

2. Are we all stupid? The Three Narcissistic Wounds................. 10

3. Defining Stupidity: The Dunning-Kruger Effect….................13

4. Peter's Principle or How to Deal with a Stupid Boss……… 20

5. The Fourth Estate: When Stupid Inform Others Stupid……….27

6. The Anekdoty: The Jokes That Could Kill You.... ................. 31

7. Modern Geopolitics: The Inevitable Nuclear Stupidity.….36

8. A Tale: Justice and Stupidity.......................................................46

9. Noticing Stupidity: The Power of the Word........................... 54

10. A Hope Against Stupidity: Education.................................... 77

11. Epilogue: Dealing with a Black Swan………........................81

- Part 2 – Neurosis

0. Prologue: Neurosis... What does it consist of?......................... 89

1. Chapter 1: The Origin of Psychoanalysis ............. .................... 94

2. Chapter 2: Defining Neurosis.....................................................100

3. Chapter 3: Psychoanalytic Concepts Related to Neurosis............ 105

4. Chapter 4: Anxiety Neurosis ..................................................... 111

5. Chapter 5: Obsessive-Compulsive Neurosis. ….....…...…... 117

6. Chapter 6: Hysteria.......................................................................124

7. Chapter 7: Phobias and Phobic Neuroses ...............................130

8. Chapter 8: Defense Mechanisms and Neurosis ……..…..... 139

9. Chapter 9: Psychosexual Development and Neurosis….... 148

10. Chapter 10: Transference and Countertransference ..........152

11. Chapter 11: Freud's Classical Case Analysis ……...............159

12. Chapter 12: Modern Approaches in the Therapy of Neuroses.166

13. Epilogue: The Future of Psychoanalysis................................171

5

- Part 3 – Consciousness

0. Prologue: Are we all conscious?............................................... 179

1. Chapter 1: What is Consciousness?.......................................... 193

2. Chapter 2: Consciousness in the Evolutionary Context.........199

3. Chapter 3: Consciousness and the Bicameral Theory……...205

4. Chapter 4: Neuroscience of Consciousness............................ 212

5. Chapter 5: Consciousness and Altered States ….....…..…... 219

6. Chapter 6: Artificial Intelligence and Consciousness..............227

7. Chapter 7: Consciousness in Contemporary Philosophy.......235

8. Chapter 8: Neuroplasticity and the Shaping of Consc…...... 243

9. Chapter 9: The Unconscious ……………………….…..... 251

10. Chapter 10: Consciousness in Altered States……...............260

11. Chapter 11: Conscience and Free Will………......................268

12. Chapter 12: The Future of Consciousness: ……………....274

13. Chapter 13: Consciousness and Spirituality...........................281

14. Epilogue: The Journey of Self-Awareness ………...……...288

6

Prologue

Good, bad or... stupid?

We're all stupid. To a greater or lesser extent, with a greater or lesser harmful impact on ourselves and society.

Never attribute to wickedness what can be adequately explained by stupidity. This is Hanlon's Razor, an epigram that tries to demonstrate that, many times, bad actions, acts or events that could be linked to villainy and evil are nothing more than consequences of the most beautiful and simple stupidity.

The concepts of good and evil and their complexity have afflicted man and influenced his psyche for eons. The ancient religions, especially those that most influenced the development of the Western world and its culture, are almost always Manichean, almost never having a middle ground between right and wrong, always with absolute measures in relation to the subjects treated. Of course, in the modern world society has adapted to these concepts, learning that a truth is never absolute and that understanding right and wrong, 'good and evil', is actually a much more complex and difficult task (do you really get it?).

Going back to the premise that mistakes, cruel acts, and historically bad decisions are driven more by stupidity than by evil, before examples let's look at some concepts about what stupidity actually is and how it moves and influences human decisions and interactions.

A stupid person is a person who causes harm to another person or group of people, without, at the same time, obtaining any advantage for himself or even suffering a loss, a definition 7

by the Italian historian Carlo Cipolla, which we will delve into in the course of the next chapters.

In this regard, nature seems to have really outdone itself. The extraordinary thing about stupidity is its ubiquity, that is, everything and everyone is subject to its power, all the time, everywhere. Either by our own actions or, especially, by others.

It is not difficult to understand how political, economic, or bureaucratic power amplifies the harmful potential of a stupid person. But we must still understand what makes a stupid person so dangerous; in other words, what does the power of stupidity consist in.

Essentially, stupid people are dangerous because sensible people find it difficult to imagine or understand their behavior.

An intelligent person can understand the logic of a crook. The bandit's actions follow a model of rationality, perverse but still rational. The bad guy wants something you own. Theft is not just, but it is rational, and if it is rational, it can be calculated, predicted. One can, in short, predict the actions of a bandit, his maneuvers and thus prepare for it.

With a stupid person, all this becomes very difficult.

Apparently irrational actions based on totally erroneous or even random interpretations of some concept or idea, or even instinct, that someone more sensible would understand without much regret, ends up being very difficult to decipher when using rationality to interpret a decision that, most of the time, did not have the slightest logical basis to be made.

Empathy in the face of dictators or ideologies linked to them, or even inaction in the face of actions that endanger one's own freedom or that of others, is also an act of stupidity.

8

There is no rational method for predicting whether, when, how, where, or why a stupid creature will carry out its decisions.

Therefore, when faced with a stupid individual, we always run the risk of being at his mercy. However, we cannot credit or classify their actions as necessarily good or bad, or even purposeful, only as actions, in a context that we will rarely fully understand.

What remains for us not to be so at the mercy (of what is in us and what is in others), is to understand a little better stupidity, its bases, its nuances, what it is and how it impacts our lives.

9

Are we all stupid? Humanity's Three Narcissistic Wounds

The Self is not master in its own abode – Sigmund Freud

The father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, articulated a concept that challenged the notion of humanity's superiority and centrality in the universe. He called this concept The Three Narcissistic Wounds of Humanity. These wounds represent historical moments in which the collective self-esteem of humanity, in its conception, was profoundly shaken. Each of these wounds challenged our view of ourselves and our place in the cosmos.

The First Wound: The Copernican Revolution For most of history, mankind has firmly believed in the geocentric view of the universe, where the Earth was at the center and everything revolved around it. This concept has been widely accepted and reinforced by philosophy and theology. Nicolaus Copernicus, however, proposed a radically different view in the 16th century. He suggested that the Earth was not the center of the universe, but that it orbited the Sun, along with other planets.

This paradigm shift was a deep narcissistic wound. Humanity had to confront the idea that it was not the center of the universe, but only a part of a vast, indifferent solar system.

This revelation shook humanity's confidence in its cosmic importance and ushered in a new era of scientific thought.

10

The Second Wound: Darwin's Theory of Evolution The second wound came with Charles Darwin in the nineteenth century, with his theory of evolution by natural selection. Until then, the prevailing view was that human beings were divine creations, distinct from and superior to all other living beings. Darwin, however, showed that all species, including humans, evolved from common ancestors through natural processes.

This revelation was a direct blow to human pride.

Discovering that we are part of the tree of life, sharing ancestors with other life forms, was a deep wound in the realization of our own uniqueness and superiority. Darwin's theory not only challenged the religious beliefs of the time, but also reconfigured humanity's understanding of its own origin and place in the natural world.

The Third Wound: The Freudian Unconscious The third narcissistic wound was inflicted by Sigmund Freud himself in the early 20th century. Freud, however, introduced the concept of the unconscious, arguing that much of our behavior is influenced by unconscious desires and fears, which are beyond conscious control.

This idea was a severe blow to the human ego. The notion that we are not fully masters of our own minds, and that unconscious forces shape our behavior, was a disturbing revelation. Freud demonstrated that the human mind is more complex and less controllable than previously imagined, challenging the view that we are purely rational beings.

11

Freud's three narcissistic wounds represent critical moments in the history of human thought in which our view of ourselves has been radically challenged. Each of these wounds has forced us to reconsider our position in the universe, our origin, and the nature of our own mind.

These challenges, while painful, have been fundamental to the progress of human knowledge. They taught us to embrace the complexity of the cosmos, the beauty of evolution, and the depth of the human mind. By confronting these hard truths, humanity has become more aware of its true condition and better able to explore the vast frontiers of knowledge.

But if we are not at the center of the Universe, if we are not divine creatures, and if we have no real control over our actions and decisions, if we are dominated by the unconscious that we do not see or understand, can we only be stupid?

12

Defining Stupidity:

The Dunning-Kruger Effect and Human

Stupidity

To better understand the reality of the world in which we live, we should, first of all, better understand the behavior of its main factor of change: the individual. And so, from the individual, we could better understand the behavior of his group.

When we analyze the individual, or their group, we look for a pattern that has led them to a situation that is not pleasant or ideal. That is, when the situation is bad, we analyze the history in an attempt to understand how we got there, what were the behaviors, decisions, and interpretations that led them to that moment. When we talk about a group, it can be a family, a company, a country or humanity itself.

Studying the paths traced, the history, we observe the errors of decisions, misinterpretations, completely wrong or poorly founded conclusions. And, regarding these paths and interpretations that lead us to a bad reality or with unpleasant consequences, one can find several failures of management, interpretation or even access to information, but what prevails in relation to all these factors, and even causes them, is a single and indispensable one, stupidity.

To better understand stupidity, let's briefly look at its five fundamental laws, masterfully described by the Italian economist and historian Carlo Cipolla in The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity (Allegro Ma Non Troppo) (1988).

13

The Fundamental Laws of Human Stupidity (Le leggi fondamentali della stupidità umana)

First, in this chapter of the book, Cipolla classifies humanity into four groups:

• The intelligent ones, who manage to have an action that results in an advantage for themselves and for society;

• Swindlers, who take advantage of themselves to the detriment of others, or of society;

• The naïve, who generate advantage to others, causing harm to themselves;

• The stupid ones, who have an action that results in harm to themselves and others.

(We could here make a superficial parallel to the clinical structures of psychoanalysis)

After that, the author enunciates the five laws of stupidity, which define his behavior in society:

1. Always and inevitably, each of us underestimates the number of stupid individuals in the world.

2. The probability that a given person is stupid is independent of any other characteristic of himself.

14

3. A person is stupid if he causes harm to another or to a group without gaining any benefit for himself, or even suffering harm. (Golden Law)

4. Non-stupid people always underestimate the harmful potential of stupid people; They constantly forget that at any time and place, and under any circumstance, dealing with or associating with stupid individuals is inevitably a costly mistake.

5. The stupid person is the most dangerous kind of person there is.

In common sense we have the concept of the chess pigeon complex, which could be a synthesis of these laws. This term appeared on the internet to summarize stupid attitudes (non-theoretically based arguments, fallacies, etc.), in discussions or debates:

Arguing with 'so-and-so' is like playing chess with a pigeon: he defecates on the board, knocks over the pieces, and flies off singing victory.

The stupid individual's movements and their consequences are based on his arrogance and confidence, whether to act, make decisions or even the completely questionable certainties he possesses about his own knowledge and reasoning.

Noting this, excusing Asimov (and Carlo Cipolla himself), we can add here the Zero Law of human stupidity and all its evils: 15

The Dunning-Kruger Effect The Dunning-Kruger effect implies a phenomenon where individuals who have little or no knowledge about a topic believe they know more about that subject than others, or even more than authorities and experts on the subject.

This confidence makes them not have a real perception of the problem or the situation, thus leading them to bad, often catastrophic results, even more so when these individuals are in positions and positions that make their illusion have consequences for a larger group or for society as a whole.

We see here at work the stupid of Cipolla's definition, the one who manages to cause harm to himself and others by his lack of perception or understanding of reality, but who blindly believes that he has this understanding. In social psychology, this overestimation of one's own qualities and abilities is recognized as illusory superiority.

This mechanism of illusory superiority was demonstrated by Justin Kruger and David Dunning at Cornell University. In the study, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology in 1999, the researchers found that in a variety of skills, even different ones, from reading comprehension and interpretation, to driving, to playing chess or tennis, ignorance and lack of real perception of one's own abilities generates confidence more intensely and more often than actually having knowledge or experience in the subject.

Dunning and Kruger therefore proposed patterns of behavior that stupid people will incur in certain situations:

• Failing to recognize your own lack of ability; 16

• Failing to recognize the genuine abilities in other people;

• Failing to recognize the extent of one's own incompetence and stupidity;

• But they can recognize and admit their own lack of skill after they have been trained for that skill.

Dunning draws an analogy as if this effect were a pathological condition, a physical disability, but the individual does not perceive it, or even denies its existence, even in cases where this disability is evident to everyone else and incapacitates him from performing the most ordinary activities.

When people are incompetent in the strategies they adopt to achieve success and satisfaction, they suffer a double burden: not only do they come to erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the ability to realize it. Instead, they get the wrong impression that they're doing very well.

It's that famous joke: When you die, you don't know you're dead. It's just painful and hard for others. The same applies when you're stupid.

"If you're incompetent, you can't know you're incompetent ... [T]he skills needed to provide a correct answer are exactly the skills you need to have to be able to recognize what a correct answer is. In logical reasoning, in child-rearing, in administration, in problem-solving, the skills you use to get the correct answer