Every level of intelligence and ability has to solve the problem of ARROGANCE anew
When you’re stupid you’re arrogant because you don’t know that you don’t know.
Your stupid and wrong explanations fool you into false confidence
You’ll take the dumbest explanation to the most complex problem, because you have no ability to discern
To you every problem looks like a potato
This makes you a very dangerous lunatic, potentially
Unless you fully acknowledge your condition and embrace the virtue of radical humbleness
When you’re average you don’t know what you don’t know
Your ignorance is largely invisible to you
You think most things are as MEDIOCRE as things in your life
You tend to not look up to those more successful than you
You’re not so stupid so as to fully be unable to comprehend that what they do, what they know, is often superior
But you’re not quite willing
Because being average is, well, quite average
When you’re talented you’re overconfident and your limitations are rarely revealed to you
You tend to do better than others — therefore you think you’re always better than them
And even when you meet someone who’s more qualified, more educated, more experienced than you — there’s still the risk that you’ll outsmart and out-talk him with some lame debating trick, or sheer sharpness of your mind
This makes you prone to profound self-delusion, madness, potentially
Of course cure for ALL of the above is:
-being bold in action and humble in words — not the other way around
-letting this action brutally show you where you know what you’re doing — and where you don’t. If life doesn’t humble you then you’re not challenging yourself
-then staying in your fucking lane
-but since life doesn’t WAIT for us to become QUALIFIED, it often demands our DECISIONS beforehand…
-…when you do have to open your mouth, but are not utterly unequivocally THE expert — embody the utmost virtue of epistemic humbleness, modesty
-and speaks in terms modalities: what’s POSSIBLE, what’s PROBABLE, what you NOTICED for and what you NOTICED against
Even a moron can do that
But only a wise man will