"I'm Smarter Than The Experts!" Really?

Regarding this current issue of Americans thinking: "I'm smarter than the experts"...(check out the article, it's pretty interesting and enlightening).

First of all, allow me this. For the record? I do NOT think I'm smarter than experts. Question, but verify. Not disagree and denigrate.

I grew up thinking I was stupid. My step-father didn't much like me. ADD helped with that belief in just making life more difficult. I read a lot in getting "grounded" at home a lot and so I actually knew a lot. When I shared those things, most others had no clue what I was talking about and so to them, and they weren't reticent in sharing it with me, they just assumed I must be... if not just weird, then stupid. 

I've written about all this before. I've shared my past like this from time to time for the most part, for those others who are going through the same kind of thing. All in an attempt to give them hope. I never thought I'd amount to much of anything or make a decent living and I've done quite well. I'm not rich. But I'm not poor either and I have worked with some brilliant minds in IT and in general. I've met very interesting people. I've raised two amazing kids to adulthood. I've had a very interesting life. How could I ask for more? So yea, there is hope. Always. 

For those considering suicide? Remember this. You can always just walk away from your life and let that be your suicide. But you'll always be there you go to. So seek help. Help yourself. Never day die. Never give up. I know, superficial view of depression and suicide. Some cannot be helped and will die. Others however, can be, and will survive, if they just keep these things in mind.

It wasn't until my third year of university in working closely with my psychology department professors, with my primary department advisor, Dr. Rees, that I was convinced I was not stupid, but quite the opposite. It's hard to counter a lifetime of belief, proven in poor k-12 grades and life being more difficult than others around you. 

But I was getting a degree in psychology. And these guys were the experts.

I learned three very important things, evolved through three very necessary stages in my college career.

The first was that I learned in college was, "Damn this is hard, but kind of fun in a painful sort of way." I could "feel" my brain (mind) at times, literally (seemingly) stretching. It was hard to find time to assimilate it all att as the pace in college is fast, at university it's light speed. In case you do not know already, colleges have masters level professors, while universities have doctorate level professors.

The second thing I learned and evolved through in college was, "Damn, I know a LOT now and I'm learning more all the time!" But I kept that quiet until my third year, at university. I got a two year degree, then transferred to Western Washington University, in beautiful Bellingham, Washington.

However, once my university professors saw that kind of behavior in me, which they were quite used to from undergrads I'm sure, they smooshed it right down and put me in my place. Usually, it just took talking to them at THEIR LEVEL, not MINE, and in doing so, realizing that compared to them, damn, was I ignorant! 

Two year colleges tend to do their best to build you up, to be able to handle being at a four or more year university. While universities realize they have to continue to build you up, but also keep you in your place to be as rational and realistic as possible. Although, some colleges one wonders about that latter part, such as with the "Ivy League" schools. It's easy to become full of oneself. 

One has achieved a lot by graduation. so enjoy it. But at tomse point, and as soon as possible, do come back down to earth. Yes?

Ever hear someone say, "I wish I was as smart as I thought I was at 16?" There is a reason for that.

Thus the third and most important thing I learned and evolved through at university. Something most armchair quarterbacks or those who just think they are smarter than the experts, may never have the opportunity to achieve as they do not have a structured course, or professors watching out for them. That being that the more I learned, the more I realized the less I knew that I knew. The semi educated know they know more than they knew, that they may know ore than many others in their group, or bubble. 

However, if you do not ever realize as you gain knowledge that the more you know, the less you know in the ever expanding envelope of the greater knowledge of he universe, then you are setting yourself up, and others around you, for a good deal of misery. 

Or appearing vapid and ignorant to those who truly are more aware of the all the universe has to offer one, overall. That is part and parcel of what we are seeing now in so many who think the Internet, is in some way an education. It is not. It's is an increasing of awareness, without form or structure in education.

My appraisal at that time at university was that for every single thing I learned, there were four or more things I didn't know. I felt I was becoming dumber and dumber, not smarter and not necessarily wiser. And indeed in the face of all experience and knowledge, so it is. Past experience, incorporated with current knowledge, can offer one some form of wisdom. But it is not the same as achieving knowledge and then applying it to current experience.

Along with that, however (luckily) went the appropriate feeling of my being humble, and in working with my professors, of being humbled again and again, before their vast knowledge and that of the universe at large. And of those others who were true experts. Those I should show respect to, 

All of who are what Kate Bush is referring to in her song, "Them Heavy People." Oh, don't know who Kate Bush is? You've missed the amazing and genius then, but...her videos and documentaries are still available. 

Those who were not only more knowledgeable, but more importantly, wiser, and that is very important, do deserve our respect and at times, our great respect. Knowledge and experience can become wisdom. CAN...become. Too often, they are not. Thus the importance of higher education in a structured form and Socratic and didactic methods with those far wiser than you.

Earth may now have the most knowledgeable people in human history, but we do not have the wisest people to be sure. And that is part of the great problem we are now faced with.

“There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”

  Isaac Asimov
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After I graduated university and went through the omnipresent and rather annoying graduate's period of "I know everything, let me share!" ....something not everyone "graduates" through and so remain an asshole the rest of their lives...I began to see in others less educated, a disrespect toward the educated and those far more knowledgeable. Even those far more educated than I would ever be.

And that truly puzzled me.

People I would feel honored to meet, to be among those types so much greater than myself in wisdom, while far too many seemed to feel bitterness or even anger toward them. Weird. Truly, really weird. Because being in their presence for a time can enhance who you are as a person and can alter your life going forward, making it easier, better, with more quality or even wealth. Which really in this context is the least of considerations. 

But surely, not to detract from it. I also always felt honored to share what I knew with others, and this is where some get caught up in thinking sharing, is about ego and it's not, and it shouldn't be. But a gift. Yet I was outwardly perplexed at how few were interested. Interesting in learning, in replacing lesser ideas with greater and more accurate ones. And for free. Without all the suffering and pain and effort I had to put into it all to finally achieve.

Seeing those wiser than oneself in a negative light merely puts one's own ignorance and ego on display for all those more knowledgeable than you. It can be seen like a beacon. When instead in seeking knowledge and sharing it, should make one appear brilliant both to oneself and to those less educated.

We have fallen down on this as a nation and a species. The Chinese in their "Cultural Revolution" for the People, actually murdered their elite thinkers, but luckily for them, only imprisoned some for many years. Some eventually brought back out when their communist nation remained their massive mistake. 

 All for feeling these educated people, doctors, scientists, historians, philosophers, were "elitist" (as opposed to being "elite" and an entirely different thing altogether), and not party of the common People. All which put China back by at least 50 years at the time. 

Just as America, in a way, in our own way, are doing to ourselves today. 

I suppose that is some of what annoys so many here and today. To feel looked down upon by those who consider themselves elitists. But too often that is a poor self esteem issue in oneself and hast utterly nothing to do with our elites whom we desperately need. IF you feel belittled in being ignorant, something I've always deemed as noble, everyone is after all, ignorant of something... then use the great inoculation against ignorance. Education. It's expensive? And why do you think that is the case? The ignorant are more easily manipulated and governed. 

Which America political party seems more against education, finding and supplying money to those institutions? Well, to be sure it is a complex subject. I did go to college in hope of better job prospects.

My older brother, after I got out of the USAF and had Vietnam Era VA benefits, seeing how down and out I was (I had lost my marriage, job, could not find a good job and that's why I went in part, into the Air Force, and I was floundering and on food stamps), tried to talk  me into college. He convinced me to think about it. 

When I graduated High School, K-12 as such a miserable academic experience, I swore to never go to school again. I took two weeks to think about it. I realized as much as I felt life, as much as it hurt emotionally at times, were I to become educated, I would find life even more in depth, I would understand everything better. I would feel greater pain in life. 

But I realized in the pro side of the pro/con list, I would also appreciate lief more, the quality of my life would be better. I would look at a picture, or film, or piece of music and have a greater appreciation of it. Or for human interaction. Or it would hurt more. 

In the end I decided the pros outweighed the cons and I started college. Never planing on more than a two year AA degree. But my girlfriend wanted a university degree. So I followed her. That was the catalyst. 

But then I was fully invested. My first college class toward an AA was Study Skills. I learned there is a way to learn in school. No one ever told me about that and so I suffered through K-12. None of us are taught that. But most of us make it through our "cookie cutter" 18th century style school systems Which has been changing to some degree of late. Having ADD just made it more difficult and yet, someone I graduated 12th grade. 

So in the end, I got a university degree. Something I'd never have though possible. Yet I did it. And others can do it. No, of course everyone doesn't need a college or university degree. Vocational schools are great things. It's really about what will make you happier, more fulfilled in life. It's not all about money! But we do have to make a living. We have to survive. But we don't have to be miserable all our lives, either. Sometimes only a little educate is all we need. For some of us we gleam that from living from day to day. But not all of us.

The important things is, remember that those who truly know more than us, should be listened to. Peer review is important. Picking out one "expert" because he agrees with you is foolish. Also ignoring the outlier can also be foolish. Confusing? Yes.

But that is why we need to educate and lean into knowledge, but ever more so...wisdom.

Yes there are indeed those who are bullies who lord it over others less educated, or poorer, or less advantaged. Many of those people however have psychological and personality issues have nothing whatsoever to do with wisdom. They give all others who are wise and would be helpful to us a bad name. 

Don't become sucked into that distraction. Too many of those bullies want you to hate all those smarter than you, merely so you will listen only to them. They can be hard to spot. But many times easy to see as those who claim they are the ONLY solution. ONLY they can save you. These are confidence hucksters, con men and women and do not trust them! Even though we have no elected on as President of the United States of America. But that too will pass. 

Still, that is no excuse for what we are seeing in America today.

Yet, there we are. Here...today.

In America.

The future is ours. It is yours. Make of it what you will

Just remember, you are not alone. What you do affects us all.

For better or for worse. 

Contained Weapons and the state of the Ignorance of Intellectual Knowledge

I've been thinking for years that we need more non-lethal weapons for police... and military. I couldn't figure out why that hasn't happened yet. I also noticed there are ways of thinking being demonstrated in public, rationales, agendas and ideologies that feel very foreign to me as an intellectual and an american, and that frankly are, stupid.

I think we've gotten to a point when it may be more necessary than desirable to examine these things.

Regarding weaponry, for police TASERs are great but we still need something better. The new sound devices that make your skin feel hot and can be used in order to disperse crowds is one interesting solution to a problem usually made worse by police and government officials.

For the military, we really need to stop the majority of these drone attacks. We may also need to start giving consideration to building contained weaponry.

What I mean by that is... take for instance, the missiles that drone carry. A drone fires a missile (OK, a drone pilot fires it, whatever), the missile tracks it's target, strikes it and detonates destroying the target. As well as unintended collateral targets. That's innocent people, usually.

Too frequently this ends in overkill.

But what if when a bomb explodes, rather than an uncontained explosion, it sets off a fragmentation weapon where the pieces remain attached to the center of the device? In that way there'd be shrapnel all of which would remain a part of the original central part of the device.

It still shoots through any people or metal within the length of the chains or wires that maintains connection to the primary piece, but they would stop within the length of that constraint. We are developing materials, new concepts, new ways of thinking, that just might be conducive to this type of technology.

Here is one example: ‘Impossible’ Quantum Space Engine Actually Works – NASA Test Suggests. We're on the crux of many new things, some of those we need to start carrying over into more practical applications.

There are many other examples out there today that could lend themselves well to visualizing my point. The more you look for them, the more you find.

Maybe the missile hits the center of a truck. It explodes, individual fragments shoot out from the source, punching holes all through the truck, killing all in the vehicle, but anyone who is say, fifteen feet from the missile, is safe (OK, safer anyway), excepts perhaps for some flying truck debris.

There be the possibility of the odd case of the loss of an eye or some minor burns or pelleting, but very much more possibly, there could be no unintended deaths.

This is the kind of thinking we need to start using. To think within the box as well as without, not allowing as in this case, for the shrapnel or explosive power to extend beyond the containment of the area surrounding the blast.

We also need more contained devices allowing for temporary disablement or minor destruction. We need to knock a crowd out, rather than killing if not dissipating everyone within range. We need to stop thinking in terms of attrition by way of destruction and start thinking of attrition by way of disablement or temporary disablement.

Benign war over the horrors of war.

We have entered into the age of  the "Ignorance of Intellectual Knowledge".

So much of our knowledge now is limited and offering us only a flat effect. Book learning limited in scope.. Information that shows us superficial meanings, with limited definitions or explorations of topics. Information in two dimensions when we need as a minimum four, maybe more.

Our ability to acquire knowledge needs to be expanded as our bandwidth permits. Which is another issue. We need faster speeds in order to access knowledge more comprehensively on the internet and more information needs to be made available, world wide, along with functional AIs that are compartmentalized to protect their user, but which can also be honed to give 4D examples of what knowledge is actually needed.

We are currently enhancing our knowledge into stupidity and we need to enhance it into wisdom.

Why do you think there is so much detriment going on around the world as opposed to enlightenment? People are remaining ignorant at a far greater rate than ever before. In the past, we didn't lean that much and so our ignorance to knowledge ratio was low.

Now however we are learning vast amounts about many varied topics and yet, we are still remaining ignorant to many integral issues about and related to these topics. We don't just need to know more facts about each issue, we need more quality information about them and more quality ways of disseminating wisdom.

Which brings us back to contained weaponry. Weapons that exert control without destruction.

We are surrounded by a rapidly changing world that we mostly aren't even aware of. If we are, it is only superficially. We need to raise the knowledge of each and every person on this planet, we need to wipe out ignorance and magical thinking styles of compartmentalized thinking and agendas (think religious terrorism).

We need people to better understand why those they have voted into office to protect and enhance their lives are only exerting controls to enhance their own lives and that of the ideologues (and oligarchs) who protect them. We need people invested in humanity and not just their small concerns, their tribe, their tiny areas of control.

There is much going on all around us and in many cases it would seem that most of us really have no clue about it all. We find people with vastly different interests and concerns and so generally speaking, as tends to happen we then find a reason or need to kill them.

I would argue that war is not our most powerful weapon. Proper and appropriate knowledge is.

Contained weaponry may just be the beginning and thinking appropriately in order to devise these types of things, to then create and use such things, could all lead us along the path that is much more useful and productive than merely breaking social contracts and then killing those on the other side of those broken contracts.

We need new ways of thinking about our world, about our actions, and about our concerns. America's priorities have been screwed up for years. We have tried hard to see what they should be, and to put plans into action to bring those things to fruition.

We have also had those in power, many of those who are rich and getting richer all the time, who control those in power, all of which have obfuscated things through a fog of too much information or not enough quality information, who have fed us mis and disinformation, and have abused their rights as human beings.

They need to be called to be accounted for, or to have their power (money) stripped from them. There is truly no reason for any human being on this planet to have over a billion dollars in a limited and closed economic system such as we have on this planet. Nations should have billions, people, and that include corporations, should not. Most especially if corporations are ridiculously to be considered people!

The first step to all that is to see what is really happening all around us. The second is to stop allowing power and money brokers abusing the systems in place, the tools they have to abuse against us and which in the end are against all people and not just our state or nation.

The first step of all that which may just be our first destination is to enhance the quality of knowledge available to us. And perhaps the first step to that is to change our ways of thinking in order to see what we cannot seem to see now.

NOTE Friday 2/20/2015: Oddly enough the fact that this article this week so far has gotten far fewer hits than most of my articles do, actually proves my point about what I'm saying here. No one cares. No one is really considering or looking into much of this. We are lazy on a point that is so prevalent as to seem unreasonable to even consider, to talk about openly, or to try to change our current path and way of thinking on. And we have to. We really, really have to.

UPDATE  Friday 2/20/2015: Here's another consideration....

I know they've done studies of prayer, and belief in God helping people to excel beyond their norm. I saw research where they proved that it doesn't take a belief in God but a belief in a considered source of power outside of oneself, which seems to be key. So you can believe in God, or Rock, or Dog, for that matter, it's all the same. But I wonder if anyone has yet done a study showing which is more effective the belief in God, or the belief in a properly considered source of power out there beyond one self.

Which basically is like saying, "I've been hiking for 20 miles and I can't go another, so I'll select that tree in the distance and make it there. Then when you make it there, select another road map up ahead and repeat. That method has gotten me through long hikes, forced marches and efforts all through my life (I'll just write one more page before quitting for the day, now another....).

Considering prayer usually fails in requests, it's counterproductive at least to some degree, which is inherent in the process. But if you are directed to consider that which is a source of power outside of yourself in the right way it won't fail, or at least less often.

That, is the study I'd like to see done. It's all about new ways, more effective ways, of thinking. We have the knowledge, we just need to get it to the right processes, apply it, get the right people (most people) using it and I suspect, all of our lives would go in a much better direction.