this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2024
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The problem is, this is wrong. Most people won't change their views easily. We instinctively downgrade evidence that disagrees with us and upgrade that which reinforces our beliefs.
Ironically, "smart" people can be FAR worse at this that stupid people. Just ask anyone who's tried to do IT work for a doctor. Smart people are able to build more elaborate mental constructs to explain contradictory evidence.
This comes to a particular head in science. Scientific papers are written in a weird way. It's always in the 3rd person, with as much personality taken out as possible. This helps when someone critiques it. Disagreements are with the paper, not the author. This is backed up by a LOT of training at university level. Even so, scientists are still prone to hanging onto outdated ideas far too long. These are people who are undoubtedly "smart" by any reasonable measure.
I get what you're saying, but assuming you're talking about medical doctors, they're a bad example. I know three doctors well and they're all dumber than a sack of hammers. Becoming a doctor doesn't require much intelligence, it requires the ability to stay in school long enough (and being able to tolerate gross stuff from other people's bodies).
What do you call someone who got all Ds in medical school? Doctor.
It's actually part of my point.
Doctors are intelligent, you have to be to absorb the amount of information they are required to learn. However, it's specialised intelligence. Being smart about medicine doesn't make you smart about other things.
It's like we all have a pool of base intelligence. We can then pour it into various moulds. The traditional intelligent professions are often just reliant on a large amount of specialised intelligence. This actually robs them other other forms.
It's easy, when you can demonstrate high intelligence, in a difficult field, to assume you are intelligent across the board. A stupid person can often know they are stupid and so can compensate. An "intelligent" person can be blindsided by their weaknesses.
Its amazing what 2 smart people in a room can rationalize.