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Comment on Assuming a button that, every time you push it, your intelligence goes up. The obvious and sane thing to do is to push the button all day. Yes? No? Maybe? Is there something that I'm missing here?

be_excellent_to_each_other@kbin.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

I think you'd wind up losing the ability to have meaningful relationships with your loved ones and others in your life, as your raw intelligence pushed you towards a sort of hyper-rationality. Maybe you'd also stop caring about that. But chances are your loved ones wouldn't.

I'd proceed cautiously. Nudge it up, give some time to see how your life changes as a result. Maybe do some journaling. A couple weeks or months later, nudge it up again, etc. That way you can get some metrics regarding how its impacting your life and make the decision to stop if you think things are heading the wrong way.

Also something something Lawnmower Man and something something Flowers for Algernon.

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EatYouWell@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Also, extremely intelligent people are often seriously depressed.

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- Coasting0942@reddthat.com ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Some dude I knew cried while drunk bemoaning the heat death of the universe.
  
  My dumbass reply?
  
  I didn’t hear no bell
  
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  - zero_spelled_with_an_ecks@programming.dev ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    That sounds dumb, not intelligent.
    
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    dope@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Apparently the majority agrees.
    
    Who knew we had so many intelligent people here.
    
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FuglyDuck@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Intelligence doesn’t necessarily make you rational; for example all the extremely intelligent people who believe in mythical sky daddies without evidence of said sky daddy.

It’d also a false spectrum to place intelligence opposite of empathy, these are two distinct qualities in people. Intelligence doesn’t predict one’s interest, or your behavior, or how you might relate to people.

Keep in mind, in flowers for algernon, Charlie was always socially awkward . Before the experiment, he was lacking in understanding that his “friends” were bullying him; as his intelligence (and knowledge and understanding;) grew… he came to understand that, coupled with the resentment of his old tormentors kept him socially awkward and isolated.

It wasn’t that he was suddenly hyper rational, but rather that he came to understand, and they resented him for that.

In any case the obvious solution is to share the button.

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- OrderedChaos@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Sky daddies. 😂
  
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- be_excellent_to_each_other@kbin.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  In any case the obvious solution is to share the button.
  
  100% agree there
  
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- null@slrpnk.net ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  extremely intelligent people who believe in mythical sky daddies without evidence of said sky daddy.
  
  Like who?
  
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  - dope@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Well there’s Bob. And Dave. And the whole CM crew down at Livermore.
    
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- dope@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  for example all the extremely intelligent people who believe in mythical sky daddies without evidence of said sky daddy
  
  When somebody who’s smart believes something that seems dumb to you, doesn’t that suggest that you might be wrong and/or misunderstand what they said?
  
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  - FuglyDuck@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    When someone says “I believe xyz exists ”, I would expect evidence of XYZ existing. That the majority of humanity happens to share that belief is irrelevant to whether or not XYZ actually exists.
    
    Without evidence, those beliefs are not based in rational thought. Humans are complicated, emotions, social coercion and all manner of other messy bullshit affect how we see and perceive the world.
    
    Intelligence doesn’t make one rational, nor does it predict the kind of things one comes to believe. Most fake news, (false) conspiracy theories, etc, are succeeding because they’re presented in a way that bypasses analysis and reasoned thinking- by going straight to the primal emotions.
    
    Which is why, for example, “Think of the children!” Is the rallying cry of Republican assholes pushing anti-LGBTQ bullshit; it bypasses reasoning for the easy and immediate emotion.
    
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  - BallsInTheShredder@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    
    When somebody who’s smart believes something that seems dumb to you, doesn’t that suggest that you might be wrong and/or misunderstand what they said?
    
    With you on that but also feel that in general judging others doesn’t ring as being very smart to me. I was bullied a lot growing up, judged etc. And that taught me how people’s judgemental remarks can affect others which helped me avoid that train of thought myself.
    
    I eventually became judgemental myself, for a while and realized that I was a very… angry and sad person.
    
    I think the biggest game-changer for me was being taught gratitude. I went from hyperfocusing on everything wrong about my life, and others to training myself to instead search for what’s nice about life, and others.
    
    So personally? Being judgemental toward another human being doesn’t seem like a smart thing to do as it will just bring down others AND myself
    
    But also… none of us handpicked to be born in our particular bodies. None of us hand-picked and chose the circumstances we would grow up in in life, nor the variables that would change us and mold us, genetics and so many factors form a person. So judging a person that just happened to grow in a different body and think differently than myself? What good does that do? If I was born in their body instead of mine then I would think exactly the same way that they do so I am absolutely no better, none of us are. Sure people do bad things and have annoying traits but at the end of the day being mad at them and judging them does nothing because we would be exactly the same in their shoes. Want to be angry at something or judge someone I guess place that judgment at fate, the cosmos, the universe, just in general things that are out of our control and we do not understand. But people in general aren’t really good or bad we are just a product of trillions of factors that we had absolutely no say in nor control of. It’s not like people can just… exit human existence for a bit become enlightened and then enter our bodies again now thinking exactly the way others think they should… they just got what they got, and our that way because this life made them that way really.
    
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    dope@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Humans are very concerned with dominance games. (See 99% of movies and games for massive evidence). We want to put the other guy down. Contriving a justification for that is trivial. Any rationale is just another tool for that.
    
    Humans are very concerned with having a consistent story for explaining their world. Any assertion that contradicts that story is gonna require shouting down. Which generally leads back to the prior paragraph.
    
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  - XiELEd@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Intelligence doesn’t trend to an objective “perfection of the brain”. Someone with 190+ IQ can still believe in false conspiracy theories due to the nature of the human brain. So someone with a high IQ would easily solve a problem and deduce patterns, but will still fall to human cognitive biases.
    
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Hobart_the_GoKart@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Yes, I was thinking more like Dr. Manhattan. Have fun on Mars.

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- be_excellent_to_each_other@kbin.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I was going to reference Dr. Manhattan but I'm not familiar enough with the comic to be sure I have the right interpretation of his character. I've only seen the movie and the series.
  
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dope@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I was thinking more the “general understanding” type intelligence rather than the spock/data type intelligence. But sure, either way your relationships might suffer.

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