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Amwelladmin (talk | contribs) (Created page with "{{A|devil|}} Italian economic historian and raconteur Carlo Cipolla pinned down stupidity in his 1976 essay ''Le leggi fondamentali della stupidità umana'' - “the basic la...") |
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{{A|devil|}} | {{A|devil|[[File:Cipolla-matrix.png|thumb|Stupidity mapped, yesterday.]]}}Italian economic historian and raconteur Carlo Cipolla pinned down stupidity in his 1976 essay ''Le leggi fondamentali della stupidità umana'' - “the basic laws of human stupidity”. They are, broadly, these: | ||
Italian economic historian and raconteur Carlo Cipolla pinned down stupidity in his 1976 essay ''Le leggi fondamentali della stupidità umana'' - “the basic laws of human stupidity”. They are, broadly, these: | |||
* To be stupid is to harm someone else without personally benefitting. Stupidity results inevitably in net loss. Pillagers may be nasty, but they aren’t stupid. | * To be stupid is to harm someone else without personally benefitting. Stupidity results inevitably in net loss. Pillagers may be nasty, but they aren’t stupid. | ||
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* We systematically underestimate how much damage stupid people can do. | * We systematically underestimate how much damage stupid people can do. | ||
Cipolla went on to create one of those simplistic four-box charts which of course cannot possibly hope to describe the world, but is still an amusing [[heuristic]]. The two axes are “benefits to self” and “benefits to world”. The four quadrants are the intelligent, the bandits (pillagers), the helpless, and the stupid. | Cipolla went on to create one of those simplistic four-box charts which of course cannot possibly hope to describe the world, but is still an amusing [[heuristic]]. The two axes are “benefits to self” and “benefits to world”. The four quadrants are the intelligent, the bandits (pillagers), the helpless, and the stupid. | ||