- a concept I forgot to bring up here, that "being smart" has two different meanings in culture. The more common one (growth mindset) can be achieved by anyone. Everyone can be "smart" in this way, and we should push people to do so, AND stigmatize not trying https://x.com/DefenderOfBasic/status/1848111292147737078
this is very bad. The reason people are anti-intellectual is because they're conflating "being smart" with "being a good person". If you tell me that I am not a good person because I am not smart, that will make me hide my lack of intelligence, which is terrible, because it keeps me dumb, makes it harder to learn, AND it's bad for society.
See: "I think there's a real language problem here and we need to make it socially acceptable to not know things, but we SHOULD stigmatize not trying to improve, not calibrating"
Totally agree with you. Having to pretend to know everything or understand everything is a self-deception mechanism that results in some terrible decision making.
One of my biggest breakthroughs with being ok with being dumb is asking dumb questions instead of pretending to know what the other person is talking about. I have way better conversations now.
it's SUCH a relief. I want everyone to try this for no other reason that this immense weight falling off your shoulder. We don't have to pretend anymore.
I also just have huge empathy for those stuck in this. I don't want people to give up their sense of identity around "being smart / competent / a good person". It's the other way around. Separate those concepts. Don't give up your pursuit of competence & excellence. That's a failure mode.
Yeah I like this. I've thought about this before wrt engineering and writing code. Engineers who think they're smart write code that is too clever and no one else can understand; engineers who know they're dumb write code with themselves in mind and make sure to keep it simple
But I guess it generalises to other domains as well
"it generalizes" -> yes, absolutely! this has been my biggest epiphany over the last year, that a lot of the deep truths I've learned in engineering apparently apply to all other domains too.
I wrote about this in this "how I learned to think for myself" article but TL;DR is that I realized the same meta-skill I have in debugging complex systems can be applied to people, and politics, and I went from having zero people skills to being better than most people around me at mediation & resolving disputes and getting what I want:
I like the idea- but I don't think this is gonna work
1) If X is a virtue Not~X will be a vice. So if knowing is a virtue, being ignorant will always be considered a bad thing
2) If you can't destigmatize being dumb- you CAN add another vice and make it worse. The way its a vice to be unhealthy, but its an even worse vice to be unhealthy and DO NOTHING ABOUT IT.
3) what if we could shift language- being dumb means 'not willing to take risks to learn'? What would we lose that 'destigmatize being dumb' would achieve?
Great article! Your take on destigmatizing "being dumb" as a pathway to personal and societal growth is spot on. Embracing what we don’t know, rather than fearing it, opens doors to learning and innovation. The concept of calibration—accurately assessing our strengths and weaknesses—struck a chord. It’s a necessary step for growth, both individually and within teams.
I also love your distinction between intelligence and goodness. Overvaluing “smart” can lead to dangerous outcomes when ethics are ignored. Your idea to shift culture by starting with micro-cultures is brilliant. The shirt concept adds a playful touch, making important conversations more accessible. This approach feels like a small but powerful step towards redefining how we view intelligence and failure.
- Tweet thread about this article: https://x.com/DefenderOfBasic/status/1848037566307586419
- a concept I forgot to bring up here, that "being smart" has two different meanings in culture. The more common one (growth mindset) can be achieved by anyone. Everyone can be "smart" in this way, and we should push people to do so, AND stigmatize not trying https://x.com/DefenderOfBasic/status/1848111292147737078
- "everyone is happiest when they work at their limit" -> this is the real point of "destigmatize being dumb - https://x.com/DefenderOfBasic/status/1848150699156160580
Where I grew up being smart is stigmatised
this is very bad. The reason people are anti-intellectual is because they're conflating "being smart" with "being a good person". If you tell me that I am not a good person because I am not smart, that will make me hide my lack of intelligence, which is terrible, because it keeps me dumb, makes it harder to learn, AND it's bad for society.
See: "I think there's a real language problem here and we need to make it socially acceptable to not know things, but we SHOULD stigmatize not trying to improve, not calibrating"
https://x.com/DefenderOfBasic/status/1848111297889448104
Totally agree with you. Having to pretend to know everything or understand everything is a self-deception mechanism that results in some terrible decision making.
One of my biggest breakthroughs with being ok with being dumb is asking dumb questions instead of pretending to know what the other person is talking about. I have way better conversations now.
it's SUCH a relief. I want everyone to try this for no other reason that this immense weight falling off your shoulder. We don't have to pretend anymore.
I also just have huge empathy for those stuck in this. I don't want people to give up their sense of identity around "being smart / competent / a good person". It's the other way around. Separate those concepts. Don't give up your pursuit of competence & excellence. That's a failure mode.
Yeah I like this. I've thought about this before wrt engineering and writing code. Engineers who think they're smart write code that is too clever and no one else can understand; engineers who know they're dumb write code with themselves in mind and make sure to keep it simple
But I guess it generalises to other domains as well
"it generalizes" -> yes, absolutely! this has been my biggest epiphany over the last year, that a lot of the deep truths I've learned in engineering apparently apply to all other domains too.
I wrote about this in this "how I learned to think for myself" article but TL;DR is that I realized the same meta-skill I have in debugging complex systems can be applied to people, and politics, and I went from having zero people skills to being better than most people around me at mediation & resolving disputes and getting what I want:
https://defenderofthebasic.substack.com/p/geoffrey-hinton-on-developing-your
I like the idea- but I don't think this is gonna work
1) If X is a virtue Not~X will be a vice. So if knowing is a virtue, being ignorant will always be considered a bad thing
2) If you can't destigmatize being dumb- you CAN add another vice and make it worse. The way its a vice to be unhealthy, but its an even worse vice to be unhealthy and DO NOTHING ABOUT IT.
3) what if we could shift language- being dumb means 'not willing to take risks to learn'? What would we lose that 'destigmatize being dumb' would achieve?
Great article! Your take on destigmatizing "being dumb" as a pathway to personal and societal growth is spot on. Embracing what we don’t know, rather than fearing it, opens doors to learning and innovation. The concept of calibration—accurately assessing our strengths and weaknesses—struck a chord. It’s a necessary step for growth, both individually and within teams.
I also love your distinction between intelligence and goodness. Overvaluing “smart” can lead to dangerous outcomes when ethics are ignored. Your idea to shift culture by starting with micro-cultures is brilliant. The shirt concept adds a playful touch, making important conversations more accessible. This approach feels like a small but powerful step towards redefining how we view intelligence and failure.