Many years ago, when I was a college undergraduate, one of our economic professors testified before congress. When he returned, he reported that much to his surprise not all of the legislators were equally smart. Some manifestly asked more penetrating questions than others.
Anyone who watched the Kanavaugh hearings on television will not be surprised by this observation. The intellectual disparity between an Amy Klobuchar and Cory Booker was striking. One was probing in her queries, whereas the other merely struck pompous poses.
Once upon a time, I thought that people could not reach positions of power unless they were unusually gifted. Since then I have learned that it is often sufficient to be half-smart. Indeed, a lot of apparently intelligent folks fall into this category.
But what does that mean? Who is genuinely smart and who isn’t? In fact, I have sometimes wondered about the adequacy my own mental equipment. Although I did well in school and IQ tests, there were many things I did not understand. How was this possible if I were truly intelligent?
Where I fit in the intellectual scheme of things only gradually, and unexpectedly, became clear. It emerged from the way in which unknown others reacted to me. An unanticipated disparity appeared during our interactions that shed light on the nature of brainpower.
Much to my astonishment, very intelligent people were more apt to regard me as bright than were less smart individuals. The former almost always paid attention to what I said, while the latter frequently dismissed me as less astute than themselves. In other words, the half-bight often thought they were smarter.
Why, I wondered, was this so. Obviously I did not always say uniquely clever things. Indeed, I frequently made foolish comments. So what was it that the very smart noticed, which the less smart did not? It turned out to be how quick I pick up on meanings.
In conversation, the very bright immediately discerned that I understood what they were saying. Because my rejoinders were responsive to their intents, they realized that I comprehended what they meant.
The half-smart, however, assumed that if I disagreed with them, I did not understand them. Because they did not know what they did not know, they assumed that a lack of agreement signified a lack of awareness on my part. It never occurred to them that I might be cognizant of information they were not.
The half-smart, in short, are not terribly quick on the up-take. They think they are. They believe they see the whole picture. Nevertheless, because they do not, they aren’t on the alert for the unforeseen. Given that the existence of these facts is not suspected, many never reach their consciousness.
Nowadays a great many half-smart politicians, journalists, and entertainers clamor for our attention. Most of these individuals are liberals who assume they have a monopoly on the truth. It never dawns on them that there might be entire universes of information of which they are oblivious.
This is not to imply that conservatives are smarter than liberals. Intelligence is almost surely distributed equally along the political spectrum. The salient difference between the left and the right is that many leftists assume they are smarter. These liberals are generally convinced that they perceive what conservatives do not thanks to their superior intelligence.
How often have we been told that progressive experts ought to control the government so that they can make decisions ordinary citizens would botch? How frequently do these liberals describe themselves as intellectuals or members of the intelligentsia?
The supreme irony is that many self-important intellects are only half-smart. They are not independent thinkers, but ideological hangers-on. Their supposed insights merely repeat slogans handed down from mentors who are regarded as brilliant trailblazers.
Unfortunately most half-smart individuals cannot distinguish genuine understanding from conceptual nonsense. Because they do not see the complete picture, they cannot recognize when important elements of a political construction are missing. They hear the socialist promises, for instance, but overlook the socialist failures.
With so many Americans having been educated in liberal doctrine, these folks assume they must be extremely smart or they would not have received good grades in school. As a result, they regularly foist absurdities upon us that are not exposed until these irrationalities do irreparable damage.
In this political silly-season, a surfeit of unacknowledged half-smartness ensures host of distressing outcomes. The therefore behooves us to be suspicious of misplaced intellectual confidence.
Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus
Kennesaw State University
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