Sociopath Community

Buttered Toast said: 

PalePeach said: 

Return monke

 Are you talking about Doodlesinurwalls?  Or what is this? =_=

Maybe someone stole monke. 

Only the most intelligent people know that they are intelligent, in my experience.

Any famous names you feel stand as good examples? I've met more people who "know" they are intelligent, rather than actually are. 
 

At some point, the objective signs are impossible to miss.

It takes a truly intelligent person to miss obvious things. 
 

Imagine discussing with a severely autistic person; it's as clear as day that "something" is missing, and it's not just your ego talking.

They likely could run circles around you when it comes to discussing things like Trains. 

Overall, you seem to generalize intelligence as if it's only one thing, a sort of "you have it or you don't" mindset, but I see it more like a balancing act where people lean towards their strengths. 

Even someone who seems like an idiot to me could be a savant in something, as even low functioning people have to find a way to make it through the day to day. The only real splitting point I've seen for the mind is capacity and speed, beyond that even an idiot can be more gifted than you or I are in areas they'd find important. 

I guess I'd ask you: Would you rather feel smart, or content? 

You think me declaring that I'm smart comes from a place of insecurity and ego rather than objective analysis. I've nothing to prove, and I have plenty that i don't know, but I am objectively very smart in relation to others.

If you were comfortable with it, there would be no complaints. The majority shares your sentiments, so what makes you any more right than they are? 

So when have I last let myself think someone is smarter than me? I genuinely don't remember, despite havjng thought about it since you asked me the question. Not even as a kid, I don't remember ever thinking someone is smarter than me, but probably.more because I never felt as a kid that it was important, nor did I feel the need for intellectual pursuits. Objectively, when I was a kid, there were people smarter than me around. It goes without saying.

By comparison, I think lots of people are smart, whether blatantly or as a diamond in the rough that's largely misunderstood. 

Does this make me stupid? 

Maybe I should make more of an effort to get to know them as people and appreciate them for their other qualities, and just accept that I'm on my own when it comes to intellectual pursuits.

From my experiences anyway, you need to see where you're stupid to recognize where others are gifted. 

Albert Einstein probably figured he's pretty intelligent, given that his name became synonymous with genius.

I sort of addressed where you were going with the autism remark and the semantics. What I call smart may well be hyperspecific.

However, out of curiosity... Say that you're right and I'm not smart and I were to have a moment of epiphany where I came to realize it. Based on your best guess, what would you have me see that I am now unable to see? How would that moment of ephiphany help me in what I perceive as real problems? What was the reason I was unable to find people who can discuss with me at my level?

In your shoes, I'd first question why the fixation on intelligence in the first place. 

If it turned out you weren't smart, what really changes other than your perception over yourself? 

Fixation with being smart?

I'm clearly not conveying my thoughts properly here. So let me try to explain again:

I have many questions. I have nobody who can answer my questions better than I already can. Hence, I feel lonely in my intellectual pursuits.

There is nothing more enjoyable to me than finding a new interesting question I've never thought about before, or finding an answer I've never considered. I've spent the majority of my life "thinking" and I've surrounded myself with a community of scholars, because I enjoy learning. I don't "stop thinking" like normal people do. Even during sex, I can hear sigmund freud whsipering "that's your mother" in my ear, and I get distracted. Most people are not like this, and most people don't "think". You're mistaking being smart with a fixed thing rather than recognizing that it is a fluid concept that changes over time.

If it turned out everyone who have honestly engaged with me was smarter than me, then it would likely mean that my questions were too hyperspecific, I'm too dumb to understand the answers, and I didn't look hard enough for new questions.

At any rate, you've misunderstood. Forget the word for a second; I don't "care" about being smart nor am I fixated on it. My fixation is with the pursuit of knowledge, and my problem is that I'm surrounded by people who don't think as deeply as I do or don't care to. That's what I care about, not about scoring points or feeling superior. Being smart is a byproduct but not the point. Just forget the word, it's unimportant. Does that make sense?

The posts become wieldy because I'm anticipating what I already suspect you will say next, because I suspect you think I haven't thought about this for the past 10 years. I should stop doing that. Most of the superficial and unoriginal answers I've already explored, through playing it through in my mind in infinite loop, playing the devil's advocate, discussing the issue with others, answering similar questions myself on other forums, reading books, connecting it with what I already know, looking at other smart people, learning from others, introspecting, teaching, and trying to distract myself.

This is sort of the point when I say I feel like I'm not being challenged intellectually, because people go for the easy straightforward answers and don't think nonlinearly, using everything they've learned and are actually are capable of using. It's like the barrier to thinking is so high and consumes so much energy that it becomes an impossibility. That's what I mean when I say something is "missing". It's like there's a block inside people's heads that prevents them from fully engaging and digging deeper.

Jada said: 

Fixation with being smart?

No, with the subject of intelligence overall. 

I have many questions. I have nobody who can answer my questions better than I already can. Hence, I feel lonely in my intellectual pursuits.

If you can't answer those questions either though, does that make you dumb? 

Or do you only ask questions out of others for things you believe you already have the answers for? 

There is nothing more enjoyable to me than finding a new interesting question I've never thought about before, or finding an answer I've never considered. I've spent the majority of my life "thinking" and I've surrounded myself with a community of scholars, because I enjoy learning. I don't "stop thinking" like normal people do. 

So meet some Insomniacs and ADHD victims with the same problem, they never "stop thinking" either, in fact it's a common complaint among amped people that their brain never shuts up. 

You definitely strike me as hyperactive. 

If it turned out everyone who have honestly engaged with me was smarter than me, then it would likely mean that my questions were too hyperspecific, I'm too dumb to understand the answers, and I didn't look hard enough for new questions.

As a thought exercise, lets use Chapo as an example. 

Don't you figure he's able to tell himself he's smart from being unable to process what's beyond him, dismissing it as irrelevant and stupid because it has no value to him in particular? He also sits there calling things a waste of time, things that you or I would find value in. 

Is what you're doing really that different? 

At any rate, you've misunderstood. Forget the word for a second; I don't "care" about being smart nor am I fixated on it. My fixation is with the pursuit of knowledge, and my problem is that I'm surrounded by people who don't think as deeply as I do or don't care to. That's what I care about, not about scoring points or feeling superior. Being smart is a byproduct but not the point. Just forget the word, it's unimportant. Does that make sense?

You can pursue knowledge just fine with the complaints you've had, you strike me as more distracted by the room to measure it and compare. 

Jada said: 

The posts become wieldy because I'm anticipating what I already suspect you will say next, because I suspect you think I haven't thought about this for the past 10 years. I should stop doing that. Most of the superficial and unoriginal answers I've already explored, through playing it through in my mind in infinite loop, playing the devil's advocate, discussing the issue with others, answering similar questions myself on other forums, reading books, connecting it with what I already know, looking at other smart people, learning from others, introspecting, teaching, and trying to distract myself.

This is sort of the point when I say I feel like I'm not being challenged intellectually, because people go for the easy straightforward answers and don't think nonlinearly, using everything they've learned and are actually are capable of using. It's like the barrier to thinking is so high and consumes so much energy that it becomes an impossibility. That's what I mean when I say something is "missing". It's like there's a block inside people's heads that prevents them from fully engaging and digging deeper.

You sound like someone who needs to remember to breathe, then you externalize that blame to the larger world rather than try to understand where this is coming from within yourself. Maybe take a steam or something, or sit in a hot tub a while, maybe even go to a spa and get a proper deep tissue massage. You sound amped in a world of sleepy people, sleepy people who have comparatively found contentment in their lot by having a lower workload to hold onto. 



You really ought to have your next pursuits be over learning how to relax, as a relaxed mind is one that is more open to newer answers and experiences, rather than one fixating on the same few areas over and over. To some degree you need to be willing to let go of what you know already to allow yourself to see what you haven't already. 

This kind of thing has worked for me anyway. 

I appreciate the sentiment and the recommendation to relax.

There's a tendency for people to hyper focus on a few select areas without being able to look beyond our immediate horizon. It's a well known cognitive bias. The thing is, I'm more than aware of it; I've been cultivating habits to minimize it for the past 7 years. Right now with the amount of work I'm doing it's difficult, but on a regular day this isn't really a thing for me.

Beyond relaxing, taking a step back and looking into tbe broader subject theme helps you make headway. Like, for example, instead of hyper focusing on mirror neurons as an explanation for empathy or on empathy being a sliding scale, stepping back and looking into qualia, philosophy, religion, neuroscience as a whole, the origin of consciousness, linguistics and how languages are constructed, other people's thoughts, yourself, for answers, and then reflecting and connecting those things into a self consistent model in your mind, would probably let you think outside the box.

Same applies to this discussion, to some extent. Instead of hyperfocusing on the word smart, or how I've expressed myself, or how I must be saying what I'm saying because of some deeprooted issues, you could make more headway by seriously considering that I am right, entertaining that thought, and placing it in the context of everything you know. You're unable to, because it conflicts with what you see in your immediate horizon, so as a proponent of Occam's razor, you reject it outright. But Occam's razor only tells us what to expect, and you expect to see what you have already seen. Only a fool follows that monk when it comes to exploring new frontiers, because then there's nothing to explore.

That's a part of what I mean by nonlinear thinking. It takes energy, except when you're in the "zone".

Ps. The hyperactivity thing is a byproduct of when I don't filter and dumb myself down. The amount of information that gets packed into my sentences tends to go up, and it can give the impression that I'm writing hastily, without properly explaining myself. That's not the case. It's mostly that I assume the person I'm chatting with is capable of following. If you prefer, I can dumb it down, and make it a bit more "reader friendly". None of what I've written is written hastily. If you heard me IRL you would have the opposite impression; I speak very slowly and with care, pay attention to how much you're following, and I think before I speak, at least when it matters.