Re: OT: Deal with it

On Apr 6, 2:29 am, Quentin Grady <quen...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Sat, 05 Apr 2008 09:00:08 +0100, Nicky <ukc802466...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:



On Sat, 05 Apr 2008 20:11:57 +1300, Quentin Grady
<quen...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Thu, 3 Apr 2008 12:01:13 -0700 (PDT), "Michelle C."
<bookbug2...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Sometimes when I see the incredibly stupid, whimsical, self-serving
acts committed by people on the evening news--behavior that hurts
someone, sometimes without even the self-serving component--I wonder
what is actually going on (or not going on) in their minds.

I think it is worth considering that some of them are brain damaged.
Read a book with a title similar to A Mind for Crime.

I'm enjoying a book called "Blind Spots" - subtitle, Why Smart People
do Dumb Things. It assumes we all have it in us to be stupid - and
offers ways to spot, and avoid, your own personal blind spots. My
favourite bit so far is when she's pointing out with pride the fact
that the drive-through bank in her home town has Braille touch pads,
showing huge disability awareness. Her visitor wants to know how many
blind drivers there are around...

This would only be a Braille necessitated spot if the pads were on the
drivers side. IMHO on the passenger side they would be the height of
considerate thinking. Is it possible this is one of those situations
that sounds like a laughably dumb things but which isn't.

Another good one is "Mistakes Were made (But not by me)". It doesn't
cater for the off-the-cuff moments of idiocy, but does explain very
clearly how it's possible to get from normalcy to jaw-dropping madness
in a series of small, perfectly reasonable steps.

Shades of strategic thinking.

Nicky.

G'day G'day Nicky,

Understanding how intelligent people make mistakes fascinates me.

Perhaps it is because I have extremely gifted friends who never the
less appear to persist in making mistakes. Clearly being talented does
not prevent mistake making. Sometimes it seems as though it actually
increases the risk. Talented people seem less likely to believe they
can be mistaken and so fail to quickly correct errors early on in
their thinking. Percentage wise they may make FEWER mistakes than most
people. However they think much more than most people. Not just a
little bit more. An incredible lot more. I have to gallop to keep up.
This give them more opportunity to make mistakes. Their intellect
also encourages them to obsess over mistakes. It also encourages them
to set the bar much higher than other folks. Less talent people would
brush their mistakes aside and be happy with lesser achievements. The
highly talented find it difficult to accept that they can make
mistakes so seek arbitration. This makes their mistakes more apparent.
So there is a dilemma.

Do gifted people make more mistakes or am I mistaken in thinking they
might?

Hi Quentin,

Many years ago, I had a relative who was married (and still is) to a
particularly gifted man--an exceptional thinker, philosopher, talented
musician. However, due to some events in his life (which I won't go
into here--it would take a book), the man had emotional problems.
Often times his *emotional IQ* seemed to fall incredibly far below his
incredible intelligence. The marriage counselor who had known both
the man and the woman through their teen years told the woman that the
man's intelligence was actually a detriment to him dealing with his
emotional problems because the intelligence gave him extra capacity to
rationalize, minimize, etc. his behavior. For a long time he kept
making the same mistakes.

However, I do believe it was his intelligence that FINALLY got to him
to realize that he had a responsibility in his own happiness, and he
began to do the work. Through the years he has made great strides.
But he still HATES to be wrong. I think this quality is shared by
many intelligent high achievers, so it keeps them from looking at
their own behavior. This man is the exception to that rule in that
although he hates being wrong, he especially hates finding himself in
an unhappy situation more than once, and so he always includes himself
in his analyses now.

Best regards,
Michelle C., T2
diet & exercise

Best wishes,
--
Quentin Grady ^ ^ /
New Zealand, >#,#< [
/ \ /\
"... and the blind dog was leading."

http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/quentin

.

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