Jonathan Finch
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I assure you I have. If you haven’t, then sit in their living-rooms for a while (like a fly on the wall) and you will garner all sorts of useful information to confirm they are idiots. Not in their subjects of specialisation but maybe in car-maintenance or plumbing. You will hear them pointing out with great intelligence that their ignorance in car-maintenance is only because they are too busy specialising. They will say they have to prioritise time. You can say no doubt you have to prioritise time but you still can’t mend your car despite being infinitely superior to car-maintenance. When you are tired of arguing with them, you can leave the wall and buzz off. They will be glad. And so will you.
Now, far be it from me to decry learning : Indeed, if you talk to an uneducated person you often wish they had studied – just a bit. Try getting an uneducated person to understand that differences between babies and adults do exist, or, try to convince a die-hard non-academic that children perceive things and try to reason with their brains. It’s like beating your head against a brick wall.
Yes, university professors can be charlatans but so can the uneducated. It’s worth bearing in mind.
Therefore, it comes as no surprise whatsoever that people who read me criticise me. That’s partly why I write – to get feedback, positive and negative. I don’t usually rise to any bait because I am writing my next post.
In the end I think we all should acknowledge our limitations, try to improve ourselves, know ourselves as well as we can, bear free and patient thoughts*, practise humility, and understand that if we never study any thing, we are experts in no thing – nothing. Now, I’ll go and berate my partner for never having had the opportunity to go to school after the age of ten. That’s a handicap in my opinion.
What do you think, mate? Is it a handicap to find your school shut after the age of ten? Yes, I know there is the school of life. It’s a big one and often devours the people studying there. To study well in the school of life you either need intuitive intelligence or an education beforehand or a big kiss from Dame Fortune who is often lying on her back.
*”Bear free and patient thoughts…” : An idea which comes from Shakespeare (“King Lear”). Shakespeare probably got the idea from someone else who got it from someone else, and the character who expresses the idea (Edgar) is not a great guy by any means. He’s conventional. That’s a fault, isn’t it? Oh, dear! I’ve gone and got my own knickers in a twist.
We never think that University Professors are Idiots
Are you implying society requires you / us to respect them? I come from a family of teachers and university professors. I also worked in the university sector in Italy. I can assure you not everything I do is top class. Idiotic? Probably.
I enjoyed this post! I have two university degrees and friends who are just becoming professors now and I always wonder how some of them can be perceived as “leading intellectuals” when some of their actions are questionable to say the least :))
I hope this article is given a thorough reading because it is also about the importance of study without pretension. “Now far be it from me to decry learning…”
Thanks for your feedback. Of course, your list of synonyms is daunting but I did work in the university sector for more than twenty years and do have two academics in the nuclear family (well, one now – the other died) and though “dunce” & “dolt” were never in my mind, “idiot” was. I have seen professors on the continent doing all sorts of remarkably inept things and in my family being as pretentious as Malvolio (a guy so in love with himself as to be “blind”). No excellence in learning can justify what certain academics in their corridors of power get up to, and if “idiot” is inaccurate, I would need to use harsher terminology. Given I have mentioned Shakespeare indirectly, I would like to add that from “the law is an ass” to lots of other “social” comments, the player and writer never hesitates to draw attention to the greatest flaws in the highest places.
For many years I had been doing reparation for a bathtub for a doctor, a neurosurgeon.
He told me that he did not change the car’s oil, because he kept his fingers for surgery.
I wonder, if he could use the gloves to replace the oil
Yes, it’s tricky to know what’s really going on in the minds of experts. Your neurosurgeon is like a musician I know who won’t shake hands with me because he tells me his hands are too precious to be gripped. What I really wanted to express in the article is that many highly intelligent people are lacking. Nevertheless, they directly or indirectly give exceptional value to their expertise without any consideration for their vast deficit, a deficit shared by most, I think.
No, that’s a little strong and over the top for me. The definition of the word is “a stupid person”,
synonyms: fool · ass · halfwit · nincompoop · dunce · dolt · ignoramus · cretin · imbecile · dullard · moron · simpleton · clod · dope · ninny · chump · dimwit · nitwit · goon · dumbo · dum-dum
They somehow made it to that position and are keeping employment so I think that word is probably not one I would aspire to use.
Thanks for asking.