Why do most stupid people think that they are smart?

Question

Is it because they hang around OTHER stupid people that tell them that they are smart?

Answer 1

It requires a bit of intelligence for someone to understand they aren't smart so if they are as dumb as a post they don't comprehend that they AREN'T smart.
They are too dumb to know the difference.

Answer 2

If a person is taught all the wrong things and he/she learns them well. . .this does not mean he/she is stupid. It means they are ignorant. Stupid people are not able to learn at the level of some one with normal intellect and will usually know they have a problem.

Some people listen to what they want to hear, and therefore once again remain ignorant and simply appear stupid. Having a closed mind helps to feed ignorance.

When I was a younger man, I was naive enough to believe that when someone told me something, it had to be true . . . as I used this info, I was appearing to others as being stupid and actually feeling stupid. I realized back then it was not good to take anything you hear as being true and to question it and do my own research. . . The younger a person is, the more ignorant they are. . .which is why it is best to indoctrinate the young into your countries ideology at as soon as possible, teach them religion the same way, and build this knowledge in a way to make them believe it to be the best and worth dying for. This holds true in every empire ever built, every church ever created. Being stupid is a condition of nature, being ignorant is a choice.

Answer 3

Actually, I have found that most truly "stupid" people (those with a low IQ), are painfully aware that they are not very smart.

What I have found to be more the case is that many people's perception of "stupid" is a direct reflection as to how much the "stupid" person disagrees with the person making the judgment. Interestingly, in these cases, the more the person disagrees with his judge, the more stupid he/she is...to the judge. Kinda makes you think there might be something else going on.

I sense a lot of EGO in your question, so I challenge you to take an honest look at those you are judging from that perspective.

Answer 4

Read "March of the Morons" and then reason it out. Common sense is no longer common, people are told "everyone is a winner" , kids think there is no right or wrong way to do things. Of course people are getting dumber. In Britain, they are at an average IQ for Freshmen in HS that is the lowest its been since 1991. This is not an isolated instance. And the dumber they are, with no people to tell them, "Hey, that's stupid!" of course they think they are smart.

Answer 5

Part of being stupid is not realising the fact that you're stupid. "Stupid" is more ignorance than anything. How many stupid people do you know that are ACTUALLY stupid, and are aware of it?

I think the natural tendency is that if you know you aren't as smart as you should be, you'll try to get smarter. Say you don't know much about a certain subject and someone calls you stupid because of it. You're gonna do you research and learn about that subject so you aren't thought of as stupid.

Answer 6

Smart is a word that has diverged considerably from its original meaning of “stinging, sharp,” as in a smart blow. The standard meaning of “clever, intelligent,” probably picks up on the original semantic element of vigor or quick movement. Smart has taken on other senses as a regionalism. In New England and in the South smart can mean “accomplished, talented.” The phrase right smart can even be used as a noun meaning “a considerable number or amount”: “We have read right smart of that book”
Stupidity is the quality or condition of being stupid, or lacking intelligence, as opposed to being merely ignorant or uneducated. This quality can be attributed to both an individual himself (e.g. Penny Person is stupid.) or his actions, words or beliefs (e.g., Penny Person's policies are stupid.). The term can thus also refer to poor use of judgement, or insensitivity to nuances in a person who is otherwise intelligent. The determination of who is stupid is relatively difficult, despite attempts to measure intelligence (and thus stupidity) such as IQ tests. The adjective is also used as a general pejorative. (e.g., I didn't borrow your stupid cap - go look for it yourself.)

Answer 7

Most people, regardless of their intelligence, tend to see themselves as much better than they actually are, which is due in large part to self-bias. We have a natural tendency to exaggerate our successes and minimize the negative effects of our losses. This can be seen in tests where people are asked to tell the experimenter if in certain areas they are worse than average , about average, or better than average. Obviously only 50 percent of the people are actually above average and 50 below, with the average being only a single number. But due to the bias people have, there is always an absurdly high number of above average people. This is known as the above-average effect.

One journal article I pulled up is listed below and mentions at some point a man who attempted to cover up a bank robbery by spreading lemon juice on his face. By doing so, he thought he would blind the cameras, a technique he had read incorrectly. In this situation, the above-average effect is applicable because the robber thought that he was above the law, when in fact he was robbing a bank in broad daylight as anybody not trying to conceal their identity would (he was later caught because, apparently, it doesn't work). His ignorance was his downfall in this case, but so are many of the day to day decisions we make.

When somebody tells us something, it is part of what we indoctrinate as fact. The question of what we take as true and what we do not is how much prestige and validity we assign to what the person says. This is a combination of verbal, mental, and other cues that make our final decision as to what and how much to believe about an idea. If somebody believes themselves to be smart when they are, in fact, stupid it is because something about the way they perceive life has led them astray. That coupled with the above-average effect really explains a lot about the way that society views itself.

Make sure to also take into account the fact that people who are stupid sometimes do so despite the fact that they know how wrong they are. I, for example, happen to get into many arguments that I am bound to lose as I am, inevitably, wrong. Despite how much I know this to be true, I push my side of the argument not so much to be correct, but to win. Because losing, again, is admitting that you are wrong. That is just one more thing that feeds into the above-average effect. In my mind, if I never lose I can never be wrong. The truth is harder to face - you will always lose if you fail to be incorrect sometimes.

Good luck!

Answer 8

Because their stupidity hinders them to understand what the word smart really means. they have a superficial understanding of it. and because their qualification fof being smart was too low, they believe that they are part of the smart group of people

Answer 9

normal ppl always try to know more about what is happening around them maybe when someone thinks he is smart the pride he has with him decreases his sensitivity about his environment or maybe the reason is tht because of his stupidity he has a limited world tht he can easily have command on it and it makes him feel tht he is smart

Answer 10

Less smart people are too stupid to realize that they are not as smart as the smarter one.
People measure themselves up to their own level, which is the highest level that can be defined by themselves. Usually.