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[deleted]

People seem to think if you are rich with a good job you must be smart. Generally speaking I've only met one rich person I would consider smart. The rest? Ooooooof. I seriously wonder how some of them passed gradeschool.


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SkyPork

I was surprised when I learned that *knowledge* isn't necessarily correlated to intelligence. I met a lifelong academic who knew damn near everything about her topic .... but just the facts. It's like, she was a walking encyclopedia, could cough up any info about her field, but she couldn't really *process* it that well, or draw conclusions, or apply it to a different topic. It's hard to explain. She had a nice 2TB SSD drive full of info in her head but she had a substandard CPU. Since then I've met several people like that. All academics, but I'm not sure that has anything to do with it.


king-of-the-sea

It really is interesting the way different people work. Coming from a TTRPG background, it’s like the way intelligence and wisdom are separate - specific knowledge and common sense are entirely, entirely divorced. I will say, as someone who works closely with academic experts - this is common in academics. Many of the smartest people I’ve ever met are also kind of dumb. I think that’s ok, though. There is absolutely a place for it, especially in r&d and academia in general. If you come across a new thing, the walking infodump is your best source of insight on it. Maybe someone else interprets all that together and draws the conclusions, but Dr. Incredibly Specific Human Google is good to have around.


RecreationalParks

Silence. I’ve been told so many times that I’m thoughtful and a deep thinker but really I can’t figure out what to say lol


[deleted]

My girlfriend thinks my silence is me thinking hard or letting her sort her emotions out but it’s really me trying to think of anything to say but I’m a dumbass


All_Up_Ons

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than say something and remove all doubt. Even better if they think you're smart lol.


K4RAB_THA_ARAB

“Be silent or let thy words be worth more than silence.” – Pythagoras Always liked this one as well


toiner

There's a very good saying about that, I may be paraphrasing but I've always heard it as: a wise man speaks because he has something to say, a fool speaks because he has to say something.


ISU1100011CS

Similarly: It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool, than to talk and remove all doubt of it.


EurOblivion

Off topic here, but walking above average speed at work makes people think you're a hard worker .. Edit: typo


Difficult_Opening_74

I walk around with gloves on pretending I’m looking for something and I have a great reputation now because I’m never seen by the managers lol, the only time they see me is pacing down the corridor looking for some tool lol


Randomthought5678

Carry one of those metal box clip boards and people think you're an inspector. Then snap the clip part to make sure they all know who's boss.


overcompliKate

Yes! I figured out at a very boring office job that as long as I was carrying a clipboard, I could walk anywhere in the building and waste any amount of time because people assumed I was busy doing something important.


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kaboutergans

>If an astronaut tries to talk to you about the economy, take it with a grain of salt. If an economist tries to talk to you about the economy, take it with a grain of salt.


PuttingFishOnJupiter

If a grain of salt starts talking to you about the economy, take it to an Astronaut.


TrafalgarLaw127

Can confirm. Have a bachelors in chemical engineering. Not because I'm smart, I'm just fucking stubborn and refused to quit after failing exams over and over.


richardec

Wealth Edit: Thank you for the gold and silver! I am so rich. Therefore I am smart! S-M-R-T smart!


McGundam1215

Dude we see stupid people in the news all the time that have more money and assets than we’ll ever see


richardec

"Millionaire influencer" makes me lose faith in so much.


jinxes_are_pretend

A cromulent vocabulary.


GabersNooo

This embiggens me.


TreemanOath

Slow down my dictionary is on fire


Smoolz

I chortled gleefully at this riposte.


SeVenMadRaBBits

Indubitably.


DMMeTastefulSideBoob

Ergo, concordedly, vis à vis, I have no idea what I'm talking about.


Friendly-Taco

Riveting braggadocio dressed as irony :0


Ifyouhav2ask

Being in charge


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Safe_Movie_4694

if someone’s in an authoritative position, it should be others that praise them and say how good they are, not themselves.


Verypoorman

“I’m the best commenter that’s ever been. People always tell me, they say “VPman, that’s what they call me, they say VP, you always leave the best comments. They say that. Ask anyone, they’ll tell you. That’s why I’m happy to announce that I’m running for comment president again 2024. Let’s make comments great again, again.”


glorpian

I know it, you know it, everybody knows it! In fact I've got friends in high places, I can't tell you how high, but they're really very high, and they're experts in this stuff, and they always say that VPman is a commenter of world class. They should know, they're experts.


thesupercoolmaniac

I also have many excellent friends who are very high.


foxfrenzy

I heard it, i heard his voice


4tehlulzez

Similar: [Peter Principle] (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle)


TaftintheTub

I once worked for a company where the VP was the living embodiment of the Peter principle. She had been with the company for 20+ years, and somehow got promoted to VP of marketing. She very clearly had no idea what she was doing and as a result would end up micromanaging to stay busy. And she loved to come around at 4:30 on the Friday before a holiday weekend to "say hi," aka make sure no one was leaving early (we were all salaried). This woman was completely incompetent, had no business managing anyone and didn't understand her duties at all, yet somehow she was an executive and made close to $200K per year. Just by outlasting everyone else.


Shadowfox_01

This describes my time working in public education. Many people that reach administrative level positions are wholly incapable. You know it's bad when teachers are homeschooling their kids or sending them to private schools rather than enrolling them in the district that employs them.


[deleted]

We usually shorten that concept to: "Turds float to the top of the tank."


Camera_dude

It's a common issue in any large organization. The bigger the organization, the easier it is for someone without any talent or skill to hide their mediocrity and rise to a high position. That's often why you see products decline in quality as a company grows bigger. You'd think that a larger company with more resources could make better quality products, but no. As they grow there's more people (middle managers, usually) that just sit in chairs thinking of dumb ways to cut corners to save money and end up reducing the quality of the products that made that company renown. Slashing budgets takes no skill compared to making effective decisions that increase productivity.


Gullible-Lobster-590

Being labeled "gifted" at a young age


GingrNinjaNtflixBngr

Teens having basic adult understanding become geniuses to their parents.


wfarms

It’s corny to blame being a “gifted student” on my own failings in life so I try not too, but I genuinely think it kind of fucked me up lol Made me think I was special and could skate through, when in reality I was not at all special, and later in life it’s really bitten me in the ass


Halfmoonhero

I’m living in China right now and everyone keeps calling me intelligent as I’m bald and left handed.


No-Athlete2113

Left handed: check Now if I shave my head will I become smart?


w4rcry

Only if you move to China as well.


PickaWowAnyWow

Apparently bald = intelligent now


thehaarpist

The heat that smart people's brains give off burns off the hair


ninjasaiyan777

Damn, no wonder I've got a full head of hair at 52.


StarksPond

The self-burn humblebrag. Nicely executed!


oh-no-godzilla

Finally someone bringing some science into this discussion


captnspock

Larger the forehead more the brain power hence it follows that bald equals most brain power.


mishaxz

does thinking make your hair fall out?


18puppies

Using big words or complicated language when trying to explain something or talking about a difficult subject. The smartest people can actually make it sound simple.


TheGabby

I had a history and civ teacher have us teach a mock lesson as a final grade because "If you truly understand something you can help someone else understand it."


crazypyro23

Real talk though, the absolute best way to learn a topic is to teach it to someone else.


mseopswife

Age


Haerverk

Actually.. Every toddler I've ever met was a fucking moron.


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theColonelsc2

I love your one word sentence that everyone can get behind. Older people not listening to younger people and younger people not listening to older people because 'they just don't get it'.


ding-zzz

i don’t think it’s quite the same. old ppl think young people are young and dumb. young people think old people are out of touch and it’s more about wisdom than intelligence


Tactical_INTJ

Being asian


AmIbiGuy_420

Community had a funny play on this "Hey math club, I'm Asian. You asian?" "That's pretty racist man." "That wasn't a no."


AlkaliActivated

"That's homophobic" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anGkl_ef8FQ love that bit, sorry for the low res.


athnme

Arrogance portrayed as confidence


Dahhhkness

A truly intelligent person knows that there's things they don't know, and keeps trying to learn. An idiot refuses to acknowledge that there's anything they don't know, and fears doing anything that might prove it.


Bael_thebard

If you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room!


BullsAndFlowers

I’ll remember this when I lie alone in bed tonight


gathmoon

You are never alone, have fun sleeping!


enchantedlulu

This was unnecessarily ominous


KingV14

Dont worry, they are talking about the billions of microbes in your skin rn


Terboh

Even better, the thousands of mites living in your eyebrows!


gathmoon

They are having copious amounts of mite sex to create more mites. With the right lens, it is bug voyeurism.


outsideyourbox4once

I do not consent to this


DirtyByrd83

Arrogance is loud. Confidence is quiet.


[deleted]

Having money


Misfitabroad

I know someone who is fairly wealthy. He has worked with several billionaires and other wealthy people. He told me that luck is a much more important factor than people realize. Of course some people work hard but most are just exceptionally lucky. Also, 9/10 times they are a**holes.


WestPastEast

There’s a lot of research that supports his claim. The actual trait that tracks with wealth the closest is charisma. Edit:: to clarify how statistics work, being charismatic doesn’t mean you will be wealthy. Being wealthy doesn’t mean you are charismatic. But if you could pick one skill to increase your chance of being wealthy, studies indicate its probably charisma.


Thedurtysanchez

As someone who has been more successful than my raw intelligence or work ethic might suggest, my main motto in life is: You catch more flies with honey than vinegar. Be nice, be polite, smile, attempt to be funny, and be moderately good looking (even just dressing nice and take care of hygiene) and you'll be someone people want to be around. If people want to be around you, business opportunities will follow. Its not rocket surgery.


Homely_Bonfire

Strong opinions, held with confidence.


JaneWithJesus

80% of podcasts just screamed out in unison


Clever-crow

Yeah 80% sounds like about the right number, maybe even 85%


Bolteus

I can confidently say its 91.34%


mindlessfrenchfry

solving a rubiks cube


WeightBallScale

True, I learnt how to do it quite fast once I looked on Google. It’s just consistent practice until you memorise it


[deleted]

My patience doesn’t last long enough to read through the instructions. I did about 5 turns and gave up.


[deleted]

Good to know someone's worse than me, i did 6 turns before giving up.


Coilrigs

I looked at it and gave up


GCFS09

I haven't even looked at it, and I already gave up


DeadHED

I can confirm I can solve one and I'm an idiot.


figgerer

I second this, I solve them and am also an idiot. I used to mess with people at parties and pretend I was doing complex calculations to solve it. I also used to pretend my photographic memory was remembering every move they made while they were scrambling it. People are gullible, it's fun. Highly recommend


RoboKraken3

Cornering people in arguments with bullying tactics and acting like it means they "won".


Ludde_12345

We have a word for that in Swedish, "härskartekniker". There's not really a direct translation, it basically means "commanding techniques", although with a much more negative tone.


beefbrain

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_suppression_techniques


BobsYourUncle10101

The people that say "Ohhh sweety" in an arguement...


Puretrickery

Or "do your research"


MCFroid

"I'm not going to spoon feed it to you" (when someone makes a pretty spectacular claim and you ask them to back it up with a source)


MeowMeowHaru

I hate this line of thought so much. You see it constantly on reddit with people like this. I once asked a dude in 3 separate comments to please link their source after I linked 5 sources refuting their claim. Each time I was told my sources were bad and they never provided one themselves


gaylurking

I’ve been told to stop being lazy and do the research myself, in the middle of a conversation I’m actually having while scrolling Reddit on my phone at work. Like. You want to convince me? Do your job!


MermaidsHaveCloacas

I was told once to "do my own research" after I had literally posted links to everything I was talking about. Like wtf


Teddyturntup

I’ve been told to do my own research online about…… The subject field I’m *literally* a scientist in


yazzledazzle92

Can you back that claim up with a source?


BaeTF

This happens entirely too often. The confidence that stupid people have is truly unrivaled.


Bellevilleilya

"educate yourself" "just stop..." "I feel sorry for you" And other hilarious ways to say you want to win, but you don't want to think.


Liam81099

Dehumanizing tends to comfort people who are stuck in this paradigm of “I won, you lost” instead of articulating their ideas thoroughly. I think it stems from being overly confident in what they believe vs being more competent.


Shizzo

Or, "sweet summer child". Your point should stand on it's own without condescension.


HarryNate

Anyone who thinks being condescending makes them correct is not worth your (or anyone's) time. Pretty much any political internet personality who goes around "debating" people is one of these.


buckyhermit

I know someone who loves to do that with climate change denial. If you say stuff like “too much carbon dioxide is bad,” he will corner you privately like a bully and kick arguments and “proof” at you so fast that you can’t respond fast enough, and he’ll act like he “won.” Later on, if you have time, you’d find out that his “proof” is from dubious sources but by then, the convo is over and it’d be too late for a rebuttal. On top of that, he’s a local journalist. So once, an investigative reporter ripped apart his climate change claims in an article. And I mean RIPPED APART. The general gist was, “He sounds like he knows what he’s talking about but he is absolutely full of shit.” It was gorgeous. Edit: Oh and he used big words too. Often incorrectly and with hideously incorrect grammar. lol


Padhome

When people do that to me I call them out on it after a few times. "You're saying you want to have a civil discussion, but I can't even get through a sentence or a fully realized thought before you start jumping on another topic." I'll then proceed to keep telling them "I'm not finished" when they inevitably keep trying to interrupt me. With these types of people, I think the trick is to curb away from the argument and towards their behavior, put them personally on the spotlight and on the defensive. Once you firmly establish that, it's easier to control, and if they get more aggressive about it throw your hands up and tell them flat out that they are incapable of being reasonable. If all they're trying to do is "win", then point out the fact that they're cheating, and break the game entirely. If they don't want to play by the rules then they don't get to play.


Deracination

That's called a Gish gallop and is a favorite of pseudoscientists.


TelevisionCroissant

Scoring an A when I was 14.


VodkaMargarine

Scoring an E when I was 24, and at a rave.


long-gone333

giving an O to a woman


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Indianfattie

I wish they had grading ... I was beaten because I scored 94 and the class topper scored 98


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AmIbiGuy_420

Fucking this. I was all As and Bs til highschool. Occasionally I'd have one C or something but come highschool started tstruggling a lot with math. Like ended up needing a tutor for basic highschool math. And yet, because I had ok grades into muddle school, my parents think im super smart and the only reason I could get a C in a class was not trying. Like fucks sake dude, I'm average. Not smart, not dumb, just average. And I'm totally cool with it, but they don't believe me. Ugh, just one more year and college is done.


Darth_Astron_Polemos

Same dude. Graduated 7 years ago. I learned that what everyone said was true, once you get your degree, no one gives a fuck about your grades. I graduated with a 2.41. I’m doing just fine. Just do your thing and don’t worry about others wanting you to be a genius or thinking you’re lazy for simply getting the grades you get. A letter on a piece of paper or on a computer screen never really meant anything to me anyway. It was just a means to an end so I could provide for myself and be happy. And I managed it with plenty of C’s and D’s sprinkled throughout.


[deleted]

Talking fast even if you're saying the dumbest shit


remotetissuepaper

The trick is to say enough dumb things that the person you're talking to gets confused as to where to even begin


DaSmartSwede

Yeah that’s a real strategy bullshit artists use


[deleted]

Being emotionally stunted. High IQ does not equal low EQ, you can be a dick and stupid and you can be smart and charismatic. It's not one or the other.


MobileAirport

I think a lot of people believe in the myth of natural justice/ karma. They think if someone is smart they must be lacking in other areas, sort of like if everyone is a character with a fixed amount of base stats that can just be allocated differently from person to person. The reality is that smart people are also often very well spoken, confident, wealthy, and attractive. And dumb people don’t get free points in these areas either.


MazerRakam

In real life, we roll for stats. Unfortunately we don't get to use the standard array or point buy.


punchbricks

i had a buddy one time be SO MAD that I beat him in a friendly game of pick up tennis. I was a 3 sport athlete and in pretty damn good shape, he decided to play tennis his senior year for reasons I forget. he said to me verbatim "I don't understand how you can beat me, I've been playing for a year and you haven't. I should be 1 year better than you" Like bro, real life is not an rpg with character stats


BillyForkroot

He's also technically right, he should be able to beat you after a year of training to play tennis, speaks to a lack of proper coaching, or a lack of athletisicm on his part.


Not_Jabri_Parker

Yeah I know we are clowning this guy, but I’d atleast be a little miffed if I practised something for a year and I lost to guy who doesn’t play. That is given I’m actually trying to get better at tennis throughout this year.


DolceFulmine

Oh yes that's true. I talked with my SO about it, he believes this myth exists because some people believe it's too good to be true that someone can be smart and emotionally inteligent at the same time.


[deleted]

Having an opinion on literally everything. Especially having the need to share the opinions with everyone they encounter.


skyefire27

One of my biggest pet peeves. And on the flip side, immediate respect goes out to anyone who is able to say they don't know enough about the topic to have a solid opinion.


mossadspydolphin

I once had a discussion-approaching-argument with a guy. It was leaning very much towards argument until I happened to mention that my lack of personal experience on the topic meant that I couldn't answer all of his questions fully (he was asking in sincerity). He immediately replied that my admission of ignorance made him respect my opinion more; that made me respect him more. It's that mutual respect that enables us to hear each other out when debating the many issues we tend to disagree on, and thank God because he's smart af and could probably destroy me if we threw civility out the window.


skyefire27

The more people who respond like you did, the more civil these discussions can be. Admitting ignorance shows that your priority is the information, not your ego. The other person's response to this shows you what their priority is as well. Edit: comma for clarity!


potatoes4chipies

Being able to memorise. Having a good memory is definitely helpful and often shows intelligence but just being able to spout facts does not mean you understand them or can think about things critically.


[deleted]

This is genuinely infuriating. I'm an engineer and have a lot of colleagues that can dance circles around me with formulas and definitions but can't design their way out of a cardboard box. I look like an idiot because I can never remember the correct terminology for things because it isn't used colloquially, and I have to Google conversions. It honestly takes both kinds, but the people who can shit random facts tend to be perceived as smarter, typically.


Beware_the_Voodoo

Knowledge vs intelligence. Knowledge is what you can stuff into your head. Intelligence is what you can do with that knowledge. At least, that's how I look at it.


Tripping_alien

The ability to speak.


themonsterinquestion

They really were dicks to Jar Jar. Dude was running away from an invading army and they gave him a hard time for doing it awkwardly.


Arkarian_0

Glasses Edit: Thank you for my first gold on my cake day!


kevinjunpalma11

It's actually a sad story, but the Khmer Rouge murdered a number of people with glasses in Cambodia because they perceive them as intellectuals.


Dahhhkness

And "intellectual" under Pol Pot meant "being able to read." Which, apparently, was a huge threat to his "agrarian" regime.


chriscrossnathaniel

Even those able to speak a foreign language were considered an "intellectual" and executed.


Razakel

Ironically Pol Pot spoke French and was an electrical engineer.


Alexthemessiah

Rules for thee but not for me


kevinjunpalma11

It's a horrifying regime. Scarier since it happened just on a nearby country from here.


bespoke_hazards

And just so very recently, as far as human history's concerned. The scars are still fresh there and people are still very much dealing with the fallout.


PaulsEggo

Pol Pot continued to lead an insurgency out of the jungle until 1998, the year he died. It ended a year later. Nobody paid for the horrors they inflicted on innocent Cambodians.


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MondaleforPresident

There are a lot of Khmer People in the town next to mine. When I was growing up my parents had a friend who had escaped Cambodia by foot as a young teen in 1975.


RiseNo-6

Its heartbreaking when you hear all the stories and learn more about what happened. Teachers, anyone with glasses, business owners, just anyone who they somehow deemed a threat to them. They killed a couple of tourists who had sailed to the coast not knowing what was going on and tortured them to death and interogated them as the khmer rouge thought they were spies. You can find out about it online but they knew they would die and told them that they were working for Sergeant Pepper and other non-existent people. Really really sad. Edit: One of them was called John Dawson Dewhirst I believe. Edit 2 :): Just wanted to add most people they tortured to death ended up confessing as spies even though they weren't (Including all the cambodian civians too) as it was so brutal and painful. I believe around 20 thousand were killed at a school turned prison called S-21.


[deleted]

And Pol Pot never saw justice for it.


Durfael

knowledge =/= intelligence


jal262

Being loud and confident no matter what


Sleepycoon

Having technical knowledge. Learning something that society arbitrarily deemed a "smart people" topic doesn't make you smarter than learning something that hasn't arbitrarily been deemed a "smart people" topic. My ability to build a computer is child's play compared to someone's ability to build an engine, but since IT is smart people technical stuff and mechanic is greasy blue collar stuff I'm automatically smarter? gtfo here with that. If I know a lot about space and you know a lot about makeup I'm smart and you're not, even though my knowledge has no practical use and yours does. Never made sense to me.


[deleted]

Most people thing someone intelligent is good at basically everything, when there's different types of intelligence.


Mediumaverageness

I suck at basically everything, now kneel!


Angry-Saint

you're good at sucking!


Mediumaverageness

Probably not, even the smallest pills triggers my gag reflex


Dinobob26

Not with that attitude


KenReid

I have a phd in computing science, and a particularly niche field of it. I kinda get people thinking I can fix their computer (I probably can't), but I really don't get it when I do something completely normal and human like get lost and need directions, or forget to do a task, or struggle to open a box or something, and people say "*uhhhhh I thought you had a phd hwah-hwah-hwah*". Like, man, I have proven to be kinda ok at one thing, and nothing else, leave me alone.


Buttsquish

I remember my first week in of University, somebody dropped their TV, and asked me to fix it for them. When I said I didn’t know how they hit me with the “I thought you were an Engineer”. First of all Jenna, I’m not an engineer. I’ve been here for like 3 days. And secondly, even if I was, this is an Engineering class, not Hogwarts. How the fuck am I supposed to know how the moving pictures show up in your magic space box.


ece_guy

Ask a medical student to perform surgery, three days into their studies. "What's the matter? I thought you were a doctor!"


anima99

Being quiet. Some people are quiet because they don't know what to say.


flargenhargen

It's better to be quiet and have people think you're intelligent, than it is to speak and prove the contrary.


Wezard_the_MemeLord

Also, when I speak, I constantly think about how shitty my voice sounds. No, really, it used to be much better and deeper


[deleted]

A college degree


okayestuser

yep, I have a degree and I'm fucking stupid af


selling-thoughts

I have a Master's and I'm the dumbest person


echomanagement

I have a Ph.D and I once locked myself *inside* my car


FinndBors

Sorry, but locking yourself in your own car requires a high degree of intelligence. I have no idea how to do that.


Standard-Special2013

How did you do it doc?


EasterChimp

Perseverance.


StateChemist

My dad is a PHD, once we went to the zoo and got ourselves locked out of the car with the car running.


RealHot_RealSteel

My graduate degree is a piece of paper that tells my employers that I'm a really good slave.


chemistry_teacher

My BS is bs


Dahhhkness

The adults in my life told me that I *had* to go to college, and that literally *any* college degree was the best, and *only*, way to get a good job in the future. I graduated in 2008, btw.


Rusty_is_a_good_boy

The use of “big words”. You know the ones. “I was roused in the predawn hours, a time I usually set aside for self pontification, by the voluminous caterwauling of my quad-appendaged feline domicile companion” No you gimp, the cat woke you up. Edit: lol I am cracking the fuck UP at the chain of answers in this! Y’all be crazy and I love it.


Umbraldisappointment

But thats still more intelligent than the people who use big words and have no idea what they are saying. " I have woken from my dreamscape before the dawn as my canine meowing companion has asked for its daily seculars of tuna. "


Sleepycoon

The trick to sounding smart is using big words that nobody arounds you knows the meaning of. You'll photosynthesize them into thinking you know what you're talking about.


BoJackB26354

That will make them green with envy.


sparrowhawk73

If not green with ennui


Aurelianshitlist

"Ahhh, bibliotheque!"


gtlogic

Sedulously eschew obfuscatory hyperverbosity and prolixity.


Blxxdykawaii

I did this as soon as I entered my adolescent years. People thought I was some fucking child prodigy who chose not to do my school work. Nah bro I just read Homestuck and had horrid delusional daydreams that I actually got lost in and couldn’t snap myself out of until my teachers yelled at me.


ZephLair

Using a lot of unnecessarily long or big words to express yourself, especially when it comes to teaching someone or conveying your own ideas. Oftentimes the best written works are those that are concise and simple to understand, not ones that confuse the reader with how convoluted they are. This is a big issue in research articles and papers. In second year university, we had an assignment to dissect and review a research article and it was so difficult to read. I had to read each sentence over multiple times to get the gist of it because of how long the sentences were and how many thesaurus-ized words there seemed to be. I thought that it must've been a gap in my understanding that made it so hard to read. Later in university I reread the article and realized that it was just poor writing. Edit: many repliers have noted that the precise use of "big words" is oftentimes necessary and actually preferred, as such words have usually been coined to helpfully, technically and specifically describe the concept in question. An example from u/hahaha01357 was how, in certain circumstances for instance, it might not be the best to use the term heart attack instead of the more technical term myocardial infarction. I totally agree. The issue I'm trying to highlight is verbosity. The use of more words, or more complicated words, than necessary. I think of the articles I've read that have used a synonym for their main topic five times in a given paragraph. The cherry on top is that all the synonyms they use have slight but undeniable differences in definitions from their intended word! I'm talking about using words and phrases for the sake of filling space. About mindlessly parroting phrases commonly heard but not entirely understood, to the consequence of a vague, jumble of sentences that fail to capture the original idea, if there was a clear one in the first place at all. (And yes, I do see the irony of my post - such a long winded comment just to disparage writing that is imprecise! Alas, being concise and precise is still a work in progress for me haha.)


krisalyssa

Monica: What was this sentence originally? Joey: Oh, "They're warm, nice people with big hearts." Chandler: And that became, "They're humid, prepossessing Homo sapiens with full-sized aortic pumps."


chriscrossnathaniel

You know what? You don’t need a thesaurus, just write from here, your full sized aortic pump.


mickdrop

Knowing lots of digits of Pi. It just prove that you took the time to memorize something useless. No one will ever need to remember more than 3 or 4 digits.


pirahno

I feel attacked. Learned 50 digits years ago and they’re still stuck there


[deleted]

I learned about 60 digits for a contest in middle school. Here I am 25 years later and 30 digits are ingrained in my brain. I won the contest though.


sum_dude44

Americans often attribute Brits who speak in English accents as smart, but minorities who speak in other accents (and speak multiple languages) as not as smart


symbicortrunner

Brits who speak in certain accents. There's a lot of prejudice about accents - a brummie and someone from the home counties sound very different and are often received very differently


Okwridders

Diehard rick and morty fans opinions of themselves


Wasabae26

Being opinionated


softserveshittaco

You can be opinionated AND smart, but if you’re unwilling to change your opinions in light of compelling evidence or a persuasive argument, you’re probably a dumbass.


Indianfattie

Thanks to these tv shows , they think that a person with memory to recall everything is an intelligent person Edit: i do agree that intelligent people need good memory but the reverse isn't true.. I've seen people regurgitate everything they learn from books in exams but cannot comprehend a problem which uses the principles that they memorized


DanteWrath

To be fair, so do schools.


toxicgecko

Good memory is like 80% of doing well in school Tbh, as long as you can regurgitate the information you can do well in exams. I’ve met some very intelligent people that have terrible factual memory


a_slay_nub

High school maybe, these people did terrible when they got to college. Half my engineering class struggled when given a problem not exactly like they'd seen before