Talk:Stupidity
From Academic Kids
Encyclopedia of Stupidity reported on Feedback page of New Scientist Magazine 28-Feb-2004 Stan 00:31, 28 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Ideas taken from amazon review page for the encyclopedia. Stan 13:55, 29 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Is that Bush reference really necessary?Pookleblinky 01:00, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
No, I removed it! --Numerousfalx 02:27, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Paucity of Academic research
This is hardly surprising. I can't imagine any serious minded academic wanting to be Professor of Stupidity, or to be the Stupid Lecturer, or to hold the Stupidity Chair. Similarly, to have a Masters in Pure or Applied Stupidity from a Department of Stupidity Studies (DOSS) would (no matter how many Stupid Seminars one had attended) be unikely to enance one's academic status in an immediately obvious way. Matt Stan 03:06, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Brain Damage?
(I've subordinated this section to the last in part as a suggestion of where the stupidity research is being done.)
I can't help relating stup- to the German "Stoß", which i think means a sharp blow. (The SA "stormtroopers" were the Sturmabteilung", literally "Storm [or Storming] Detatchement"), but i'm pretty sure Remarque (in Three Comrades rather than ...Western Front) used the generic term "Stoßtrup" for what i took to be Weimar-era SA or SA-like stormtroopers engaged in sharp, short street attacks.)
My full-sized print Amer Her Dict traces "stupid" thru Latin words connected with being "stunned" and Greek ones concerning "beat"ing to Proto-Indo-European "steu-" which includes "beating" in its constellation of meanings.
So i think we usually say "stunned" metaphorically, suggesting the (temporary) effects of a blow to the head, and that the concept of stupidity fundamentally evokes the difference in an individual's behavior before and after the infliction of permanent brain damage by a blow to the head. "What are you, stupid?" to me means "Did you get your brains scrambled, and i didn't get to hear about it?"
Not sure that's encyclopedic, but then, i'm not sure the article is any more so. [smile]
--Jerzy(t) 18:47, 2004 Dec 17 (UTC)
To the contributers who add the names of 'stupid' individuals to this article
Adding the names of individuals deemed 'stupid' by the contributer is neither big nor clever. Neither is it particularly original- a quick browse of the change log for this page will show many have done this before. There is no point, as the change will be reverted almost immediately.
Ironically, this is a great way to demonstrate your own 'stupidity' whilst unintentionally bolstering the credibility of those you seek to slander.
