The IIS

Intelligence is learning what you can and making use of it. Ignorance is ignoring what you don't want to know.

As much as our friends would judge that we who agree with them are intelligent and those who think otherwise are ignorant, nobody is simply one or the other. Let's call it the ignorance-intelligence spectrum, IIS.

The IIS is not just another number like the IQ; our brains are too slippery to be pinned down by a score on a quiz. Position on the IIS depends on such weighty factors as who contributed to our genome, birth order among siblings, what we got from Mrs Jones who taught grade five, and whether we play football. Also relevant are more fluid circumstances like our tax bracket, how much sleep we got last night, who we are talking to, the topic under discussion, what we had for lunch, how close it is to quitting time, whether we watch The Big Bang Theory or Jeopardy, and everything else. 

You are both a genius and a turnip and so was Einstein and so am I; and while we are here, we are wandering back and forth along the IIS all day every day. Let nobody claim the high ground. 

Now that I think of it, which end of this spectrum is high? 

Fable
Some camel driver, maybe 2,783 years ago or so, had the strange thought that knowing things might be dangerous. He put that in a story and told it to his kids who had no idea what he was getting at. Their kids, who didn't get it either, kept on finding things out that were more or less useful. They remembered the useful things and ignored things they didn't want to know. Recently, their progeny traded in camels for SUVs, and that was the beginning of the end. 

Moral
If we had stuck with camels, we wouldn't be facing the sixth mass extinction. Because we evolved with big heads, we are on the IIS and it will be the end of us. Can't help it. It's evolution. 

Those who live by what they know will die by what they know or maybe what they ignored.

I'll think more about it and write it up next time. If you don't want to know this stuff, you may ignore what I write. Your IIS, your choice.