Stupid is as Stupid Does

To begin with let’s look at what some of the great minds had to say about human stupidity.

Albert Einstein: “Great ideas often receive violent opposition from mediocre minds.”

Albert Einstein: “Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.”

Aldous Huxley: “At least two thirds of our miseries spring from human stupidity”.

Konrad Adenauer: “In view of the fact that God limited the intelligence of man, it seems unfair that he did not also limit his stupidity.”

Voltaire: “The only way to comprehend what mathematicians mean by Infinity is to contemplate the extent of human stupidity.”

Frank Zappa: “There is more stupidity than hydrogen in the universe, and it has a longer shelf life.”

George Bernard Shaw: “When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares that it is his duty.”

Why did these famous individuals take time to comment on human stupidity?
My belief is because stupidity is everywhere and so are stupids. The proverb “Every village has its stupids” reemphasizes that wherever you go you will find them.
Like entropy stupidity in the universe must only be increasing.

You must have heard the saying “If you want something to be done right, do it yourself”. Atleast I have. If the job lands in the hands of a moron it could be messed-up big time.

When I was in class 7 our Hindi teacher gave us homework to write an essay on the theme “Samudra kinare pe ek ghanta”. Students wrote about collecting sea-shells, playing football, a picnic and similar events on the beach. One student was confused; ‘ghanta’ meant ‘an hour’ or ‘a bell’. He wrote about himself finding a bell on the beach. The teacher read out his submission and the entire class had a riot. This incident became so popular that students teased him ‘ghanta’, and eventually that became his nickname. Even today my schoolmates say on the phone, “Can I speak to ghanta?”

During my college days once we had a group assignment to solve a crossword. The class was divided into 8 teams. Students got busy discussing, arguing, thinking, and searching clues on notebooks and on the net. A teammate who set behind me kept bothering the rest of us, “What does (5,3) mean”, “What is 11 down?”, “5 across?”, “What’s 2 down?”, “Do you know 10 across?”. He did this the entire 15mins that my team took to solve the puzzle; irritating and disturbing our concentration. We lost time and were the 4th to finish.

A friend of mine once told me about one of his project meetings. A lady was told to program the ‘user registration’ module and submit it fully tested. When asked why the module allowed more than 1 user to take the same username she argued that when the passwords are different there is no need for checking for same username. She spent the next 10mins explaining how the probability of two users having the same password is microscopic.

A TV news report said that farmers in a remote village in Maharastra suspected the newly installed windmills for lack of rainfall. An opposition MLA was shown saying that the rains had reduced since the installation of the windmill, the windmills must be driving the clouds away.
Some individuals choose to act stupid.

The ‘Ergonomics and Economics 2007’ report prepared by Pitu labs says that in software industry each high performing developer spends 20% of his office-time in arguments with stupids; making them understand concepts or correcting their mistakes. The report further says that 45% of the project maintenance is fixing defects.

Don’t you wonder how come stupids reach universities or find jobs?
There must be some stupids already in the government agencies, HR departments of private companies and in universities who recruit or accept new stupids in their organizations. This way the cycle continues.

When smart people are busy finding solutions to problems and working effectively, stupids are engaged in finding shortcuts to the top. Most of them eventually get into politics and rule us. This explains the current state-of-affairs and the reason why governments can’t set things right.

Is case of ambiguity a stupid will choose the most incorrect, meaningless and unsafe option. And usually he/she would do this after hours of senseless thinking and useless analysis.

Discussing stupidity or mocking at stupids over the coffee table could be fun; but imagine the catastrophe that could occur due to stupid action at a nuclear power station, active war zone, submarine, construction site or a mine. Actually difficult to imagine, because stupids often cross all limits to do the unthinkable.

We have all behaved stupid at some time or the other. This may happen due to ignorance, lack of alertness, or sheer bad luck; but for some individuals stupidity is the way of life.

It’s possible to make a thing fool-proof but not stupid-proof.