The one thing I would say is that I think intelligence is a tool and not a virtue. It's not as simple as either having intelligence or not having it, and a person's worth, morally and spiritually, doesn't scale linearly with an IQ graph. The bell curve meme is accurate-ish but I think it goes deeper than that (ie. you're not automatically an insufferable twat just because you're a midwit).
This seems like an overly obvious thing to say, yet at the same time I think a lot of people (irl, not necessarily on this forum) act like the ultimate goal of life is to prove you're smarter than everyone around you and that there's some innate moral value to clawing your way up the ladder of intellect. The important thing is not just to have intelligence and show it off but to do something with it that amplifies your value system.
'If only I could understand absolutely everything that was going on right now and completely destroy my enemies with facts and logic!' - noble human qualities like humility can teach you the former is impossible and remind you that the latter is important not because your enemies are dumb, but because they're evil, which is not the same thing. Evil being dumb is good because it suggests an easier win, but make that association too much and you fall in the trap of always thinking 'my enemies are dumber than me' and also 'smart must be good'.
The one thing I would say is that I think intelligence is a tool and not a virtue. It's not as simple as either having intelligence or not having it, and a person's worth, morally and spiritually, doesn't scale linearly with an IQ graph. The bell curve meme is accurate-ish but I think it goes deeper than that (ie. you're not automatically an insufferable twat just because you're a midwit).
This seems like an overly obvious thing to say, yet at the same time I think a lot of people (irl, not necessarily on this forum) act like the ultimate goal of life is to prove you're smarter than everyone around you and that there's some innate moral value to clawing your way up the ladder of intellect. The important thing is not just to have intelligence and show it off but to do something with it that amplifies your value system.
'If only I could understand absolutely everything that was going on right now and completely destroy my enemies with facts and logic!' - noble human qualities like humility can teach you the former is impossible and remind you that the latter is important not because your enemies are dumb, but because they're evil, which is not the same thing. Evil being dumb is good because it suggests an easier win, but make that association too much and you fall in the trap of always thinking 'my enemies are dumber than me' and also 'smart must be good'.