I'm an idiot

[Hawkflyer]

Re: I\'m an idiot

Yea! You guys have the idea. The point is that poor Trev here, while certainly a normal human, subject to the occasional mistake, clearly doesn't qualify as an idiot. He's paying attention, and learning from his mistakes. Moreover, he's trying to help others with less experiance by sharing the details in a public forum.

Ignorant people and idiots would never do this. Ignorant people have no interest in learning, ergo they are not interested in teaching. Idiots spend a lot of their time denying that what they do is not too bright, and so have no reason to admit that they made a mistake./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

 

[Gary_in_Indiana]

Re: I\'m an idiot

<font color=blue>"Ignorant people have no interest in learning"</font color=blue>

Hawk, I'll have to disagree with you on that point. Ignorant people are simply lacking knowledge of a subject or are unaware or uninformed of something. It doesn't in any way mean they lack intelligence or a desire to learn.

For example, I am ignorant of welding. I know nothing about it. I've never done it. I've never really seen it done. I do, however, have a desire to learn about welding and to become somewhat proficient at the very basics at least. I feel no shame about my ignorance of welding nor do I believe I should. I've never been exposed to it and, until recently, never felt I had a real need to know about it.

I would guess that there are topics or areas of human knowledge about which I would be considered somewhat knowledgeable about which you would be considered ignorant. Again, there's nothing wrong with that. It probably just represents a difference in backgrounds, educations and experiences.

In essence, in most instances, ignorance can be cured by education, exposure and experience while stupidity can "overcome" all of those things. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[Hawkflyer]

Re: I\'m an idiot

I would agree with everything you said up to a point. /w3tcompact/icons/hmm.gif

While ignorance CAN be cured with knowledge (and stupid is forever), there is a big difference between not know something and wanting to know it, and not knowing something and being willing to learn it. In other words, lots of intelligent people want to know but are unwilling to go through the process of learning./w3tcompact/icons/eyes.gif

You are also quite correct on another point, I don't have all the answers on anything. In fact, I have very few answers on most things. Now, I have a pretty high IQ but I view that like a fuel tank. The tank might have a capacity of 50 gallons but it is empty. Mine is not empty but I do run the engine out of the bottom half of the tank most of the time./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

Just remember a liberal arts student studies until he knows nothing about everything, and a physicist studies until he knows everything about nothing./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

 

[Gary_in_Indiana]

Re: I\'m an idiot

Well, again using myself as an example of ignorance here, I'll give an example of that, too. I an ignorant of how to play the piano. I think it would be neat to know how to play it and wish I did know. My desire is not great enough, however, for me to go out and take lessons and spend the time and effort it would take to learn. It's just not that important to me.

In this instance, I'm ignorant and choose to remain so. In the example of welding, I'm also ignorant but willing to spend the time and effort to learn. The opportunity cost of learning welding might be the time it would take me to learn to play the piano. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[OverlyRun]

Re: I\'m an idiot

Is it a blooper if you can fix the problem with the same tractor that caused it?

In parking the tractor I nudged a barn post off its footing. Though the front roof sagged it didn't collapse. FEL had just enough height to it to push the beam up to level and permit kicking the post back onto the footing. No one was looking...if they had been: "Just practicing with the tractor, dear."