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Yes: Con-artists are intelligent. Washington lobbyists are intelligent.
Outside of capitalism, gang leaders are intelligent, priest-kings are intelligent.
Intelligence is generally helpful.
If you stab your partner in the back and take his half, some could say you were “smarter” than him, but I dont see that as “being smart” I see it as being “ruthless”. You could define who ever wins the backstabbing contest as “the smartest”, but its not always a strategical win like in a game of chess, but rather who was the best liar.
My main argument is that most people conflate being a psychopath with being intelligent because they’re successful. I assert If these successful psychopaths took intelligence tests with the people they stabbed in the back, they would not always be the smartest.
My fist point was that capitalism often favors con-artists and lobbyists.
which I agree with. I’m just pointing out that you could define intelligence as “being good at capitalism”, and arguing that its really the same as “being good at deceiving people”, and suggesting its different than intelligence, or that intelligence is a broader term.
Ok. This post is confusing. Since you made the post, I thought that the title was your assertion “Capitalism Favors Intelligence”, but it seems like you actually reject that assertion.
yup
Disagree
Elon musk is a great example of how this is not true. The media portrays him as some genius but many of his ideas are incredibly dumb. He grew up in a rich family that exploited apartheid South Africa and got lucky and even richer off the intelligence and hard work of other people at pay pal. was replaced as CEO of what became pay pal after only 2 years, but his shares skyrocketed in value. He passes off ridiculous ideas like the “hyperloop” and “rockets replacing airplanes” and the media eats it up. In reality, high-school math and basic engineering can prove they’re impractical. Simply, he got to where he is from inheritance and luck.
I’m not claiming to be smarter than the engineers at Tesla or Spacex, rather I believe they know to keep their mouth shut about the bosses dumb ideas. By firing anyone who is not a “yes man” Elon has created an environment where noone challenges him. Additionally the media will uncritically praise his dumb ideas because they want to be seen as relevant and perpetuate the idea that “rich people are smart” because rich people own the media companies and it helps them hold their position. Watch how this newsperson salivates over what is an extremely underwhelming tunnel.
Also, Elon is a bald face liar. He said all of the houses in solar city, had the new solar roofs, in reality only one did and the rest were mock ups. He’s claimed “full self driving” was a couple years away ten years ago! when in reality it no where near working even today, and is probably another decade or more away from reality. Almost everything he says is a lie or streched truth, but noone seems to mind when his ideas are proven impractical.
He is just one particularly egregious example, but It highlights the flaws with the idea that “capitalism favors intelligence”. In reality, having no morals allows buisnessmen to lie cheat and steal without consequence. A dumb psychopath has an easier time becoming a billionaire than a smart person with empathy. Capitalism often favors psychopathy.
This sounds a bit like more or a criticism of Elon musk than a argument against capitalism favoring Intelligence.
Him benefiting from his parents wealth was obviously the most important factor in him finding success. Same with Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerturd and Bill Gates. None of them were poor. And that is a fair criticism.
Likewise in communist countries like North Korea the status and wealth in society is largely determined by family ties. The families that helped the communist revolution are still in a higher caste than those that did not.
Intelligence has many forms, social, mathematical, musical but intelligence to solve problems will certainly help in a capitalistic system.
In capitalism if you have 10 dollars you can spend that money how ever you want. After your needs are met you then have a surplus to decide on. Whether you decide to invest it or spend it on prostitutes takes a certain level of intelligence. An intelligent person may spend 5$ on rent, 2$ on food, pirate a movie for free and then 3$ on bitcoin. That bitcoin will double in 2 to five years. A unintelligent person may spend 5$ on food, 5$ on a good time and get evicted for not paying their rent.
If you chose to spend it on drugs, removed, or a Disney plus membership instead of something that has a proven track record of growth like bitcoin or a stock index that in my mind is at-least some proof of lower intelligence.
Elon musk is really good at marketing. Similar to trump. Probably why they both liked twitter so much. I would not trust him to solve a engineering problem but I would trust him to hype it up to get funding and maybe managing people I guess. That is a form of intelligence.
It’s also fair that to say capitalism devolves into basically monarchies that need to be toppled from time to time. Because wealth creates wealth there comes a point where you cannot justify access wealth with competence alone and maybe a cap on ownership at the extremes is helpful.
I agree that its not a full argument, but an example. I also agree that there are different types of intelligence.
I agree, and think this is because they are very proficient liars that tell people what they want to hear. Psychopaths lack empathy and that allows them to lie without internal consequences. I see how deception could be its own kind of intelligence. Since nether of those people are smart in any way other than in deception, I don’t really credit them as being smart. I would rather say they are ambitious and deceptive.
Yup, free-market capitalism doesn’t “just work” out of the box. It favors wealth over intelligence.
I would agree that pretty much everyone who works in Marketing or HR are Psychopaths.
What’s the point of posting a thesis if you’re going to immediately argue against it? I haven’t seen anyone really arguing that capitalism favors intelligence, at least not in the sense you’re arguing against. Capitalism favors efficiency, or rather it favors nothing, it’s just that with relatively unconstrained conditions for competition those who are more efficient tend to survive. You clearly have an axe to grind against Musk, so why not post an opening statement against that guy in particular, instead of what is effectively a strawman against capitalism as a whole.
https://gtio.io/post/105/comment/49
How is it a strawman? It’s a case-study.
Capitalism is just the economic system. What about it would lead it to ‘favor intelligence’?
I think it is clear historically it favors nepotism and exploits intelligent people, such as Nikola Tesla as a classic example. To climb to the top of capitalism takes some cunning, but I believe that’s a different concept to favoring intelligence. Intelligent people are frequently kept down by capitalism, especially those who want to act in public benefit rather than personal benefit.
Exactly capitalists exploit the intelligent people.
And today in America a months supply can cost upward of $1,500 dollars. Capitalism doesn’t reward intelligence, it rewards greed.
from: https://www.t1international.com/100years/