On intelligence and ignorance.

I read this excerpt about how many not-so-intelligent people seem to have one particular trait: confidence. Now, I know from experience that when we're young, we tend to be exuberantly confident about ourselves, and that as we get older and gain more experience, we tend to realize that, in fact, we barely know much about the world, the universe and ourselves. Self-awareness is a good thing, right?

But have you ever noticed that, when you look all around you, regardless of age, there are people who simply have impeccable confidence about their intelligence, looks, and personality? Looking through the Craigslist classifieds, how often do you find some hideous person exclaiming that they're beautiful and/or sexy? Why do people have to point out that they're intelligent? Are they afraid that those of us who are intelligent won't be able to discern them from their style of writing, their grammar and their vocabulary?

In fact, if I see ads with keywords, "intelligent", "beautiful" and "great personality", I consider them as markers for people who are in fact, unintelligent, grotesque and bland. (So judgmental, I am!)

Now of course, what I'm talking about isn't exactly what the article is referring to, because what I'm describing is more likely a sign of a lack of confidence, exhibited by outward proclamations of intelligence, beauty and personality. Nonetheless, extremely confident people always freak me out, because there are a lot of downsides to that confidence.

And so do people who drive expensive cars that live in low-income housing. That's another dichotomy.