Comment on Iran's shitposts were obliterated, too!
whotookkarl@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 days agoAl Capone was very successful at running blackmail and intimidation rackets despite being mentally well below average. It doesn’t take intelligence to do what maga does, that’s kinda the point why they do it because it’s the only way they’ve seen how to accumulate power that doesn’t require intelligence or at least good prediction models.
TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world 4 days ago
The mainstream should re-think what intelligence is because experts already said there are different types of intelligence. Are math prodigies with autism not intelligent? Are biologists dumb for struggling with quantum physics? That said, someone who may be unempathetic and lack emotional intelligence may have high intelligence on how to persuade and manipulate others. Many would call this Machiavellian (although personally, I don’t see Machiavellianism as inherently bad). It takes certain skill and intelligence to become a mob boss despite doing poorly in school, or even a leader of a country.
A lot on Lemmy scoffed it when I said Trump and other dictators are not as dumb as they might seem to be, because they ended up in charge, not someone on Lemmy with PhD. It possesses a certain kind of intelligence to be a demagogue and take power.
Hapankaali@lemmy.world 3 days ago
On the one hand, I think it is true that a certain kind of skill is required to read and manipulate people - the same kind of skill a conman or used car salesman needs to do their work, and that kind of skill obviously doesn’t need knowledge of quantum physics or even a rudimentary understanding of how the world in general works.
On the other hand, one shouldn’t give people like Trump, Berlusconi and Idi Amin too much credit. They ended up where they did largely due to historical happenstance, and millions of other conmen and used car salespeople stayed small-time.
TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Putin wasn’t the only KGB colonel before he became the president of Russia. He had peers and were given equal footing as him. But he had proven to be more cunning and ruthless than them so he gained power.
There are those who started from the bottom, quite literally. Stalin was a pure thug who robbed banks for the Bolsheviks. He was also ridiculed for being intellectually inferior on the communist theory, especially by Lenin. And well, who lived until the ripe old age of 70, while the other was murdered in cold blood with an icepick?
I neglected to mention before and what I’m trying to say now, is to not underestimate the opponent. Once the person underestimates the opponent, is when that person loses. It’s the basic of art of war. I’m gonna be blunt, who is dumber? The person whose social security details were robbed in broad daylight, and that data is sold and fed to the private digital surveillance to train AI? It’s certainly not the dumb ketamine addicted CEO of a conglomerate of grifting companies, nor the dumb orange president who could push the red button at any notice. To think you and I are not dumb, whose details were already put into surveillance AI, are wishful thinking and coping.
Never underestimate the opposition.
Hapankaali@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Putin isn’t in the category I mentioned. Even so, Putin rapidly rose up the political ranks and in the chaos of the later Yeltsin presidency ended up prime minister largely by chance.
The numbers don’t add up. Suppose there are a million savvy conmen. How can they all become major players on the international business and political scene? There just aren’t enough of those positions.
Elon Musk started with a heap of money (as did Trump), in an oligarchic system heavily favouring those with money.
Not Lenin, who died of an unknown illness. I think you mean Trotsky.
My opposition, personally? That would be practically all politicians, ideologically, to some degree or other. I am not a member of any political organization.
One should also not overestimate them.