What's the difference between ignorance and stupidity?

Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨hour⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨DarkMayhemXIII@sopuli.xyz⁩ to ⁨[deleted]⁩

Is there really a difference? I feel like if you don’t know something, that kind of makes you stupid, right? If you don’t know historical facts or mathematics—at least the harder stuff, like algebra or calculus—or if you don’t know about advanced political topics, then you’re kind of a stupid person, not just ‘ignorant.’

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Buffalox@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
Ignorance is being uninformed.
Stupidity is to either ignore or not understand or to intentionally stay uninformed.

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AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.world ⁨31⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
Ignorance characterizes knowledge; stupidity characterizes behavior.

You can be ignorant without being stupid and stupid without being ignorant, but they tend to be correlated because avoiding knowledge is stupid behavior.

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DrBob@lemmy.ca ⁨26⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
Ignorance is not knowing. Stupidity is not applying what you know. Think of the friends meme…

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DigDoug@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨hour⁩ ago
Ignorance is not knowing things.

Stupidity is refusing to learn things.

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- Racoonwithbenefits@lemmy.zip ⁨55⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
  Stupidity is also inability to learn
  
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- Venator@lemmy.nz ⁨41⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
  Ignorance can be used to refer to both cases.
  
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  - SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨7⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
    yeah but that’s a phrase not a word: “willful ignorance.”
    
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TheLeadenSea@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨hour⁩ ago
I don’t know and I don’t care

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Janx@piefed.social ⁨57⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
Ignorance is not knowing the words have different definitions. Stupidity is refusing to look up either, and instead crowdsourcing the answer.

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Venator@lemmy.nz ⁨37⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
Ignorant is more specific, only applies when someone doesn’t know or doesn’t want to know something. That can be referred to as stupid, but stupid can also refer to any other kind of stupidity, such as struggling to work out a basic math or logic puzzle, or failing to follow basic instructions.

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Triumph@fedia.io ⁨27⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
Ignorance is an overlapping circle with stupidity. If you are ignorant about something, you do not possess knowledge of it. Perhaps you've not been exposed to the information yet, or aren't old enough to comprehend it. In such cases, you may be ignorant but not stupid.

If you are stupid, you have failed to acquire knowledge that you should have, given your circumstances, or you come to incorrect conclusions based on the correct knowledge you have acquired. In the former case, you are both stupid and ignorant; in the latter, only stupid.

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FreshParsnip@lemmy.ca ⁨54⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
Stupidity isn’t just lack of knowledge, it’s lack of wisdom. Lack of ability to think about your knowledge and apply it

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yesman@lemmy.world ⁨55⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
We are all ignorant, stupid.

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je_skirata@lemmy.today ⁨1⁩ ⁨hour⁩ ago
Ignorance is not knowing something. Stupidity is knowing something and acting like you don’t.

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