This was very interesting. I enjoyed reading it too.
My initial thought about the difference between wisdom and intelligence, argued in Is it worth being wise? is that they're just compartments of the same thing. Words. Probably found in the same paragraph in any thesaurus. Splitting hairs.
Smart vs wise.
I agree with your take on wisdom, @hr1 . Wisdom is distilled knowledge, born from experience. After spending a lot of time with much older people, I learned that time doesn't equal wisdom. Plenty of dumb old people. Reading 'wisdom' memes doesn't imbibe you with wisdom either. I'd add that wisdom isn't always about making the right choice. It can be about considering and understanding, not necessarily linked to actions or choices. Not necessarily with a goal in mind.
Smarts or intelligence: if you look at 'street smart' this is about distilled knowledge and experience applied to real life.
Whereas a few years ago I read an interview with a mathematician who said that most nights he went to bed discontented, feeling he hadn't made enough progress. … Is the mathematician a small man because he's discontented? No; he's just doing a kind of work that wasn't very common in Confucius's day.
This sounds more like neurosis to me. I don't think it's to do with variations in employment.
I disagree with Paul Graham about the path to wisdom being through discipline. I think you distill information, store it. When new or conflicting info comes along, you consider it alongside all the stuff you've stored. Then you calibrate everything as a whole. This is continuous.
Half of his physicists are on Prozac. Lol. Half of everybody's on Prozac! Them's the times we're in. Big Pharma's eating everyone.
Thanks. It was interesting to chew over these matters.
PS I know I'm late to the party but it was just too juicy to not say anything. Thanks for posting it.
It's funny, I wanted to respond about discipline being an important aspect for gaining wisdom by citing Confucius, which went in my head as:
And I was interpreting the 'limitation' as purposeful limitation of own actions, which I think of as discipline. Of course it didn't quite make sense to me for it to be the 'easiest' option. But if you think about it, forbidding yourself some actions does make your life easier, as you don't need to consider them anymore.
Anyway, I've just found out the quote goes in fact like this:
Anyway thank you for joining in! I think it's never too late to discuss things that matter. Hope to read your thoughts on my future posts as well..
LOL ahahahah I'm glad you found the real quote. I'd have tortured myself with considering 'limitation'. But isn't it interesting how we can throw 'limitation' in with everything and make it fit the model. Humans: we gotta make everything make sense somehow. We love our patterns. You may have taken philosophy in a new direction. Confucius who? HR1's in town now :D
You'll deffo see me in your future posts. I'm into all this type of thing. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. And thanks for the lovely upvote too.
@Hr1 and @anjkara, my name is Lori. ✨I am amazed.
I find this interesting and yet... very heavy with truth. It is an incredible lesson in the word-fumble between limitation and immitation.
I think that is strikingly fitting to a fundamental irony in humanity.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ What I mean is, if we enjoy an activity very much, it often times is something we ought not to do too much- like eating a donut or sleeping.
What is it with humanity that restricts the pleasures and freely delivers all the hard tasks in abundance? Challenges are all around.
Actually... if things are overly abundant they become less pleasurable I guess.
Rarity is a feature that adds value to a pleasure. It’s odd that we are like this and it seems like a form of self - cruelty. After all, if we are always more interested in the things that we don’t yet have, are we able to truly enjoy the moment that is happening now? I wonder how difficult it would be to change these patterns of thinking. It might not be an instinctual activity. I think we might be trained to think this way by our collective, silly society. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Great post!, I am glad I tracked it down through your comment feed hr1. Thanks for the support and I am really enjoying all the great content here on steemit! Happy to be a new member of the family. I believe wisdom and intelligence come from a love and devotion to your craft. I never went to college but have fallen deep for my passions and have grown very wise through making mistakes. Great article and thanks again bud!
Lol Prozac.
Wonder what confucius wood thank about that. or um maybe im just comfused...
ROFL
sorry had to, after reading first reply...but i think you nailed it
@anjkara you are very wise and kind.
thanks for the knowledge +1