Thursday, July 19, 2012

The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity

0.
There is no upper bound on the amount of stupidity that can exist within any particular individual.

I.
We always underestimate the number of stupid individuals in circulation.

II.
The probability of a person being stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.

III.
A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons, without any advantage accruing to himself- even possibly incurring losses of his own.

IV.
Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. They constantly forget that at any moment and under any circumstances to deal and/or associate with stupid people invariably constitutes a costly mistake.

V.
A stupid person is the most dangerous person in existence.

from The Power of Stupidity by Giancarlo Livraghi