The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity
by Carlo M. Cipolla
30 popular highlights from this book
Key Insights & Memorable Quotes
Below are the most popular and impactful highlights and quotes from The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity:
“A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.”
“El pueblo vikingo, aunque primitivo, era en algunos aspectos bastante desarrollado. Un antropólogo norteamericano logró calcular el rotated factor index del desarrollo sociocultural de algunos pueblos primitivos. El rotated factor index para los vikingos es de 1,60, mientras que es de 1,73 para los aztecas, 0,99 para los hotentotes, 0,89 para los mafulu, 0,44 para los bosquimanos y 0,28 para los esquimales. Lo que pueda ser exactamente el "rotated factor index" sólo lo sabe el antropólogo norteamericano que lo ha inventado.”
“Essentially stupid people are dangerous and damaging because reasonable people find it difficult to imagine and understand unreasonable behaviour.”
“Third basic law of human stupidity: A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring loss.”
“An intelligent person may understand the logic of a bandit. The bandit’s actions follow a pattern of rationality: nasty rationality, if you like, but still rationality. You can foresee a bandit’s actions, his nasty maneuvers, and ugly aspirations, and often can build up your defenses. A stupid creature will harass you for no reason, for no advantage, without any plan or scheme and at the most improbable times and places. You have no rational way of telling if and when and how and why the stupid creature attacks. When confronted with a stupid individual you are completely at his mercy. The fact that the activity and movements of a stupid creature are absolutely erratic and irrational not only makes defense problematic but it also makes any counterattack extremely difficult—like trying to shoot at an object that is capable of the most improbable and unimaginable movements.”
“The Second law of human stupidity: The probability that a certain person be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person”
“Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.”
“Individuals are characterized by different degrees of propensity to socialize. There are individuals for whom any contact with other individuals is a painful necessity. They literally have to put up with people, and people have to put up with them. At the other extreme of the spectrum there are individuals who absolutely cannot live by themselves and are even ready to spend time in the company of people whom they do not really like rather than be alone. Between these two extremes, there is an extreme variety of conditions, although by far the greatest majority of people are closer to the type who cannot face loneliness than to the type who has no taste for human intercourse.”
“Perdida ya toda esperanza de alcanzar una vida mejor en este mundo, la gente fue depositando cada vez más sus esperanzas en la vida del más allá, y la idea de obtener recompensas en el cielo la ayudó a soportar la falta de pimienta en esta tierra.”
“Their failure is just another expression of their helplessness”
“reasonable people have difficulty conceiving and understanding unreasonable behavior.”
“Within a democratic system, general elections are a most effective instrument to insure the steady maintenance of fraction σ among the powerful. One has to keep in mind that according to the Second Basic Law, the fraction σ of the voting population are stupid people and elections offer to all of them at once a magnificent opportunity to harm everybody else without gaining anything from their action. They do so by contributing to the maintenance of the σ level among those in power.”
“La Prima Legge Fondamentale della stupidità umana asserisce senza ambiguità di sorta che:Sempre ed inevitabilmente ognuno di noi sottovaluta il numero di individui stupidi in circolazione.”
“Pur non potendo fornire cifre precise al riguardo, possiamo affermare che nel 1347 c’erano in Europa occidentale molti più ratti e più pulci di quanto comunemente si crede.”
“If you lose we will be equals and stay friends forever, and if you win you'll take my precious blue flower as a prize and we stay friends forever. How lucky you are!”
“We all recollect occasions in which a fellow took an action that resulted in his gain and in our loss: we had to deal with a bandit. We also recollect cases in which a fellow took an action that resulted in his loss and in our gain: we had to deal with a helpless person.* We can recollect cases in which a fellow took an action by which both parties gained: he was intelligent. Such cases do indeed occur. But upon thoughtful reflection you must admit that these are not the events that punctuate most frequently our daily life. Our daily life is mostly made up of cases in which we lose money and/or time and/or energy and/or appetite, cheerfulness, and good health because of the improbable action of some preposterous creature who has nothing to gain and indeed gains nothing from causing us embarrassment, difficulties or harm. Nobody knows, understands, or can possibly explain why that preposterous creature does what he does. In fact there is no explanation—or better, there is only one explanation: the person in question is stupid.”
“L'umorismo va distinto dall'ironia. ando si fa dell'ironia si ride degli altri. ando si fa dell'umorismo si ride con gli altri. L'ironia ingenera tensioni e conflii. L'umorismo quando usato nella misura giusta e nel momento giusto (e se non è usato nella misura giusta e nel momento giusto non è umorismo) è il solvente per eccellenza per sgonfiare tensioni, risolvere situazioni altrimenti penose, facilitare rapporti e relazioni umane.”
“A Primeira Lei Fundamental da Estupidez Humana afirma, sem ambiguidade, que «inevitavelmente, toda a gente subestima sempre o número de indivíduos estúpidos em circulação.»”
“Quer se pertença ao tipo eremita ou ao tipo social, todos lidamos com pessoas, ainda que com intensidades diferentes. Até os eremitas se encontram ocasionalmente com pessoas. Além disso, um indivíduo afeta os seres humanos também ao evitá-los. Aquilo que eu poderia ter feito por um indivíduo ou por um grupo mas não fiz é uma oportunidade-custo (i.e., um ganho perdido ou uma perda) para essa pessoa ou esse grupo em particular. A moral da história é que cada um de nós tem um equilíbrio atual com todos os demais.”
“The damaging potential of the stupid person depends on two major factors. First of all, it depends on the genetic factor. Some individuals inherit exceptional doses of the gene of stupidity and by virtue of inheritance they belong from birth to the elite of their group. The second factor that determines the potential of a stupid person is related to the position of power and consequence that he occupies in society. Among bureaucrats, generals, politicians, and heads of state one has little difficulty in finding clear examples of basically stupid individuals whose damaging capacity was (or is) alarmingly enhanced by the position of power that they occupied (or occupy). Religious dignitaries should not be overlooked.”
“The perfect bandit is one who, with his actions, causes to other individuals losses equal to his gains. The crudest type of banditry is theft. A person who robs you of 100 dollars without causing you an extra loss or harm is a perfect bandit: you lose 100 dollars, he gains 100 pounds.”
“Most people do not act consistently. Under certain circumstances a given person acts intelligently and under different circumstances the same person will act helplessly. The only important exception to the rule is represented by the stupid people, who normally show a strong proclivity toward perfect consistency in all fields of human endeavors.”
“The first basic law of human stupidity asserts without ambiguity that: Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation. At first, the statement sounds trivial, vague and horribly ungenerous. Closer scrutiny will however reveal its realistic veracity. No matter how high are one's estimates of human stupidity, one is repeatedly and recurrently startled by the fact that: a) people whom one had once judged rational and intelligent turn out to be unashamedly stupid.b) day after day, with unceasing monotony, one is harassed in one's activities by stupid individuals who appear suddenly and unexpectedly in the most inconvenient places and at the most improbable moments.The First Basic Law prevents me from attributing a specific numerical value to the fraction of stupid people within the total population: any numerical estimate would turn out to be an underestimate.”
“Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.’fn1”
“A questo punto, a costo di interrompere il filo del discorso, viene spontaneo un contro tra il destino dell’Inghilterra e quello dell’Italia. L’Inghilterra si ritrovò tra le mani ottima lana quando (nel Medioevo) la lana era la materia prima più ricercata; si ritrovò tra le mani ottimo ed abbondante carbone quando (ai tempi della Rivoluzione Industriale) la materia prima più preziosa era il carbone; e si ritrovò tra le mani il petrolio del mre del Nord quando (ai giorni nostri) il petrolio divenne la fonte di energia più usata nell’attività produttiva. In contrasto l’Italia ebbe poca e grama lana nel Medioevo, pochissimo e gramissimo carbone nella Rivoluzione Industriale, e pochissimo e gramissimo petrolio nell’epoca corrente: in compenso ebbe sempre abbondanza di marmo che usò soprattutto per adornare chiese ed erigere monumenti funerari nei cimiteri.”
“Jotkut saavat perimässä poikkeuksellisen paljon typeryysgeenejä ja kuuluvat näin ollen syntymästään lähtien typerysten eliittiin.”
“Olen tutkinut asiaa useamman vuoden, ja havaintojeni perusteella uskon vakaasti, että ihmiset eivät ole tasa-arvoisia, jotkut ovat typeryksiä ja toiset eivät ja että sen määrää luonto eivätkä kulttuuriset tekijät.”
“Humor dagegen ist, sofern er in der richtigen Dosierung zum richtigen Zeitpunkt angewandt wird (wenn das nicht der Fall ist, handelt es sich nicht um Humor), ein Wundermittel, mit dem Spannungen abgebaut, unangenehme Situationen entkrampft und menschliche Beziehungen oder Verhältnisse erträglicher gemacht werden können.Ich bin daher der festen Überzeugung, dass es eine gesellschaftliche Pflicht ist, Humor anzuwenden, wann immer sich eine Gelegenheit dazu bietet. Keine derartige Gelegenheit darf verlorengehen.”
“one is impressed by the fact that any country moving uphill has its unavoidable σ fraction of stupid people. However, the country moving uphill also has an unusually high fraction of intelligent people who manage to keep the σ fraction at bay and at the same time produce enough gains for themselves and the other members of the community to make progress a certainty. In a country that is moving downhill, the fraction of stupid people is still equal to σ; however, in the remaining population one notices among those in power an alarming proliferation of the bandits with overtones of stupidity (subarea BS of quadrant B in figure 3) and among those not in power an equally alarming growth in the number of helpless individuals (area H in the basic graph, figure 1). Such change in the composition of the non-stupid population inevitably strengthens the destructive power of the σ fraction and makes decline a certainty. And the country goes to Hell.”
“Whether you move in distinguished circles or you take refuge among the head-hunters of Polynesia, whether you lock yourself into a monastery or decide to spend the rest of your life in the company of beautiful and lascivious women, you always have to face the same percentage of stupid people – which percentage (in accordance with the First Law) will always surpass your expectations.”
