I have seen this phenomenon referred to as Tall Poppy Syndrome. Anyone who stands head and shoulders above his peers gets his head chopped off, so to speak, to make everyone even. Apparently, this attitude is very prevalent in Canada and Australia, even more so than in the United States.
Nothing proved that more than the propaganda hurricane that supported the covid vaccine. I could not convince my own wife nor my adult children to resist the pressure. Even now with several friends dead or dying and my own wife with cancer, they still trust the damned doctors rather than me. It is truly an amazing phenomenon. Go along to get along. Don't rock the boat. Don't stand out.
As someone with extremely high level of disagreeableness that didn't internalize this lesson in my 20s and 30s, that ignorance cost me millions of dollars in forsaken income, ownership stakes in lucrative businesses and mentors. An expensive lesson.
Upvoted because this opens an intriguing box of thought experiments, and on first read, the correlations you point out make sense. But hedged because I think there are an equal number of confounding variables.
Just one that came to mind is that athletes, whether in team sports or as individuals, are in a competitive social context. But athletes might not be the best analogy for those who score high on standardized intelligence tests.
Intellectual influencers are often in a competitive publish-or-perish context. But at their best, I am guessing they are more in a collaborative problem solving context, part of a community defined by a common goal. Teasing skills for abstract reasoning from social contexts ... ugh. I'd be sweating, squirming, and probably fuding the stats if tasked to address that with a quantitative study.
A qualitative study might be more appropriate ... or better yet, extending that initial insight into a diary, short story, or another work of art. Intriguing.
From my experience, those in the "publish-or-perish" arena are often midwits who fancy themselves geniuses but too insecure/insufficiently talented to simply strike out on their own or come up with something truly innovative. Apex men rarely fit into tiny academic silos created (and administered) by lesser men.
We might be comparing apples to oranges. From anecdotal experience, I've found only a handful of people I would classify as 'apex' enough to allow myself to become their student in the broadest sense of the term ... and I would say authentic compassion is one of the qualities they have in common. Many more others might be similarly accomplished by professional standards, but if I don't find something in them to respect first as fellow humans, I dismiss as "semmon baka" (Japanese for 'specialized idiots') ... merely serving a bureaucratic or symbolic place-holder role in a provisional social hierarchy. On the other hand, from such people's perspective, my opinion is of no consequence. "Care" for we lesser mortals does not hold a high place in their hierarchy of values.
Your original comment would be interpreted in a variety of different ways so I responded to the perspective I was imagining you were taking. This clarification helps.
If you are at, say, the 150IQ+ level, you are literally you are one in 50,000+.
And just because you have similar rare levels of processing power doesn't mean you'd get along, any more than I get along with most motorcycle rider or other "shared hobby" folks.
The more of an outlier you are, the less likely you will get along even with similarly-outlier folks, since each high-IQ person uses their above-average processing power for different things.
It's still to one's selfish advantage to treat everyone cordially - making unnecessary enemies creates friction and chaos that degrades one's own life for no measurable upside.
I have seen this phenomenon referred to as Tall Poppy Syndrome. Anyone who stands head and shoulders above his peers gets his head chopped off, so to speak, to make everyone even. Apparently, this attitude is very prevalent in Canada and Australia, even more so than in the United States.
Indeed. It takes a tremendous amount of willpower and stamina to resist the social pressure to play along.
Nothing proved that more than the propaganda hurricane that supported the covid vaccine. I could not convince my own wife nor my adult children to resist the pressure. Even now with several friends dead or dying and my own wife with cancer, they still trust the damned doctors rather than me. It is truly an amazing phenomenon. Go along to get along. Don't rock the boat. Don't stand out.
I have always believed politeness can cover up for high disagreeableness
Totally true.
As someone with extremely high level of disagreeableness that didn't internalize this lesson in my 20s and 30s, that ignorance cost me millions of dollars in forsaken income, ownership stakes in lucrative businesses and mentors. An expensive lesson.
Hi K.C.
Upvoted because this opens an intriguing box of thought experiments, and on first read, the correlations you point out make sense. But hedged because I think there are an equal number of confounding variables.
Just one that came to mind is that athletes, whether in team sports or as individuals, are in a competitive social context. But athletes might not be the best analogy for those who score high on standardized intelligence tests.
Intellectual influencers are often in a competitive publish-or-perish context. But at their best, I am guessing they are more in a collaborative problem solving context, part of a community defined by a common goal. Teasing skills for abstract reasoning from social contexts ... ugh. I'd be sweating, squirming, and probably fuding the stats if tasked to address that with a quantitative study.
A qualitative study might be more appropriate ... or better yet, extending that initial insight into a diary, short story, or another work of art. Intriguing.
Cheers.
From my experience, those in the "publish-or-perish" arena are often midwits who fancy themselves geniuses but too insecure/insufficiently talented to simply strike out on their own or come up with something truly innovative. Apex men rarely fit into tiny academic silos created (and administered) by lesser men.
We might be comparing apples to oranges. From anecdotal experience, I've found only a handful of people I would classify as 'apex' enough to allow myself to become their student in the broadest sense of the term ... and I would say authentic compassion is one of the qualities they have in common. Many more others might be similarly accomplished by professional standards, but if I don't find something in them to respect first as fellow humans, I dismiss as "semmon baka" (Japanese for 'specialized idiots') ... merely serving a bureaucratic or symbolic place-holder role in a provisional social hierarchy. On the other hand, from such people's perspective, my opinion is of no consequence. "Care" for we lesser mortals does not hold a high place in their hierarchy of values.
Your original comment would be interpreted in a variety of different ways so I responded to the perspective I was imagining you were taking. This clarification helps.
If you are at, say, the 150IQ+ level, you are literally you are one in 50,000+.
And just because you have similar rare levels of processing power doesn't mean you'd get along, any more than I get along with most motorcycle rider or other "shared hobby" folks.
The more of an outlier you are, the less likely you will get along even with similarly-outlier folks, since each high-IQ person uses their above-average processing power for different things.
It's still to one's selfish advantage to treat everyone cordially - making unnecessary enemies creates friction and chaos that degrades one's own life for no measurable upside.
Agreed!