Help me understand Scott Adams.

[redgreenandblue]

He seems like an intelligent person (he was a certified Mensa member at one time as far as I know). Yet, he is completely sold on the idea that Trump is mostly working for the betterment of the country, is a genius persuader, is "playing 11 dimensional chess" and that his presidency so far has been a string of successes etc.

I just wonder how people of intelligence can draw such widely different conclusions from one another about the state of the world.

[longship]

1. Start with people who somehow need to promote their IQs.

MENSA == fucking idiot!

[Girard442]

9. LOL. Isn't it obvious that using just one number as a measure of cognitive ability...

...is stupid!

[kcr]

10. Yep. There's your problem, right there.

Certified MENSA member

[hatrack]

2. It's easy . . .

When your brain is replaced with an glop consisting of (A) shredded $100 bills and (B) self-produced video loops of Stephen Hawking, Margot Robbie and LeBron James telling you over and over and over again how smart, hot and skilled you are, Scott Adams syndrome is inevitable.

[Siwsan]

3. Greed

That's my guess.

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

17. Ding ding ding... we have a winner!!!

[NRaleighLiberal]

4. $$$$$$

[PJMcK]

5. Why bother?

He's deluded and his comic strip isn't funny.

[Dave Starsky]

6. As someone who was known many Mensans...

I can assure you that I never heard crazier bullshit in all my life than that which issued from some of their mouths. Really appalling, prima facie nonsense that not even a reasonably well-read sixth-grader would believe.

I never understood why that was until I heard something that James Randi once said: that people who are highly intelligent are often far more likely to fall for flim-flam because they see themselves as being just too smart to be fooled, when, in reality, ANYONE can be fooled. It's almost like a reverse Dunning-Kruger effect at work.

[ProfessorGAC]

19. With Ya, Dave

I passed the test and went to a couple meetings of the Chicago group, back in the mid to late 70's. First one i figured might have been a fluke, but after the second one i realized it was not my thing.

Lots of silliness in those get togethers.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

21. I would be interested in hearing more

[Dave Starsky]

22. That was my exact experience.

It only took a couple of meetings to realize that I had ZERO in common with these people other than that we all got a really good score on a multiple-choice test. It wasn't like a chess club or a photography club (or just about any other kind of club, really), where everyone is fascinated by a hobby and wants to see what other people are doing in it.

But good Lord, did I hear about some crazy politics, whacky conspiracy theories, and depressingly detailed health problems.

[edhopper]

7. Cognative dissonance

and confirmation bias

[oberliner]

8. Read his latest book

It will provide you with all the insights you seek on that subject.

[redgreenandblue]

11. Lol. No. Then he'd get my money.

[oberliner]

15. That's my point

His goal is to sell books.

[LanternWaste]

16. Any other relevant goals? Or merely the one?

Any other relevant goals? Or merely the one?

[oberliner]

18. I think basically he is a self-promoter who found an opportunity to cash in vis-a-vis Trump

If you listen to him talk about Dilbert and how he deliberately created it to maximize sales, I think you get a good idea about how he approaches this sort of marketing.

[Amishman]

12. He's a pseudo libertarian and anti establishment

He got suckered in by the campaign bullshit and desperately wants to believe the lie.

His politics piss me off but as someone who has worked shitty IT jobs before, I still enjoy his cartoons.

[Nitram]

13. His cartoons are not as good as in his heyday, when each one seemed to be specifically about

the office where I worked. The parallels were amazing! He still has some good ones, but many are now so cynical and bitter that they no longer make me laugh. Meanwhile, it also became clear that he's a misogynistic right winger.

[spanone]

14. so much for mensa

[Orsino]

20. He had a great idea once.

A comic strip celebrating the isolation of the American tech worker. For decades, his adoring readers have fed him jokes to draw, and this seems to have fed his sense of entitlement.