A stupid person is more dangerous than a pillager.

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Carlo M. Cipolla

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The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity

This explores the controversial subject of stupidity. Stupid people are seen as a group, more powerful by far than major organizations such as the Mafia and the industrial complex, which without regulations, leaders or manifesto nonetheless manages to operate to great effect and with incredible coordination. by Carlo M. Cipolla

Stupidity

People

Smart

Human behaviour

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Law #1 Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.

Carlo M. Cipolla

Law #2 The probability that a certain person (will) be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.

Carlo M. Cipolla

Law #3 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 losses.

Carlo M. Cipolla

Law #4 Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. In particular non-stupid people constantly forget that at all times and places and under any circumstances to deal and/or associate with stupid people always turns out to be a costly mistake.

Carlo M. Cipolla

Law #5 A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.

Carlo M. Cipolla

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Two factors are important to consider when exploring human behaviour: Benefits and losses that an individual causes to: 1. him or herself and 2. to others.

Torsten Caspar

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Intelligent people (top right), who contribute to society and who leverage their contributions into reciprocal benefits.

Carlo M. Cipolla

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Helpless people (top left), who contribute to society but are taken advantage of by it (and especially by the "bandit" sector of it); note, however, that extreme altruists and pacifists may willingly and consciously (rather than helplessly) accept a place in this category for moral or ethical reasons.

Carlo M. Cipolla

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Bandits (bottom right), who pursue their own self-interest even when doing so poses a net detriment to societal welfare.

Carlo M. Cipolla

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Stupid people (bottom left), whose efforts are counterproductive to both their and others' interests.

Carlo M. Cipolla

My parents were always involved in community theatre, and I'd do the tech work and play the child.

Mark Linn-Baker

I think Bush understands the Internet and the incredible expansion of global e-commerce.

Jack Kemp

I try to be the best husband I can be, and if people respect that, that's cool. But there's no 'perfect husband.' We just all try to do the best we can, you know what I mean?

Nick Lachey

Over time grit is what separates fruitful lives from aimlessness.

John Ortberg

I spent more money on one robe than guys spend in five years.

Ric Flair

If it doesn't feel organic to the audience, you gotta trust your gut.

Freddie Wong

Did anyone ever have a boring dream?

Ralph Hodgson

Objects are what matter. Only they carry the evidence that throughout the centuries something really happened among human beings.

Levi Strauss

My son complains about headaches. I tell him all the time, when you get out of bed, it's feet first!

Henny Youngman

I have no aspirations of world domination through the pop charts. None at all.

Anne Hathaway

Too many people go through life without pausing to enjoy what they have.

David Gemmell

I've never really had any barrier to break I guess. I don't really have anything to rebel against. I'm quite lucky.

Emma Watson

I'm very thankful to players like John Stockton and Spud Webb. They've made it possible for someone like me to make it. I think teams are actually looking for one player under 6-feet now, because they make things happen.

Scott Brooks

If it is not right, do not do it, if it is not true, do not say it.

Marcus Aurelius

A deep cynicism is taking hold of the country, with more and more Americans convinced that big money calls the shots in Washington and that there is nothing that can be done about it. We must resist that conclusion and fight back on behalf of everyday citizens. Reform is possible, and it is imperative.

John Sarbanes

I can see, and that is why I can be happy, in what you call the dark, but which to me is golden. I can see a God-made world, not a manmade world.

Helen Keller

We are led by lawyers who do not understand either technology or balance sheets.

Thomas Friedman

Sarah Palin is treated like a bimbo sometimes, but she has never given the public the respect they deserve. She acts silly and doesn't know stuff. She didn't even finish her term.

Gail Collins

No matter how small you start, always dream big.

Stephen Richards

World's use is cold, world's love is vain, world's cruelty is bitter bane; but is not the fruit of pain.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The feminist movement is not about success for women. It is about treating women as victims and about telling women that you can't succeed because society is unfair to you, and I think that's a very unfortunate idea to put in the minds of young women because I believe women can do whatever they want.

Phyllis Schlafly

I cannot be separated from Rudy Giuliani, but I am also not Rudy Giuliani.

Joseph J. Lhota

Before they got vengeful, conservatives had some useful points to make about welfare. Government 'help' is too often guilt-assuaging gesture. It creates layers of wasteful bureaucracy. Too much help of the wrong sort creates a culture of dependency that swamps our ability to provide.

Donella Meadows

I think that it's perhaps harder to learn from victory than it is from defeat. I think that we don't want defeat. We don't want defeat in sport. We don't want defeat in life. How are we going to be beaten? All right. We have to deal with those things. What's going to cause us to lose the game, whatever the game might be?

Bobby Knight