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.

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Carlo M. Cipolla

11

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

Carlo M. Cipolla

A stupid person is more dangerous than a pillager.

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

This is Texas. We're still figuring out how to spell tolerance.

Rachel Caine

The act of war is the last option of a democracy.

Joseph C. Wilson

On my return to Pittsburgh, I resolved to go back to the fundamental problems of electronic structure that I had contemplated abstractly many years earlier.

John Pople

I came into this environment where there was so much love, so much positive energy. I never heard my parents say, 'We have adopted kids.' The minute my sister Linda and I landed in Sweden, we were their kids.

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We must do our work for its own sake, not for fortune or attention or applause.

Steven Pressfield

There's no harm in hoping for the best as long as you're prepared for the worst.

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If you make a film about a pig farmer in Wales and you are a huge hit as the pig farmer's wife, the next thing is you'll be asked to do a film about a sheep farmer in Scotland.

Kristin Scott Thomas

I speak pretty fluent American, though I do so with a strong British accent, and I love America: The scale and the variety of it are astonishing to someone not born there, and I'm convinced that its energy and generosity have somehow rubbed off on me and affected my writing. For the better.

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Mathematicians care no more for logic than logicians for mathematics.

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I'm a huge fan of 'Sons of Anarchy.'

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A house, having been willfully purchased and furnished, tells us more than a body, and its description is a foremost resource of the art of fiction.

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Of all the projects I've worked on, I've never worked with another director like Billy Friedkin. I think he's a genius.

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I have had four happy days in my life, and three of them turned out to be illusions.

Taylor Caldwell

Throughout my career, no matter what I've done or what decision I've made, I've made it with my family first. My priority was taking care of my family while I was taking care of business.

Mindy Grossman

The thing I love most about my job is watching people age backward, becoming more lively and energetic as they free themselves from situations that are toxic to their essential selves.

Martha Beck

Nothing is old, nothing is new, save the light of grace underneath which beats a human heart. The way of feeling, of understanding, of loving; the way of seeing the country, the faces that your father saw, that your mother knew. The rest is chimerical.

Georges Rouault

Out of the fullness of the heart, the mouth speaks.

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The Jews are trying to destroy all other cultures - as a survival mechanism - the only Nazi country in the world is Israel.

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Unfortunately, the boards of art institutions tend to be populated with well-meaning supporters of the arts who often lack any business background or appetite for imposing appropriate discipline.

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All I want to do is be the best attorney general that I can be.

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A will finds a way.

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Literature is memory written down. All literature is memory.

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Behind every attractive room there should be a very good reason.

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My coach is pushing me harder than ever to make sure I stay at a good level.

Usain Bolt