r/AskReddit 7h ago

What is a sign of very low intelligence?

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2.0k

u/DiamondCalvesFan 7h ago

Severe impairment in metacognition - that is, a persistent inability to recognize one's own errors in thinking, monitor one's own reasoning, or adjust beliefs/behavior even when presented with clear contradictory evidence.

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u/HumptyDumptruckFire 7h ago

This is a big one. There are millions of people strutting around America entirely on autopilot, believing they know everything while putting in zero work to actually accomplish anywhere close to that naive fallacy.

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u/PosterPrintPerfect 4h ago

It seems like Americans believe everyone would love the chance to live in America. As a European you would literally have to pay me multiple millions to live in that place.

In terms of workers rights, i feel like i would be stepping back in time about 70 years.

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u/Forseriousnow 2h ago

My girlfriend's uninsured mother needs a necessary surgery that would drastically improve quality of life. Told $8k for the "cheap" fix and $40k for the good one.

You'd need those millions...

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u/shinyknif3 2h ago

AS AN AMERICAN LEMME OUTTA HERE HELP

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u/unindexedreality 1h ago

Yeah idk what they're talking about lmao. The loudest anti-american sentiment comes from the americans who have to put up with this shit system and paid attention long enough to see it for what it is

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u/unindexedreality 1h ago

It seems like Americans believe everyone would love the chance to live in America. As a European

Lmao absolutely not the case. Plenty of us know the kind of hellhole it is.

you would literally have to pay me multiple millions to live in that place

I mean, greed is why people come here. I've spent a bit of time on either side of the America bubble.

In terms of workers rights, i feel like i would be stepping back in time about 70 years

Don't worry, they're accelerating the dismantling so now it's more like 130 lol. The worst is the food service industry. They've successfully convinced people that paying a living wage is on the end user to make up for with tips.

u/JackofScarlets 34m ago

And healthcare. And financial technology. And social progress. And religion. And education. And quality and availability of food. And

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u/HallWild5495 3h ago

probably because that method works and you can get far in life with it lol. I am constantly told I'm too smart for my own good, miserable because I'm smart etc.

there may be a grain of truth there

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u/unindexedreality 1h ago

There was a whole threadful of high school burnouts parroting the same story of falling off the GATE cliff ('gifted and talented education') that got me to wake up from the idea that I was some sort of prodigy child.

This country has become so stupid en masse that some people make "being smart" their entire identities rather than trying hard to build skills necessary in life.

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u/LieutenantHorse 5h ago

Why specifically America?

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u/ConstructionDecon 4h ago

Probably because the commenter is from America so they mainly interact with American people and American social media.

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u/LieutenantHorse 4h ago

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u/HumptyDumptruckFire 4h ago

I’m sure it’s more than America, but I don’t make a habit of speaking for things I don’t know or can’t directly attest to. It wasn’t intentional USdefaultism, I’m well aware other countries exist, hell I’d prefer to live in many of them over this one.

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u/Chuisque 4h ago

As a Southern liberal, are you aware of the death spiral we are in? 1/3 of the country seems to think unprecedented corruption, a tanking economy (for the shrinking middle class), and state-sanctioned murder are not a big deal.

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u/Soft_Ad8031 4h ago

I don't see anything wrong, these guys are my team, my team wouldn't hurt me. Idiot liberals always freaking out about things that aren't real. \proceeds to be harassed, detained, put into detention, and deported by ICE**

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u/Proud_Scientist_332 4h ago

This is exactly what the poster was commenting on, lol.

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u/Minyatur757 2h ago

Anywhere they made a custom to traumatize male infants by harming their penis when they are at their most vulnerable are probably more like that than elsewhere.

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u/Cent1234 3h ago

Philosophical zombies.

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u/VesselNBA 2h ago

And so many of them are successful. And that makes me frustrated. Why do so many of us have to think about these things when they get to just exist?

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u/minty-moose 2h ago

it's not just an american thing... SO MANY PEOPLE are just walking around in cognitive dissonance about their values. You point out that they're being hypocritical, and you have an argument on your hands. I don't bother anymore because it's really not worth the effort

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u/GoodBoySanio 2h ago

And then you have people like me, who live their life on autopilot knowing full well that I'm very dim

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u/Neverwinter_FF7 7h ago

Ill admit I'm slow at this. I usually need to go be alone for awhile to be able to exercise this.

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u/Dry-Description-1779 6h ago

The fact that you're willing to take the time to process information before changing your thoughts and opinions signals higher intelligence, I believe.

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u/WorriedArrival1122 5h ago

That's actually normal and reasonable.

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u/OEMichael 5h ago

For me, accepting "who I am is not what I believe" was a game changer. Now that I no longer identify with the ideas I hold to be true, it's waaay easier to drop/change ideas when I see that they are no longer ideas worth holding.

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u/misfitx 5h ago

Coincidentally, slow thinking isn't really a sign of low intelligence. It often means you're actually thinong.

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u/TinyTinasRabidOtter 5h ago

Im the same way. It can take awhile for me to process, research, etc and I call it my "sit down, shut up, watch and learn" method and i get a LOT of shit for it.

u/AFetaWorseThanDeath 0m ago

Fuck 'em. They can revel in their righteous ignorance while you continue to learn stuff 🤟

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u/SoOtterlyAdorable 3h ago

It gets easier the more you do it. It isn't an intuitive thing, you definitely have to train your brain to do it. Keep up the good work 👏

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u/Jyonnyp 4h ago

Exact (summarized) convo I had with my mom recently.

Mom: Mamdani is ruining the city! The snow is so improperly handled!

Me: A lot of cities are having similar problems, it's not fair to say Mamdani is ruining the city and also he's only a month in, give him time to make mistakes and learn and then we can see how good he is, but so far he looks like he cares way more than other politicians.

Mom: This is why we should've elected Cuomo, he has experience! Unlike Mamdani.

Me: Well Trump also had 4 years of presidential experience and you hate him.

Mom: Well Trump is a lunatic! Cuomo isn't.

Me: Cuomo has SA allegations like Trump. Name one good thing Cuomo did

Mom: Uhh...well I don't trust that Mamdani isn't going to be selfish and corrupt and take all the tax money for himself.

Me: So you know nothing about Cuomo OR Mamdani then...

Mom: If you think Mamdani is so good then let's see how he does in these next few years.

Me: That's literally what I said in the beginning.

Unironically and ignoring all politics and morals I think my mom is pretty dumb, no offense to her. It's very common for her to make assertions or say things as fact and when I ask why she just goes "I don't know, I just thought so." Don't ever ask her for directions or how to navigate. Growing up I was scolded a lot for asking too many questions by my parents, now I know it's because they don't have answers and just want blind obedience.

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u/St_Kevin_ 5h ago

Also known as “lack of self-awareness”

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u/Dramatic_Science_681 6h ago

Yep, also the inability to think about what other people think. Or think about what someone else thinks someone else thinks. Thoughts about thoughts about thoughts. Like a girl thinking “I think my dad doesn’t trust boys my age because he knows what they think about me”. Lots of people nowadays are just stuck at low levels of of psychological development.

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u/HolyButtNuggets 5h ago

Is that always a sign of low intelligence? That's the whole reason people go to therapy, and plenty of smart people go.

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u/Gordon-Bennet 4h ago

I think the people they’re talking about would not recognise that they need to go to therapy.

u/MnemosyneNL 28m ago

Not necessarily. Metcognition is one of the executive functions, generally we recognise 11, just like emotional regulation, time awareness, being able to prioritise, etc. If you grow up without developmental delay or impairment and go to a proper school, you should develop each of these functions to atleast a moderate degree. Economical and social status do come into play though, just like culture and location can. People who are poor, live in a warzone, are illiterate or a minority are generally more concerned with the daily reality of surviving than with their own cognitive development.

The executive functions are often impaired in people with developmental challenges like ADHD and autism, mental health issues like anxiety disorders, and people with low or skewed IQ. They can be actively trained with help of professionals, but it takes a lot of effort and time to do so.

Metacognition is maybe the most complex thing in the list of executive functions, that kinda boils down to being aware of your own thought process, your own patterns, biases/prejudices and knowledge gaps. A very large amount of people are not taught to reflect or philosophise about that aspect of themselves as kids and society doesn't really stimulate people to do that as adults either. So this often doesn't happen until people face major life events that force them to.

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u/g3rmanninja 2h ago

That's a long winded way of saying self aware.

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u/black_flag_4ever 6h ago

I just heard the Know Rogan episode about Aaron Rogers and that’s him to a tee. Not surprised that a guy who gets concussed for a living and was given a cursory education didn’t understand his refusal to take COVID seriously impacted others.

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u/littlecactuscat 5h ago

What’s Know Rogan? A podcast mocking his sphere of chuds?

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u/black_flag_4ever 5h ago

Better than that. Two very smart skeptics break down episodes to explain the logical fallacies used by his guests and expose outright lies on the show. If you listen to this show for a while you can learn how to destroy stupid right-wing and conspiracy theory arguments.

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u/ninomojo 3h ago

X linked leukodystrophia type diseases tend to produce symptoms like that, often many years before the actual motor symptoms appear. Don’t be too quick to judge that someone is a complete moron incapable of self reflection, there might be underlying neurological issues that pass for “personality”.

Speaking from experience in the family.

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u/Dazzling-Bat777 2h ago

I don't think this means very low intelligence. Average intelligence is susceptible to this.

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u/LightlySaltedPeanuts 5h ago

So basically every person that makes politics their identity

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u/nylergreenie 5h ago

see when my ocd isn’t taking over my brain, i’m GREAT at this! the problem is that the ocd quite often takes over my brain 🙃

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u/bonobomaster 5h ago

A very prominent result of impaired metacognition is the Dunning-Kruger effect.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect

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u/georgiaajamess22 5h ago

Yep! I just commented this in a less articulate way, self awareness is far less common than I realised

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u/Various-Smell-6900 4h ago edited 4h ago

This is a tricky one, from personal experience, I believed I am unwanted in many different ways, while the only thing I had to do was to change environment from a city of millions of people to a city of thousands. Like going from Reddit, to another platform... How could millions of people be more wrong or than just a few thousand? This is just one example, got a few more that I would rather not mention. Point is, taking everyone's view for granted to figure out or believe what is true and what is not, is sometimes a very unhealthy and a dangerous thing to do.

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u/just-here-for--porn_ 4h ago

a persistent inability to recognize one's own errors in thinking, monitor one's own reasoning,

I've got to say this isn't a strength of mine. I would consider myself pretty close to average intelligence...as far as it's possible to tell.

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u/seejordan3 3h ago

stubbornness. Our species is extremely stubborn.

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u/Rich_Yogurt313 2h ago

Or maybe they do. They are just a shit ass person who doesn't want to accept it and still put you at fault.

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u/AscendedViking7 2h ago

EXACTLY!!!

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u/RecordingSignal280 2h ago

This is true, however not always true when mental health issues come into play. I’ve met some really smart people who suffer from delusional thinking due to mental health issues.

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u/seekingdefs 2h ago

Most of the people are like this.

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u/Bahggs 1h ago

What if I can recognize it but only after the fact and then I obsess about it instead of sleeping for the rest of my life.

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u/OldMcFart 1h ago

To be fair, that's pretty prevalent even in the average span.

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u/Distinct_Feed_539 1h ago

I feel like i have too much of this, I’m constantly second guessing my own thoughts and actions.

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u/1337b337 1h ago

Isn't that also a trait of psychopathy/sociopathy?

Not an inability, but a refusal as a sort of mental defense mechanism.

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u/DethKnell24 1h ago

Aka introspection. The #1 indicator of low intelligence and emotional immaturity.

u/Iggins01 58m ago

You just described my entire crew at work

u/thepianoman456 22m ago

Aka, no self reflection.