I don't think ntelligence and wisdom are one and the same. Wisdom is your ability to understand how intelligence can be positively beneficial, either for yourself and/or for others, and to use it effectively in such a way. Wisdom is gained through experimentation. We take chances and put our intelligence to practical uses. Sometime we succeed; sometimes we fail, but we eventually learn from these experiences is wisdom. That doesn't mean that teenagers can't be wise. It just means that the older you are, the more you've experienced, so the more wisdom you've again...usually. There are plenty of old folks who seriously lack wisdom. They didn't learn from their experiences.

What do you mean by smart? That they are able to memorize things better and have a sharper memory? Perhaps, but a wise man would not claim such broad generalizations as fact and would always back up his claims with solid evidence.

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WARNING: In the unlikely event of an accidental agreement with any or all points made in the above post, contact a clinical psychologist immediately.

The views expressed in the above post are not necessarily those of Joker and/or any of his affiliates.

. "You have found the secret message. Do you have too much time on your hands? ...Let it go."

Now Joker, go back about 3-4 years and remember how smart you were then? Then suddenly, maybe even in one day, about 2 (?) years ago you had a realization of just how much you did not know.


Most teens do not know what it's like to be truly responsible, not for just going to school or work, but 100% responsible for another human being or 100% responsible for where your every meal will come from. That's a whole different kind of "smart". My own kids are in their 20s and they still have a safety net. I have no doubt that they're "smarter" than me. But, they're also already smart enough to fight over who gets to be my partner in Trivial Pursuit.

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"Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves." ~Ronald Reagan

The problem I've seen with a lot of teens is that they are more interested in "spreading wisdom" than "taking in wisdom". Strangely this is also true of a lot of adults... but adults have generally gathered more experience through mistakes and, as 12th said, acquired more responsibility.
Still a young point of view is refreshing... but for as much as they complain about being taken seriously, few serious teens I've known... even myself as a teenager... were willing to take seriously us old farts.
In order to truly have debate, we must be willing to listen to one another as well as spew out what we have to say.

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As a general rule, as people gain experience, they do tend to gain some wisdom from it. But that is not to say thaty all old people are wise and no young people are wise. There are some old people who are nothing but old fools and there are some young people who are wise beyond their years. Also, I think the difference between intelligence and wisdom that people have been addressing in this thread is that intelligence is book smarts (learning a bunch of technically correct factoids about history or politics or whatever else your favorite suibject might be) while wisdom has a distinct component of emotional intelligence (realizing that you should treat others how you want to be treated, learning life's lessons from painful experiences).

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Theodore Lamar Heiks
BA, History/Political Science, Western State College of Colorado, 1984
MBA, Entrepreneurship/Marketing, City University of Seattle, 1993

That's beautiful.

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What it do?

Here we are debating the nature of Intelligence and wisdom, and ultimately, ignoring the thoughts and opinions of a teenager. Have we been set up? I feel like such a tool.

Anyway, Brian, the debate over global warming has become so asinine over the last year or so, I simply can't believe either side of the story. First, you have the cons who, until recently, refused to even admit global warming was a reality. Just a year ago, people were claiming it didn't exist. At least now they acknowledge it existence, if not take any kind of responsible, even partial, for it. It's all about the sun to them. They are looking forward to the time their property doubles in value because it is suddenly beach front. Then you have the liberals who make it out like it will be the end of the world in about 50 years or so with massive floodings, and horrifying weather changes.

In the end, we should be good stewards to the earth. We shouldn't think of it as something to be exploited and used.

I think your points on religion are pretty much dead on.

What I do find refreshing about the opinions of the young is their lack of ideological attachment. Although the few articles you have presented have a definite liberal tilt (and I do mean a few), you claim to also hold conservative beliefs as well. Hopefully they will come out more as your blog grows.

It's nice to see someone who's political beliefs are based on personal viewpoints rather than ideological conformity.

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WARNING: In the unlikely event of an accidental agreement with any or all points made in the above post, contact a clinical psychologist immediately.

The views expressed in the above post are not necessarily those of Joker and/or any of his affiliates.

. "You have found the secret message. Do you have too much time on your hands? ...Let it go."

He hasn't written a single post, since that one.

I was right....he was just whoring out his website.

For starters, the thread-starting post did begin with a complaint about how grown-ups often do not take teens seriously, so some commentary on the intelligence vs. wisdom issue seemed not inappropriate. Anyhoo, on the global warming issue, it is not that the cons (and this is, to my knowledge, the only issue where I agree with the cons) don't think it doesn't exist. The differences consist in disagreements about the causes of global warming and how much we can do about it. I'm tired of hearing that man is entirely responsible for global warming. On the old thread about cow farts causing global warming, some lib said that cow farts ought to be categorized under human causation because cattle ranchers and dairy farmers own cows, little realizing that, even if there were a mass emancipation of bovines, cows would still exist and they would still be letting out their cow farts as they wander the Great Plains. Likewise, the libs give too little credit to natural causes like sunspots and volcanic activity. Also, the libs miss the point that the declines and falls of civilizations are not brought about by global warmings themselves (or by global coolings themselves either ... and they have happened in human history, too), but rather by how people adapt to the global warmings (or global coolings) they find themselves in as they try to work out their economic survival. It's just that the cons don't think that throwing sixteen vestal virgins down every volcano on earth or throwing our entire economy down the toilet is a price worth paying.

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Theodore Lamar Heiks
BA, History/Political Science, Western State College of Colorado, 1984
MBA, Entrepreneurship/Marketing, City University of Seattle, 1993

Actually if domestic cattle were let out into the wild, they would quickly go extinct being creatures very ill-suited for survival in the wilderness. And if niot, we'd have a hunting season open for them to keep down their population.
Still it's pretty silly to think that we're going to put an end to cattle farms... but they are a human construction. Domestic cattle are cattle evolved to be submissive, stupid, and fat.

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That information is classified and to be given only on a need-to-know basis...
And I do not need to know.

Get your daily dose of truth*

* or something approximating it

I never said it was inappropriate. I said we all focused on that single issue. No one mentioned anything about the blog or any of the opinions written in it, which was also mentioned in the original post. It was as if we were ignoring the opinions of a teen.

I know. That's what I said, but it wasn't long ago, less than 2 years ago since I can remember it be said on this forum since I was a member, that the cons were denying the existence of global warming.

Honestly, which credible sources have made such claims? The UN's IPCC(?) report didn't make that claim. I watched An Inconvenient Truth recently; that movie doesn't even attempt to make that claim.

I don't doubt that there are more than one single factor contributing to global warming, but what I'm tired of hearing that man can't possibly be a powerful enough force of nature of effect the climate.

I think that makes sense.

Like I said, the libs overexagerate the issue to the point that it seems the world will end in fifty years, and the cons underexagerate the issue to the point that they are working forward to the day they have beachfront property. And in the meanwhile, no one considers exactly what we must do to adapt to the climate change.

__________________
WARNING: In the unlikely event of an accidental agreement with any or all points made in the above post, contact a clinical psychologist immediately.

The views expressed in the above post are not necessarily those of Joker and/or any of his affiliates.

. "You have found the secret message. Do you have too much time on your hands? ...Let it go."