 You'll have to forgive my pessimism, I'm simply trying to create theories which help me understand and explain what I experience. Why is there so much confusion in the world? Why are so many bad ideas believed by so many people? How can charlatans like Lawrence Krauss or Thomas Piketty be respected as profound intellectuals? There are many possible explanations, but I've recently become persuaded by one. Most people do not think clearly enough to recognize clear thinking. In fact, they're dissuaded by clear thinking. Clarity gets identified with shallowness, and imprecision and vagueness, on the other hand, are seen as markers of depth and profundity, often to such a degree that outright logical contradictions are accepted into people's worldviews. Famous philosopher Michel Foucault famously told John Searle that, quote, 25% of one's writing needs to be incomprehensible nonsense in order to be taken seriously by French philosophers, end quote. Now, if academicians are producing and persuaded by incomprehensible nonsense, then where does that leave the general public? I'm convinced that the children's story, The Emperor's New Clothes, satisfactorily explains a great deal of social behavior. Most people defer to authority, whether intellectual authority, aesthetic authority or political authority, and they do so out of insecurity. They worry about being perceived as stupid or uninformed. In addition, there's this general notion that intelligent people deal with complex ideas, and the more complex and abstract, the more intelligence it takes to understand. And therefore, if you can't grasp the concepts that are coming from the experts, then you must not be intelligent. Thus, when Derrida writes some extremely nonsensical fluff, people act as if it's profound, because they want to appear smart. This compounds on itself, just like in The Emperor's New Clothes, and the result is a huge group of people who act like nonsense is brilliant. They outsource their own critical thinking to a group that they perceive as being smarter than they are. When it doesn't end there, then these pseudo-intellectuals will seek out nonsensical ideas, those which are the most incomprehensible, just to show how smart they are, to the degree that people actually think they can transcend logical reasoning. They become enlightened enough to see that intellectual consistency is the mark of a simpleton. That clear thinking is naive, and that contradictory thinking is profound. So we arrive at an absurd conclusion. People are most impressed when they are most confused. When somebody says that, quote, we now know that cats can be both alive and dead at the same time because quantum physics proves it. The pseudo-intellectuals all go, oh wow, that's right, yes I understand. Even though that's counter-intuitive, science is amazing. And all their pals agree and exchange high fives with one another, glad that they are surrounded by such intelligent peers. It no longer matters what you say, but how you say it and who says it. You might think I'm being unfair, but then watch the video I have linked in this article. It's about adding together a mathematical series, 1 plus 2 plus 3 plus 4 plus 5 add infinitum. And you get the most absurd conclusion imaginable, negative 112. That seems ridiculous, that's because it is. You're talking about adding up an infinite series of positive integers and getting a negative fraction. You literally couldn't think of a more preposterous conclusion. If this video didn't have a high production value and didn't involve PhDs in academia, if the people didn't perceive it as being serious, it would be over the top satire. And yet here's professional academics acting like they've discovered some mysterious paradox in the universe. I urge everybody to investigate this idea for themselves. The internet has many articles defending and rebutting the ideas in this particular video that you could add up an infinite series and get a negative fraction. But the point is, anybody who actually agrees with their conclusion certainly does not understand why. It's literally nonsense, it's a clerical error. Thus the proponents demonstrably discredit themselves. Yet read the comment section of that video. It's filled with pseudo-intellectuals whose entire argument is, oh, well the experts can't simply be wrong. If you don't understand, you're just dumb. If you think they've made an elementary error, it's because you just can't grasp this level of abstraction. Indeed, to those seeking out the most absurd, nonsensical, illogical, and paradoxical ideas, look no further than some of the claims of mathematicians. Then watch another video that I have linked in this article of Lawrence Krauss who in his own words, establishes himself as an irrational fraud. He claims that in some circumstances 2 plus 2 can equal 5. Yes, only once you reach a very high level of intelligence can you know that 2 plus 2 equals 5. It should be no surprise then that Lawrence Krauss is revered in many pseudo-intellectual circles for his illogical work. So how do you demonstrate clear reasoning to somebody who can't think clearly? I don't have an answer, but I'm open to suggestions. Here's a slightly different question. How do you impress somebody who cannot think clearly? And that answer is simple. Just use vague language in big words, contradict yourself, interject the words quantum or science, infinity, peer review or transcendent, and act as if you're part of an enlightened intellectual club. Avoid any propositions which are clear, straightforward, logical, or appeal to common sense, and avoid simplicity like the plague. For what it's worth in my own studies, I have discovered a remarkably consistent truth. The deepest, most abstract principles in any field of thought tend to be simple. Simple formulas in physics, simple principles in the martial arts, simple concepts in philosophy, simple basics in economics. When you first begin learning anything, all you see is murky complexity. But as you learn more, things get simpler and simpler. It's like navigating through a dense jungle. At first, you're surrounded by darkness and overgrowth, whacking away at everything with your machete. Then once a path is cleared, it remains clear, and you can make some serious progress. Chess, for example, to a grand master, is much simpler than chess to a beginner. It might involve more intense calculation, but the concept serves clear as day. Of course, you only arrive at this level of clearheadedness after an enormous amount of work and effort and practice. This is one reason why most academic writing is, in my opinion, a waste of words, at least in the soft sciences. Nobody takes the time to understand basic conceptual truths, and they mainly concern themselves with grandiose terminology, mathematical fiddling, and references to each other's work. All the while, getting the foundational concepts wrong. So I admit I'm a pessimist. I don't know whether the popularity of cloudy thinking is because people's lack of capacity or lack of understanding. But I have a hunch. Hopefully, with the internet circumventing academia, without the intellectual gatekeepers anymore, we'll be able to see a renaissance of clear, logical, and straightforward thinking. If you like these ideas, make sure to subscribe. And if you want to help create a more rational worldview, then please head over to my Patreon page and you can support content like this for $1. To read this article or to learn about my books, check out stevedashpatterson.com.