4 ms·

Age != Wisdom. Wisdom comes from Experience and living life. If you sit on a couch all day watching t.v. your experiences do not equal someone who goes

Age != Wisdom. Wisdom comes from Experience and living life. If you sit on a couch all day watching t.v. your experiences do not equal someone who goes out of the house, builds things, etc... Wisdom is earned by doing, not by aging.

deleted 9y ago
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wruza 9y ago
And theirs do not equal to yours. While it is generally admitted that "outside" is more experience-rich and your inequality is mathematically correct, you force the statement that interacting with "non-real" entities does not generate experience. This is not true, actually. Ask a gamer, a worker, a stripper, a mother about their experiences and they'll tell you hell of a lot you traveller never experienced or even thought of. Wisdom is a function of time among other arguments, though the application area and the volume of it may vary on many of these. One cannot age and do nothing, except for few percent of extereme isolation cases.
- wallace_f 9y ago
  Yes, exactly. I would go further and say generalizing intelligence, even types of it like wisdom, is one of the most pervasive-yet-close-to-meaningless concepts that exists. Maybe we say the one who went to Harvard--even assuming the rare case they got in on academic merit alone as a particularly incredible prodigy--may have fantastic mathematical ability, but not have ability or willingness to socially adapt or even contribute constructively to society (Ted Kacznyski). In other words, is there positive value in saying he was particularly intelligent rather than good at math and academic coursework, etc? There are infinite other examples: one can be good at engineering, and bad at writing, etc. Granted there are in fact those with more intellectual horsepower, but everyone has it in a different variety. Then their different experiences, skills and knowledge shape them as a different person. The misleading nature of our thinking about particular ability and abstracting that into a concept of intelligence appears to also be part of human's arrogance in their egos. Hubris is something very human that we collectively get caught up in. The reality is we are all bad thinkers relative to omniscience. Arguably the greatest scientist, Newton, had plenty of crazy ideas about secret messages in the bible, and alchemy, etc., and it's not that he was stupid or illogical, it's that he had different mind that existed in a different environment, as we all do. We also have extremely stupid ideas that people in the future will look back on in the same way, and ask themselves "why were they so smart, yet so stupid?"
jondubois 9y ago
Doing different things in different situations. Contrasting experiences are important. In my view, you can't be wise if you haven't experienced the full spectrum of basic emotions and situations: Major failure, major success, poverty, wealth, insecurity, confidence, naivety, scepticism, laziness, ambition, pessimism, optimism, extremely bad luck, extremely good luck... If your life experiences lean too much in one direction then you will be biased and not wise. I think that an average person who had contrasting experiences of moderate magnitude is probably wiser than someone who mostly got an extreme set of one kind of experience.
- sametmax 9y ago
  Funnily, that's one of the goals of some meditation technicals (vipassana comes to mind). Where it will help you to notice when you experience things, so that you don't blindly go through and gain wisdom from it.
smrtinsert 9y ago
Whataboutism at its best. Given the average person (and people are remarkably average) I would bet on an older person being wiser than a younger person.
- sametmax 9y ago
  Not sure. I see most people acting safer as being older, but in no way less destructive. They just manage to keep destruction far way from them. That's not being wise, that's just the survival instinct kicking in, boosted by experience. Actually I tend to see people getting more scared with age. And living in fear is as far from wisdom as ignoring danger is.
tremon 9y ago
In my view, wisdom is gained by reflecting on what has been done, not by doing. Reflection is not a given at any age, but in my experience older people tend to afford more of their time to it.
- iamNumber4 9y ago
  if you don't do something, you haven't done anything to reflect on. Reflection is something you do. so by doing the action of reflection you can gain insight on what to do next time around.
codingdave 9y ago
I wouldn't fret over that distinction. If you try to spend 60 years sitting on your butt, staring at screens, you won't make it to 80 to enjoy your wisdom anyway.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

wruza 9y ago

And theirs do not equal to yours. While it is generally admitted that "outside" is more experience-rich and your inequality is mathematically correct, you force the statement that interacting with "non-real" entities does not generate experience. This is not true, actually. Ask a gamer, a worker, a stripper, a mother about their experiences and they'll tell you hell of a lot you traveller never experienced or even thought of. Wisdom is a function of time among other arguments, though the application area and the volume of it may vary on many of these. One cannot age and do nothing, except for few percent of extereme isolation cases.

wallace_f 9y ago
Yes, exactly. I would go further and say generalizing intelligence, even types of it like wisdom, is one of the most pervasive-yet-close-to-meaningless concepts that exists. Maybe we say the one who went to Harvard--even assuming the rare case they got in on academic merit alone as a particularly incredible prodigy--may have fantastic mathematical ability, but not have ability or willingness to socially adapt or even contribute constructively to society (Ted Kacznyski). In other words, is there positive value in saying he was particularly intelligent rather than good at math and academic coursework, etc? There are infinite other examples: one can be good at engineering, and bad at writing, etc. Granted there are in fact those with more intellectual horsepower, but everyone has it in a different variety. Then their different experiences, skills and knowledge shape them as a different person. The misleading nature of our thinking about particular ability and abstracting that into a concept of intelligence appears to also be part of human's arrogance in their egos. Hubris is something very human that we collectively get caught up in. The reality is we are all bad thinkers relative to omniscience. Arguably the greatest scientist, Newton, had plenty of crazy ideas about secret messages in the bible, and alchemy, etc., and it's not that he was stupid or illogical, it's that he had different mind that existed in a different environment, as we all do. We also have extremely stupid ideas that people in the future will look back on in the same way, and ask themselves "why were they so smart, yet so stupid?"

jondubois 9y ago

Doing different things in different situations. Contrasting experiences are important. In my view, you can't be wise if you haven't experienced the full spectrum of basic emotions and situations: Major failure, major success, poverty, wealth, insecurity, confidence, naivety, scepticism, laziness, ambition, pessimism, optimism, extremely bad luck, extremely good luck... If your life experiences lean too much in one direction then you will be biased and not wise. I think that an average person who had contrasting experiences of moderate magnitude is probably wiser than someone who mostly got an extreme set of one kind of experience.

sametmax 9y ago
Funnily, that's one of the goals of some meditation technicals (vipassana comes to mind). Where it will help you to notice when you experience things, so that you don't blindly go through and gain wisdom from it.

smrtinsert 9y ago

Whataboutism at its best. Given the average person (and people are remarkably average) I would bet on an older person being wiser than a younger person.

sametmax 9y ago
Not sure. I see most people acting safer as being older, but in no way less destructive. They just manage to keep destruction far way from them. That's not being wise, that's just the survival instinct kicking in, boosted by experience. Actually I tend to see people getting more scared with age. And living in fear is as far from wisdom as ignoring danger is.

tremon 9y ago

In my view, wisdom is gained by reflecting on what has been done, not by doing. Reflection is not a given at any age, but in my experience older people tend to afford more of their time to it.

iamNumber4 9y ago
if you don't do something, you haven't done anything to reflect on. Reflection is something you do. so by doing the action of reflection you can gain insight on what to do next time around.

codingdave 9y ago

I wouldn't fret over that distinction. If you try to spend 60 years sitting on your butt, staring at screens, you won't make it to 80 to enjoy your wisdom anyway.