You Think You're So Smart

you are think you so smart with your fancy law schoolin but when you are thirdsy in the dessert and need to find the watter whole les see who have the smart now.

Knowledge and intelligence are different. Make sure you know the difference before you consider yourself "smarter" than someone else. Knowledge is relative to locative conditions, whereas intelligence, ones abilities* to use knowledge is not.

Quitting smoking

I just responded to someone asking for advice on quitting smoking on Yahoo Answers. I know my reply isn't going to be well received by everybody, but I figured if I didn't say something, the worst that would happen is someone wouldn't get help. I figured the worst that would happen if I were wrong is I would only look like an idiot, which seems well worth the risk of damage of my personal image considering someones personal health. I shouldn't care about my personal image.

Self obsessed ego's are entrapments of men. Ironically and thankfully, those 'mightier-than-thou' of ego's are becomming cliche.

I've been guilty of having one of those ego's. I've been trying crushing it, but it's been hard... It's as if I'm throwing away a shield, but it does make me more light-footed, so to speak.

I am not who others think I am and I'm probably not who I think I am, for neither others nor I know myself well enough. I do know that I want peace and will do anything short of disturbing peace in pursuing it. I'm not talking about peace of action, but peace of mind, where happiness can remain in myself and others as in a reflection on clear waters on a sunny day. When Earth trembles, our minds still can be still. Our minds will not spill as the Earth moves, as our cup does not spill when we walk with it. We will have peace.

About Happiness in the World - A comment

This is an extended comment I made on Donald Trumps blog post about "The Worlds Happiest Nations"

I'd say Mr. Inglehart is right [about the correlation between happiness and peace]. Who's happy about fighting except professional fighters? And even those professional fighters are only happy when they're winning, but in modern times they don't even have to worry about death so much. It's not like the sword fights of old.

Regarding the correlations [of peace between democracies] - I'm not a history or political major so I can only speak for recent years through memory, but it seems to me like governments usually don't want to fight each other, considering themselves friend by default (enemy of my enemy is my friend, considering other forms of government their enemies)... I think there's more to the correlation of happiness with democracies though... People actually feel more safe from their government because they have a strong hand in its actions (at least, they're supposed to). Even at its worst when the people are convinced they've played a major part in their own directions, they can say "at least I'm fighting for something I believe in."

Extension:
(I thought this may be a bit too political of an extension to include in the comment on his blog)
People need to realize something about democracies which makes them fragile though. The biggest reason they're better than a communist government is because a democracy realizes that a single person or small group of people can easily become corrupt. When corrupt they will over look the common good. A democracy needs to be stirred, like any good soup, it will burn if not stirred. The richest and most humble flavors need to be spread throughout, so that every bite will be just right. Not too powerful, not too weak. A democracy is a Samaritans government when it's working the way it's supposed to.

By the way, the Trump Blog has some very good reads to it. I suggest subscribing to it if you want to hear one of the most powerful mens opinions in the world, he supposedly posts the blogs himself. I find he's surprisingly humble and expectedly intelligent.

Enunciation Without Information

First they want take away our information, creating a stunted education, resulting in a society too stupid to save their right to enunciation.

I had this thought around the time I wrote an article about Obama on Net Neutrality.

Relaxing Lions

I think it takes a little ignorance to really relax sometimes... So I suppose a small dose of it every now and then is probably healthy.

Image Credit: Tambako

Lions don't relax in fields because it hurts ;)

As long as we don't get gluttonous with relaxation, we'll be alright... It's amazing how quickly and easily anything can be over done (referred to as gluttony), I'm pretty sure a major key to controlling gluttony is realizing that just as easily as a habit has started is just easy as it can be put to rest. We don't think very much about habits when we start them, so why should we think so much about stopping them? That's so tiring that it's boring. Just don't think about it, quit it, and relax. Take a break.

The Value of Scientific Opinion

Sometimes science is creating public opinion, other times it's validating it, but either way it currently determines for the masses the question of their own sanity claiming priority over their own experiences; In essence, determining reality for the masses.

Who's the Smartest Person in The World - A comment

This is an extended version of a comment (which only allowed 300 characters) to this question (which I did answer and had my answer chosen the best): Who's the Smartest Person in the World and Why?

I think the more virtues and stronger virtues a person has, the more smart they may become...

This "serenity prayer" is about requesting virtues from god... acceptance, courage,
"God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things that should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serenity_Prayer


There are many other virtues though...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtue#Virtues_and_values

I think the lessons people will learn from obtaining these virtues can be applied throughout life and make things in general more understandable. Some virtues are learned by chance, but many may need to be actively sought.