A lot of people are working to fix the K-12+ educational system which is the root cause of many stupid people, but beyond that, it's objectively hard to fix stupid.
Most people, stupid or otherwise, wouldn't take a critical thinking course, for example. Many would have no time for it, to say little of motivation. Fewer are proud of being stupid and will shun anything they consider "intellectual".
This is a bad take. Because even the craziest of crazies (the flat earthers) are actually doing the scientific method by running experiments to test their crazy conjectures. What makes them crazy is that they have a poor sense of discernment about when it's worth it to trust authorities and when it's not; they're not dumb, and education is not really failing them (in the sense that they "aren't being taught what science is"). They are arguably better scientists than "trust the science" folks because at least they are getting out there and moving atoms to test shit.
On the other hand intellectuals have poor discernment too, they overly trust the literature and the interpretation of working scientists. These two phenomena are two sides of the same coin, and the flat earthers/antivaxx etc crazies are directly downstream of the "trust the science" bad behaviour, especially since the education system has taught them what good science is and they are rightly perceiving that good science is not being done.
This is a bad start to a post on HN. Less confrontational would be better.
> Because even the craziest of crazies are actually doing the scientific method.
I can name several conspiracy theories off the bat which I've heard repeated by people who have not tested the theories. The vast majority of them, at best, found a video of someone on the internet with "dr" in the username. The percent of "jet fuel can't melt steel beams" folks who have actually personally tested whether steel can lose structural integrity at such temperatures, is absolutely minuscule.
> They are arguably better scientists than "trust the science" folks because at least they are getting out there and moving atoms to test shit.
Reading something on the internet is moving photons and electrons at best, but I can't speak to whether a given Parler thread which convinced someone of a given conspiracy was read inside or outside.
Let go man. Science is rotten. I spent a decade doing science. You wouldn't know unless you were there (and half the people who were are so wrapped up in the holiness of science as part of their identity that they can't see the rot).
Most people, stupid or otherwise, wouldn't take a critical thinking course, for example. Many would have no time for it, to say little of motivation. Fewer are proud of being stupid and will shun anything they consider "intellectual".