Bitcoin Forum

When I give a peek to 4chans /pol or reddit, facebook, twitter, pretty much any big community and/or social network people seem to be so ignorant and willing to voice their ignorance whereas in communities such as Bitcointalk (and a couple others which I shall not name) people are able to put together logical arguments, have discussions and view the current events without the glasses with a thick layer of crappy propaganda on them?

Seems that you rarely stumble upon ignorant fools on here.

I disagree, I see it totally flip-sided.

This forum is filled with a lot of trolls due to very low moderation.

These groups are not representative of humanity at large. At least, I hope to Eris they aren't. :-\

i think you are right. on other forms i can count the number of people who know how to make a rational argument on my fingers, and i cant count the fools on my fingers. here its the opposite, i can count the fools and cant count the number of people who know how to make a rational argument.

i feel on 4chan/reddit there are many intelligent kids, they're just also cynical and let off steam.

Or........intelligent people control more sock-puppets here....thus artificially inflating our collective intelligence.

Something of a intelligence bubble. Meh.

My point exactly, it's not seldom to see people blaming either:
A) The Jews
B) Ni--ers
C) Israel

On either of those for pretty much any problem anyone in the world has yet I have never stumbled upon a single thread like that on here, despite the fact that the forum isn't heavily moderated.

People also seem to be aware of the need of decriminalizing controlled substances, stopping waging wars overseas, opposing the military industrial complex and are generally aware of how rotten to the core the system is on here.

You should probably go look in the politics forum.

hang out in either btc-e.com or sealswithclubs.eu 's chat lobby for awhile see if your opinion still holds.

we love demonizing fools here  ;D

The perceived difference comes from the fact that you share most beliefs with the rest of the people on here. So instead of reading about someone blaming those damn jews, you are reading about (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=261573.0) how we (the bitcoiners) will kick the Bilderberg group of the new world order throne.

Which may not be regarded as propaganda but instead as conspiracy by most intellectual societies I know (most academics, etc).

They're not representative of humanity at large. They're representative of humanity at large in 15-20 years.

Erisian ideology is stronger than ever, because more than ever, society at large is supreme commander of fuckin' idiot. The dumber we are, as a whole, the smarter we, as individuals, think we are. That's the true cycle of revolutions, and why we're destined to become continually more stupid. The rise of Discordianism is nothing less than an indicator of an imminent cultural revolution. - And more pony porn.

Trolo-fucking-lo.

Fun fact: Disco kiddies are some of the angriest people I've ever met.

One simple reason for the generalization made in your topic title is that Bitcoin is still very user unfriendly. Not being idiot proof means you can't have many idiots!

The people I know who are the most into Bitcoin are a certain type of person, usually people who are intelligent enough to figure out the Bitcoin system or at least clever enough to take interest and learn about it. I think one mark of unintelligent people is laziness towards seeking out information. That's why they aren't smart!

It's hard to take interest in Bitcoin at this step if you aren't smart, because you can't use Bitcoin unless you're smart enough to figure out how!

There's some noise here, but mostly you could just ignore such users. I don't think you lose much valuable information from ignoring certain people, as what they say are far too often useless. At one point, you become too old to troll, and want to keep things rational and civilized.

I think one reason you find more intelligent people on bitcointalk is because you need to be somewhat intelligent to understand bitcoin, and it's kind of a nerd thing, and you need to be somewhat intelligent to be nerdy? If that makes sense..

But there's quite a lot of trolls and weird behaving people here as well.

I think most are missing one important thing: the newbie system.

Other websites take seconds to join. Register, then post. BitcoinTalk is different. The newbie system places a cost on joining. Consequently, people will not join just to flame a certain post they read. People will only join out of genuine interest. After expending the time and effort needed to join, people naturally take the forums more seriously. They then post not out of sudden urge to do so, but out of a genuine desire for constructive discourse.

Many claim the newbie system is too difficult or unnecessary. I believe it is the reason why BitcoinTalk trumps other discussion groups.

You may remember that when it started, Facebook was only between Harvard students. Rich, bright kids. Now that it's mainstream, intelligence level of the average user has come down dramatically. With BTC still in an early phase, intelligence level of the average bitcoiner is high, but this will not last, and nobody should want it to last.

It's awful, but if we want bitcoin's success, we want it to be used by dumb blondes, high school dropouts, sickos, Homer Simpson, etc...

/as opposed to actually being intelligent?

/snarky ;D

Such people, without using any negative words about them, but let's just call them 'avg. citizens' just to be polite, today uses lots of very advanced and complicated equipment. Like a computer, a car and other stuff. All of these items are quite complicated in their inner workings, but they've made customer friendly, and you don't need to know much about how it works, to just use it. I would think in the future, there will be customer friendly ways to use bitcoin, which makes it rather easy to use, and you don't have to know anything about the underlying system.

Ahem, yes quite. Lunatic fringe FTW! Paganistic discordian decentralization and disagreement shall prevail! That's why I believe in nothing. lol

The ignore button allows people who can plague other forums to remove themselves unwittingly from general view. It's a great idea!

Pro tip: when you're bored, cruise the newbie forums - help out where you can and harvest names to ignore based on their first few vacuous posts. Later on, when they get their wings and have posted often enough, peek at the color of their ignore button to see how good your early judgment was. You can always give them a second chance if appropriate - and them none the wiser either way.                  :)

Bitcoiners 'seem' intelligent because it's part of the self-image of Bitcoiners that they are intelligent.  And why is that?  Because Bitcoin is the Dunning-Krugerrand, you idiot!

It takes someone intelligent to come up with that kind of recursively mocking quip. Nicely done! But, but... where does that leave us? Is we is or is we ain't?

Quit patting yourself on the back.

I've never seen so many con men and marks together in the same place.

The Bitcoin world has reproduced in miniature almost every financial scam known, from pump and dump to blind pools to bucket shops to front-running. There are plenty of marks on here who have no clue how to recognize a con game.  It's embarrassing.   

I hate to say this, but... con men tend to be more intelligent.

Well, I was never cheated out of any bitcoins, wasn't involved in any of the scandals. Perhaps pure luck, or just because I used common sense? Perhaps I have a tad of intelligence?

Nagle, why are you always so negative? I know you won't answer this, as you never answer questions, you just spew your propaganda. :) But, is there anything in your life you're discontent with, that makes you a grumpy fart? Anything we could help you with to feel better about yourself?  :P

Herpa derp derp

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=herp%20derp

    

 ;D

You've been saying that kind of thing for over two years now, since your newbie days in June, 2011: "It is completely incorrect to describe Bitcoin as a 'pyramid scheme.' Technically, it’s a 'pump-and-dump.'"

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=20907.msg264914#msg264914

right up to this month's "Someone needs to sue Mt. Gox. Now."

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=251895.msg2738504#msg2738504

Fascinating.

Part of it is that it is a niche community that requires some effort to understand....

And I think an equal part of it is confirmation bias :)

Most normal people can't wrap their head around Bitcoin. I've tried explaining it to many people for hours and they still have no idea what I'm talking about.

These are not stupid people I'm trying to explain it to either- these are people with college degrees and successful businessmen. I think it is the technical (geeky) side of Bitcoin that is really a huge hurdle that most people can't overcome to understand Bitcoin easily without doing a lot of research on the subject.

Bitcoin certainly needs to become easier to use/understand to go mainstream.

I'm realistic.

there's a certain level of (technical and economic) literacy and awareness it takes to understand bitcoin, is all. some people won't spend the time and effort to attempt to understand

Bitcoiners get recursion and self-mockery.  'Nuff said!

I admit, i havent been very active lately...

I think a good think is to be visionary, open-minded and have the ability to look outside the box you live in, many people don't have this ability.

Lol...

But Bitcoin isn't realistic; it's both idealistic and futuristic.

Similar to the early days of the internet, Bitcoin currently requires proficiency and some technical knowledge, so people who aren't smart enough to use Bitcoin aren't likely to come and talk about it.

Because you are perceptive, and we are all intelligent.

Most Bitcoiners probably have an inquisitive nature, a desire to forge new frontiers, a passion to seek an alternative monetary system and it takes a certain level of intelligence to be involved with Bitcoin, however to what degree depends on how deep you have gone. 

This forum unfortunately is littered with muppets, who spend their daily dose of intelligence looking to troll and bait others intelligence.

Most intelligent Bitcoiners can smell these wastoids from a distance... intuition and intelligence are undercurrent themes of Bitcoin.

Viva Bitcoin Carajo!!

it's like, all relative, man

I have to agree!  It's like watching the math department flocking into a Vegas casino.  So innocent.  So unsuspecting.  So hilarious!  ;D

I think you mean
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j95kNwZw8YY

t'was an influence

Bitcoiners almost certainly have an avg IQ over 100 and that's because they are smart enough to not just follow the status quo and how things are "supposed" to be done.  They are intelligent enough to think for themselves.

And they also understand basic math and are computer literate more than the avg (100 IQ) person.   They are more analytical and therefore "intelligent" by conventional measures.

Yes but the whole point is that a lot of people don't have that certain basic level of technical and economic literacy and moreso, they don't have the capability to achieve that awareness.  It isn't always a matter of time and effort.

Anyway it took me a month or so to really get a firm grasp on bitcoin and it was a steep learning curve, I must say if you include the various exchanges and how to get money in and out of the system, etc. 

The two main differences between Bitcointalk.org and facebook are:

1. Bitcoins take a little bit more technical know-how and effort to acquire, whereas anyone can sign up for facebook and use it to its full potential.
2. Bitcoins are money- by default people should be smarter when dealing with them than with facebook or twitter, where it doesn't matter how dumb you are. If you're stupid on facebook, oh well. If you're acting stupid with bitcoins, you lose money.

However, like others have said, Bitcoiners only seem to be more intelligent. People you agree with are going to seem smarter than they really are. There are a ton of conspiracy theorists on here. The average person may see everything through a "thick layer of crappy propaganda" but there are a lot of people on here who are just as bad, just in the opposite political spectrum.

I think that we have a dichotomy of two different Bitcoin users.

One is highly intelligent and sees the value of Bitcoin revolutionizing money and the world.

The other is looking for a way to hide their nefarious activities, such as drug use, gambling, cheating etc.  (these users could still be smart but it depends on how much the drugs have affected them perhaps)

My thoughts anyways.

There is a poll in another thread that shows that this forum has a MUCH higher rate of INTJ/INTPs than the general population. That group is generally more intelligent than the rest, and I agree with other comments here: Bitcoin simply attracts certain types of people. Specifically introverted logical types.

Yes very true...some just want to launder $ or just order some illegal drugs from Silk Road, so they may not be the brightest or just of average intelligence...although I'm sure the best drug dealers have above avg IQs or they wouldn't be the best, most likely....well on average at least.

But the "bitcoiners" who post on this forum are obviously into it more than even the avg person who has used bitcoin casually so that is a smaller sample and even more intelligent than avg.

Here's one for ya, bro. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=93514.msg1034403#msg1034403

Includes stats for Ronpaulforums from a few years ago, compared to general population. Has a decent sample size. I haven't tried demographics polling for this forum, but from the responses, looks like it'd be about a mirror. Same with 4chan, though I haven't properly polled them, either (kind of difficult). It'd be very interesting to try segregating data collection by the type of people in the community. For example, is there a significant difference between the Voorhees, Vers, and Shrems versus the smoothies, danks, and Atlases? Something to do later, I guess.

Though - the biggest flaw in this information, is that it only polls people in an online forum, which probably itself skews results strongly toward INTx types.

I'm apparently ENFP:

• You have moderate preference of Extraversion over Introversion (56%)
• You have distinctive preference of Intuition over Sensing (62%)
• You have moderate preference of Feeling over Thinking (25%)
• You have slight preference of Perceiving over Judging (22%)

I got into Bitcoin thanks to friends, so I guess extraversion helps there. But introverts are more likely to work in Bitcoin-related fields, or so I've heard. Granted, this is an online forum, so my extraversion is probably an anomaly here.

I agree that intuition is necessary to understand why Bitcoin works, as it can't be sensed. As for Feeling, I've always thought of myself as someone who thinks things through... maybe the personality test doesn't agree. I agree that Thinking is probably needed to understand Bitcoin—maybe I'm an anomaly. But I think that Perceiving/Judging also makes a difference. I feel that neither feeling nor thinking about Bitcoin will get one to understand it, so those who perceive are at an advantage over those who judge.

I don't think anyone has done a poll of this. Maybe we should start one.

I think the stated size of certain scams were wayyy overestimated.

PirateAt40 made off with 500,000 BTC?
Bullshit.

because we are just smart like dat!  ;D

Those people are misinformed. It's actually 263024 BTC (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=83794.0#post_bitcoin_savings_and_trust).

Only 263,024? That's only about USD 26 million...

Of course at the time he cashed out at 3 million USD and got caught laundering that....

I thought it was only a few $100k?

Right. A few BTC100k.  :P

Point is that it wasn't 20+ million and they wouldn't get him unless so many people would push so hard, needless to say that if that happened with fiat it would take 1% of the effort.

I disagree. I would rate it as, in descending intelligence

reddit
facebook
bitcointalk
pol

Facebook is of course special because your experience will vary a lot depending on who you know.

Facebook doesn't discriminate based on interests or affiliations, so if you want to use the qualifier "most,"  I would say that "most" of facebook's users are just like average people, i.e. not intelligent.

It's quite a futile exercise to rate different social media and the average intelligence of it's users.

Sometimes, you can find nuggets of gold in cesspits.

But in general, I find bitcointalk.org to be of a higher quality in terms of intelligent and challenging input than youtube. But true, bitcointalk have a lot of noise too.

There are some devs here that's really intelligent and also share their ideas and opinions with others. And in general you find people who dare to challenge the current status quo, and don't accept everything that govts do.

I think what you get out of this forum is mostly what you chose to get out of it. You could engage in challenging discussions, or you could engage in mindless trash threads, there's some of them as well.

im afraid of this world if their are more people out there remotely close to mme  :(

Using facebook is a sign of inferior intelligence.


ya.ya.yo!

People who cry about "very low moderation" are really complaining about losing arguments and being unable to run to mods to demand they use their authority to intervene.

Bitcoin and bitcoiners eschew centralized power; few on these forums emulate your pro-nanny whimpering.

Most here are adults with healthy senses of humor, capable of laughing at or simply ignoring the occasional genuine troll.

For once I agree with you, I think what helps the Bitcoin forums so much is the fact that we have a functioning ignore function that way if you don't want to be forced to read someone else's posts, especially if they annoy you, they can be hidden, I find it difficult to believe anyone who thinks that any sort of block function needs to be removed has genuinely good intentions.

I'd donate, if donators had the option of disabling non-donators' ability to ignore them.  

I'd donate even more for 'Power Troll' status that formats my posts in a larger font, but only for non-donators who tried to ignore me.

Wouldn't that be the most annoying thing EVAR?   ;D ;D ;D

Argh!!
After this I'm ignoring the OP, thus erasing this masturbatory thread from my front page view.

Why I seem intelligent? Because I'm surrounded by idiots.

Are you feeling less pretty today? Surround yourself with ugly people.

Are you feeling unwealthy today? Go find some poor people.

Wanna know what's it like to be a god? Get monkeys.

Interesting how you correlate harvard students with bright, and trow high school dropouts together with the dumb blonds.

You might want to read some stories about Bill Gates, Steve Jobs etc.

Bill Gates and Steve Jobs are not high school dropouts... In fact, Bill Gates is a Harvard student...

Let me correct that for you:

"In fact, Bill Gates is a Harvard student dropout."

High school means higher education in Europe (+18 year), OP might have meant people that drop out of school between the age of 12-18?

I think 'university' and 'school', on average, do more bad than good. Hence dropping out of it is a mark of achievement in many cases.  

I have the impression, which might just be me, that people with the best grades do generally worse in life later on than people with poor or average grades.

The use of Harvard, rather than Cambridge or Oxford, is an indication that the poster is American.

Also, I do not see how school does more bad than good for intelligence, though this depends on one's definition of intelligence. Most people I consider to be intelligent are well-educated.

I mean with intelligence, wisdom. Sorry if that was not clear.

Most people I have known that were well educated (high degrees/grades), were not wise, nor happy.

The explanation for that is that education is learning you to submit rather than think for yourself. To do as other people say, rather than follow your feelings.

I think school is a prison and university just a milder form of it. True learning is what happens when you follow your interests in freedom, like what happens here.

My husband is a senior software architect.  He has learned that in hiring if the resume has "Masters" or "Doctorate"  he is less likely to want to even interview the person.  The main reason is that the person thinks he is smarter just because of the degree and is often so tied to what he "learned" in college without really working in the "real world" that the education becomes a negative instead of a positive.  He would joke with colleagues when he saw "masters degree" on the resume and then toss it in the trash.

I think sometimes the smarter you are the less the person wants to bother with "higher education."  Just my observations here.

superiority bias. i think i'm smarter than you their for you dont have anything to teach me. these sorts of people may be ahead in the beginning but that attitude inhibits their growth potential and they gradually begin to fall behind. of course they never realize it but everyone else does and they end up becoming even more cynical, "they are all just too dumb to realize how smart i actually am".

I'm not sure I would consider either Bill Gates or Steve Jobs especially wise. Each of them has made numerous questionable decisions.

Wisdom is something obtained through decades of experience. Some who are wise are also otherwise intelligent: philosophers are usually among societies' wisest, and they are usually considered intelligent by other metrics also. But many wise people are not especially intelligent by other metrics, and have merely grown wise with age and experience. A war veteran, for example, is often wise, but not necessarily intelligent by other metrics.

While it's true that schooling has little impact on wisdom, I do not see why it would harm wisdom. It's true that many wise people were poorly schooled: Jean-Jacques Rousseau comes to mind. However, many of the wisest people in history were exceptionally well-schooled: Aristotle, one of history's wisest philosophers, was schooled at Plato's academy—the highest education available then.

All in all, I feel that education carries little harm along with it—indeed, most who succeed are well-educated. Whether this is because of education or because of alternative factors (such as access to education) is not definitively known, but there is nonetheless strong correlation between schooling and productivity in later life. I certainly have not noticed a pronounced decrease in prudence or wisdom as a consequence of education; however, I am interested in any studies that argue the contrary.

Also, stupid people have more babies. Probably because they're bored.
Intelligent people have less, because it's the intelligent thing to do.
  Result = general IQ is plummeting, and that's perfectly fine with The Powers That Be.
I know I don't like it when my sheep question me.

"Seem"

That's well said!

;)

"seem" intelligent to whom?

Themselves

By page five they began to explore the definition of the terms in the original question. That is intelligent behavior, albeit belated.

As for the wisdom thing - it is said that "intelligence" is knowing that a tomato is a fruit and "wisdom" is knowing not to use tomatoes in a fruit salad.
In that vein, intelligence might compel us to want to comment on a thread like this, but wisdom would tell us not to bother.

This troll-bait thread has its moments though. People keep insisting on making thoughtful, serious comments. Is that an intelligent thing to do? For 10 extra points, why(not)?

That's common wisdom, tho.
As long as you do it intelligently you can still use tomatoes in fruit salads.

I dunno, i think evolution is pretty clever in making man kill himself.

And who cares about the climate anyway? For sure only humans.

Isn't intelligence not what you do when you know but what you do when you don't?

Humans may pollute the environment, but at least we are aware of the consequences (even if some of us don't care). There are other species that are perfectly capable of destroying an environment or ecosystem, and they are completely ignorant of what they're doing. Many invasive species will destroy all other forms of life they come in contact with, even if it will lead to their deaths. I'd say that our awareness puts us ahead of most species in that aspect. Plus, while humans may destroy the environment, we also nurture it. No other species protects others from extinction.

People that think that we are of ANY danger to earth are hilarious, Earth may have summoned us for the sole purpose of creating plastic and greenhouse gas, could be that earth didn't know how to create it naturally so it summoned us and let us go through the whole process of evolution just so plastic would become a part of it. One thing for sure, Earth has been here billions of years before us and it will stay here billions of years after us.

Stop anthropomorphizing!

Most likely you have a Libertarian leaning, and tend to agree with many people in the Bitcoin community. People who think like you will always seem more intelligent, I find Paul Krugman to be a simpleton and a bigot, yet, he's very accomplished academically and has a Nobel prize in economics, so not everyone agrees with me.

This comment is successful at substantiating the claim it is intended to substantiate


but not at all for the reasons the author thinks ::)

That was a Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, not actually a Nobel Prize. They don't have one of those for economic. Very minute difference though.

There Mr. ManBearPig, I fixed it for you.  ;)

'It' being your anti-industrial, neo-primitive, faith-based, anthropomorphisizing, scientifically illiterate fucktard BS.

Isn't putting people down typical of people who are not intelligent?

Yes. In one or more areas.

There is no more a causal or statistical connection between IQ and politeness than between human activity and climate change.

Only a fool would entertain either obviously stupid notion.

Only a blithering idiot would think whining about "putting people down" is an effective deflection from the truth about volcanos' massive output of CO2 and toxic chemicals.

Can't rebut the message?  Attack the messenger by implying they "are not intelligent" because they insulted someone you agree with!  Works every time, unless you happen to get called out and mocked for it....  ;D

George Carlin at his best.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rld0KDcan_w (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rld0KDcan_w)

I do not agree with him at all I am simply against putting people down.

Then simply say so in the first place.  No need to make a baseless IQ to politeness assumption and insult our intelligence.

I think you are right. People that put other people down have little empathy and are likely frustrated and unhappy.

I would agree that empathy is a form of intelligence. 

Mostly children lose empathic capacity and put other children down, when they themselves are being abused/neglected/mistreated. 

I've been like that :(

Oh, the irony! It hurts!

Ahhh yes!  Let's indulge in the slouchy trend of declaring all human activities "forms of intelligence" until the word's meaning has been diluted into subjective meaninglessness.  If it massages your ego, do it, right?

dumb jock?  No!  Genius level athletic intelligence.
gullible Al Gore mark?  No! High environmental intelligence.
crappy debater?  No.  Empathetic intelligence.

Congrats, you have a special gift of being able to make up, I mean discover, new kinds of intelligence.

Such a precious snowflake, and such high intelligence intelligence.  AKA bullshit intelligence.   :D

Am I being condescended to by a furry, in the name of demonstrating the value of manners?

That's like the fourth time this week.  How do I pry these pervy freaks off my nuts?   :-[ :-[ :-[ :-[

I dont know why you feel the need to be so rude but trust me you have far more cause to be embarrassed than rassah. Thats quite enough of out of you. ignored.

Wow, you're the personification of the perfect prejudiced asshole. When you lose an argument with a black man I bet you resort to calling him a nigger, a gay man a fag and an Asian man a chink. You wouldn't happen to be MysteryMiners brother would you?

No, it's done by people of all IQ. You should know this.

Great thread - it's my experience as well that the bitcoin community at large has a higher level of intelligence, and most importantly, a better sense of awareness.  Why?  This is fringe community, it's not a place for the sheeple to congregate.  To jump into something revolutionary and outside the norm, it either takes courage, anger, or smarts.  Or all three.  As a rule, those that dare to help create new systems for others to follow are smart enough to see the big picture, and to conceive of ways of doing things that improve upon what already exists.  Bitcoin is a community of leaders, for the most part (at least for the time being), and those folks tend to take a high IQ with them as they lead the charge.  It's one of my favorite aspects of this group - we think for ourselves, overall, and it's a beautiful thing.   ;D

I'm not being condescending. I'm just pointing out that you quite literally said that when someone can't rebut the message, they attack the messenger, except that you were the first one to attack them. It's like the Inception of attacking the messenger due to not being able to rebut the message  ;D

For some reason when you open a thread about intelligent people it immediately attracts all the trolls/stupid people.

'i'll suck yo dick'  :D

Well, I didn't expect that one.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=242494.0

because most unintelligent people wouldn't even know how to buy them.

Top lewl thx for the link

It depends on where in the forum you go. There are a lot of paranoid conspiracy theorists on this forum.

Why won't this thread just die...?  ::)

It's not paranoia if it's really happening  ;)

Nice post Kat awaits your true appearance :)

Are you kidding me? This forum is filled with garbage and people without brains!

Just click on Show unread posts since last visit.

- "How do u get bitcoins?"
- "How I turned 50 satoshi into 25 BTC using InsantiyDice"
- "How I turned my small penis into a boring fucking post"
- "wow, bitcoin's astro birth chart is full on!""

These are all thread on the first page of that link.

Then I have my own collection in my sig, which I removed but kept a copy of:

---

EDIT:

Why does this site attract so many nutjobs?


irc.freenode.net #bitcoin




Don't even get me started on the "investment" forum. Someone makes a company called BTCPonzi, and it was a ponzi! Then there was the "non-ponzi investment scheme" which was also a ponzi!

Yes, look how easily stupid Anon136 and QustionAuthority got trolled by blatantly obvious trolling.

Most bitcoiners seem intelligent, but not so much those two.

How will I ever go on living when humorless frumps like Anon136 ignore me?  ???   :D

I especially like how he payed me special attention in the process of his egotistical ignore announcement.   That seems EXTRA intelligent!   ::)

I was vigorously correcting someone spouting crap about how humans are so terrible, for producing CO2 and toxic chemicals, while volcanos are far worse.

Did you pay attention in science class, or were you too busy writing erotic Alvin & The Chipmunks fan fiction?

This boring whining about how 'mean people suck' and speculation regarding mean people's IQs are distractions, red herrings, smokescreens put up to avoid the fact that volcanos cause infinitely more climate change than those evil earth-raping humans.

Thanks, felt good  ;D

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning-Kruger_effect

Can you make a case that this is happening here?

Because the second paragraph in your link says "Actual competence may weaken self-confidence, as competent individuals may falsely assume that others have an equivalent understanding. " which might balance out your effect to zero.  

Whether your intelligence is real or delusional, sucking each others dicks about it on a public forum is gross.

THIS, SOOOOO THIS

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=define+most

This site needs to have an IQ test.  After it's scored, it becomes part of your profile page.  That could help us determine who to pay attention to and who to ignore.

that would filter out people like myself who are not particularly intelligent but compensate for it by being rigorous, intellectually honest, and passionate about learning.

Question One.
An obvious troll is obviously trolling in a troll thread.  What do you do?

a.  Get all huffy, write an indigent post denouncing not only the troll's offensive utterance but IQ as well.
b.  Laugh at the smart-ass punk, improve your mood, perhaps respond in kind.
c.  Sanctimoniously announce you are going to Ignore the troll, as if anyone cares.

d.  Trolls?  My subconscious can skip some posts without my conscious even realizing it.  What trolls?

On the topic of IQ,  my husband said that he heard once that people cannot have an intelligent discussion with anyone outside of 30 points of their personal IQ.  Hence why people in the 100-120 range are typically the most "successful" especially in sales jobs or any jobs requiring communication.  Also, this is why it can become more difficult for people with IQ's above 140 to find more people to relate too.  There are just less people in that range.

Fortunately, I am 130. :)  My husband with 142 tells me I am lucky to be lower than him and I honestly have to agree.  There are some people that look at him cross eyed when he tries to explain things to them.  I find that I can communicate with most people.  It might be interesting to do a poll here.  I have a feeling that the average Bitcoin user is much higher than average.  There will come a day when it becomes simple enough for the "average" person to use but for now I do think there is a discrepancy.

The problem with this is, it's hard to figure out whom this applies to. We have two groups, Bitcoiners, and Detractors (trolls, SA goons, etc)

The situation could be any of the following:

• Bitcoiners are dumb, but think they are smarter than the detractors, and are ignoring the advice of the smart detractors.
• Detractors are dumb, but think they are smarter than bitcoiners, and are ignoring the advice of the smart bitcoiners.

I'm not sure how this dilemma can be settled. I mean, there are a few very very obvious cases (we have some obviously completely retarded bitcoiners, and the detractors, especially a lot of the goons, have a lot of really retarded armchair economists), but overall it's kinda hard to tell. I think, when it comes to making a decision on the Dunning-Krueger, the only winning move is not to play.

I haven't really found that to be a problem in daily life. I'm over 160, but I can still have a casual banter with friends and coworkers about random stuff. It's only a problem when I'm having to deal with work or business stuff, where the people I'm working with seem to constantly lag many steps behind me in figuring out or processing information, and it sometimes gets very frustrating. But it's one of those things where I think that the people I work with are really stupid, and then I immediately feel bad about thinking about them that way, because they can't help it :P Oh, and the random bouts of insanity and megalomania are a bit annoying sometimes, too  ;D

But if you work in a more "technical" industry your co-workers might all have IQs of 130 and up, so the 30 IQ point differential might still be there.  How do you do talking with the the cashier at the local store or when you have to call someone on the phone for help with billing etc?  That is when it gets hard. ;)

Hence the appeal and ensuing propagation of the ELI5 meme.

Study of cognitive linguistics and public speaking may help improve your communicative range.

I was well over 130 at last check (5th grade :P) and enjoy the challenge of avoiding glaze-over to effectively explain something to a normal, non-egghead person.  Especially Bitcoin, of course!

I think you misinterpret the Dunning-Kruger effect.
You do not have to be dumb to be affected. It's a relative scale.
The smartest people on earth have problems with this phenomenon.
It simply states that people affected will think they are smatrter than they realy are.
It's about thinking you are smarter than you actually are. It's not about being smart or dumb in an absolute way.
Moreover, you synthetically divide the community into 'bitcoiners' and 'detractors' while it's an obvious 'no true scotsman'.

IQ of 160 my ass.... you've been Dunning-Krugering yourself.

IQ tests have to be the most bullshit way of identifying a persons intelligence I have ever seen, especially the ones that are largely maths problems because not everyone is good at or likes doing maths.

What realy makes it hard is brain specialization.
Often you will see smart people programmed to think along certain paradimes. This makes them utterly impractical to communicate with.
More often than not it's the smart person that's inable to communicate normally simply because they never got around to practicing it and now their brains are too specific to lock easily into other brains.

The smarter the people you work with are the more they behave like a collection of autistic cats.
At least, that's my experience.
Once you get into the 150's you find that everyone has their own view on existance and making an argument, however casual, will result in half these people re-evaluating the meaning of life.

BTW, IQ is not a measure of intelligence.
It's a measure of order of intelligence.
It gives you an order of intelligence, like 120 is more intelligent than 106, but it does not tell you how smart 120 is compared to 106.
It just tells you how likely someone is to be born with that particular IQ.
What you see is that there is little gain from ever higher IQ. The difference in real-life (non IQ-test) performance is much greater when going from 100 to 130 than it is when going from 130 to 160.
So this whole intelligence thing is weird anyway. It's stupid to discuss it.
If you want to be realy realy fair then you will have to conclude that an IQ score is a measure of how well you perform on IQ tests.
This simple truth is by far the most accurate description of IQ.
So what are we talking about anyway?
If you never heared of algebra and heared a 12 year old explain it to you, wouldn't you think she was the most intelligent human being alife?
For a bystander it would certainly seem as if the little girl is much smarter than you.
But what if you were a greek named Archimedes?
You would still be oblivious to algebra and it would still look to an outsider as if the girl was outsmarting you in these math puzzles.
But meanwhile you would have your own body of work that your brain was perfectly capable of dealing with (since it was trained for that) and here is where your intelligence shines.
So if you were to make an IQ test based on symbol manipulation like in algebra, then the girl may come out as having a higher IQ.
On the other hand, if you were to make this test based on geometric relations chances are you, Archimedes, would come out as having the highest IQ.
But all that is OK, because we still haven't got a good idea of what intelligence is supposed to be in the first place!

Yeah. The hardline is that IQ tests measure your ability to solve IQ tests.

Who else stopped reading at "paradime" and began laughing?   :D

IQ tests measure general intelligence.  Not mathematical knowledge (sorry imaginary algebra girl!)

Results correlate strongly with SAT scores for scholastic aptitude.  Mere coincidence, I'm sure!   ::)

They work great for determining which kids go into the gifted program, and which will be stuck parroting the same boring old loser speech about how meaningless tests are.  Also a coincidence, according to the Idiocracy lobby.   

Bluh-bluh, cultural socioeconomic bias, oh noez!

Bluh-bluh, dimensionless numbers are meaningless!

Bluh-bluh, teaching to the test, test anxiety, self-serving arguments from ignorance, etc.

And the all-time favorite classic "Your I Will is more important than your IQ."

Complaining about IQ tests is a great way to demonstrate both low intelligence *and* an inferiority complex.

Would you rather your pilot/surgeon/lawyer/programmer/mechanic/broker/child be an IQ 59 moron or 135 near-genius?    ;)

what about the bad population of bitcoiners? the drug dealers? they are all over the darknet

The system is corrupt to the core, the way I see it there is nothing wrong with drug dealers despite the fact that I am an athlete and chose the life of sports over drugs/alcohol, they are responding to a free market and drugs on the darknet have been the best at reducing violence.

I'm sorry to inform you, but there is no such thing as general intelligence.
And if there is then our IQ tests are way too specific to measure it

Don't be fooled- they aren't.

Yah, I covered that already, in my list of predictable objections to IQ tests beloved by mouth-breathers who fail them.

No need to be sorry, as you aren't informing me of anything beyond the low values of your own mental parameters.


I notice you ignored ^my question^ because the answer is not appealing to your dim mendacity.  How cowardly.

But thanks for illustrating the point in the middle.   ;)

I've read Steven J. Gould's tendentious failed attempt to critique IQ into meaninglessness, and found it far less convincing than The Bell Curve.

You can't even comprehend the complete content of my posts on the subject, and so have zero chance of succeeding where the overrated, politically correct Harvard professor failed.

And what is a "paradime" anyway?  Some new altcoin perhaps?   ;D

No, it's by design. It has to do with the IQ tests reflecting how our scholastic systems present problems. This expression/presentation of problems is not nearly as generic as would obviously seem. People with different environmental contexts (all  the way down to what they watched on tv as a kid) can score differently on these tests for various reasons besides intelligence.
And of course there is the problem of pure motivation (as opposed to intelligence). How can you tell the difference between aptitude and attitude? Would a lazy smart person allways score more than an ambitious but less smart person?
Did you know you can boost your IQ score just by practicing the kinds of specific abstract questions that are asked in a particular IQ test? How is that anything even near general?


So we have this fine grained distribution of something and the best we can do is make a few digital decisions based on that set?
You know there is something incomplete about that.
If you would talk to some of the gifted people you describe they will basically tell you the same thing. Incidentally, there are a lot of very gifted people that do not test well on IQ tests. It just happens that their intelligence is not mostly in solving abstract logic puzzles of the kind seen in IQ tests.


Yes, because it's a serious problem with every single IQ test. Intelligence is not a singular thing.


No, but they do distort the relative differences in intelligence and have no absolute meaning besides relating to the test themselfs.


Yeah, these all matter to a certain degree, especially taking a similarilly formulated test several times or actually training for it. But cultural and developmental factors are much stronger. How well would you do on an IQ test if you had never as a baby played with one of those toys that make you put the right shapes in te right holes? So again, how general is the intelligence you try to measure if it is applied to specific abstract situations?


No, but is does play a big role. By taking an IQ test you also measure the motivation of the person to do these tests. How much effect this has will differ from instance to instance of test being taken.


Nah, mine is fine as it is. It's just that i'm smart enough to understand what they mean.
By the way, the designers of these tests are some of the biggest critics of the same thing. Would you say that this also demonstrates their low intelligence?


I don't think you can get a pilot/surgeon/lawyer/programmer/mechanic/broker with an IQ of 59.
Anyway, the difference between and IQ of 59 and an IQ of 135 is about 98% of the world population.. That's quite some rare people you want to hire for some of the most common jobs in the world..
And you get all kinds of new problems with intelligent people. Most of them are incapable of processing instruction that were not generated by themselfs. If they do manage this then they have internally translated the intructions to their own set. This can be a hit and miss thing if the instructions are simple but strict. They tend to rearrange the system to fit their particular set of instructions instead of just executing the instructions as intended.
So for a lot of tasks it is better to have someone with a suitable intelligence (and experience and insights) instead of having someone with a particularly high IQ.

How do you fail an IQ test?  ::)

Aah, more insults of my intelligence.
And i am supposed to be the one with an insecurity about intelligence?
 ;D

By failing to recognize an ancient, well-worn joke, even when deviously obviously put in place just to give you another opportunity to demonstrate your lack of wit.

Thanks for asking, I'm glad my unkind assumptions regarding your humorless propensity towards pompous-yet-ineffectual pedantry proved productive.    :D


Umm, parse error.  Specific != abstract.


I rest my case.  


https://i.imgur.com/JxQr7RW.jpg

Thanks for playing You Got Trolled - Junior Edition (for IQs 19-99).

Its better to give job to loyal idiot than smart asshole

some jobs, yes.

the important jobs requiring critical thinking I specified in my pointed question?

certainly not.

your attempt to answer a different question from the one asked is indicative of your dishonest desire to avoid the obvious answer.

those claiming they'd prefer an IQ 65 moron surgeon operate on their children, 'because IQ is meaningless social construct' or whatever, are a special kind of cowardly, insecure cretin.

I always thought that IQ tests were not representative of intelligence. Any "standardized" test is way too simplistic to measure how intelligent one is. People have different strengths and weaknesses, and you can't just pick one number to decide their "intelligence". There's also the factor that getting a bunch of  random, generic questions right might not have anything to do with how smart you are with actual real world problems.

Of course, if you have a really high IQ you could be incredibly intelligent- but that one number should not be the sole indicator.

I found some interesting articles on the subject:

On motivation and IQ:


On the "three components" of intelligence:

I am curious, do any of you high IQ members have any criminal record? If yes then for what?

So, did i win?

If that's what you believe, then you are free to ignore someone's IQ test score.  No one is saying you should be forced to take someone's IQ test score into consideration, just that it would be nice to have a person's IQ test score available for those of us that disagree with you and believe that IQ test scores are a good measure of intelligence.

Are you really going to judge people's contributions by their IQ, as opposed to what they say? That is very stupid. What if someone with a low IQ says something that is provably correct? Is it wrong just because their IQ is low?

This thread has been around long enough now to remove any concern that Bitcoiners might have above average intelligence.

Why are you so bothered about what factors I would use to determine the value of someone's contributions?  As long as you are free to decide what factors you take into consideration, why does it matter what factors I take into consideration?


Not at all.  If someone with a low IQ told me that 2 + 2 = 4, then I would certainly agree with them.

We have two very distinct groups here: people who like bitcoin and support it, and people who dislike bitcoin and think it's stupid. The group that is indifferent is irrelevant, since it simply doesn't participate. I don't see an issue with the 'no true scotsman' here.
Regarding Dunning-Kruger, I wasn't aware that there was a scale to it. From what I understand, it's just a concept where people who are dumb are convincing themselves that they are actually smarter than they truly are, and reject competing ideas from smarter people as stupid. If you didn't understand the issue I was talking about, let me rephrase it:

Bitcoiners, being involved with a digital currency in many different aspects, believe they understand economics, currencies, and finance. Bitcoin detractors, such as SA goons, believe that bitcoin is actually a stupid idea, and that bitcoiners who support it are suffering from a Dunning-Krueger effect, wherein the bitcoiners have convinced themselves that they are smart about finance and econ, when they actually aren't. In this case, bitcoiners are dumb Dunning-Kruger types, and the detractors that accuse them of such are the smart ones.

Conversely, bitcoin detractors, such as SA goods, believe they understand finance, currencies, and economics, and think that bitcoin is a stupid idea. Bitcoiners think that bitcoin is actually a good idea, and that bitcoin detractors are suffering from a Dunning-Kruger effect, wherein the SA goons only think they are smart about finance and econ, but actually aren't. In this case, bitcoin detractors are dumb Dunning-Kruger types (ironically), and bitcoiners that use bitcoin and understand the related finance and econ are the smart ones.

It's not a question of who is smart and who is dumb. It's an issue of bitcoin detractors, such as SA goons, accusing Bitcoiners of suffering from Dunning-Kruger effects, thinking they understand econ and  finance better, when, ironically, they themselves may be the ones suffering from those effects.


As for IQ, it sounds like some of you don't even know what IQ test questions are like. They don't test your knowledge (i.e. you don't need to know algebra, though I knew it since I was 10). You just need to show how well you can conceptualize problems, and how quickly you can process data. A good analogy would be:

A person with a high IQ is like a Quad-Core 3.5Ghz PC. A person with a low IQ is like a single code 1.5Ghz PC. One can process data much faster than the other. Knowledge and skills, on the other hand, is like OS and software. You can stick Windows on the 3.5Ghz PC, and a trimmed-down Linux on the 1.5Ghz PC, and in the end they will both run at about the same speed. The 1.5Ghz PC may even be more capable, depending on software you need to use. So, if you were to sit two people with the same set of skills in front of a logic or concept problem, both will be able to solve it, but the higher IQ one will solve it faster. If you give the problem to an experienced low-IQ person and an inexperienced high-IQ person, the low-IQ person will solve it faster, since the high-IQ person will have to figure it out from scratch. If you give the problem to low and high IQ people who have no prior experience at all, the low-IQ one might never be able to solve it. FYI, I am a lazy bastard, and spent the last two years of highschool getting shit grades and almost never doing homework or studying for exams, but I never got less than a B on tests, simply because I derived most of the exam problems from scratch or bits of memory, instead of studying and memorizing things like my classmates. Out of humility, I'd like to think that I'm not that special, and any one of my classmates could have done the same, but I somehow doubt that.

OK.  I totally believe you have a 160 IQ now. :)

Seriously, the smarter you are it seems the more bored people are in high school.  In my experience it seems those that have the best grades are the ones in the 120-130 range.   I was just barely above that so my grades were OK but not great.  I did not care that much.  I was shocked when I graduated with honors.  I was like, "How did I do that?"  I was not really trying to. ;)  I felt a little guilty then.  I often think if I had only applied myself I guess I could have graduated at the top?  But I did not care that much really.  In fact, after taking one AP class I realized I was working harder for an "A" and it would be much easier to just take a normal class, not study at all and get an A or B.  I guess I was a little "lazy" too.

Bitcoin is just the natural and rational evolution of money. Not surprising it would be firstly noticed by intelligent people :)

I felt the same way during my university graduation. Everyone was all excited about having such a great accomplishment, and patting themselves for overcoming great difficulties, while I felt that there was nothing special about it. I just did what I was told to, one step at a time, and graduation was just another in a long series of steps. It's like, "anyone can do this, if they just went out and did it. What's the big deal?"
Master's level graduation was a bit different. They REALLY tax your brain and make you work in those classes.

Well, how much would you have to support or like bitcoin to be considered on the side of bitcoin?
Conversely, how much do you have to dislike bitcoin to be considered a detractor?
What about the people without strong opinions? People who like bitcoin but not fanatically? Or people who don't like digital money but still use it because its there? Are they true supporters and haters?

I don't think there is a hard division between people who like bitcoin and people who are against. It's a synthetic proposition.

I always got shit grades in school, except that I was also in a bad financial situation and had to work up until 12AM as a waiter despite the fact that it was illegal to employ me that late as a teenager, I was also almost always tired in school and rumors were running around that I was using drugs, one of the teachers even told my friends not to hang out with me because he was so convinced, all the "geeks" that studied well in those days are lacking aspirations nowadays and generally behave like sacks of shit getting below-average pay and spending their free time being backstabbing lazy couch potato stoners, people that are like minded and go through life like sheeple taking advice from teachers/parents/friends go nowhere in life.

I  ended up getting an awesome job with above-average pay, getting in shape, smashing sloots and generally having a pretty sweet life. High school grades != (Intelligence/success in life), Uni grades !=(Intelligence/success in life)

I has an IQ of 82 can I join yer club?

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5334/9443734697_db393f5b54_n.jpg

I would argue that there are very few human beings who aren't intelligent; our species is the very definition of intelligence, the reason why the word, let alone the concept, exists at all.  It depends on how a person acts; even people who believe in completely irrational things can appear highly intelligent; they can form sentences just fine and explain clearly their beliefs, whatever they may be.  The effect seen when examining people on this forum is that they generally favor logic and reason, complete their ideas using their language properly, and have an interest in ideas that other people don't prefer to think about; I believe this is directly influenced by Bitcoin and what it is, that draws so many of the same type of personalities.  A test was done earlier that showed this forum was dominated by INTx personalities, who are known to be rational and logical, and love abstract concepts like philosophy and science.  Perhaps it is these traits that make them appear more intelligent than others, but this does not imply that their minds are literally bigger or faster; the personality merely holds knowledge in a very high regard.  So, the presentation of these people are generally as I've described; a desire to be clear and concise with one's language, so they may express their ideas on abstract concepts (like Bitcoin) in a way others would understand.

Of course, everyone has different interests, and they're all intelligent, even if their beliefs are irrational (like racists, for example.  And scientologists/mormons.)  Bitcoin just attracts a certain type of person.  Are they more intelligent?  I don't believe we can measure the ability of a person to think based on their interests, personality or presentation; I believe it is already obvious that a person can think, and what it is they think about is what they naturally choose to think on, and how often.  My mind works in no different fashion than any other; what differs is what I value, and though some people may value morals, or wealth, or relationships, I value knowing and understanding.

So naturally, that would lead to an increase of general knowledge.  But if we're measuring intelligence on how much we know, People magazine would be the most stimulating literature in the world.

The bitcoin community seems very polarized to me. It is exacerbated by the fact that to really understand bitcoin, one needs to have both the ability to grasp the technical side of the software/protocol and various economic mechanisms.

On one hand you have people capable of thinking outside of the box, who 1/ realize that the world is not immutable 2/ can attempt to imagine how things could be if they were different from what they are now.

On the other hand you have gullible idiots who believe in instant riches, conspirations and magics and basically can't think for themselves but are very eager to follow any guru they will find.

Usually the "smart" people in the community are computer engineers and they sometimes have and an understanding of the economy that is too simplistic. There is not enough "economists" in the community but the main reason is that "economic science" not being a science, most economists are stupid and narrow minded and are therefore constantly victim of cognitive dissonance through their life. So they would very quickly reject bitcoin without giving it much thought. Therefore it's among traders and entrepreneurs (whome I call the real economists) that you will find many of the people constituting the other half of the "smart" people.

I think most Bitcoiners or crypto currency enthusiast in general understand at some level the current economic situation and geopolitical sate of the world. 

We understand that America cannot print money forever.
We understand history repeats itself (Nazi Germany printed money, like crazy before WWII... lead to hyper inflation).
We understand that currency wars lead to trade wars, which leads to real wars (history proves this)
We understand that GOLD is great store of value, but you cannot carry gold around with you (though some gold is necessary in a portfolio...5%)
We understand that the printed money are used to fund clandestine wars all over the world.

Most importantly that the world cannot and should not keep the current monetary system which has been around since after the times of Egypt.  Central Banking controlled world by the elites where most governments around the world are their puppets doing their bidding.  Media is used to make citizens think, act and spend a certain way.

Do you have student loans?
Do you have car loans?
Do you have credit card debts?
Do you have a huge mortgage?

Understand , You are in debt by design.

People are the workers in the system kept indebted,  paying taxes and banking fees funneling the money up the chain to the few that just keeps getting richer. 

We understand that a new and more egalitarian /  free money system must take over and at least give some power to the people, instead of the governments and elites that control over 80% of the world's wealth.

If you can spare a few hours watch this video analysis about Control System and "The Matrix" world we live in :

http://www.moneyaccumulator.com/1118/the-matrix-trilogy-decoded-by-mark-passio-the-system-we-live-in/

The above is pretty much all I can think of right now.  I'm sure the hoards of smart people on this forum can add more points.

Peace out.

CryptoCoinMKT

Then it would follow that the Dunning-Kruger effect claim is a synthetic proposition as well.

Ha Ha , this is funny.  ;D

Your prize is 1000 Paradimes!   8)

The idea behind Paradime (the altcoin for dimwits) was to create a clone of Primecoin, but with block rewards going to miners who are the first to discover new even numbers that are multiples of 10. 

Unfortunately Paradime is not traded on any exchange.   The code was written by people who strenuously believe IQ has no bearing on aptitude or ability, so it's completely broken.

If you are a BASIC guru, perhaps you can submit some bug fixes and get it going. 

Agreed, I know a lot of people with "Masters" and "Doctorate" who have their nose so high, thinking they are better than everyone else in the office, meanwhile they are doing the same things I am, getting paid the same wage, thinking they deserve more because they went the extra mile in education. The kicker is that sometimes their higher education doesn't translate into actionable or useful skills at the workplace.

Mind you, not all are like this, I know quite a few that are motivated and contributes a lot to the task at hand at the office...but one thing in common is that they all have huge "student loan debts", up in the $100K area. Ouch.

What makes it "hard" is the average person can't figure out how to swipe a credit card and use a pin keypad. The can't remember passwords, or even phone numbers anymore because they store them all in their iphones.

The entire planet is going the way of idiocracy.

I think we are moving more mundane things out of our brains and into devices that can handle these things for us, and are freeing up our brains for more advanced things. Well, some of us are.

Has anybody said Dunning-Krugerrands yet?

On facebook, you would be the most hated person, your could even be on TV by now. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SQ60Eg47d4 (see comments))
And here... No one seems to have had a fuck about it, besides me lol

Just by the very nature of finding this forum and understanding the security and irreversibility of Bitcoin enough to know it's easy to scam people with it puts even the SA goons and other detractors at 120 or higher IQ, IMHO. They may be quite young and unemployed, but that doesn't mean they're not smart.

I would almost imagine most forum users of *any* forum are at least 80 IQ. People under 80 IQ are pretty rare on the Internet. For one, they almost always parrot what others say and don't do any critical thinking, and rarely find the comment button or even use the Internet for anything other than Netflix or Youtube. I've seen people like this use the Internet, they just don't even understand how it works. It's all "magic" to them.

I mean think about it. Almost everyone commenting in this thread likely knows how to torrent, understands what a VPN is used for, and can surmise why the federal government cannot shut down Silk Road. Do you really think anyone under an IQ of 120 can lay claim to those three things and still be posting in this thread?

I think Bitcoiners seem intelligent because the only people willing to converse about the concept of a decentralized currency are intelligent, whether they are detractors or promoters. People with less intelligence simply don't care about their money or finances. There will never come a day where they start to care, either, they'll want other people to take care of it for them. Bitcoin is best positioned to replace the petrodollar, it just needs some more things to make it more secure like Trezor and/or two-factor authentication built-in to the client. Then you'll see more adoption by those under 120 IQ.

I also think IQ tests can be gamed. I was able to "raise" my IQ by taking one test out of the blue for 120 and then later took the same model of test (with different questions) after 5 days of on-and-off online IQ testing and got 133. I imagine I could make 140 or higher if I put some effort into it.

Not nearly as funny as TsimFuckis.

Wow you are smart :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o How can I become smart like you?

I find the cromulence of your homily alluringly embiggening to the astutement of cerebroponderosity. 
Pray, do continue to enchant us with your rarified undumbeningz!
~Me

The real fun is having an official IQ of 79......that and being thrown off research project they ran in the late 70's in liverpool... supposedly tasked with finding a correlation between IQ and criminal behavior.

Too many trolls for too long. Nothing phases anyone here anymore. They're numb to it all like a battered wife. They just keep marching on praising each other for their vast intellect like Khan Noonien Singh from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

If you are finding stupid people. Consider going to bitcointalk gamble, loan; coin chat #begging. Occasionally one or two in #main. You have to know that those people don't know their way to irc or reddit.

I am replying coz  a guy in coinchat and just dice ( same guy) is making me face palm every single line of his chat

okay... now it propagates to the IRC....

confirmation bias
http://youarenotsosmart.com/2010/06/23/confirmation-bias/

Spend a few hours at that site and realize how stupid we all really are.

A lot less stupid than the ones using the fiat system I can tell you that much :)

There are a lot of good articles on that site, but the author should tone down the ads. I made it to the site, I don't need to see an ad for the stuff I'm already reading...

Yeah, I liked him more before the book. Gotta eat I guess.

“Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.”

Ideas like bitcoin!

I'm going to totally shamelessly plug my bitcoiner personality thread (MBTI/Keirsey) because it's not entirely unrelated.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=215232.0 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=215232.0)

In a thread about people.

rofl

Ultimately we are all here to discuss ideas (or at least discuss people that discuss ideas) or

http://i.qkme.me/3vg7l9.jpg

(sorry it sounded better in my head  ;D)