These days political talk shows are the primary dose of ‘reality T.V.’ that my parents are enjoying. I started watching small clips and snippets of these shows as well, mainly due to the boredom of the summer vacations. Now a key feature that I saw in almost all of these shows was how most of these political analyst and politicians had a habit of either talking over their fellows. Upon investigating this behavior (using the basic level knowledge I got from my primary Psychology 101 class and Beginner’s Philosophy) I came to the conclusion that we are Intellectually Arrogant.
Intellectual Arrogance is a characteristic of certain people that leads them to overestimate their cognitive or thinking capabilities. This leads to a dismissal of potential sources that increase knowledge. In other words, apnay aap ko haqeeqat se zyada aqalmand samajhna aur isi waja se ilm aur hikmat me izafa na ho pana.
One of the reasons why these people talked over each other without listening to what the others is due to their false idea that they know more than the other person. Thus they dismiss the other person’s idea without considering it as better than their existing notions.
This behavior is not only common amongst our politicians but a number of other groups as well. I started seeing this behavior among people of the academia as well. Most of the teachers aren’t even ready to listen to different opinions from students. They blatantly dismiss their students’ ideas. The patriarchs and men of our society are also inclined towards this behavior, which becomes apparent when they make decisions about their families and those around them. This arrogance usually results from places of power. The power makes people think that others (who are without this power) lack the analytical skills to form an opinion. Thus the politicians, teachers and patriarchs here are at a place of power.
The best way to combat Intellectual Arrogance is to resist the exploitation of power. Meaning call out anyone who misuses their power. One also has to form a resistance towards this misuse. This disease is obstructing the growth of knowledge from our societies. Hopefully we will treat this kind of arrogance as the illness that it is.
