People Aren’t Stupid — They’re Lazy Thinkers

Many people evade the ethical responsibility to think deeply

(Source: yayimages)

People are smart. We call ourselves Homo sapiens for a reason. People are smart enough to figure out how to go to the moon. So why do a small minority of people choose to believe we didn’t go to the moon, or stupid things like that the Earth is flat, that vaccines don’t work, that everything they disagree with (like election results) are false, and so on?

There are political motivations behind such false beliefs to be sure, but, mostly, people believe wrong and stupid things not because they are stupid but because they are lazy. We normally think of people being lazy in the physical sense — being too lazy to get up and do something. People have physical capabilities that they choose to be too lazy to use, but people also have mental capabilities that they choose to be too lazy to use. Lazy thinking is a problem that is all too common.

Two Forms of Thinking