Combining Texts

Ideas for 'Community and Citizenship', 'The Philosopher's Toolkit' and 'New Scientist articles'

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4 ideas

18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 5. Rationality / a. Rationality
Consistency is the cornerstone of rationality [Baggini /Fosl]
     Full Idea: Consistency is the cornerstone of rationality.
     From: J Baggini / PS Fosl (The Philosopher's Toolkit [2003], §1.06)
     A reaction: This is right, and is a cornerstone of Kant's approach to ethics. Rational beings must follow principles - in order to be consistent in their behaviour. 'Consistent' now requires a definition….
No one has yet devised a rationality test [New Sci.]
     Full Idea: The financial sector has been clamouring for a rationality test for years.
     From: New Scientist writers (New Scientist articles [2013], 2013.10.29)
     A reaction: Many aspects of intelligence tests do actually pick out what I would call rationality (which includes 'rational intuition', a new favourite of mine). But they are mixed in with rather mechanical geeky sort of tests.
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 7. Intelligence
About a third of variation in human intelligence is environmental [New Sci.]
     Full Idea: Possibly a third of the variation in our intelligence is down to the environment in which we grew up - nutrition and education, for example.
     From: New Scientist writers (New Scientist articles [2013], 2013.10.29)
     A reaction: This presumably leaves the other two-thirds to derive from genetics. I am a big believer in environment. Swapping babies between extremes of cultural environment would hugely affect intelligence, say I.
People can be highly intelligent, yet very stupid [New Sci.]
     Full Idea: You really can be highly intelligent, and at the same time very stupid.
     From: New Scientist writers (New Scientist articles [2013], 2013.10.29)
     A reaction: This is closely related to my observation (from a lifetime of study) that a talent for philosophy has a very limited correlation with standard notions of high intelligence. What matters is how conscious reasoning and intuition relate. Greek 'phronesis'.