• HardWorker
    83
    Intelligence and wisdom are two different ways of being smart. The way I've heard them being described is like this, if you feel wet drops on your arm intelligence tells you its raining and wisdom tells you to go inside.

    That being said, what it sounds like to me is that intelligence identifies a problem, from the wet drops intelligence identifies the problem that its raining and you want to keep dry and wisdom comes up with a solution, to go inside. So the way I see it intelligence identifies problems and wisdom formulates solutions.
  • I love Chom-choms
    65
    Intelligence and wisdom are two different ways of being smart. The way I've heard them being described is like this, if you feel wet drops on your arm intelligence tells you its raining and wisdom tells you to go insideHardWorker
    This suggests that every person that goes inside when it starts raining is wise.
    An obviously false conjecture.
    I will now assume that your definition.
    So change the definition.
    I honestly don't understand either so I will try to prove you wrong but I can't add anything thing else.
  • Vince
    69
    Intelligence is about understanding, wisdom is about making choices...I believe
  • Caldwell
    1.3k
    The way I've heard them being described is like this, if you feel wet drops on your arm intelligence tells you its raining and wisdom tells you to go inside.HardWorker

    Neither. It's instinct.
  • unenlightened
    8.7k
    I know all about intelligence but I am wise enough to keep it to myself.
  • Outlander
    1.8k
    "Knowledge is power, energy. Intelligence is potential, wisdom is kinetic."

    "Wisdom is knowledge vetted through the proving ground of life."

    Those quotes are mine by the way, don't steal them.
  • I love Chom-choms
    65
    Knowledge is power, energy. Intelligence is potential, wisdom is kinetic."
    So,I guess you are saying that wisdom is the correct application of knowledge and intelligence is just having that knowledge.

    Neither. It's instinct.Caldwell

    Please explain.
  • Tom Storm
    8.4k


    I think wisdom and intelligence are synonyms. Are there any uses of the word wisdom where intelligence can't also be used? Sometimes there's snobbery about words and we often reach for 'wisdom' when we are looking for higher status, sage-like accounts of intelligence. Hence we are more likely to say the Dalai Lama is wise rather than the Dalai Lama is intelligent. Wisdom is intelligence wearing a romantic cloak.

    I think the real distinction you may be looking for is the difference between knowledge and intelligence/wisdom.
  • 180 Proof
    14.1k
    My short shorthands for these terms:
    Intelligence corresponds to aptitudes for learning and creativity.

    Wisdom corresponds to the competence of using intelligence without either misusing intelligence (i.e. fallacious reasoning, bias, delusions) or abusing intelligence (i.e. maladaptive, or immiserating, conduct).
    A philosopher contemplates these ^misuses and ^^abuses of intelligences and, ideally, s/he performs reflective exercises daily (e.g vide P. Hadot) to habitualize reducing both the occurrences and scope of their adverse effects. Study, exercise and dialectical discussions like this constitute my (yoga-like, martial arts-like) 'philosophical regimen'. I believe that to seek wisdom is to seek what 'the wise' seek: mastery of opposing-reducing both ^foolery & ^^stupidity. In a pragmatic sense, at most one strives to grow less foolish, even less stupid, in due course, perhaps always approaching like a horizon but never arriving – or like Sisyphus and his 'philosopher's stone' – always with intelligence seeking, persevering, loving wisdom, even though the Muse (daimon?) remains ever out of reach (vide I. Murdoch re: erotics of The Good; Spinoza re: amor dei intellectualis; et al).
  • Yohan
    679
    Wisdom: a mean between common sense and imagination. (Other names could include skepticism and open mindedness)
    Imagination reveals possibilities, inspirations. Common sense filters to probabilities. Grounds toward the pragmatic and actionable.
  • Caldwell
    1.3k
    explainI love Chom-choms
    Which one to explain -- the meaning of instinct? Or the reaction of human to rain falling on him?
  • TheMadFool
    13.8k
    — Neil deGrasse Tyson

    What do the arrows represent? Anyone?
  • Yohan
    679

    Chaotic data?
    Refine data so that makes sense? = information
    Organize information into a comprehensive map of reality= knowledge
    When enough diverse knowledge is obtained, the opposites of perspectives cancel out resulting in emptiness of opposition, and one obtains poised equilibrium resulting in behavior that is in Buddhism called the 'middle way' and in Christianity 'straight and narrow' = wisdom?
  • Hermeticus
    181


    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIKW_pyramid

    "Typically information is defined in terms of data, knowledge in terms of information, and wisdom in terms of knowledge".
  • TheMadFool
    13.8k
    Chaotic data?
    Refine data so that makes sense? = information
    Organize information into a comprehensive map of reality= knowledge
    When enough diverse knowledge is obtained, the opposites of perspectives cancel out resulting in emptiness of opposition, and one obtains poised equilibrium resulting in behavior that is in Buddhism called the 'middle way' and in Christianity 'straight and narrow' = wisdom?
    Yohan

    Nice! I have no theory of my own regarding Neil deGrasse Tyson's views on the matter.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIKW_pyramid

    "Typically information is defined in terms of data, knowledge in terms of information, and wisdom in terms of knowledge".
    Hermeticus

    :up: Thanks a million. I've saved the page for later.
  • Athena
    3k
    Data→Information→Knowledge→WisdomData→Information→Knowledge→Wisdom
    — Neil deGrasse Tyson

    What do the arrows represent? Anyone?
    TheMadFool

    No progress can be made without thinking and experience is essential to get from knowledge to wisdom.
    A high IQ and book learning doesn't equal wisdom. We need the experience to understand the meaning of all that knowledge.

    Zeus was afraid once man had the technology of fire he would discover all other technologies and then forget the gods. I think that is technology without wisdom.
  • TheMadFool
    13.8k
    No progress can be made without thinking and experience is essential to get from knowledge to wisdom.
    A high IQ and book learning doesn't equal wisdom. We need the experience to understand the meaning of all that knowledge.

    Zeus was afraid once man had the technology of fire he would discover all other technologies and then forget the gods. I think that is technology without wisdom.
    Athena

    If you ask me, a high IQ eliminates the need for experience and vice versa. Of course, we would be better off having the best of both worlds but if given a choice, I'd opt for IQ instead of experience: as @Yohan put it in a thread on life advice which has been deleted, "learn from other's mistakes".
  • Athena
    3k
    If you ask me, a high IQ eliminates the need for experience and vice versa. Of course, we would be better off having the best of both worlds but if given a choice, I'd opt for IQ instead of experience: as Yohan put it in a thread on life advice which has been deleted, "learn from other's nistakes".TheMadFool

    Well, when it comes to a high IQ I will never achieve that and I have known people with a lower IQ than mine who are pretty wise.
  • Athena
    3k
    Refine data so that makes sense? = information
    Organize information into a comprehensive map of reality= knowledge
    When enough diverse knowledge is obtained, the opposites of perspectives cancel out resulting in emptiness of opposition, and one obtains poised equilibrium resulting in behavior that is in Buddhism called the 'middle way' and in Christianity 'straight and narrow' = wisdom?
    Yohan

    The first part of the transformation of data to information and knowledge makes sense to me, but the last phase does not make sense to me. It sure does not happen naturally.
  • TheMadFool
    13.8k
    Well, when it comes to a high IQ I will never achieve that and I have known people with a lower IQ than mine who are pretty wise.Athena

    School of hard knocks, not everyone wants to go there.
  • Athena
    3k
    Intelligence and wisdom are two different ways of being smart. The way I've heard them being described is like this, if you feel wet drops on your arm intelligence tells you its raining and wisdom tells you to go inside
    — HardWorker
    This suggests that every person that goes inside when it starts raining is wise.
    An obviously false conjecture.
    I will now assume that your definition.
    So change the definition.
    I honestly don't understand either so I will try to prove you wrong but I can't add anything thing else.
    I love Chom-choms

    I want to jump in because I think,I love Cham-choms, is correct. I had a friend with a low IQ who had the smarts of an animal (I envied him for this) and wisdom. It was like he had the clarity of mind that Yohan mentioned. Some of us have so much chatter going on in our heads, we are not really present and do not see the obvious.
  • Athena
    3k
    School of hard knocks, not everyone wants to go there.TheMadFool

    I am not sure what you mean by that. My mother thought children were naturally wise and she influenced me to value wisdom. I think that my choice to have wisdom lead to experiencing much adversity? Kind of like a Native American proverb I once heard of wanting specific characteristics and getting the life lessons that strengthen them.

    I think memory is important to intelligence and I never had a good memory! It took me forever to memorize the alphabet, days of the week, months of year, etc. and I have never memorized the times' table despite making a lot of effort to do so. Because math is so useful in knowing our world and having good logic, I greatly regret I seem to be no more capable of understanding math than I am capable of flying.
  • TheMadFool
    13.8k
    I am not sure what you mean by that.Athena

    If everybody had to be attacked by a lion to know lions are dangerous, we would have a world full of amputees, horribly scarred people, not to mention very well-fed lions. With IQ, vicarious learning is possible, greatly increasing the odds of survival and, if you've mastered the art of learning from the bad experiences of others, a good life. With experience, you'll learn all right but, as people have told me n number of times, the hard way.
  • Vince
    69
    "The aim of the wise is not to secure pleasure, but to avoid pain."
    -Aristotle
  • TheMadFool
    13.8k
    The aim of the wise is not to secure pleasure, but to avoid pain."
    -Aristotle
    Vince



    Aponia?

    Absence of pain (aponia) is a cakewalk compared to the presence of pleasure (hedonia?).
  • 180 Proof
    14.1k
    Ez Pz :up:
    I can't say what 'the good life' is but I can't conceive of it not including

    amor dei intellectualis deus, sive natura
    ataraxia
    aponia
    apatheia
    (i.e. amor fati)
    solitaire et solidaire (i.e. non serviam)

    & getting one's kicks.
    180 Proof
    I'm an 'epicurean-spinozist' (or absurdist) meaning that aponia & ataraxia without transcendent illusions (or sisyphusean eudaimonia) is (my) "hedonism".180 Proof
    My life-long aspiration :point: gnóthi seautón ... panta rhei ... pan metron ariston ... tetrapharmakos —> aponia, ataraxia (& eudaimonia) ... apatheia ...180 Proof
    Platonism is too other-worldly – escapist (e.g. gnostic) – for cultivating ataraxia, aponia & apatheia here and now in this world ...180 Proof
    :death: :flower:
  • Tom Storm
    8.4k
    I like it when you talk dirty. :wink:
  • TheMadFool
    13.8k
    Platonism is too other-worldly – escapist (e.g. gnostic) – for cultivating ataraxia, aponia & apatheia here and now in this world ...180 Proof

    :up: What's the difference between acceptance and resignation? Are we wise (accepting truths, not chasing after what are mere illusions) OR are we helpless (we have no choice but to put up with whatever life throws at us, that despite our ability to conceive of a better deal)?
  • Caldwell
    1.3k
    What's the difference between acceptance and resignation?TheMadFool
    With understanding comes acceptance. Acceptance can never happen without understanding. Resignation is as what you mused above -- one has no choice or lacks energy to quarrel.
  • 180 Proof
    14.1k
    What's the difference between acceptance and resignation?TheMadFool
    If you're alluding to apatheia, maybe the difference is between active indifference and passive indifference ...
    Are we wise ...
    No. Congenitally (though not necessarily incorrigibly) foolish.
    OR are we helpless
    No. Akratic as I've mentioned already.

    Sometimes I aim to sleaze. :smirk:
bold
italic
underline
strike
code
quote
ulist
image
url
mention
reveal
youtube
tweet
Add a Comment

Welcome to The Philosophy Forum!

Get involved in philosophical discussions about knowledge, truth, language, consciousness, science, politics, religion, logic and mathematics, art, history, and lots more. No ads, no clutter, and very little agreement — just fascinating conversations.