Abstract
This paper will present the model Carlo Cipolla developed in his worldwide best-selling essay on “The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity” along with the framework of social behaviors it contains. Cipolla did not intend to explore intelligence but to focus primarily in his analysis on stupidity, two characteristics of the social behavior that man, as an individual or group agent, can reveal when he interacts in social groups and organizations of all types and sizes. More generally, Cipolla put forth a simple framework that classified the behavior of the man/actor in a social or organized group based on the advantages and disadvantages such behavior brought to the actor and the group of which he is a part. According to the author, all group individual behavior can be qualified according to two parameters: 1) advantages or disadvantages to the actor, and 2) advantages or disadvantages for “others”. The combination of these parameters produces the four individual types: 1) Intelligent people, 2) Helpless/Naive people, 3) the Bandit and 4) the Stupid person. This general outline is so simple that it represents a powerful and effective educational tool to make people aware of how they can be guided when they interact with other individuals. Therefore, Cipolla’s book is used in schools, universities and training courses for managers to send an educational message: behave intelligently and avoid stupidity, because “the Stupid person is more dangerous than the Bandit”. This study seeks to demonstrate that when a third parameter is introduced—The volition or lack thereof of the actor to cause advantages to others—four other types of individual can be added to Cipolla’s original typology: 1) the Able or Capable person, 2) the Hero, 3) the Incapable person, and 4) the Egoist. These eight types can be represented in a circular model that I have termed the Social Wheel, which increases the educational power of Cipolla’s idea. The paper will show that “the Incapable person is more dangerous than the Stupid one”.
Highlights
Recognizing IntelligenceIn their book Intelligent Behavior in Animals and Robots, David McFarland and Tom Bösser recognize that Intelligence is a relative, elusive, multi-faceted concept:[...] definitions of ‘intelligence’ vary with the theoretical position
Cipolla did not intend to explore intelligence but to focus primarily in his analysis on stupidity, two characteristics of the social behavior that man, as an individual or group agent, can reveal when he interacts in social groups and organizations of all types and sizes
In his pragmatic vision of “intelligence” as an attribute of human behavior, Cipolla starts from the assumption that intelligence and stupidity are not revealed all that much by the type of communicative behavior produced by a given agent
Summary
In their book Intelligent Behavior in Animals and Robots, David McFarland and Tom Bösser recognize that Intelligence is a relative, elusive, multi-faceted concept:. The following is an interesting definition of intelligence as behavioral and cognitive ability: Individuals differ from one another in their ability to understand complex ideas, to adapt effectively to the environment, to learn from experience, to engage in various forms of reasoning, to overcome obstacles by taking thought These individual differences can be substantial, they are never entirely consistent: A given person’s intellectual performance will vary on different occasions, in different domains, as judged by different criteria. Cipolla’s test is known as the “Stupidity Test”, and it is applied to any type of “agent”: individuals, couples, groups, organizations, public authorities, even sovereign nations In his pragmatic vision of “intelligence” as an attribute of human behavior, Cipolla starts from the assumption that intelligence and stupidity are not revealed all that much by the type of communicative behavior produced by a given agent. Cipolla’s Test has a wide field of application, since it allows us to judge others’ behavior in relation to the four types of behavior mentioned above
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