Hi DMB:
>There is a hierarchy
> of ideologies so that one moves from fascism to the more intellectual
> system as development proceeds. There's a strong correlation between civil
> libertarianism and high I.Q., for example. Different ideologies appeal to a
> wide range of value systems and the one you wear says tons about where
> you're at.
If this means the more intelligent you are, the more likely you are to be
a libertarian, a recent book entitled "The Reckless Mind-Intellectuals in
Politics" contradicts the assertion. From the New York Review of Books:
"How can intellectuals who should be most alert to the evils of tyranny,
betray the liberal ideals of freedom and independent inquiry? How can
they take political positions that, implicitly or not, endorse oppression
and human suffering on a vast scale?
"'The Reckless Mind' is a study of how a number of important twentieth-
century European intellectuals came to support tyrannical regimes and
totalitarian political ideas. In profiles of Martin Heidegger, Carl Schmitt,
Walter Benjamin, Alexandre Kojeve, Michel Foucault, and Jacques
Derrida, the author demonstrates how the convulsions of the twentieth-
century shaped the political sensibilities of important thinkers who
were so deluded by the ideologies of the time that they closed their
eyes to brutality, coercion and state terror."
I haven't read the book, but my guess would be that some of these
guys were attracted to the intellectual siren song of communism which,
as shown by the disastrous Russian experiment, led to the most brutal
totalitarian regime in history.
As Pirsig points out, intellectuals (defined as high IQ types) are ill-
equipped to run society.
Platt
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