# Stunning examples of willful ignorance **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 30, 2007, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644 "2007-10-30T23:50:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 13
**Author:** ![Li\_l\_Pluck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ee59a6/32.png) [@Li\_l\_Pluck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Li_l_Pluck)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2007, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/241 "2007-11-10T20:58:51Z")
[QUOTE=fetus] Huh. I thought :dubious: was for expressing the feeling that a claim is dubious. Especially since it’s called : dubious :. I guess they should’ve called it :snark:. [/QUOTE] Yes, I realize that the :dubious: means “dubious”; it’s just that ISTM that, more often than not, it’s used in a snarky way. Apparently, that is not what you were doing, so I apologize for misunderstanding your intention. Many :smack: 's to me. [QUOTE=fetus] Apparently. I suspect that you’re right in that it’s a generational difference, though, like how a Dutch man in 1635 would’ve paid as much for an interesting tulip as he would’ve for a house, but by 1650 nobody thought tulips wer all that interesting. [/QUOTE] Yes, it is indeed a generational difference. I suspect, however, that even in my own generation (I’m 37 years old), I’m something of an outlier in the whole letter-writing regard. And yeah, I do think it’s sad that letter-writing has become a moribund art. [QUOTE=fetus] No, but many people in my generation used the energy they would’ve spent remembering cursive and devoted it to, say, Java programming. [/QUOTE] Understood, but I’d guess that it takes much less “headroom” to “remember” how to write in cursive than it does to remember how to program in Java. IOW, both ought to be able to co-exist rather comfortably and peacefully. At any rate, again, my apologies for misinterpreting you. ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2007, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/242 "2007-11-10T21:05:34Z")
No problem. FTR, it seems that your professor asked who didn’t write in cursive, not who didn’t _know how to_ write in cursive. Big diff. Of course, I answered as if it were the latter, so fie on me, but between myself (b. 1986) and someone around my age, there’s very little utility in letter-writing unless one of the participants is in jail or boot camp; it’s far slower than any other conceivable method of non-face-to-face communication. And although I appreciate that flowing script may add to your missive-reading experience, I regard it as just harder to read. We are a culture of efficiency, for better or for worse. ---
**Author:** ![Boggette](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@Boggette](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boggette)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2007, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/243 "2007-11-10T22:31:58Z")
In high school, I had a friend who wasn’t the brightest bulb. One day she was complaining loudly about a new tooth coming in. It was a wisdom tooth, she said. I told her, “Oh! Do you know what that means? Wisdom teeth mean you’ve reached your learning capacity. Once they grow in, you can’t learn anything more!” She said, “OH! I better drop out then and get a job!” Took me forever to convince her I was joking and that she should stay in school! ---
**Author:** ![Tony\_Montana](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/278dde/32.png) [@Tony\_Montana](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tony_Montana)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2007, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/244 "2007-11-10T23:33:39Z")
[QUOTE=lizardling] _looks about_ I’m wearing a set of devil horns today at work. [/QUOTE] _My_ horns hold my halo in place. 😃 One of my good friends smokes the “Mary-Jane”,much to my disliking. I jokingly called her a ‘druggie’ once. She replied: “Weed isn’t a drug,it’s an HERB its NATURAL” :dubious: I know better than to argue with her this point ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/245 "2007-11-11T00:59:23Z")
I can barely write in cursive, since I learned it in 3rd or 4th grade, and virtually never used it after that until junior year when I had to copy a pledge when taking the SATs. Cursive is simply not useful to me, and I’ve almost never had occasion to use it. Thus, the skill faded over the years. ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/246 "2007-11-11T05:34:43Z")
> [@Tony Montana](#): > > She replied: “Weed isn’t a drug,it’s an HERB its NATURAL” > > I know better than to argue with her this point You do, do you? ---
**Author:** ![Tony\_Montana](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/278dde/32.png) [@Tony\_Montana](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tony_Montana)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/247 "2007-11-11T06:10:30Z")
[QUOTE=fetus] You do, do you? [/QUOTE] What do you do about that doo-doo?Do you give a clue till your blue or shoo? Sam I am,I dont like green eggs and ham.. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/248 "2007-11-11T06:36:13Z")
[QUOTE=Tony Montana] _My_ horns hold my halo in place. 😃 One of my good friends smokes the “Mary-Jane”,much to my disliking. I jokingly called her a ‘druggie’ once. She replied: “Weed isn’t a drug,it’s an HERB its NATURAL” :dubious: I know better than to argue with her this point [/QUOTE] I usually respond with, “Here, let me roll you a hemlock reefer. What? It’s natural!” ---
**Author:** ![Scribble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scribble/32/3317_2.png) [@Scribble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scribble)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/249 "2007-11-11T07:53:41Z")
[QUOTE=Li’l Pluck] Will people’s brains leak out of their ears if they learn how to write in cursive? I mean, damn, it’s not Sanskrit. [/QUOTE] So…Sanskrit makes people’s brains leak out their ears? ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/250 "2007-11-11T11:48:57Z")
re: Writing cursive: I remember when I was in 1st and 2nd grade, we had two classes relating to handwriting, one early in the year where we learned some kind of handwriting that was a sort of half-assed cursive, I want to say it was called “Manuscript”, but I can’t remember, and then Cursive itself later on. I recall that I never cared for it, and stopped using it as soon as it was no longer required of me (at the same time, I learned how to type). Now I can type 100 words per minute, can write in something resembling manuscript fairly quickly (though legibly is a matter of some debate), and I can’t write in cursive to save my life. When I was in Basic training, we were required by our instructor to sign everything legibly in cursive, first name, middle initial, last name, so I learned how to do that pretty well. Once I got to tech school and perfect legibility was no longer required, my signature reverted to my doctor signature. 😃 Now, my story of wilfull ignorance: When I was at Basic training, in the first week, were were required to get something like 5 different shots. It was kind of like an assembly line, you walked through a room with your sleeves rolled up, and four different people stuck you with needles as you walked by, whole thing took 10 seconds if you tripped and fell on your face half way through the room, and the next day we came back so we could get a largish syringe of pennecilin shot in our rear buttock (ouch). By the second week of training, quite a few people were getting the sniffles, catching cold, coughing up stuff, etc. I know from previous experience being around large groups of people in high-stress situations for extended periods of time that, well, it’s because you’re around a large group of people in a high-stress situation, probably not eating and sleeping properly, etcl. If one guy has a cold when he shows up for training, everyone in the flight will have a cold by the time training is halfway done. The leading theory? The shots they gave us were DESIGNED to make us sick. Because that would make the training more difficult, or something. (because the Air Force is just that RAWR Hardcore! Marines tremble before the sounds of our footsteps! We train with colds… ON PURPOSE!) In response, I (rather sarcastically) replied “Yes, that’s true. They also put saltpeter in our food so we can’t get hardons.” “Really? What’s saltpeter?” “No, not really! Nevermind. Dumbass\*.” :rolleyes: \*Please note, “Dumbass” is used in this context as a term of endearment towards a fellow trainee who constantly showed himself to be too stupid to be allowed to breed, and was not used as a reaction to this one example of ignorance. ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/251 "2007-11-11T14:53:06Z")
[QUOTE=Raguleader] …next day we came back so we could get a largish syringe of pennecilin shot in our rear buttock (ouch). [/QUOTE] Well, at least it was your rear buttock. Imagine the hell if it had been your front buttock. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Li\_l\_Pluck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ee59a6/32.png) [@Li\_l\_Pluck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Li_l_Pluck)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/252 "2007-11-11T16:36:50Z")
[QUOTE=Scribble] So…Sanskrit makes people’s brains leak out their ears? [/QUOTE] 😕 ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/253 "2007-11-11T17:31:42Z")
I still don’t understand this no-cursive business. Cursive is not calligraphy and it’s not just meant to make things look pretty. Did you not take any notes in high school, college, and/or university? Cursive is called cursive because you can write it more quickly than printing (currere, to run). I can’t imagine how irritating it would have been to have to _print_ all the notes I took during my higher education. I think my hands would have fallen off several times over. ---
**Author:** ![Li\_l\_Pluck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ee59a6/32.png) [@Li\_l\_Pluck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Li_l_Pluck)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/254 "2007-11-11T18:09:03Z")
[QUOTE=matt\_mcl] I still don’t understand this no-cursive business. Cursive is not calligraphy and it’s not just meant to make things look pretty. Did you not take any notes in high school, college, and/or university? Cursive is called cursive because you can write it more quickly than printing (currere, to run). I can’t imagine how irritating it would have been to have to _print_ all the notes I took during my higher education. I think my hands would have fallen off several times over. [/QUOTE] Yeah, that was what I thought about when my professor asked that question. Not all of the no-cursive students had laptops balanced on their little desks, so I’m thinking, “Damn, so you guys actually \*print \* your notes?!” :eek: Then again, this professor’s lectures are such that it can be difficult to take clear, comprehensive notes (he’s a fine teacher–nice guy, knows his stuff, and popular, too), but his lectures aren’t necessarily clear-cut, y’know?), so we all just try to identify and write down (what we think might be) the most salient parts of his lectures. IOW, perhaps in classes where they’ll take pages of notes, those who are non-laptoppers in this class become…the Borg. Not for me, though, as I’ve \*always \* taken notes by pen–and in cursive. ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/255 "2007-11-11T19:07:05Z")
[QUOTE=fachverwirrt] Well, at least it was your rear buttock. Imagine the hell if it had been your front buttock. 😉 [/QUOTE] Wait… we have FRONT BUTTOCKS! ZOMG! Yeah yeah, I meant right. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/256 "2007-11-11T19:08:53Z")
[QUOTE=matt\_mcl] I still don’t understand this no-cursive business. Cursive is not calligraphy and it’s not just meant to make things look pretty. Did you not take any notes in high school, college, and/or university? Cursive is called cursive because you can write it more quickly than printing (currere, to run). I can’t imagine how irritating it would have been to have to _print_ all the notes I took during my higher education. I think my hands would have fallen off several times over. [/QUOTE] Eh, when I write cursive, it’s painfully slow for me (I think I can actually write in Chinese faster than I can write English in cursive, but it’s a close one), but through practice I can print fairly swiftly. Probably the problem is that I saw cursive as pointless as a kid, and thus never invested heavily in maintaining my ability with it. ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/257 "2007-11-11T20:01:52Z")
> [@Inner Stickler](#): > > I usually respond with, “Here, let me roll you a hemlock reefer. What? It’s natural!” I think the point is to differentiate it from other drugs like: Alcohol (also “natural”, but distilled and/or fermented from plants which are not otherwise psychoactive) Cocaine (which is also natural, but is an extract, not an herb; the powder form is not at all the same thing as the coca that grows out of the ground, whose effect is more like a strong cup of coffee) Heroin (which is “half-synthetic”; two synthetic acetyl groups attached to morphine, a natural extract of the opium poppy; either way, again light years ahead of the effect of the poppy plant itself–more accurately, its seeds–which are quite mild) Amphetamines (completely synthetic) When they say that it’s not as bad because it’s “natural”, what they really mean is that it’s not as bad as other non-poisonous psychoactives because it comes directly from some loving gardener’s soil. And they do love their plants, make no mistake; they may love the money too, but their passion for their plants is unrivaled. For a compherensive treatment of this and other interesting plant stories, see The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan. These folks’ explanation may be oversimplified, but the main point, which they get and which they’re trying to communicate to you is: marijuana is not given so much attention in the drug war because it’s more dangerous than the other drugs (or even _as_ dangerous), but because it’s the most widely-used by far. Books have been written about the reasons _why_ it’s the most widely-used illegal drug, but the simplest one is this: it strikes the most successful balance between the ability to bring the smoker insights and ways of thinking which can’t be found in the sober world, and the relative lack of danger compared to other illegal drugs. (Except for LSD and psilocybin mushrooms, but those are perceived as more dangerous because they’re a more intense psychological experience; that’s a complex question which is outside the scope of my argument here.) By “sober”, BTW, I mean “not drinking, smoking, drugging, meditating, becoming Zen, training with samurai in the deepest forests of Japan, etc.” That’s what “weed isn’t a drug, it’s an herb; it’s natural!” means, even if **Tony Montana** could’ve chosen much better words for it. In short, **TM** , what your friend is saying is, “quit calling me names; at least I have the decency not to shoot up heroin and steal your stuff”. > [@Raguleader](#): > > the next day we came back so we could get a largish syringe of pennecilin shot in our rear buttock (ouch). FTR, you could’ve gotten out of that by claiming to be allergic to penicillin, at which point they would have given you pills of something else instead. After basic, if it came up again you could say “Me? Allergic to penicillin? They must have been smoking something at Reed.” And they would believe it, too. The stories I have about Reed Medical Center… > [@matt\_mcl](#): > > Did you not take any notes in high school, college, and/or university? Cursive is called cursive because you can write it more quickly than printing (currere, to run). I can’t imagine how irritating it would have been to have to print all the notes I took during my higher education. I think my hands would have fallen off several times over. My problem is that I can hardly read my writing when it’s in print, and if it’s in cursive, all bets are off. It’s kind of like how Dvorak advocates claim you can type faster with it, but really, I’ve been typing in QWERTY since second grade, and the practice I would have to put into Dvorak to get anywhere near my QWERTY speed would not be worth it. (I’ve tried.) ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/258 "2007-11-11T20:13:40Z")
[QUOTE=fetus] FTR, you could’ve gotten out of that by claiming to be allergic to penicillin, at which point they would have given you pills of something else instead. After basic, if it came up again you could say “Me? Allergic to penicillin? They must have been smoking something at Reed.” And they would believe it, too. The stories I have about Reed Medical Center… [/QUOTE] Heh, I bet the stories don’t rival those told about Beutel Student Clinic at Texas A&M. There’s a story we like to throw around about how an ROTC cadet went in for nasuea, was told that he was pregnant, and lost his ROTC scholarship because of it (you can’t go through a military commissioning program in the US if you’re pregnant, it turns out). 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/259 "2007-11-11T20:31:29Z")
You’re right, **Raguleader** , that’s a winner. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2007, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644/260 "2007-11-11T20:40:49Z")
[QUOTE=matt\_mcl] I still don’t understand this no-cursive business. Cursive is not calligraphy and it’s not just meant to make things look pretty. Did you not take any notes in high school, college, and/or university? Cursive is called cursive because you can write it more quickly than printing (currere, to run). [/quote] Personally, I can write much faster and more legibly (at least to me) in print than I can in cursive. > [@](#): > > I can’t imagine how irritating it would have been to have to _print_ all the notes I took during my higher education. I think my hands would have fallen off several times over. If I wrote my notes in cursive, my muscles would cramp inside of half an hour. I’m more used to print than cursive, and consequently it works better for me. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644.md?page=12) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stunning-examples-of-willful-ignorance/424644.md?page=14)