So why’s everybody so smart? Or, at least, why’s everybody so well educated? Is it just that the smart people are the most outspoken, or that the people qualified in one subject will always speak up when that subject is mentioned? I mean, I can understand that the place would be somewhat self-selecting, but still…
If you mean smart Dopers, I agree, altho’ I don’t include myself in the erudite crew. I like researching the Net, so will help out when & if I can. I think it also depends sometimes on life experience. I learn a lot here. And I think it should be give & take.
Speaking as a relative newbie to the board (although a longtime addict to TSD), I think it’s self-selecting on two levels:
1- Dumb people aren’t going to grok a lot of what the Master says, so they aren’t going to read his column, so they’re never going to find this place. The folks who -do- read this board are drawn to it because, if they’re like me, they learn something new in every thread. People who enjoy that automatically become smart people after a while.
2- I, as a forexample, have really in-depth expertise in a few very narrow subjects. If someone posts anything on those subjects, I’m so all over it, and I will look like a major league genius. On the other hand, I was tempted to post on a astrophysics-related thread the other day… got about a paragraph into it before I realized I really don’t know anything about astrophysics, so I shouldn’t waste the time of the people who would leap in and correct me.
On the other hand, there’s always room for participation even if you don’t know anything, in the form of supplementary questions, hijacks, and jokes. Those do a lot to add to the board’s allure, at least for me.
If everyone was so smart, my lad, Cecil would be out of business…
Ya know, you’ll go blind if you keep self-selecting like that.
This is a private, smart-persons’ club.
How’d you get in here?
