alt Hacker NewsI'm genuinely baffled each time I encounter this notion that the power is dumb.
It's as if power was a kind of demigod Heracles who paves its way with sheer brute force alone.
But in reality it consists of very mortal and feeble creatures of meat and bone.
How in the world can people assume dumb those who possess all the means and rights for violence by controlling and manipulating myriads of other creatures of meat and bone, is totally beyond me.
Power and intelligence are not completely unrelated. Are government officials, politicians, CEOs, judges, etc, usually above average intelligence? Probably. Do the institutions they work within make intelligent decisions? Sometimes.
The fallacy is assuming intelligence automatically equates to power and influence. University professors and doctors have very little power in their institutions even though they may often be more intelligent than their bosses.
A worse fallacy is assuming intelligence creates better political outcomes (in the broad sense of politics as contested collective decision-making).
I don't know many people who would willingly trade their freedom to make a bad decision for the enforcement of the "right" decision by a superior intelligence.