disinterest: people who can't admit when they're wrong

[sab]

Faux pas #78636; turns out you can only select one of the radio buttons on that last box, and one can't edit a poll! And so, go ahead and just check one.



[Poll #626294]



And then I'll stare at these answers and do some highly unprofessional analysis and post some more questions tomorrow, along with some general rambling on people who admit they're wrong and people who ARE wrong and people who are dumber than other people. Watch this space!

Comments

[notpoetry.livejournal.com]

I fully admit to being an elitist in certain areas of my life -- because I'm getting an education in it right now, I'm a writing elitist. I'm friends with people who are fantastic writers, and since you usually have to, you know, be fairly intelligent to be a fantastic writer, my friends are incredibly smart people. And I love being surrounded by smart people, even smart people who disagree with me. But one of the common things I've found about my friends is that they almost always admit when they have gaps in their knowledge and are willing, even eager to learn more. And I love that. I wish I were better at it -- I'm always up for learning more, but it takes a lot for me to admit out loud when I don't know something as well as I should.

This is an interesting poll, and not one I ever would've thought to do; I look forward to seeing the results.

[klia.livejournal.com]

I rarely write, and am very insecure about it when I do, so I'll ask trusted friends for critique. But with vids? No beta. I've/we've always just done what I/we wanted.

[permetaform]

For the last question these three:
- Knows most things, and can admit what she doesn't know.
- Knows some things and asks lots of questions about things she doesn't know.
- Knows a lot about specialized things, and doesn't demonstrate any doubt in those arenas.

For the beta question:
It's different for every fic, especially for mine 'cause I tend to go for heavy stream-of-consciousness with a heaping handful of play-on-formatting and try to find beta's who are narratively/plot orientated. Also, I tend to write some lines for their aural value and if they don't 'scan' right I'd just leave it. So roughly half/half, being more or less depending on the nature of the fic.

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

I am averagely smart in the circle of my best friends, but I just wanted to add that I have some extremely smart friends.

[kristophine.livejournal.com]

On the beta question: what happens with betas is this--I'll beg someone smart to beta for me, and then, when I get their message, I'll read it once, very quickly, and feel very hurt and defensive, and then go away and do something else for a bit and think on what they've said, and then come back the next day and read it for real and go make the changes I agree with, which are usually almost all of them. I have to sidestep my ego, coddle it a bit, but I can work around it.

[kristophine.livejournal.com]

Me, too. I'm a fucking genius, but the vast majority of my friends are brilliant, as smart as me or smarter, and usually exceptionally talented and skilled in their own areas--art and linguistics and teaching and sociology and sound design, to name a few.

[gamesiplay.livejournal.com]

Yep, this is me, too. Although less "defensive" than "incredibly depressed." I need at least a day to regain some perspective and understand that just because I make mistakes, it doesn't mean I'm a complete hack.

[permetaform]

pwah! that last paragraph made no sense, which, yeah, I should go to sleep before attemping to comment.

But basically:
I write in a form that tends towards non-narrative. I find betas that think as little like me as possible. After getting back their replies, usually to the tune of "that didn't make sense", I get bummed and then leave and then return to tweak the stuff, but do it so that the original intent is there but transferred in a way that makes at least a mediocrum of grammatical sense. Sometimes I keep things that don't make grammatical sense because it scans better the other way.

[kernezelda]

First question: I think I am wrong occasionally, depending on the subject matter. I prefer to acknowledge that I'm wrong so I can get correction when available, especially in a work setting.

Beta question: I read/listen to everything my beta says, even if I don't act on it on every instance. The beta serves a specific purpose, and I'd be wasting both our time if I failed to respect her opinion/function.

[kernezelda]

Forgot the last question:
Knows most things, and can admit what she doesn't know.
Knows some things and asks lots of questions about things she doesn't know.
Knows a lot about specialized things, and doesn't demonstrate any doubt in those arenas.
Gives good advice.
Takes advice well.

I'd add, someone who isn't afraid to ask for help, rather than someone who asks for it frequently.

[apathocles.livejournal.com]

God, I could've ticked every answer for the 'conversation about a subject I don't know'. Heh.

I listen to everything my beta has to say. How much of it I actually put into action varies from story to story. (And I haven't had a story beta'd in way too long.)

Was uncertain on the 'smartest in the group' question, because I'm usually one of the smarter people IRL, but fandom can be quite effective at making me feel like a dunce.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_swallow/]

Swarthmore dramatically changed two radical parts of my self-image (so radical that it meant a changed self, too): my understanding of how attractive I was to other people, and my understanding of how intelligent I was in comparison to other people.

I grew up under the prodigy's morphine-drip of adult attention. When I met someone new, I knew I'd have to wait for a few moments, after I gave the basic smalltalky exposition of my life, for them to get over being impressed with me so that we could get back to actually talking. I was raised by a mother who said things, utterly sincerely, like "You're the most intelligent person I know," "you're the best writer I know." I know, of course, she's my mother! But she's also a creative writing professor at UPenn, and including herself and her colleagues in that statement-- I don't explain this in order to give authority to what she'd said, but rather just to show the scope of her sincerity. She was my most intense intellectual mentor; she championed me like a second self.

Swarthmore taught me that I was stupid about most things, and the things I'm not stupid about, no one probably cares about my thoughts, or believes that I do have authority. A completely different person won the prizes, published, edited, visited Germany on scholarship. I'm slightly below average here. It's hard to remember that I'm capable of doing what I did, now that it doesn't seem easy.

... so, college got me laid, and gave me the first peer-group of friends I'd ever had. And it gave me humility, which is no small gift. But it did take away my bravery. I have some residual arrogance, but no courage. I wish it'd been gentler!

The point is, anyway, that I didn't answer the "Compared to the rest of my friends/trusted compatriots, I am smarter/less smart" question, and I can't even touch the "the upper eschelons of mediocrity" poll. I have no idea how to quantify my own intelligence, much less my friends'; Swarthmore's made me decide that that's an utterly worthless pursuit. All I know is that I'm good at grasping some ideas, and that I am really, really bad at grasping others (I get worse at mathy stuff every year. It's horrible) that there will always be someone better than me in every sphere.

[mecurtin.livejournal.com]

Maybe too late for the party, but --

on the beta question, I *listen* to everything the beta says, consider it, but do not always take her advice.