Too much exposure to too many smart people can be a bad thing.
There is a science and an art to capturing the attention of as many people as possible. In the media, writers, artists, and video makers do everything they can to grab your attention and then to bend your mind to believe what they have to say is relevant, important, and meaningful.
Even if you are philosophically-minded and virtually immune to the cheap sensationalistic attempts at attention-grabbing involving sexuality, disease, death, and cute little cats and dogs, there are millions of intelligent individuals doing their best to pull you into their latest topic.
If, for example, you follow twenty intelligent people on Twitter, you will, every day, be exposed to very convincing arguments to think in certain ways, to read various books, study various topics more deeply, watch various films, go here, go there, do this, and do that. While it would be nice to read and study all the classic literature and philosophy as well as the thirty or more excellent books published each year in various non-fiction and fiction genres, as well as listen to all the new and old music, play an instrument, run a marathon, spend time with family and friends, travel to see some of the wonders of the world, and fight the good political fights to save whatever your particular values have latched on to, work, advance your career, and spend time relaxing... it is clearly impossible. Exposing yourself to intelligent and convincing people that want you to care about what they care about can be confusing and distracting.
There is a science and an art to capturing the attention of as many people as possible. In the media, writers, artists, and video makers do everything they can to grab your attention and then to bend your mind to believe what they have to say is relevant, important, and meaningful.
Even if you are philosophically-minded and virtually immune to the cheap sensationalistic attempts at attention-grabbing involving sexuality, disease, death, and cute little cats and dogs, there are millions of intelligent individuals doing their best to pull you into their latest topic.
If, for example, you follow twenty intelligent people on Twitter, you will, every day, be exposed to very convincing arguments to think in certain ways, to read various books, study various topics more deeply, watch various films, go here, go there, do this, and do that. While it would be nice to read and study all the classic literature and philosophy as well as the thirty or more excellent books published each year in various non-fiction and fiction genres, as well as listen to all the new and old music, play an instrument, run a marathon, spend time with family and friends, travel to see some of the wonders of the world, and fight the good political fights to save whatever your particular values have latched on to, work, advance your career, and spend time relaxing... it is clearly impossible. Exposing yourself to intelligent and convincing people that want you to care about what they care about can be confusing and distracting.
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