The Cult of Smart and Loving the Holy Fool
Fredrick deBoer’s The Cult of Smart points out flaws in our societal narrative. Anthony Barr looks at how that narrative has shaped his heart, and how Christians can respond to the deification of intelligence in the modern world.
Review by Anthony Barr
Once, in my final semester of college, I was sitting in the campus cafeteria eating dinner with a close friend. At one point in our conversation, we began to reflect on what it means to be “smart.” I asked my friend, “Would you rather be smart, but an asshole, or dumb but kind?” Immediately he quipped, “Well, I know what I’m supposed to say.” After a long pause, he simply said, “That’s a good question.”
This was not the first time I’d felt uncomfortable with my own implicit valuation of intelligence as the end-all-be-all. In high school I read Flowers for Algernon, the heartrending novel about a man with severe intellectual disabilities who undergoes a miracle surgery that turns him into a genius—briefly—before he slowly reverts to his original capacities. I couldn’t escape the visceral feeling that in the same situation, I would absolutely kill myself after I regressed to a certain point. I grew horrified as I considered the implications for my own relationship with aging and its accompanying declines. Do I truly believe I would prefer my own nonexistence? Is simply being intelligent worth that much to me?
Fredrik deBoer’s new book The Cult of Smart begins with one fundamental and disquieting empirical claim: Some people are smarter than others, and that is largely due to genes. On the basis of this claim, deBoer advances a straightforward argument: To the extent that we assign value to people (and ourselves) on the basis of intelligence, we do so based on accidents of birth, much like India’s caste system. Meritocracy wrongly tells “gifted kids” that we deserve every success that comes our way, that our elevated and comfortable positions in the “creative class” are the deserved fruit of our labor. The Cult of Smart instead insists that we got lucky, and then asks if we should be content with a society that increasingly reserves economic stability, dignified work, and social respect for those lucky enough to be born with the right genes.
It is illiberal and inhumane to adapt Social Darwinism as a sorting mechanism to determine who is cared for and who is abandoned by our society.
At the onset, deBoer provides some caveats to his argument. First, he is clear that genes are not the only factor—nature matters most, but nurture matters too. Second, he is also clear that this posited differentiation in intelligence is on the individual level; it is not a group trait. He is decidedly not advocating for pseudoscientific claims about the superiority of one race or gender over another. Even with these caveats, the claim is uncomfortable, and not something we’re inclined to talk about in polite company. It‘s one thing to say that some people have access to better tutors, better schools, and better extracurricular activities than others: If you’re not smart, it’s society’s fault. It’s much harder to admit that much of the potential for intelligence is rooted in what is innate: It’s just not in your genes, sorry. Here, too, deBoer anticipates a fear, namely that the emphasis on genes could lead to eugenics. He responds by arguing that scientifically, we are very far from anticipating how genes and environment will impact a person’s intelligence. But beyond that, the central point of deBoer’s argument is that society shouldn’t value persons on the basis of their intelligence. Thus, eugenics is just the extreme endpoint of a categorical error that society (myself included) makes all the time.
Though deBoer dodges a number of landmines, The Cult of Smart falls short in that he doesn’t actually define intelligence. Indeed, he takes IQ tests, SAT tests—any form of quantifiable test designed for specific kinds of reasoning—as his assumed basis, as though “intelligence” were a microbe you can study under a microscope. (Is the mechanic not expressing impressive intelligence in the work of her skilled repairs?) But I don’t think that shortcoming undermines the book’s central observation—that talent is not distributed equally—nor the central argument, that it is illiberal and inhumane to adapt Social Darwinism as a sorting mechanism to determine who is cared for and who is abandoned by our society. Let the alt-right blood-and-soil fanatics sing of Teutonic strength; I am not interested in a world where only the smart or strong can flourish.
Confessing that I am knee-deep in the cult of smart is a necessary first step to escaping it.
Yet for all my humane values, I must still go back to that conversation in the cafeteria. Despite my liberal arts training, despite being formed by Catholic social teaching that affirms the dignity of every person, despite even my own genuine love for many people who are not as “smart” as I am—still, I cannot say honestly that I’d prefer to be dumb and kind. I’m deeply attached to being smart, and almost as deeply attached to being perceived as such. Maybe it’s time for me to name things correctly. Earlier I spoke of a categorical error. That is too benign. It is sin. To the extent that I value myself falsely, that I obscure the reality that the dignity of my humanity is a gift of grace and not a personal achievement, I am warped by pride, the chief of vices.
Confessing that I am knee-deep in the cult of smart is a necessary first step to escaping it. And while I affirm much of deBoer’s argument for deconstructing the structures of meritocracy in society at large, I am also left realizing how much need I have for the peeling away of sinful structures in myself—in how I think, and how I feel. In the end, I am left with one prayer: that in a world of would-be kings, I would learn to be a holy fool.
Anthony M. Barr is a recent graduate of the Templeton Honors College at Eastern University, and a recent Fellow at the Hertog Foundation in DC. He is currently pursuing his MPP at Pepperdine University. Anthony has done research on political theory, education policy, and civic and moral virtue for various nonprofits, businesses, and independent publishing companies.
The Cult of Smart is published by MacMillan Publishers, who graciously provided a copy of the book to our reviewer. You can purchase a copy on their website here.
