Why I can never get along with anybody

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I can't imagine that people who bond over being highly selfish can last long. Surely they would betray each other at the slightest opportunity.

I know how you feel. I live in the Bible Belt and the majority of people around me believe most of those things. Most people never question the beliefs of those around them and come to most of their beliefs through luck. But I've known intelligent people that do believe many of those things, sometimes creating elaborate rationalizations for them. One of the smartest people I knew in college existed thought God existed because of the ontological argument. No matter how smart you are its very hard to understand what you don't want to understand. It's very hard to respect people who believe stupid things without researching but the people who spend a lot of time thinking about and researching stupid beliefs only to become more convinced of them are frightening and humbling.

I wanted to make better products available, so I trained as a design engineer. I also read the business books, which advised forming a team with talented experts in each department. Then, I learned that the best salesmen will never work for the best product, because what they fear most in life is hearing their peers say "well, Anyone could sell That!" Sadly, they are wrong. Even the best ideas need to be sold through rhetorical tricks to the majority of the customers, if only because of the cacophony promoting inferior things. Thinking takes more time, energy, bravery and skill than following the herd, so most people only learn to blend in.

Pirates did quite well. Still do. True though, there is no honor among thieves (i.e. there's always that chance that they'll betray each other. Of course, they all know that).

You aware that the six thousand figure is a reference to Genesis in the Bible.

Genesis supposedly happened sometime around 4000 years before Christ. Christ was born 2020 years ago. Do the math.

I don't know if the word that describes most the people in the west is stupid.

Perhaps, impressionable and too tired after working for a living to be bothered to think for themselves.

Getting your opinions prescribed to you by the media / press / news propaganda takes far less effort that actual thinking.

Such a trend turns people who have the capacity to be highly intelligent into brain dead morons.
Their not stupid, they just have chosen not to use their intellect.

There should be a different word to describe such people.

I think that there is a lot of honour among thieves. There is a strong element of mutual blackmail, and a hierarchy to minimize the risk of betrayal. Enforcement is also quite ruthless. Gangs lie as witnesses in court to protect each other, earning credits for their own defence if needed. Government regulators bounce between agency work and highly-paid positions in the industries they are supposed to regulate. Huge fees are paid for token speeches when a job offer is not appropriate.

I still go with the OP coming in contact with the wrong people.

I encounter people every day. Very few of them have expressed the opinions he mentioned. One tends to encounter these sorts of opinions on the Internet, rather than in “real life.” Possibly because there’s an anonymity in the Internet which makes people bolder, and sometimes brings out the worst in people.

I bet the OP will ultimately succeed in romance.

I won't argue with the bolded bit and at least for me it's a constant battle of reminding myself when I'm more susceptible to those patterns of thinking. Lots of people are ignorant on lots of topics, but it's good to remind yourself that even intelligent people don't have the time to research every single opinion they hold, and even if they had the time they might not have the energy or ambition.

I've had to work next to people who espouse conspiracy theory nonsense and 'white genocide' nonsense on a daily basis for the entire 5 years I was at that factory. White Power Jim often sounded like a moron, but he had a fair bit of practical work knowledge (having been there >20 years) and there were other topics he was well informed about even if there were many he was badly disinformed about.

It was frustrating and it took a long time before he started in on a topic he did know something true about, but it also served as a learning experience for why I should have been slower to write people off.

1. I can't do maths
2. I've already stated that I don't believe in God or Jesus so how am I to know how many years ago Jesus was born?
3. When I said '2020', I was referring to some people who think that the Earth is 2020 years old just because it's the year 2020 (hence the laughing emoticon).

Yes, I nearly ran away from this as I have hit so many crazymakers in my own life. Try having a mother who had schizophrenia with paranoid delusions as your carer. Narcissists are the worst as they control through making one feel stupid & responsible for their feelings. Workplaces are full of them. One meets many strange & deluded people who because they are afraid they are on shaky ground will try & undermine others to make them feel good about themselves. The vaccine idea that they cause ASD is ruined by people like me who did not receive childhood immunizations until we were teenagers; they were not available in rural Australia. Kids got all sorts of terrible diseases. I got rheumatic fever & Brucellosis from infected cow's milk, my cousin got Diphtheria, & kids still had Polio! So I did not get Autism from a vaccine; I did however inherit Asperger's from my father who had every phenotype with icing on. Do not engage with these people. Instead look for quality people & maintain your healthy skepticism. People who have a lot of fear in them hop onto strange bandwagons to transport their nonsense - it is a heavy burden to carry.

There is more to beliefs than intelligence.

I'm tempted (and asking) to sig this. Is that still a thing? I'm old now.

Many intelligent people have unintelligent opinions.

I hope that things improve for you, soon.

Its not your fault, but ...WOW!
Am not talking about religiosity. I am talking about cultural literacy.

Both your family, and your nation's education system massively failed you! Its not your fault.

Im sorry, but religous or not, its astounding to me that you dont know when christ was born. I hope you're joking.

Back in the 1900s when I grew up EVERY person in the western world over seven years old could instantly answer the question "approximately when was Christ born?". All you had to do was know what year it was. In 1959 the answer was "about 1959 years ago".

That is because the early church set up the calender by starting with (what they calculated was) when Christ was born. Christ was probably actually born in four BC. But the year one of our calender was the year they thought he was born. So this year is supposedly two thousand and twenty years "after Christ". Except they dont call it that. They call it "the year of our lord" (which in Latin is anno domini, or "AD"). And thats why dates in ancient history that are before christ are called "X number BC" (before Christ). And why dates after Christ are called "such and such AD".

Trouble is now they have replaced BC with BCE (before the common era) and AD with CE (the common era). Political correctness, or whatever. But the same concept.

So ...when was Christ born Joe? "About 2000 years ago?" CORRECT!

Other cultures start their calendars on other dates. Muslims with Mohammed (so they are still in the 1300s).

But the Jewish Calendar starts, not with Christ, but with the start of the Old Testament. The old testament starts with Genesis (when the human race, the world, and universe were all created in one week according to the Bible). The Jewish year is close to year 6000. And Christian scholars have also calculated that Genesis happened about six thousand years ago at 4000 years before Christ.

So if you are a person who believes in taking the Bible absolutely literally then...how old would the earth be?

RIGHT! Six thousand years.

Sorry to seem so worked up about it. But thats some basic stuff that you should know.

Oddly enough, though that 4000 BC date is not an accurate date for the beginning of man, and of the universe, it probably is a pretty good date for the beginning of civilization.

The pyramids of Egypt and the first cities in the ancient middle east appeared about 3000 BC. A few centuries after the transition from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age...about 4000 BC.