Overestimating Incompetency

In Theology class today, we talked about addiction as attachment to things, ideas or habits that are less than love of God. We settle for loving finite things rather than the infinite, because to love God takes great risk and requires tremendous vulnerability that we simply won't do it.

Even as we try to fulfill our utmost desire, to love and be love, the vulnerability it requires leaves us open to pain, and to avoid hurting we protect ourselves by trusting in the little things.

I remembered this class discussion as I read this article on Salon.com that talks about overestimating our intelligence when in fact we're incompetent, and those who are competent tend to think everyone else is, too:

"People who lack the knowledge or wisdom to perform well are often unaware of this fact. That is, the same incompetence that leads them to make wrong choices also deprives them of the savvy necessary to recognize competence, be it their own or anyone else's."

The converse also bears repeating.... In short, smart people tend to believe that everyone else "gets it." Incompetent people display both an increasing tendency to overestimate their cognitive abilities and a belief that they are smarter than the majority of those demonstrably sharper.

Let us pray for humility, the beginning of all wisdom... and competency.