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Its a little disappointing to see that half of the comments are people defending their actions to no one in particular, justifying why they act like a jerk but aren't necessarily a jerk.

Its not like being a jerk/sweetheart is some binary or mutually exclusive relation, but it seems like this article struck a chord with a lot of users.

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my theory is that the smarter you are, the more likely you are to try to justify behaviors that you are not necessarily aligned with

Why would you think that? Rationalization is one of the pillars of human behavior overall. The only difference I would readily admit is that smarter people are probably more mindful of their own rationalizing.

The article disagrees though:

"Academically intelligent people, by the way, aren’t immune to motivated reasoning. On the contrary, recent research by Dan M. Kahan of Yale University suggests that reflective and educated people might be especially skilled at rationalizing their preexisting beliefs..."

Oh dear. I'm just gonna go bathe in my weltschmerz again. :/

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