“Beer is to dumb guys what books are to smart ones — Just having a lot of them makes you feel a whole lot smarter.” — Stephen Pastis
There is a lot of truth in both ends of that quote. Drink enough beer and you do feel smarter. You may not be smarter and you may not act smarter, but sure enough you feel a whole lot smarter. It doesn’t matter if you are a dumb guy or a smart guy, either – at least not in my experience.
A lot of smart guys do feel a whole lot smarter if they have a lot of books. I am not sure it works that way. It depends on how you define “smarter.” If you actually read the books, you become more knowledgeable but I am not sure you become more intelligent. That assumes the books are worth reading. Fill up on an exclusive literary diet of books like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, Mein Kampf, Das Kapital, and The Communist Manifesto, and I don’t think you will actually become more knowledgeable or more intelligent. In that sense, having a lot of them will make you smarter in the same way as having a lot of beers does. You might even feel smarter.
Regardless, knowledge is good. If you pick the right books – and read them – you might become smarter. Just stacking up piles of books without reading them may make you feel a whole lot smarter, but again only in the same way having a whole lot of beers does.
If you want to be perceived as smarter, write a book. It does not make you any smarter, but everyone else assumes you are. Trust me on that one. I am no smarter than I was before I had my first book published. I get the same thing from many of people that meet me for the first time after they realize I have written a book: “Boy, you must be really smart.” It is only after they get to know me they realize I am smarter for having written a lot of books in the same way I am smarter after having a lot of beers.
The only difference is you don’t wake up hungover after having a lot of books the way you do after having a lot of beers.
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