First, a disclaimer, before launching into an attack on some of the world's most stupid people. Let me point out that just moments ago, I realised that the reason I did not feel so bothered about the humidity was because my trousers were not zipped to the usual degree of decency. The matter was rectified thanks to our eagle-eyed office receptionist, so I can now proceed with the matter at hand.
My interest in stupidity was piqued by an item in the German newspaper Bild last weekend about a pill that may help those of us who forget, remember. It's been dubbed the 'anti-stupidity pill'. Studies of its effects have been carried out only on mice and fruit flies, so it is still a long way from being popped with a glass of orange juice at breakfast - to allow the new day to begin with clothing at full mast.
Despite the diminutive size of his test subjects, though, Hans-Hilger Ropers, the director of the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics in Berlin, seems positive that he is on to something that could one day help those of us with a problem in the intelligence department. He says the drug prevents hyperactivity in some brain nerve cells, making for greater attentiveness and stabilising short-term memory.
Translating such findings from flies to humans is a daunting-sounding step. But if Dr Ropers can make it happen I, and some esteemed company - judging by a few recent occurrences - would be eternally grateful.
Just days before the good doctor's announcement, Hollywood actor Mel Gibson was pulled over by police for drink-driving. He said some rather foolish things about Jewish people that, had he had access to an anti-stupidity pill, he would not have said. Then a Reuters news photographer was dismissed, this week, for embellishing photographs of the fighting in Lebanon with computer-augmented smoke and flares.
Most spectacularly stupid, though, has been the five weeks of to-ing and fro-ing of the United Nations Security Council in coming up with a resolution for a ceasefire between the Israeli defence forces and Hezbollah militia. As Lebanon disintegrates and civilians on both sides die pointlessly, the people who claim to be able to save the world from itself are sitting by, arguing over whether 'i's' should be dotted and 't's' crossed.
