Does naive = stupid?

Obviously not.

Hmmm...

Take the character ROSE from the Golden Girls.
She was naive, right?
But I think we could also say she wasn't very bright.

I think naivete=innocent for young folks and stupid for older folks.

I think it's fair enough for an adult to be naive in certain matters (we can't all be expert at everything) but it's a bit worrying if a judge exhibits naivety in matters of judgement.

naive, stupid, unintelligent, uneducated and dumb are NOT all the same thing. not at all. the end result may be the same, but the causes and variations are very, very different, and should not be confused.

naive, stupid, unintelligent, uneducated and dumb are NOT all the same thing. not at all. the end result may be the same, but the causes and variations are very, very different, and should not be confused.

Amen, Kate. I know of extremely well educated folk that sometimes make (what I call) silly decisions. However, this is only my opinion; that does not mean they are necessarily stupid. Based on how a person talks, they might come across as being "uneducated". Still, they may be really smart, in terms of life matters.

naive, stupid, unintelligent, uneducated and dumb are NOT all the same thing. not at all. the end result may be the same, but the causes and variations are very, very different, and should not be confused.

Amen, Kate. I know of extremely well educated folk that sometimes make (what I call) silly decisions. However, that does not mean they are necessarily stupid. Based on how a person talks, they might come across as being "uneducated". Still, they may be really smart, in terms of life matters.

I think naive people are just SO optimistic it negates their better sense.

Stupidity, it seems to me, is the persistant inability to generate useful insights from one's knowledge or experience. Naivety is the lack of one or more key pieces of knowledge or experience required for generating a useful insight. Naive people often lack the key information they need because they are actively misled by misinformation.

The worst naivety comes from those beliefs that align with one's internal desires, but are contrary to external facts. Because of the inherent attractiveness of such misinformation, naivety can also be quite persistant. The longer such naivety persists in the face of reality, the more it resembles stupidity. That's why certain beliefs can actually make a smart person permanantly stupid, at least where that belief is concerned.