This small section at the front of the book is the most important.

It should be read multiple times and I will emphasize it the most.

The Intellectual Golden Rule is Socratic Wisdom.

There are two types of people in the world: the wise, who know that they are fools; and fools, who think that they are wise.

Many people are fools because they think they know things when they actually do not.  Later on we will discuss how we can claim to know something is true.

A few people know that they are fools, but they are wise enough to realize it. 

Socrates developed this monumental idea after his friend talked with the Oracle of Delphi.  She said that Socrates was the wisest man on earth.  Socrates took that so seriously he devoted the rest of his life to proving it was wrong.  He went the wisest people on earth, hoping to find someone wiser than himself.  Instead he found people who made claims to knowledge they could not defend.  So Socrates found that even though he thought he was not wise, he was at least wise enough to know that.

The point of the rule that I would like to talk about is to escape two common extremes, dogmatism and skepticism. 

Dogmatists generally are hemmed into a small box, a trap, of their own making.  Due to their inability to consider alternatives, they are very poor at learning.

Socrates is often held up as a skeptic but that was about as far from his real attitude as could be possible.  Socrates was willing to listen to anyone about any idea, he never began as a skeptic about an idea.  Extreme skeptics can face one of two problems.  First, many skeptics are actually dogmatists in disguise.  They are great at being skeptical about ideas they do not agree with, but they often have many pet ideas that they are completely uncritical about.  Second, if they take their skepticism to its logical conclusion, they should doubt their own skepticism and thus be trapped in a vicious circle.

Instead of dogmatism or skepticism, the attitude you should take is one of humility.  Someone who is humble will admit that they might be wrong, they have open the possibility that they might have to change their minds about an idea. And they do not start out as skeptics, but they know they may have to end up skeptical about an idea and say 'I do not know that it is true or false.' But they will not end the discussion at that point like a dogmatic skeptic, they will keep on searching. Humility is not just good moral virtue, it is also a good intellectual virtue.

A Secondary Rule 

A secondary rule from Socrates is Know Thyself.  Are you wise or foolish?  Socrates quote "An unexamined life is not worth living."

Part of the attitude of intellectual humility you should be cultivating is to examine your own thoughts and motives.  What groups of ideas that you hold dear are you more likely to not consider alternatives to?  What groups of ideas do you dislike and thus will not give them a fair hearing?

The chapter will end with "There are two types of people in the world: the wise, who know that they are fools; and fools, who think that they are wise." in big bold letters.