[The Comedian]

Intellectuals are more like a song writer or a musician. All the same words and notes have been used before many times over, but they create a new song, a new thought or idea from them.

That, unfortunately, is overly-optimistic. In an ideal world, that would be the case. In fact, it was the case regarding great thinkers of the past. I stand by my philosophical and moral evaluation stance. Logical abstraction that simultaneously maintains philosophical and moral cohesion is the definition and expression of a true intellectual.

However, there is nothing new under the sun, and today's rearranging of the Scrabble tiles (calling theft "taxation" or abortion "family planning" or Stalinists "Progressives", and lying to come up with justifications) does not equate to inventing a new word or alphabet. That is all today's "intellectuals" do.

And again, I don't disagree with Sowell, but this particular article had no impact on me because of the lack of a definition of the subject: Intellectual.

Part of the problem with Western society today is the assumption of shared, identical definitions of terms, philosophy, and morality. This is rapidly becomming a fatal communications failure. "Hope and Change", anyone?

Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.

[Cold Heat]

Part of the problem with Western society today is the assumption of shared, identical definitions of terms, philosophy, and morality

That only happens in science, and it's rare when it actually happens, IMO

I also qualified my analogy by saying they are most often wrong.

Does it have to be logical? Perhaps, but only to the person who admires the thinking. Others can find the work totally illogical and dismiss it.

I suppose from their perspective, they try to develop something that the reader will find illuminating and they need readers so this guides them in a subtle way, which is why they are often wrong.

I prefer writing that goes outside what may be popular or even acceptable, so is that logical or morally cohesive? Is that old or repetitive?

I think that if the intellectual writer needs a paycheck, they may well write a bunch of well oiled tripe to fund their bank account, but the good ones always salt and pepper that repertoire with some good stuff and none of them are really alike. If they are, then they don't fit my definition.