You’re not so smart

Everyone messes up. We’ve all made mistakes. But not like 18th-century rich boy, Rohan.

Rohan didn’t just make a mistake—he committed to the mistake. He built a legacy on the mistake. He bet his entire social capital on a flaming runaway train of bad judgment and rode it straight into the history books.

See, Rohan wanted more status. And one day, he’s asked:

“You know Marie Antoinette?”

He’s like, “The cake lady?”

They go, “Yeah. She doesn’t like you.”

He’s like, “What’d I do?”

They go, “You snitched. To her mum. Who happens to be the actual Holy Roman Empress.”

Rohan feels like he’s in a pickle.

Before we go further, lets check-in with the Austrian-born psychologist, Gustav Ichheiser. In his 1970s work, *Misunderstandings in Human Relations,* he pointed out that we always think we’re being objective when we judge others… but we radically underestimate the role our own biases play and how much of that judgment is us projecting.

So Rohan heads to France to fix things with Marie. There, he meets a woman named Gian, who claims to know the Queen. At first, he’s sceptical. But five minutes later, she’s in the castle, sending him handwritten notes back to him signed Marie Antoinette.

He’s hooked.

Rohan didn’t know he was being stupid. Which, of course, is how stupidity usually works.

This is where the work of Solomon Asch comes in. In the 1950s, Asch showed how people ignore their own senses just to fit in with what they think everyone else sees. Rohan becomes that guy, staring straight at a fake letter from the Queen, thinking: “Yeah, this all checks out.” Because that’s what he wanted to believe.

Think about in our own lives how many times have we’ve been in a conversation, already slightly annoyed, already sure of what the other person meant—so sure that everything they say just confirms our view, even if they’re saying something completely different?

That’s not rational thinking. That’s just human thinking.

Enter confirmation bias. Rohan didn’t want to see a con artist. He wanted to see a Queen who called him handsome and wrote him love letters. So that’s what he saw. Every red flag? Ignored. Every flirty note? Glued to his ego like gospel.

By now, the availability heuristic has kicked in. Recent memories shape what feels real. And Rohan’s recent memories? Love notes, flirtation, royal vibes. His brain goes: this is reality.

Then comes the main event: the necklace.

Most people don’t know: Marie Antoinette never wanted it. It was originally made for the last King’s mistress—and she’d already turned it down. But the jewellers were desperate to sell. So Gian makes her move.

She tells them: “Actually, the Queen’s changed her mind. But she wants it discreet. Have Cardinal Rohan collect it for her.”

They believe her.

Rohan, now fully love drunk, picks up the necklace and hands it to Gian—thinking he’s doing the Queen a royal favour.

She disappears.

Weeks pass. No payment. The jewellers panic and hit up Rohan. He shrugs: “Ask the Queen.”

So they do. They bring him to Versailles.

Marie Antoinette looks him dead in the face and goes: “Who are you?”

Scandal explodes.

The King reads one of the forged letters. “This isn’t even my wife’s signature. Are you blind and dumb?”

The court goes silent. Not because they’re shocked. Because it’s so obvious. To everyone but Rohan.

Because Rohan really believed. And that’s what’s so devastating—and so human.

Perception isn’t just what’s in front of your eyes—it’s what’s already in your head.

Which brings us to Immanuel Kant. Kant believed reason should guide our actions. His categorical imperative teach us to act only according to principles you’d want everyone else to follow. And, to "act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end, never merely as a means."

But no one here is doing that.

Rohan isn’t reasoning—he’s fantasising.

Gian isn’t principled—she’s manipulating.

The jewellers aren’t careful—they’re hopeful.

Gian escapes. Rohan gets arrested, then declared innocent. But he leaves the courtroom exiled—not for theft, but for stupidity.

But because of how absurdly stupid the story is, public doesn’t believe the verdict. They assume corruption. “Let them eat cake,” they say—even though Marie Antoinette never said it.

Suddenly because of one man’s stupidity the illusion of monarchy falls and soon after, so do the guillotines.

The necklace scandal helps tip France into revolution. Revolution brings Napoleon. Napoleon loses in Haiti. France sells Louisiana to the U.S. Boom: America becomes a superpower.

All because Rohan couldn’t spot a fake letter.

We like to think our beliefs come from evidence. But more often, our evidence comes from belief.

Confirmation bias filters what we see. Anchoring locks us to first impressions. The availability heuristic makes the recent feel more real than the true information we have at hand.

Kant hoped reason could save us. That we might think, reflect, and act better.

But let’s be honest.

Rohan wasn’t that smart.

But neither are we.

Maybe the best thing we can do is remember humilty and try to build in a little more awareness.

To pause.

To ask:

What am I not seeing because I want to be right?

Because sometimes, all it takes to break an empire… is one person who really believes a lie.