I’m pretty sure the “4d chess genius” thing was satire to start that just got Poe’s lawed.

Isaac Asimov in 1980:

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.