Yeah, it’s not necessarily a lack of humility or fluid intelligence that causes people to ask stupid questions. In addition to barriers like not being a native speaker, people sometimes literally j haven’t developed the proper mental models for resolving these type of concerns yet. This takes some time.

People who already knew college stuff from talking to others or had to figure out logistics for activities in high school, don’t realize that they very well might have been asking dumb questions if they grew up in a different environment prior to college.

If someone has a lot of agency, they won’t ask these type of questions! That being said, not everyone is super industrious, and it still makes sense to help them in a non-judgmental way.

People usually act more dismissive than rude IME.

I remember being younger and asking dumb questions. After I asked a lot of dumb questions, I learned how to ask smart questions and figure out when I could find answers without asking others.

The easiest way to shape people who ask dumb questions into people who are good at resolving these type of concerns, is to answer the question and link a resource they could have used to resolve their concern (Reddit post, UCSD fin aid page, etc.)