Thick as a brick
Meaning
Very unintelligent or exceptionally dull-witted.
Origin
Imagine a brick. Solid, unyielding, entirely without a spark of intellect or capacity for understanding. This stark, blunt imagery is precisely what gives "thick as a brick" its punch. The phrase doesn't just call someone stupid; it conjures a mental picture of a mind as dense and impenetrable as a wall of masonry, utterly incapable of absorbing a new idea or processing complex information. It's the ultimate, unflattering comparison to an object so fundamentally inert, solid, and stubbornly unintelligent that its very nature embodies a complete absence of wit, making it a perfectly cutting, if harsh, metaphor for extreme dullness.
Examples
- He's thick as a brick; no matter how many times I explain it, he just doesn't get it.
- Despite all the training, some people remain as thick as a brick when it comes to technology.