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bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
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 Posted: Sat May 23, 2009 6:43 pm Post subject: Study: the Inner Worlds of Fools and the Gullible |
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Sachi Sri Kantha recently completed 25 years as an active scientist. During this time he estimates that he has read over 13,000 research papers, in subjects ranging from astronomy to zoology. Among his Top Ten is
�The Psychology of the Fool�
by James Alexander and Kenneth Isaacs in The International Journal of Psycho-Analysis.
The authors correctly observe that �the fool is not innocent, but is often gullible.�
"I am a fool." So said quite a few of the educated folks.
Other excerpts:
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| The fool [Webster�s Dictionary: One who acts absurdly or stupidly; a simpleton; dolt; one who professionally counterfeits folly, as a jester or buffoon; a retainer formerly kept to make sport, dressed fantastically in motley, with cap, bells and bauble.] represents a special pathological type of character-formation, a sort of sub-group within the large category of alloplastic neuroses in which the conflict is behaviourally discharged in a manner known as acting out. |
| Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote: |
| Folly is a more dangerous enemy to the good than malice. You can protest against malice, you can unmask it or prevent it by force. Malice always contains the seeds of its own destruction, for it always make men uncomfortable, if nothing worse. There is no defence against folly. Neither protests nor force are of any avail against it, and it is never amenable to reason. If facts contradict personal prejudices, there is no need to believe them, and if they are undeniable, they can simply be pushed aside as exceptions. Thus, the fool, as compared with the scoundrel, is invariably self-complacent. And he can easily become dangerous, for it does not take much to make him aggressive. Hence, folly requires much more cautious handling than malice. We shall never again try to reason with the fool, for it is both useless and dangerous. |
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| To deal adequately with folly it is essential to recognize it for what it is. This much is certain, it is a moral rather than an intellectual defect. There are men of great intellect who are fools, and men of low intellect who are anything but fools |
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| One feels somehow, especially in conversation with him, that it is impossible to talk to the man himself, to talk to him personally. Instead, one is confronted with a series of slogans, watchwords, and the like, which have acquired power over him. He is under a curse, he is blinded, his very humanity is being prostituted and exploited. Once he has surrendered his will and become a mere tool, there are no lengths of evil to which the fool will not go, yet all the time he is unable to see that it is evil. |
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| The essential dynamic constellation in the fool consists of unacknowledged hostility, which nonetheless unconsciously produces guilt, which in turn is repressed and denied. The guilt urges toward repentance, but individuals of the kind under consideration do not wish to give up their anger, but are determined to remain angry and to behave destructively. Consciously, they subscribe to that which is right or decent. Thus, perhaps the most characteristic trait or quality of the fool is dishonesty. He deceives himself. To recapitulate, the fool is angry and is determined to remain hostile despite strong guilt feelings. A strong tendency to treachery is the inevitable consequence; and to resort to metaphor, �when the chips are down�, the fool is sure to betray others or himself. |
| The authors wrote: |
The fool is not innocent, but is often gullible.
The gullible have a credulousness which stems from the need to be deceived. That is, they must deny their distrust and, therefore, place trust in situations with their intelligence clearly tells them is improbable and unsafe. Thus, the gullible differs from innocent in that the latter has no intrapsychic drive to be deceived. |
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| The true fool is one who denies his folly but eternally acts it out and does so because he is at the most fundamental level a nihilist. |
Summary
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The type of character disorder considered in this paper is not the buffoon-jester-clown type of fool who plays the �fool� with conscious intentionality, but the type that consciously has no recognition of being a fool and hence, who acts out his folly against himself and others � usually under the guise of decent or even lofty ideals. Freud said that the moral-ethical was self-evident. This was true of Freud, but it is not true of everyone. To us it appears that it is not possible to deal with the psychology of the fool without considerable reference to the moral-ethical domain.
Guilt is an intolerable narcisstic wound to the sort of person who deserves the epithet of �fool�. Hence, the fool denies the guilt and the destructive rage which lies behind it. Reaction formations of idealism are erected, but they fail to prevent the destructive acting out. The fool does not believe in the reality of forgiveness.
Essentially, the fool is nihilistic. His seeming idealism and seeming possession of humane convictions sometimes permit him to obtain power, such as political power, but he is very prone to betray any trust reposed in him. The fool, because of his fundamental dishonesty, seldom enters psychoanalytic or any other form of treatment. |
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JMO
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Daegu
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| Posted: Sat May 23, 2009 7:06 pm Post subject: |
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I just followed the link and read the original paper. There is no data. Shouldn't there be data? There are lots of 'we believes' but no explanation of why they believe so, except opinion.
I would have liked a more definitive definition of 'fool' then a study of people who fall under that classification.
And I got to say, this guy read over 13000 papers and this is in his top ten? He must have a very bad memory or little taste. |
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bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Sat May 23, 2009 7:11 pm Post subject: |
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It is extremely difficult to near impossible to do controlled experiments and get hard data in psychoanalysis.
The article did, however, appear in one of its top journals. |
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JMO
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Daegu
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 2:50 am Post subject: |
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| bacasper wrote: |
It is extremely difficult to near impossible to do controlled experiments and get hard data in psychoanalysis.
The article did, however, appear in one of its top journals. |
Maybe I am the one being taken for a fool? 
It has to be a joke. They don't even try to define the word fool in a clinical way. Surely that would be a first step. There are zero data and there are 7 referenced texts from seemingly all very different backgrounds.
I don't see why it would be hard to
a ) define the word 'fool'
b ) find people who fit that description
c ) devise a study to examine traits that they share/similarity in background/genetics or anything really. Just for the love of God do some bloody work.
Anyway, what did you think of this 'paper' and why did you post it? I don't see its relevance to this forum..
BTW something being from a top journal, doesn't mean it is the bees knees and because a guys read thousands of papers does not mean he can discern the good from the bad.
Last edited by JMO on Sun May 24, 2009 2:52 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Manner of Speaking
Joined: 09 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 2:52 am Post subject: |
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| Wait a minute. Let's go back to the other thread for a minute. |
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bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 6:50 am Post subject: |
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| Let's not and say we did. |
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Manner of Speaking
Joined: 09 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 6:59 am Post subject: |
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| Then you're missing the point. |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 7:09 am Post subject: |
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| Why the "conspiracy" blowup again, now? |
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bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 7:38 am Post subject: |
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Apparently someone cannot abide the idea that other people on another thread continue to debate the official fiction of 9/11, and some of them do not buy into his own personal conspiracy theory regarding the Catholic Church scandal.
Unable to control himself, he could not resist posting off-topic on that thread in an attempt to force his views, so much so that he had to be admonished by the mods.
Like a petulant child, he just had to have his own way and had to resort to a new thread to do so. |
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JMO
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Location: Daegu
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 7:50 am Post subject: |
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| bacasper wrote: |
Apparently someone cannot abide the idea that other people on another thread continue to debate the official fiction of 9/11, and some of them do not buy into his own personal conspiracy theory regarding the Catholic Church scandal.
Unable to control himself, he could not resist posting off-topic on that thread in an attempt to force his views, so much so that he had to be admonished by the mods.
Like a petulant child, he just had to have his own way and had to resort to a new thread to do so. |
And this 'paper' was your response?
I am surmising that you googled 'fool' 'pyschology' and put this up for the sole reason of having something opposite the 'psychology of a conspiracy theorist'. That would mean I wasted the time I took to read this bloody thing as you obviously don't have an opinion about it and don't actually want to discuss it. Annoying... |
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Manner of Speaking
Joined: 09 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 8:12 am Post subject: |
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| Still missing the point... |
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bacasper
Joined: 26 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 8:37 am Post subject: |
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| JMO wrote: |
And this 'paper' was your response?
I am surmising that you googled 'fool' 'pyschology' and put this up for the sole reason of having something opposite the 'psychology of a conspiracy theorist'. That would mean I wasted the time I took to read this bloody thing as you obviously don't have an opinion about it and don't actually want to discuss it. Annoying... |
Sorry for your annoyance, but since the offending off-topic post was aimed at me, I felt I had to respond.
I did answer your first concern regarding data. It is hard to come by in psychoanalysis.
| JMO wrote: |
I don't see why it would be hard to
a ) define the word 'fool'
b ) find people who fit that description
c ) devise a study to examine traits that they share/similarity in background/genetics or anything really. Just for the love of God do some bloody work. |
These are all good suggestions, and maybe you missed your calling as a psychoanalytic researcher, if such a field existed. That it does not may be due to the inherent difficulties in the field, as well as the fact that psychoanalysts generally prefer discussing ideas/theory rather than hard data.
| Quote: |
| Anyway, what did you think of this 'paper' and why did you post it? I don't see its relevance to this forum.. |
Its relevance here only due to the author's recently placing it in his top ten. And again, I posted it because it was incumbent upon me to respond.
While the paper is typical psychoanalytic fare, I'd never considered "fool" as a diagnostic category before. And I did especially appreciate the comparison with Heinz Kohut's formulation of narcissism, and raised for me the question, "If analysts diagnose and treat Narcissistic Personality Disorder, why is there not an analogous Foolish Personality Disorder?" |
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