Topical Guide 690
Mark Dorset
Self-Image, Self-Assessment
Madness
What a Piece of Work I Am, Chapter 20:
“I guess most people who are nuts don’t think they are.”
Wikipedia, “Illusory superiority”:
In social psychology, illusory superiority is a cognitive bias wherein a person overestimates their own qualities and abilities compared to other people. Illusory superiority is one of many positive illusions, relating to the self, that are evident in the study of intelligence, the effective performance of tasks and tests, and the possession of desirable personal characteristics and personality traits. Overestimation of abilities compared to an objective measure is known as the overconfidence effect. […]
In a survey of faculty at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, 68% rated themselves in the top 25% for teaching ability, and 94% rated themselves as above average.
In a similar survey, 87% of Master of Business Administration students at Stanford University rated their academic performance as above the median. […]
Svenson (1981) surveyed 161 students in Sweden and the United States, asking them to compare their driving skills and safety to other people's. For driving skills, 93% of the U.S. sample and 69% of the Swedish sample put themselves in the top 50%; for safety, 88% of the U.S. and 77% of the Swedish put themselves in the top 50%.
Wikipedia, “Emotive conjugation”
In rhetoric, emotive or emotional conjugation (also known as Russell’s conjugation) is a rhetorical technique used to create an intrinsic bias towards or against a piece of information. Bias is created by using the emotional connotation of a word to prime a response from the audience by creating a loaded statement. Used seriously, such loaded language can lend false support to an argument through emotional connotation and implication, rather than through fact. While emotional conjugation is considered effective by researchers, it ultimately employs a logical fallacy. […]
Emotional conjugation was originally defined by Bertrand Russell in 1948 on the BBC Radio program, The Brains Trust. During an interview, he gave multiple examples of emotive conjugation, with his most famous example being the following:
“I am firm, you are obstinate, he is a pig-headed fool.”
Examples of emotive conjugation include: […]
I am eccentric, you are weird, he is mad.
Marcel Proust, Within a Budding Grove, “Madame Swann at Home” (translated by C. K. Scott Moncrieff)
A stranger with whom we have been exchanging—quite pleasantly—our impressions, which we might suppose to be similar to his, of the passers-by, whom we have agreed in regarding as vulgar, reveals suddenly the pathological abyss that divides him from us by adding carelessly, as he runs his hand over his pocket: “What a pity, I haven’t got my revolver here; I could have picked off the lot!”
See also:
Madness, Senility, Dementia TG 146; Madness, Wisdom TG 147
Self-Deprecation TG 39
Self-Presentation (or Presentation of the Self) TG 427, TG 508; Voice of Reason, Man of Action, Madman, the Engagé and the Dégagé TG 430; Altruist TG 443; Devil-May-Care Bon-Vivants, Self-Denying Elder, and Outspoken Rebel TG 446; Self-Sacrifice versus Self-Indulgence TG 522; Self-Congratulation TG 522; Self: Re-invention or Renovation TG 529; The Compulsion to Express Oneself, the Difficulty of Doing So, Especially Under Conditions of Repression or Suppression, and the Rush of Release When Self-Expression Is Achieved TG 614; Character, Personality, The Self TG 653
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