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One unfortunate aspect of this is that many upper class/upper middle class people I’ve met can become insane with rage if you point out that their self-assessme

One unfortunate aspect of this is that many upper class/upper middle class people I’ve met can become insane with rage if you point out that their self-assessment is wrong. Eg a mediocre student with successful academic parents may dismiss something as trivial, and when you ask him if he can prove the thing he just said is trivial, he’ll start throwing his arms in the air and yelling and stomp out of the room (personally seen more than once).

deleted 7y ago
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theoh 7y ago
This is probably narcissistic rage, and it would be a result of the narcissistic injury of being less intelligent than the parents. There are lots of other potential causes of narcissistic injury, but realizing that one is relatively stupid can do it for people of any class background.
- bigred100 7y ago
  The guy in question isn’t even stupid, average to above average for a difficult research lab in a decent PhD program, which means smart, but through some bizarre mental problems tries to convince himself and others that award winning work by internationally recognized people 20+years into their field is trivial, sort of slacks off and spins his wheels chasing low hanging fruit, and gets mad if you say this
  - theoh 7y ago
    Pretty sure these "bizarre mental problems" are a manifestation of rivalrous narcissism. Dismissing others in order to feel better about your own intelligence is a symptom of that. It sounds like he would like to be a heavy intellectual hitter but isn't, which is all I meant by relatively stupid. Narcissism involves a kind of fraudulent, artificial self-image. Claiming something is trivial and then not being able to follow through on that is exactly the kind of bluster I'd expect from a narcissist. The slacking off fits the profile, and the "gets mad" is also a narcissistic trait. To return to my original point: this is not about class origins, it sound's like it is about having a chip on one's shoulder about intellectual achievement. There are many other things that can play that role in narcissism, including coming from an underprivileged background. It's really important to develop a proper analysis of these personality problems. The typical engineer has a blind spot in this area—they can see when there's an obvious problem but they don't try to build up a deeper intuition for the dynamics behind it.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

theoh 7y ago

This is probably narcissistic rage, and it would be a result of the narcissistic injury of being less intelligent than the parents. There are lots of other potential causes of narcissistic injury, but realizing that one is relatively stupid can do it for people of any class background.

bigred100 7y ago
The guy in question isn’t even stupid, average to above average for a difficult research lab in a decent PhD program, which means smart, but through some bizarre mental problems tries to convince himself and others that award winning work by internationally recognized people 20+years into their field is trivial, sort of slacks off and spins his wheels chasing low hanging fruit, and gets mad if you say this
- theoh 7y ago
  Pretty sure these "bizarre mental problems" are a manifestation of rivalrous narcissism. Dismissing others in order to feel better about your own intelligence is a symptom of that. It sounds like he would like to be a heavy intellectual hitter but isn't, which is all I meant by relatively stupid. Narcissism involves a kind of fraudulent, artificial self-image. Claiming something is trivial and then not being able to follow through on that is exactly the kind of bluster I'd expect from a narcissist. The slacking off fits the profile, and the "gets mad" is also a narcissistic trait. To return to my original point: this is not about class origins, it sound's like it is about having a chip on one's shoulder about intellectual achievement. There are many other things that can play that role in narcissism, including coming from an underprivileged background. It's really important to develop a proper analysis of these personality problems. The typical engineer has a blind spot in this area—they can see when there's an obvious problem but they don't try to build up a deeper intuition for the dynamics behind it.