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The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

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Re: The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

#101

Post by gfrecvh »

pstuart wrote: post #21

Here's One Weird Trick™ to avoid being an ideologue: be ok with being wrong. Flipping that over: aspire to be correct in your beliefs, not in "being right". Karl Popper (the man behind the Intolerance of Intolerance "paradox) identified it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsifiability

Falsifiability - misunderstood idea that's often used to discredit string theory, for example.

As stated on Wikipedia:

> Falsifiability is a standard of evaluation of scientific statements, including theories and hypotheses. A statement is falsifiable if it belongs to a language or logical structure capable of describing an empirical observation that contradicts it.

Re: The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

#102

Post by gfrecvh »

beloch wrote: post #32

Information hygiene is important if you don't want to go "crazy" in this sense. Be careful about what news you consume, even if it appears to agree with you. Check sources. Check facts. Try to work up to your beliefs from direct observation and basic principles whenever possible. Question your beliefs. Maybe they're wrong! e.g. It's easy to get worked up about Trump. There's an awful lot bad press out there about him…

> Pay attention to what the man actually does.

Pardoned a lot of the highest profile criminals of the past decade.

Started a war with Iran.

Re: The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

#103

Post by ifwinterco »

DavidPiper wrote: post #65

> The person [is not super fired up and] doesn’t just want to act as a soldier for their team This pulled me into a tangential thought: Has anyone else noticed that a lot of people just CAN'T be wrong? They might be contrarian, cynical, narcissists, experts in their field, experiencing PTSD or other emotional disregulation, extremely online, ... Then the team-based things: political entrenchment, [colour]-pilled, con…

It’s not that you’re crazy, it’s that human beings are not actually rational most of the time.

More intelligent human beings can do a better impression of rationality but in most situations they’re still using their intelligence to post-rationalise some existing feeling.

Once you recognise that you’ll see that it’s true even in yourself

Re: The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

#104

Post by gfrecvh »

api wrote: post #42

This is great. The error it highlights would work for anything. The Earth is on the back of a large turtle. Prove me wrong. Most of the arguments you hear will be deeply flawed. Therefore we are on the back of a giant turtle.

I think it's easy to give correct arguments, it's just easy for you to dismiss them.

For example if i say "we're not on the back of a giant turtle, because humans went into a rock ship, went all around the planet and checked there's no turtle", is absolutely correct. But then you'll say something like "how do you know, were you yourself in the rocket ship?".

And this is how normal people see extremists: "I just addressed your point, but you choose to hold a ridiculous position"

Re: The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

#105

Post by bratbag »

miyoji wrote: post #22
imoverclocked wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think knowing about the branches of your government is a prerequisite to having an opinion or good argument about it. It’s not sufficient to just know that but it’s a good filter in the USA where a surprising number of people have “opinions” but lack the most basic knowledge.

It's a prerequisite, but so is breathing. It's necessary but not sufficient. The bar I like to use is pretty simple: do you know who represents you in Congress (I am American so this is my bias, but substitute your country's equivalent if there is one)? As in, your state's two Senators and your district's Representative? If not, you probably don't vote or don't pay attention when you do, and you've definitely never c…

You are filtering out politically engaged people who have assesed the current mechanisms of state to be too flawed to be worth continued interaction.

This is likely quite a large group.

Re: The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

#106

Post by TrackerFF »

For the past few years, I've seen a dozen of friends or acquaintances turn "ideologically crazy", and they can be roughly grouped into:

A) Onset of schizophrenia or other serious mental illness, followed by psychosis. This is actually the most common I've seen. But it is also the easiest to spot.

B) Some crisis event in life, followed by finding / joining a community. Some were hit hard by this during COVID.

I've yet to personally see people that have their, well, shit together and live busy lives turn into ideological crazies or extremists - where there is no mental illness. Of course, it could be that they just hide it better. Don't use their public accounts, etc.

I also think it is much easier to become radicalized today. Once you search for any extremist views on say social media, you'll be bombarded with it. Just belonging to a certain demographic could trigger a non-stop barrage of extreme wing influencer content in your feed.

Re: The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

#107

Post by Ntrails »

miyoji wrote: post #22
imoverclocked wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think knowing about the branches of your government is a prerequisite to having an opinion or good argument about it. It’s not sufficient to just know that but it’s a good filter in the USA where a surprising number of people have “opinions” but lack the most basic knowledge.

It's a prerequisite, but so is breathing. It's necessary but not sufficient. The bar I like to use is pretty simple: do you know who represents you in Congress (I am American so this is my bias, but substitute your country's equivalent if there is one)? As in, your state's two Senators and your district's Representative? If not, you probably don't vote or don't pay attention when you do, and you've definitely never c…

Having valid opinions about politics and engaging with the existing political system are not the same thing. I am super happy to chat about political questions (of all sorts) irrespective of my interest in voting.

Note that when I say "talk politics" I really mean "discuss things controlled by politicians", not "discuss politicians". If you mean the latter it is a super fair bar to set!

Re: The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

#108

Post by j16sdiz »

strken wrote: post #73
miyoji wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a prerequisite, but so is breathing. It's necessary but not sufficient. The bar I like to use is pretty simple: do you know who represents you in Congress (I am American so this is my bias, but substitute your country's equivalent if there is one)? As in, your state's two Senators and your district's Representative? If not, you probably don't vote or don't pay attention when you do, and you've definitely never c…

This particular test might be reasonable, but at some point you're just filtering out anyone who's not in your bubble, which is a problem when your beliefs are extreme because your bubble is tiny. Imagine a Marxist who refuses to discuss economics with anyone who can't explain dialectic materialism or enclosure.

IMO. It is ok to filter them out.

One simply does not have infinite time and resource to engage with everybody.

Aware what you have filtered and don't treat them like idiot

Re: The main way I've seen people turn ideologically crazy (2025)

#109

Post by 121789 »

TrackerFF wrote: post #106

For the past few years, I've seen a dozen of friends or acquaintances turn "ideologically crazy", and they can be roughly grouped into: A) Onset of schizophrenia or other serious mental illness, followed by psychosis. This is actually the most common I've seen. But it is also the easiest to spot. B) Some crisis event in life, followed by finding / joining a community. Some were hit hard by this during COVID. I've yet…

Don’t agree actually. Have seen many busy working professionals fall into “extremism” and it’s pretty much always the same. They have a few issues they are firm on and align with one party, they don’t like the other side because of this, then they only hang out with people aligned with their views and only consume media aligned with their views. Quickly turns into lunatic talking points, and I’ve seen it happen to both the left and right.
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