James Lee77 said:I can forgive that easily, but I won't talk nonsense.
My point with Jesus and Socrates wasn't that they were "obsessed with being outsiders," but more that you can look at them as role models and build an "outsider ideology" based on their examples. Like, "just as the system crushed Jesus, Socrates, or Galileo... it crushes me too." I used those specific names because I wanted to show that being an outsider is deeply baked into Western tradition, since those guys are basically foundational figures for how we understand ourselves in the West. So, I'm not talking about them as historical figures, but as symbols that define our understanding of what a great man is. And honestly, in Western tradition, a great man is very often an outsider. If someone takes those great people as inspiration, they might end up "embracing outsiderism." In that sense, being an outsider can actually be an ideal for some. And if that ideal becomes a group thing, then you've got this weird paradox of collective outsiderism.
Basically, like I said before: there are outsiders who "live the outsider life," and then there are those who are truly authentic.
I hope you don't think "ideology" is just a mashup of ideas + logos, because that "-logy" suffix actually implies a systematic study, development, or a doctrine.
ideology
In 1796, "science of ideas," originally "philosophy of the mind which derives knowledge from the senses" (as opposed to metaphysics), from French idéologie "study or science of ideas," coined by French philosopher Destutt de Tracy (1754-1836) from idéo- "of ideas," from Greek idea (see idea) + -logy. Meaning "systematic set of ideas, doctrines" first recorded 1909. Ideologue first recorded 1815, in ref. to the French Revolutionaries.
"Ideology ... is usually taken to mean, a prescriptive doctrine that is not supported by rational argument."
[Raphael, "Problems of Political Philosophy," 1970]
So, not every single idea someone expresses is an ideology. That "-logy" part implies a systematic doctrine (a discipline) built upon an original idea.
Look, I know what ideology means. I was just trying to expand the definition a bit in this context, which is why I wrote it out as ideo-logy.
You actually caught onto exactly what I was aiming for: the systematic development of an idea.
And yeah, like I mentioned before, that's how I'm using the word here.
On the other hand, when Tesla had his idea about how to improve electric motors by switching from DC to AC, and he actually pulled it off through systematic research and hard work—we call that innovation, not ideology. Tesla didn't have some "vision of an ideal motor"; he just improved the current state of things given the circumstances.
I don't really get what you mean by "improvement" here, unless you're talking about actually refining something or moving closer to some kind of perfect standard.
Like, take an engine—the "ideal" there is pretty straightforward: an engine is better the more efficient it becomes (which we can actually prove with math).
Ideology is basically anything that imposes a specific ideal and systematically forces everything "below" it to change in an attempt to make the subject of that change "ideal."
By your logic, even a Tesla innovation would be considered ideology, which is just... kind of wild.
Actually, based on how you're looking at it, it's not even absurd. An ideal could be a machine with higher efficiency, and the entire power grid system gets systematically changed just to bring it closer to that ideal.
If EVERYTHING we say is ideology, then the word "ideology" doesn't mean anything at all because it fails to distinguish between anything.
Even if we go along with that—assuming everything we say is ideology—the term still manages to separate ideology from just staying silent (which I think I mentioned earlier in this thread).
Plus, following your definition of ideo-logy, it distinguishes itself from both silence and just talking nonsense without any structure (which is also what I meant when I first brought up the concept).
ps: if anarchy is the goal of freeing society from individual ambitions and ideas, and letting it function without any single authority imposing their own "ideal" on everyone—then anarchy can't be an ideology!
A society like that wouldn't have an ideal or a vision for itself. I mean, for a society to have an ideal or a plan for its future, you basically need an individual with a PERSONAL vision and idea that somehow gets "agreed upon" as a collective one.
I could just say, "Sorry, but you're talking nonsense," but honestly? I'm just lost. How does wanting society to be a certain way (like, specifically "Way A") not involve having an ideal (basically, defining what "Way A" actually is)?
That sentence is basically a textbook example of what we mean when we talk about identification... And if you want to make matters even worse, this whole process relies on the fact that people who have been discriminated against end up seeing their own experiences reflected in others—which is really just a direct result of victims identifying themselves with other victims of social bias.
Everything that ties them together is just the same old brand of suffering—inflicted by the exact same discriminatory mechanisms. And honestly, this doesn't have much to do with ideology at all. It’s more about a victim mentality—a sort of psychological quirk where someone chooses to identify with non-constructive, superficial similarities rather than engaging with actual, meaningful substance. It’s like they’re trying to force their grievances into a "Socratic" comparison just to make their own suffering feel heavier or more significant than it actually is.
Look, I get what you were doing there—I know you were just trying to caricature the situation, and I don't think you meant it literally... but even if we’re talking metaphorically, you can't really call that an ideology.
If I had stuck strictly to those specific examples, my goal would have been to demonstrate how being an outsider is actually baked right into the DNA of Western thought—because, honestly, these figures aren't just names in a dusty textbook; they are the very architects of how we perceive reality. I’m not talking about them merely as historical relics or people who lived a long time ago—I mean them as archetypes that fundamentally shape the lens through which we understand what it even means to exist. A truly great man.And honestly, it’s just a fundamental part of the Western tradition—it’s baked right into our DNA at this point. A truly great man. It’s pretty common to be viewed as an outsider. If someone decides to take that kind of path—you know, the one where you don't just follow the crowd—it's almost inevitable that people will see you differently. Great people—it’s funny how we talk about them, isn't it? We tend to put them on these massive pedestals, almost like they're some different species entirely, rather than just humans who happened to push the boundaries of what's possible. When you really sit down and think about the figures who actually shaped our world, it's less about some inherent "greatness" and more about that relentless, sometimes even stubborn, drive to see things differently. It's that specific kind of courage—the kind that lets someone stand alone against a crowd because they simply can't ignore the truth in front of them. Whether we're talking about philosophers, scientists, or leaders, it always comes back to that same core: having the guts to question everything we take for granted. When you look at how people choose their role models, you could argue that some folks basically "revel in being outsiders." It’s almost like they make a lifestyle out of it. In that sense, being an outsider isn't just a circumstance—it can actually be the whole damn goal. But here's where things get interesting—if that ideal becomes something shared by a specific group of people, you end up with this weird, paradoxical situation: collective outsiderhood. It's like a club where the only rule is that you don't belong.
If someone starts linking being an outsider to greatness—thinking they can somehow become a legend just by mimicking the struggles that hit the greats along the way—then honestly, they’re a bit delusional. They’re basically setting themselves up to waste their entire lives in the most perfect way possible: playing the part of the misunderstood loner while hiding from the real world.
Look, I’m not saying those kinds of people don't exist—honestly, human stupidity is basically an inexhaustible resource, and you have to hand it to them: the sheer creativity of fools can be absolutely mind-blowing sometimes. But surely, we haven't let that specific breed of idiocy become the gold standard for what defines an ideology, right?
You can always find some crowd of idiots out there trying to take off from the top of a skyscraper using nothing but a single chicken feather—mostly because it never occurs to them to actually test their flight technique by jumping off level ground first.
I have to wonder if these kinds of examples even belong in a serious argument anymore—I mean, since when did people with severe cognitive disabilities become the baseline for "calibration" in any kind of logical process, unless you're just using their diagnosis as a shorthand for being wrong?
To put it simply—and I feel like we’ve touched on this before—there’s a massive difference between people who are actually outsiders and those who just perform being an outsider for the sake of an aesthetic. You've got the ones who lean into that "rebel" persona because it looks cool, and then you have the genuine articles—the people who truly exist on the fringes, whether they realize it or not.
Real outsiders aren't driven by some rigid ideology—they actually have their own thing going on. But these people who just parrot whatever they hear? They don't even have the capacity to grasp a real mental concept. Honestly, that kind of mindless copying is just a desperate attempt to look like they belong, all in service of spreading more self-delusion down the line.
Neither group qualifies as ideological outsiders—though the latter probably just needs a doctor's note and a long nap.
I know what ideology means. In this context, I was trying to expand the scope of the word, which is why I broke it down into ideo-logy.
You actually caught exactly what I was aiming for: the systematic development of a specific idea.
Moving forward, I’ll continue using the term in that sense.
Fair enough, but I still don't see where you pulled this "LOGOS" concept from... which was pretty much the sticking point here. 🤷
I don't quite follow what you mean by "improvement" if it isn't some kind of refinement—you know, moving closer toward an ideal or perfection.
Take an engine, for example. That ideal is fairly straightforward: an engine is closer to perfection the higher its efficiency (which we can define mathematically).
Look, have you actually thought about what you're saying, or are you just messing with me at this point? Do you honestly believe innovation stems from a math equation that says a gas engine turns 4 liters of fuel into work while the other 6 liters just pollute the air and gunk up the works?
How is it that this 60% energy loss—this mathematically proven gap—and our image of an "ideal" gas engine (one that hits 100% efficiency) hasn't led to any meaningful breakthroughs, despite the fact that the American auto industry has access to virtually unlimited resources, brilliant minds, and cutting-edge tech?
Isn't it a well-known fact that our observational tools catch less than 5% of the total magnetic spectrum, meaning we aren't even seeing 5% of the universe? Aren't there tens of thousands of scientists working across every continent and both poles for over a century just to try and bridge that gap?
So, it's clear to me that calculating efficiency via energy consumption does absolutely nothing to push those boundaries. To move the needle, you need something else entirely... a mind that is completely open and free, stripped of all preconceived ideals and rigid models. You need massive understanding, a healthy dose of intellectual stubbornness, and total self-sacrifice.
The math is left to those "experts" who need it to justify their titles, their paychecks, and those massive scientific "projects" that pull in more monthly funding than Tesla ever invested in his entire lifetime. And don't even get me started on the actual results those "experts" produce...
Now, let's say I'm wrong and I've missed something obvious... If you could give me one concrete example of an innovation born from a hypothetical mathematical idea of 100% efficiency, I’d be genuinely surprised...
Based on your logic, that isn't absurd at all. An ideal is simply a machine with higher utility; the entire system of generating and transmitting electricity undergoes changes specifically designed to bring that system closer to that ideal state.
To hell with an "ideal" built on a mathematical model of maximum efficiency. Anyone who thinks that way about improvement might as well start kicking themselves in the backside—because they're basically hoping that by stumbling around, they'll accidentally trip, knock the engine off its stand, and somehow, by pure luck, break it in a way that actually makes it better.
Engine efficiency doesn't care about math, just like the efficiency of biological organisms has nothing to do with math. Honestly... try taking apart a gas engine and using math to pinpoint exactly where those 6 out of 10 liters of gasoline "go." If you manage to pull that off, you'll find the real problem—and you'll realize your mathematically perfect model would require expanding the periodic table by 300% and discovering alloys that are somehow 200% lighter during piston expansion than they are during compression.
If we’re talking about taking a path that leads straight to innovation—well, then call me Papa Smurf.
Even if we go down that rabbit hole—assuming for a second that absolutely everything we say qualifies as ideology—that term still serves a purpose. It actually creates a necessary distinction between having an ideology and simply staying silent (which is something I’ve touched on earlier in this thread).
If we lived in a world where voting, speech, and ideology were all just three different ways of saying the exact same meaningless thing—and language itself was nothing more than a recreational hobby where we just toss in pointless synonyms to make things "fun"—wouldn't the whole experience feel like someone decided to add hurdles to a professional sprint track? Just unnecessary obstacles added to a race that was already supposed to be about speed and direction.
Now, if we’re looking at that definition of ideology I laid out earlier—you see, it isn't just about silence. It’s actually quite different from that kind of mindless chatter or those disorganized, rambling thoughts that don't really lead anywhere (which is something I touched on briefly when I first introduced the concept).
If all else fails, ideology serves as this ultimate litmus test—it’s the thing that finally draws a line between people who just sit there in silence and those who can articulate their thoughts with total fluidity. It’s almost like a way to distinguish between a functioning verbal machine and a broken one that’s just stuck on mute.
Look, maybe we could try something different for once—just a thought—and actually realize that being precise with our language is basically just a mirror for clear thinking. When we start inflating a single concept until it’s bloated and meaningless, we aren't actually communicating anything; we're just engineering a more sophisticated way to fail at talking to each other. It’s like when people take one specific idea and stretch it out until it covers five other things—suddenly, that one word is trying to act as a stand-in for staying silent, avoiding nonsense, identifying a target, and mimicking someone else all at once. You end up with this messy soup of two affirmations and two negations, mixing verbal labels with psychological ones, and in the end, you haven't actually said anything at all.
Just to make sure we’re covering all the statistical bases and hitting a wider spectrum of possible meanings—and while I'm at it, let's essentially render my own statement unrecognizable—we can expand the context of what "ideology" actually means. If we do that, the whole concept becomes about as flexible as a prophecy from the Oracle of Delphi—though, mind you, it stays flexible in only one direction, without any chance of being interpreted two different ways.
I could easily just say, "Sorry, but you're talking nonsense here," but instead, I'll just be honest: I am completely lost. I don't follow your logic at all—how does the desire for society to look a certain way (let’s call that specific way "Option A") somehow fail to include the actual ideal behind it? It feels like you're trying to separate the goal from the blueprint itself, which just doesn't add up to me.
This might actually shock you, but the answer is incredibly straightforward. You can practice non-acceptance, refusal to participate, or any kind of general negation without needing to cling to some grand, lofty ideal. In fact—and this is the kicker—you *have* to do it that way. By its very definition, negation isn't meant to swap one ideal for another. If you were just trading one belief for a different one, we wouldn't be talking about negation anymore; we’d just be calling it a trade, a compromise, a transformation, or a transaction.
Look, I think there's a bit of a misunderstanding about what negation actually means here. When you negate something, you're doing exactly what the word implies—you're denying the premise. Denying someone's authority isn't the same thing as just trying to swap them out for someone else. It’s not like I'm looking to tear down one leader just to install a new one in their chair. What I'm getting at is much more fundamental—I'm questioning the very legitimacy of authority itself. I'm not interested in providing a placeholder or predicting some new figure to fill that vacuum; I'm simply rejecting the idea that the position holds any inherent right to rule in the first place.
So, it’s not really a case of one thing leading to another—it’s more like one thing existing specifically to prevent the other. But then again, if we decide that "not staying silent" is itself an ideology, you could just as easily label my habit of verbally rejecting authority as an ideology too... at which point, I guess anything goes. ☕
