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[–]Carthimundia 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

I just read recently that Derrida, one of the founding fathers of this kind of nonsense babble, felt like a fraud his entire life. Apparently his dissertation committee were torn between failing him outright or passing his thesis with highest honours - they couldn't decide if it was bullshit or genius. The idea that he had imposter syndrome his entire life pleases me greatly and its probably the reason he wrote in the way he did.

[–]MarkTwainiac 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Dunno if famed French psychoanalyst and fellow author of impenetrable prose Jacques Lacan (born a generation earlier than Derrida) also suffered from imposter syndrome. But Lacan actually was a fraud for real.

Long hailed as a genius by many in intellectual circles, Lacan stole the basic ideas that he became most famous for - "mirror theory" - from his own teacher, a mentally-ill man who posited that in order to have a sense of self human beings must be able to see our images in modern-day looking glasses. But as it so happened, Lacan's teacher had a condition that caused him to go blind. When he'd lost nearly all his eyesight, he sat himself in front of a glass mirror and blew his brains out - and Lacan then stole his ideas and presented "mirror theory" to the world as his own.

[–]BEB[S] 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Really interesting -thanks. I am fascinated with how these ideas took hold.

[–]BEB[S] 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Thanks for that.