Who is an "Irrational Man" according to Woody Allen?

November 28, 2018
Psychology of conflict
Svetlana Semak

Only internal analysis allows you to know and improve your own “I”. A person can be rational or irrational. An intuitive person, who is more inclined to perceive phenomena and states than logical arguments, is more often able to understand his inner world.

Irrationality is a term in psychology that refers to inconsistency and bias. A person who thinks in this way relies on intuition and comes to non-standard, sometimes completely absurd, conclusions. Irrationality means that a person lacks critical thinking.

Irrationality is in psychology. Different approaches

The term “rational psychology” was first introduced into science by Christian Wolf. By this concept he meant strictly defined relationships within the human soul. Psychology itself studies how a person perceives the world, how he thinks and feels, and according to what canons he builds his internal concepts of existence.

And what is irrationality in psychology? Psychologist A. Ellis described irrational thinking as over-pretentiousness. That is, the desire for self-deification, the refusal to accept one’s human framework, to accept the possibility of mistakes and imperfections around oneself and in oneself. Another psychologist, A. Beck, called unreasonable thinking simply cognitive errors. C. Jung believed that those who have “access” to archetypes are irrational and can create based on these archetypal images.

In fact, there are a lot of approaches in psychology. From what has been said, it can be established that in psychology, irrationality is the definition of thinking built on the basis of illusory ideas.

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The general division of personality types into RATIONAL and IRRATIONAL, proposed by Jung, seems legitimate.

Thus, the Thinking and Emotional personality types rely on Consciousness - a command module that “works” according to a certain algorithm, consistent with the existing world order. It is the work of Consciousness that ensures the constant maintenance of a person “within what is permitted.” Belonging to one of these types says that the implementation of the plan set by the DP, during the formation and change of the FP, in the world we perceive, does not violate the algorithm of control of the human body inherent in consciousness. Those. the conditions for applying the existing algorithm also include incoming changes to the existing information “hardwired” in it (specific consciousness). More precisely, the ability to process these changes within the existing algorithm exists.

We will classify these types as Rational - based on certain principles that do not change throughout the life of a given person, and to a large extent, correspond to the existing world order, within the limits of their possible awareness.

Rationalism is an understanding and comprehension of both what has happened and what is to come, although to varying degrees for different people - the ability to “see” and analyze the path of life. A rational approach to the environment and oneself consists of “working” with objects, which can also be ideas borrowed from outside. Consciousness builds objects, including ideas existing in society, into a certain picture, reflecting a certain integrity corresponding to the structure of a specific consciousness, i.e. in a given coordinate system. At the same time, the orientation of consciousness towards the environment places the perceiving subject himself in it. Focus on one’s own inner essence, on the contrary, adjusts the surrounding objects to the subject who perceives them, including his ideological orientation. But, in both cases, a complete picture is created, to one degree or another, like a frame or a cast of what is happening. This implies a certain static nature in the assessment of what is happening, since changes in objects or a subject “must correspond” to the existing algorithm in a given coordinate system.

Consciousness can rely on both intellectual and emotional areas, which “work” in parallel and sequentially, simultaneously. The sequence reflects the interchange of signals with qualitatively different parameters - from the area of thinking and intelligence, and from the area of feeling and emotions. In this way, inferences are formed as logically developing realizations of something (with the leading role of intellect), and judgments as evaluative categories of realized realizations in comparison with what is already known (with the leading role of feeling).

Intuitive and Sensing personality types are more susceptible to changes depending on newly received information, i.e. there is an “exit” beyond the boundaries of the possibility of using the currently existing algorithm of Consciousness of a given individual. In Consciousness there is a restructuring and search for a new optimal algorithm that takes into account these changes, i.e. the algorithm changes in accordance with new boundary conditions (in the case of intuitive perception) and a redistribution of significance in the incoming information occurs (with the leading role of sensations). We classify these types as Irrational - those who are in constant search for principles that most fully correspond to the current world order for a given person, and the invariability of the algorithm of the work of Consciousness is possible only with sufficiently high stability in the surrounding world and the internal state of the human body.

Irrationalism is, first of all, a change in the principles of “foreseeing” what is happening and “sensing” the future, developed to varying degrees in different people. But the common unifying factor is the prevalence of the parameters of personal life processes over the parameters of the forms of specific objects or the subject himself. Those. consciousness works with objects in a given sequence. And the characteristics of the process in which this or that object appears are decisive for the perception of the object’s parameters. For the sensing type, the determining factor is the process of changes in the physical parameters of the subject itself and the surrounding world, while for the intuitive type it is the process of changing consciousness, i.e. changes (usually inaccessible to personal perception) of the parameters of “reading” what is happening. It is for better understanding within the framework of a given process that the coordinate system is very flexible, just like the algorithm of consciousness. Consciousness is focused on the processes of interaction of objects and the life processes of a specific perceiving subject.

The changes that occur with the intuitive type are associated with the “givenness” of the process of changing the structure of the individual’s consciousness and the corresponding algorithm to ensure the balanced existence of this individual “in the future.”

Changes of the sensing type are based on “adjusting” the algorithm and the development of processes in the surrounding world, with the same goal.

The spheres of manifestation of processes that reflect the sequence of formation and development of a particular personality, and the areas of its interaction with the environment, form additional differences that exist between people.

The rational type of personality can be compared to a ship anchored at the bottom, and the irrational type is afloat. Hence, their methods of maneuvering when “weather” conditions change are different. Moreover, both one and the other may be, to a greater or lesser extent, reasonable or not reasonable.

In terms of theory and practice

– rational, more abstract in its theorizing (and to ensure the essential unity of this process, it is necessary to fix the coordinate system to which the abstractions are “tied”);

- irrational is more specific and practically directed (he uses the selection of a coordinate system in which, in his opinion, the essential unity is not violated and is most clearly perceived)

From the standpoint of rationalism, the behavior of an irrationalist is second-class rationality, leading him to critical situations. And vice versa, the irrationalist does not understand how any “reasonable” ideas can be placed above what is actually perceived. Relationships of these two types are usually built on the basis of transferring a personal projection onto a partner, which, during further communication, becomes a source of misunderstandings and resentments in personal relationships, and the reason for the impossibility of achieving consensus in society.

In general, the rational type relies on the analysis and synthesis of incoming information with subsequent forecasting of events, and the irrational type relies on anticipation and premonition of what is happening. Pure “rationals” and “irrationals” do not exist in nature - this is only a characteristic of the prevailing tendency inherent in a particular individual.

In the social orientation, the object-subject division is also essential, characterizing what role - leading or driven - is characteristic of a particular individual in society.

Rationality and irrationality. What are the differences?

We often say about someone - “he is irrational.” What does this concept mean? Rationality means consistency with reason, validity. From Lat. ratio is reason. Whereas irrationalis is unreasonable, based not on arguments, but on general ideas.

To understand the difference between reasonable and unreasonable, we present the signs of both principles of thinking.

Signs of rational judgment:

Confirmation of logical conclusions by experience.
Balance of emotions. Rational thoughts never cause a “storm of emotions” in the soul of an individual.
There is no absolutization of phenomena. A rational person knows that all events and phenomena mean exactly as much as the value we ourselves put into them.
Efficiency.

Now let's list the signs of the irrational.

The categorical judgment is “I won’t be able to live if...”.
Bias. No facts can prove an irrational thought.
Presence of violent hysterics, tears.
Inefficiency. Such thoughts do not help you move forward towards a positive goal.

Now it is clear how irrational individuals think. Anyone who is biased, unpredictable and cannot separate the main from the secondary because of his emotionality when solving pressing issues is irrational. What does it mean? This means that a person most likely has emotional-figurative thinking since childhood. And a profession should be chosen by such a creative person, associated with emotional states, not facts.

But sometimes the reason for such thinking is negative attitudes. Such programs serve only destructiveness and need to be corrected with the help of a psychotherapist.

Incomprehensible actions

Irrational behavior is an action aimed at obtaining a result without premeditated actions and evaluation. Such behavior does not have pre-considered possible options for the development of a situation, issue or task. It is usually associated with the spontaneous manifestation of feelings and emotions that irritate or, conversely, sharply calm thoughts arising as a result of an emotional impulse.

Usually such people are able to see reality beyond its logical explanation and with the advantage of some arguments over others. They are guided by actions without pre-prepared algorithms of actions, called “life instructions.” Most often, such behavior is based on the person’s own faith in the good result of the work performed, with a complete practical lack of understanding of how the required result was achieved. Sometimes people have only one explanation - the favor of fate.

You can often notice that irrational thinking saves a person from destructive criticism of his own actions and actions. It brings to the fore the idea that the individual has already encountered such a problem and once again solved it with the help of acquired experience. Although the problem arose for the first time, and its solution was spontaneous and not conscious. This is explained by the fact that a person looks for answers in his subconscious on a sensitive and also intuitive level, and already in the process of solving the task he copes with it.

Cognition of reality. Concepts

Psychology considers 3 forms of rational knowledge: concept, judgment and inference. Knowing how to make rational conclusions, a person makes his life easier in many ways. People who are driven by irrationality accept the world based on intuition.

Concepts of reality can be based on logical objective judgments, but they can also be completely biased, that is, irrational. Biased mental constructs need to be worked through throughout life, otherwise they can interfere with the normal development of the individual and provoke unreasonable anxiety.

What are these beliefs?

“I have never been confident, and never will be.”
"I have something to prove."
“I have to be approved, otherwise I’m worthless.”

An irrational person is one who is accustomed to thinking irrationally and accepting sensations as an objective reality and logical arguments as something frivolous.

The vague and unclear image that people are discussing is also irrationality. We will consider this definition and the meaning in the psychology of such thinking later.

Irrational and its characteristics

If we try to explain the concept of “irrational” from the position of philosophy, then it can be characterized as a certain beginning of human nature, opposite to the property of rationality, i.e. understand this world intelligently. The irrational admits that there are areas of the worldview that the mind is not able to understand, but nevertheless they are acceptable thanks to faith, feelings, and intuition. Thus, the irrational is one of the characteristics of the special nature of reality. Over the years, issues of the irrational have been studied by such famous philosophers as Bergson, Delta, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer and many others.

So to speak, “free” individuals who do not think about the consequences can allow themselves to think irrationally. To act this way is to admit that reality cannot always be understood using scientific methods. Based on the views of supporters of irrational thinking, reality with all its components and derivatives, for example, life and psychological processes, is not subject to generally accepted laws.

Of course, such a position has its place, but in the case of critical thinking it is completely unsuitable. Irrational people strive to understand the laws of existence, violating all generally accepted laws, while rational people, on the contrary, think critically, not trusting what cannot be verified, relying only on reliable and confirmed facts. And, taking this into account, we must say that even if the irrational is characteristic of you, if you want to develop the ability to think critically, you must at least temporarily discard everything that may contradict it.

What exactly is to be discarded? Let's try to clarify this point, because irrational thoughts can be of different types.

Irrationality of claims

Irrationality in psychology is an unreasonable approach to reality in terms of expectations from other people. By assuming that other people owe us something, we set ourselves up for disappointment.

Such expectations are called irrational because they are not based on any objective agreement. You can expect something only after a mutual agreement, when two adults clearly define each other’s responsibilities and rights. They are also biased beyond what they expect from themselves.

What do rationalists think they are?

Often these are people whose activities are directly related to the thought process. The characteristics of a rational person are an open mind, an inquisitive mind, a willingness to learn new things, and a passionate desire to gain knowledge. They are skeptical about the truisms imposed by society and question any fact that has not been proven, for example, by a mathematical theorem, that is, in a way that can be repeated.

Often rationalism awakens in perfectionists, since both of them are not satisfied with a certain object, or rather its nature, in the existing picture of the world. In an attempt to restore their balance, they strive at any cost to characterize the object, which sometimes causes misunderstanding among more creative people who perceive the environment as it is, without asking questions.

The meaning of irrationality

Irrationality makes a person vulnerable, but he himself is not aware of his delusions.

The negative consequences of such thinking are manifold:

the perception of the external material world is disrupted;
no adaptability, flexibility;
motivation to act decreases;
fear of communicating with superior people develops, as well as an unreasonable fear of public reproach;
efficiency in professional activities decreases;
Anxiety and depression develop.

Note that it is generally useless to think about your emotions. Therefore, irrationality is a negative state in psychology.

Contrast with empiricism

Despite the fact that the ideas of rationalism and empiricism cannot be opposed in their primary form, supporters of these two worldview ideas often enter into confrontation regarding the methods of understanding the world. So, for example, rationalists advocate giving an object a qualitative characteristic based only on the thought process, while an empiricist must touch, try, experience it. The opposition of thought to experience is illogical, but it still occurs. Leibniz himself directly notes in his work “Monadology”:

“We are all three-quarters empiricists.”

This indicates that proponents of rationalism are often empiricists and vice versa.

Installations from childhood. List

We acquire most of our irrational attitudes in childhood. Since the child’s mind is not yet capable of critical thinking, he perceives all judgments of adults as pure truth. As an adult, every person must reconsider their views and understand which beliefs are personal and which are inspired by their parents and educators. Those attitudes that were useful in childhood and adolescence, but are harmful in adulthood, must be removed. They are also irrational. This means that every attitude that we can become aware of must be subjected to critical analysis.

Here is a list of popular beliefs that bring suffering to an individual:

should, but could not;
should have done better;
they (he) owe me;
if I fail, there will be a disaster;
I'm a failure in life;
nobody needs me.
and etc.

All these mentalities have no logical basis. They are simply useless and need to be “removed” from the mind, like virus programs from a computer.

Methods of rational thinking

These methods are based on the use of logical techniques for processing information:

Analysis is the mental division of a whole into its constituent elements, highlighting its properties, connections and other characteristics, determining its structure.
Synthesis is the reunification of several elements or parts into a single integral structure. With the help of synthesis, a person mentally connects parts in new combinations, which allows him to establish connections between them and draw conclusions about their interaction.
Comparison - establishing similarities and differences between objects or objects. With the help of comparison, a person identifies various properties of objects and objects, both qualitative and quantitative characteristics.
Generalization is the mental unification of several objects according to some of the most significant characteristics.
Abstraction (distraction) - highlighting the basic, essential properties of objects and distracting from unimportant details.

A wide variety of processes are carried out on the basis of logical ones. They are successfully used both in academic research and experiments, and in the field of simple everyday affairs.

Pre-neurotic state. The role of attitudes

The danger of irrational perception and an unreasonable way of thinking in the development of deep and long-lasting neuroses. Negative attitudes and constant anxiety lead to a pre-neurotic state. When an individual's nervous system becomes tired of incomprehensible alarm signals, it experiences functional overload. But a person cannot do anything about his condition, since he is not aware of his negative and biased attitudes.

Rationality is more useful in this regard than irrationality. In psychology, this meaning is quite serious. Helping to make the transition to rational thinking is the main task of a psychoanalyst who works with such a patient.

How to fight?

Recognizing irrationality on your own is quite difficult. If the case is advanced, then it is still worth contacting a specialist.

If you believe in your own strengths and are ready for introspection and changes in life, perform special exercises.

Keep a diary and write down all the thoughts that cause you anxiety or any other negative emotions. It will soon become clear where they come from and what causes their birth. Over time, this way a “barrier” will appear in your head that will not allow irrational ideas.
Don’t give in to panic, even if it suddenly seems like the whole world has turned against you. A colleague or close friend refused to communicate, and this became the cause of despondency. Perhaps they are just in a bad mood or tired. And everything that happens has nothing to do with your personal relationships. Always try to look at the situation from the perspective of the person nearby. Are you ready for fun when you're sad? Take the place of your counterpart. It will soon become clear that the devil is not as terrible as your consciousness painted him out to be. It’s just that my friend suddenly turned out to be out of sorts. This happens to everyone, and this is not a reason to let everyone down.
Find a middle ground. Stop going from one extreme to another. Eliminate from your vocabulary such words as “terrible”, “impossible”, “wonderful”, “best of all”, “worst of all” and so on. Try to use less categorical assessments. Give yourself and others the right to make mistakes.
Don't give up on yourself. Even if it seems that the situation is hopeless, never allow the thought that this will kill you and make life unbearable. Remember that there are more important things in life.

How to learn to think rationally?

Sometimes irrational behavior interferes with living and establishing contacts with people. Therefore, it is extremely important to learn to work with your irrational attitudes. We need to gradually replace them with rational ones and move forward.

Irrationality - what is it in psychology? Let us remember that this is a tendency to think and act biasedly. And in order to learn to act logically at the right time, in the right place, in accordance with the requirements of rationality, you will have to train.

There are 3 ways to change your way of thinking.

Before making a decision, learn to ask yourself questions: “why do I think this?”; the second question is “is this really my thought, and not something inspired by my mother (grandmother)?” To conduct such an analysis, you need to retire to a quiet place and calm your internal anxiety.
Substitution of irrational thoughts. You’ll have to develop a new habit—think critically about your fears. And when a person begins to reproach himself again, say, for low motivation, he should think: “Perhaps I demand too much from myself. Motivation cannot be high 365 days a year.
Keeping a diary in which every “strange” thought should be analyzed. It is necessary to simultaneously create thoughts that make you balanced and confident. And gradually replace negative ones with positive attitudes. This is an effective method, but takes a long time.

The problem is that it is difficult to change your thinking on your own. This requires patience, perseverance and discipline. The main thing is to be sure that the work done on yourself should bring good results.

Rational thinking: what is it?

The basis of rational consciousness is real facts for reflection and logically sound arguments for making decisions. They allow you to see things in their true light, explain incomprehensible phenomena and show the shortest path to your goal.

Traditionally, a rational way of thinking is associated with the exact sciences, but in everyday life people are forced to use it to build their career, save money for a major purchase, and plan a vacation.

Rational Personalities:

sensibly assess the surrounding reality;
set realistic goals for themselves;
respond adequately to criticism;
listen to others;
support their conclusions with specific facts;
are distinguished by prudence and pragmatism;
soberly assess the possibilities – their own and others’.

The determination to think rationally is a positive thing from the point of view of a person working on his shortcomings.

People of a different type, who do not know how and do not want to make plans for life, sometimes find it difficult to achieve their goals, because they:

do not think about the consequences;
they are late everywhere;
They do not know how to predict the course of events.

Guided by rational thoughts, a person does not commit spontaneous and rash actions and minimizes the risk of unpleasant surprises. It is this calm view of the situation that allows a person to gather himself at a critical moment, when passions and emotions are boiling around.

Kant's contribution

Supporters of Kant's ideas are probably aware that this philosopher began as a rationalist. Later, he transformed the classical idea of knowing the world through thought and experience into something unified - transcendental idealism. In his understanding, determining the nature of an object using reason and experience are complementary concepts that serve a single purpose - the search for knowledge. He created the definition of “thing in itself,” which means an object that cannot be defined and characteristics cannot be assigned to it. Moreover, such a subject should not be studied. He believed that the work of the mind begins when thought reaches the threshold of the known.