<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Mighty Midget @ Jan 18 2007, 01:57 AM) [snapback]275432[/snapback]</div>
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Ok, on a serious note: I believe that "if you are right and everyone else is wrong, then you are mad" holds a great deal of truth. I think this will mostly only apply to the real nutcases, who find themselves opposing everything everyone else hold as true. Just because you disagree with everyone on one issue only, doesn't mean you're insane, but as the number of issues grow, the reasons to worry should also increase.
Let's see if this works:
"If you are always right and everyone is always wrong, then you are insane".
Leads to: "If you are not always right and everyone is not always wrong, then you are sane"
Yup, it seems fair to me.
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I would disagree with the "if you think you are always right, and believe everyone else is always wrong, then you are crazy" statement. I would say a person like that isn't so much crazy as just downright annoying. I think we all know someone who refuses to admit they could possibly be wrong about any of their opinions - it's a fairly common affliction ;P
The main reason that I disagree is because "what is right" is really a very subjective condition. What you are referring to should more appropriately be termed "social deviance" - meaning, that it is a condition in which an individual's mores and norms deviate from society's
currently accepted mores and norms.
Social norms are fairly fluid, and in fact can be extremely different from culture to culture at any given time. Religion is a pretty good example of how people of one culture can consider another culture "crazy". I won't give any examples of that, but I'm sure most could come up with a few ideas on what I mean by following that train of thought.
In addition, social norms change over time, and our viewpoints on what exactly constitutes deviance therefore also change. Today's "crazy guy" may be tomorrow's genius
Personally, I would only consider true chemical imbalances or neurological defects, and certain psychopathies and sociopathies (which are possibly chemically or neurologically linked) to be true insanity.
And the really scary thing is that the most "dangerous" types of insane people are those that you'd never even guess were crazy. I suppose having having an unattached (meaning a sort of imperical scientific observer's rather than a participating member's) perspective of "normal" social behavior makes it easier to emulate it.