idee fixe


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idea

 [i-de´ah]
a mental impression or conception.
autochthonous idea a persistent idea, originating within the mind, usually from the unconscious, but seeming to have come from an outside source and often therefore felt to be of malevolent origin.
dominant idea one that controls or colors every action and thought.
fixed idea a persistent morbid impression or belief that cannot be changed by reason.
overvalued idea a false or exaggerated belief sustained beyond logic or reason but with less rigidity than a delusion, also often being less patently unbelievable.
idea of reference the incorrect idea that the words and actions of others refer to one's self, or the projection of the causes of one's own imaginary difficulties upon someone else.
Miller-Keane Encyclopedia and Dictionary of Medicine, Nursing, and Allied Health, Seventh Edition. © 2003 by Saunders, an imprint of Elsevier, Inc. All rights reserved.

fixed i·de·a

1. an exaggerated notion, belief, or delusion that persists, despite evidence to the contrary, and controls the mind;
2. the obstinate conviction of a psychotic person regarding the correctness of a delusion.
Synonym(s): idée fixe, overvalued idea
Farlex Partner Medical Dictionary © Farlex 2012

idee fixe

Fixed idea Psychiatry An obsessive idea, delusion, or compulsion
McGraw-Hill Concise Dictionary of Modern Medicine. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

i·dée fixe

(ē-dā' fēks)
French for fixed idea (q.v.).
[Fr. obsession]
Medical Dictionary for the Health Professions and Nursing © Farlex 2012

idée fixe

A fixed idea or obsession, often delusional, and having a marked effect on behaviour.
Collins Dictionary of Medicine © Robert M. Youngson 2004, 2005
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References in periodicals archive ?
Whereas some prominent breeders, most notably the Aga Khan, prefer to ring the changes as a matter of routine, rarely repeating a mating, Martin and Pam Wygod's policy with Tranquility Lake has been that of the idee fixe. The mare has consorted only with the world's most expensive stallion since she was taken out of training, and it is perhaps the plan to pursue that course until a filly results.
Horse Racing: After Market rewards breeders' persistence; Storm Cat produces Grade 1 winner for Wygods Pedigree analysis
Many look behind it, however, from snobbery, mischievousness, or the thrall of an idee fixe, seeking another Shakespeare than the one it presents.
Shakespeare in full
As Marina Van Zuylen's introduction reminds us, 'monomania' came from Pinel and Esquirol, his pupil, in the early nineteenth century, and from the psychiatrist Etienne-Jean Georget; it was associated with the idee fixe, and it could act as a synonym for melancholy.
Monomania: The Flight from Everyday Life in Literature and Art
Consider Columbus, who made a huge miscalculation about the dimensions of the earth but who was driven by the idee fixe, and as a result discovered America--by accident.
Leonardo's mystery: an interview with Umberto Eco
The book is a language carnival, mixing expressions like "schtup" and "idee fixe" in the same sentence.
Fabulous short stories
The perception of Africa as a corrupt continent--whether rightly or wrongly earned--has now become such an idee fixe in the rest of the world, that such a decisive gesture against such a highly-placed politician speaks volumes for the continent's determination to change this perception.
The fall of a good man
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, as the baby boom generation inserted itself into the life of the mind in Western Europe and America, it became an idee fixe that the Enlightenment had given birth to a number of the most odious characteristics of Western civilization: wanton imperialism, capitalism, ecological depredation.
New thoughts on an old idea
But Friedman remains resolutely credulous in the face of these gales of corporate spin, and in the end, his corporate triumphalism becomes an idee fixe. Everything that matters is forcibly shoehorned into his tech-driven globalized future.
Falling flat: Thomas Friedman's recycled view of globalization
When we offer a pragmatic explanation of someone's belief, presenting it as, say, a wishful thought or idee fixe, then we will have different expectations of her doxastic behavior.
Pragmatic believing and its explanation
conservatives used Israel as justification for the war, it was either because they insisted on a superficial reading of Israel's needs or because Israel served as one more pretext for a policy that had be come an idee fixe.
The Israel deal: conventional wisdom: Israel wanted the Iraq War. Reality: when America is overextended militarily, U.S. support for Israel is inevitably weakened
Among the neoconservative thinkers who hold sway in the present administration, one current idee fixe is the dream not merely of eradicating Islamic terrorism but of transforming Islam itself.
Not a prayer: then as now, American schemes to change Islam have been dangerous folly

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