Some rambles that I sent to a friend about S3 ep7 of House MD.
He wants people to listen to him (does that mean he wants power?). He had an idol experience/Eureka experience where it basically sums down to: it doesn't matter what you do, what you act like, how you dress, people will listen to you when you are right (as a doctor). Therefore, it explains why he doesn't feel the need to fit in, to play nice with other people. And instead chooses to be uncaring and rude to everyone.
But he isn't emotionless. He does feel some sympathy or empathy, as shown in causing the love of his life to leave him because the lohl was cheating on her husband. He saw himself in the husband, felt some sort of empathy towards him.
I may be projecting here, but it seems like he is thinking of being a doctor as a conditional thing. I am right = it is okay to be a bad person. And so he continues on to be rude even when his actions are shown to have consequences, that affects not just him but people he cares about.
Does this mean he is a bad person? If what he is doing saves lifes, does it make up for the hurt that he still causes.
Trust is a stable theme of the show. House is shown to not trust what anybody says, most particularly the patients. Perhaps that is why he is good at reading body language and other gestures, shown in the charity poker tournament (also made to show that House is smart). The one time we see his trust getting broken is when the leg thing happened. He was in so much pain that he wanted to be put in a coma. what house didn't expect was that this vulnerability would cost him his leg. His partner agreed to a surgery that House was vehemently against when he was awake, because she was scared he would die. Because of her judgement, he became a cripple. This reinforced the idea of "I can't trust anybody, even people I am close to".
When House was shot though, he had hallucinations where his leg got better because of Cuddy's decision to put House in a ketamine induced coma. House didn't ask for the ketamine, he didn't consent to the possibility of his leg getting better. He didn't have control over the situation. But the situation was good, his leg got better, he was able to walk without pain again. So when he wakes up for a brief moment, he asked to be put in a ketamine coma by Cuddy. I think that he was gaining control of that situation. Instead of trusting Cuddy to do the ketamine (because we don't even know if she knows about the ketamine thing), he gains control of the situation and asks for it himself, making the vulnerable coma less vulnerable.
House needed the history from the coma guy, who made a deal with House that for every question House asks, the coma guy can ask one thing about House. The big question coma guy asks is why House chose to become a doctor. House tries to deflect it at first, and lie, but with coma guy's prodding and House's need to be correct, he gives the real (that we know of) truth. House is reluctant to be vulnerable, he can rationalise that coma guy will go back into a coma in a few days so it was okay to tell him. But who else was in the room to hear him? Wilson. Wilson who has always been there for House. Who had sacrificed his job for house. Who had lied to the police for House. And House doesn't want to lose this friendship, no matter how much he tries to sabotage it. I think House trusts him in some extent, to be able to be vulnerable and talk about a turning point in his life.
The other big question House answers, this time willingly to only the coma guy is what would House have wanted to hear from his father. House says "You were right. You did the right thing". House wants reassurance. He acts infallible, that he is always right, but he still questions himself on whether his judgement is correct. Maybe that is why Cuddy and Wilson lying about House being right about the cortisol patient affected House so much. House has always been right, reinforcing the idea that House has been doing the right thing. So when he thinks he was wrong, he crashed so hard after being so high in the sky.