Personality typing by brainscan

[OutOfTheBlue]

Oh, I misunderstood. I thought you were wondering about the later part of my comment. The fact that Jung abused women under his care as well as his daughters is pretty well documented.

Thanks, I will read up on that.

In the meantime, may I ask: is it a coincidence that you mentioned Jung after my answer to arbrk who brought the subject of Jungian therapy up?

If so, was this an oblique way of attempting to discredit his work? What's your opinion on his psychology itself?

And would you have mentioned Heidegger's brush with Nazism if we were discussing his philosophy?

Of course, if it was a coincidence (on maybe a "synchronicity"), these questions have no raison d'être.

[7Wannabe5]

Well, Jung literally abused women.

How does this relate to Gottman's lack of scientific credibility? I agree that there is likely a general positive correlation between a famous mathematician or scientist and being an asshole. However, I also think this is a bi-modal distribution.

Humans - especially intelligent humans - are exceptionally good at convincing themselves that they lack agency in areas where they have previously failed spectacularly.

Absolutely, and they are also likely to convince themselves that they possessed more agency in areas where they succeeded. For instance, I think Libertarians are probably less likely to send their mothers thoughtful cards on appropriate holidays I have noticed that I had a higher overall feeling of belief in personal agency when I spent much of my time running my own business than I do now that I spend much of my time teaching disadvantaged children.

Anyways, to the extent that I feel like I believe in agency, I do believe that humans do have a good deal of agency over their marital success, especially if success is simply defined as getting married and staying married. In fact, I even believe that third parties can exert a great deal of agency over the success of a marriage. For instance, if you were to offer me maybe $250,000 for finding a willing party to walk me down the aisle again, and maybe $10,000 for every month I managed to keep the old guy happy enough to stick with me, I would quite possibly take that deal. BUT, to the best of my knowledge, that is not a good description of the FIELD in which you, I , or any/all of my theoretical potential future husbands/soulmates* are operating

It's one thing to recognize that you have some agency/influence in a realm where you are significantly and actively invested. It's another thing to sell somebody a book or narrow program of therapy claiming to improve their odds of success, especially if it is based on shoddy math. IOW, follow the money. Another very popular book having to do with firms, as opposed to marriages, "Good to Great" promoted a similar theory, only 1 of the 16 companies that Collins chose on the basis of his Principle for Success! produced strong growth over the following decade. Unfortunately, the entire history of the field of statistics is riddled with bias, some quite unsavory, and perversely, the reason why has often been an irrational attachment to the notion of objectivity.

*Soulmate here defined to be anybody whose near constant company I would value at > $10,000/month, so third party bribing would not be necessary.

[Slevin]

Anyways, to the extent that I feel like I believe in agency, I do believe that humans do have a good deal of agency over their marital success, especially if success is simply defined as getting married and staying married. In fact, I even believe that third parties can exert a great deal of agency over the success of a marriage. For instance, if you were to offer me maybe $250,000 for finding a willing party to walk me down the aisle again, and maybe $10,000 for every month I managed to keep the old guy happy enough to stick with me, I would quite possibly take that deal. BUT, to the best of my knowledge, that is not a good description of the FIELD in which you, I , or any/all of my theoretical potential future husbands/soulmates* are operating

*Soulmate here defined to be anybody whose near constant company I would value at > $10,000/month, so third party bribing would not be necessary.

Isn't this just the description of marrying a semi-well off old guy with a pension? Which is like a pretty large pool of candidates?

[7Wannabe5]

@Slevin:

No, the power structure would be different. I suppose I should have precluded collusion between Ego and my new hubby to make that clear.

Also, I HIGHLY doubt that my current value on the market would garner me an otherwise somewhat tolerable husband willing to offer me monthly personal allowance of ten grand. I did have a certain degree of Carter Blanche in making use of credit card of much more affluent partner in my last two live-in relationships, but given my well demonstrated level of frugality, this was definitely not akin.

[jacob]

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog ... ers-briggs

Worth reading for the doubters. It also includes the backstory of how the theory came about and why most academics dismiss it. Not a pretty history, but not entirely surprising either. I've mentioned some of it here or there before.

Notes of interest:

MBTI is reliable (STEM translation: it has precision) in that 68-75% (similar numbers given elsewhere) of people will get the same result (out of 16 types) when retested a month later. If MBTI was but random astrology, that number would be 1/16=6.25%

It dawned on me that some may not realize that MBTI gives results on four percentage scales (just like OCEAN's five). If one has access to a good test rather than a 4-question Mickey Mouse app, the result will be in the form of four numbers from 0-100% and not four letters. If one's score on a given dimension is close to 50%, it's no wonder that it may oscillate around between the two letters. Obviously that doesn't mean that one is introverted, when the I/E-score was 51/49 and then extroverted a month later, when one's score is 49/51 on a different test. A little diligence would show that what appeared to be random is actually a solid signal.

Insofar one takes the time to READ both adjacent type descriptions, it's quite evident that types sharing 3 letters have quite a bit of overlap(*). Indeed, for serious students, the test is not the result and the result is not the goal. It's the starting point for reading the descriptions. Reading the descriptions makes it clear that people have different preferences. Understanding the cognitive functions and the theory tries to explain what that is. The goal is to understand oneself and others. Not everybody is interested in that---but why dunk on those who are?

(*) This is because their cognitive stacks are similar but only switched around a bit.

Given the critique, it is quite ironic that MBTI is a complete subspace of Big5/OCEAN with a similar factor structure:

Specifically

• N-S is the axis measuring people's preference for abstract thinking and applying different perspectives which correlates with (O)penmindedness.
• J-P measures whether people are planned and result-oriented or spontaneous and process-oriented and correlates with (C)onscientiousness.
• E-I is the same axis as (E)xtraversion
• T-F measures people's preference for logical objectivity or (inter)personal factors correlates somewhat with (A)greeableness.

MBTI has no dimension for (N)euroticism.

As such, if you know someone's OCEAN numbers, you can calculate their MBTI numbers and vice versa (minus the N) and get pretty close to the mark. They're basically linear transformations of each other under the usual uncertainty of the softer sciences. In other words, the academic critique is a bit like a Windows user claiming that Linux is not a real operating system because the design of the user interface is different and because it hasn't been certified by Microsoft.

The greatest misunderstanding I see is believing that one's type pigeonholes one's capability. NO! Your type describes your preference, that is, the kind of behavior that is most satisfying or natural to you when you don't have to fit in or abide social expectations. This means that you're likely most satisfied [in life] when your type and your behavior are aligned. It doesn't mean that an INTJ can't be great at sales or small talk about vacations and babies. It also doesn't mean that an ESFP can't do math or understand logic. However, the main prediction here is that they're probably unlikely to be very happy doing those activities strictly more than necessary(**). This is what PREFERENCE means. In other words, MBTI is not like an IQ test that measures how good you are at something. Rather, it measures how likely you are to actually want to behave a certain way or consider certain things from certain perspectives.

(**) Obviously talking about some who are strongly typed and not 49/50 on a given dimension. This is why it's important to know the strength of a given dimension as well.

Of course, people can be talked into all kinds of beliefs about what they should value and do or look at the world. Kegan3 is notoriously the stage where the sociocentric mind is formed and people start to lose their own identity in favor of the group's or partner's identity in order to better fit in. (This is incidentally where 56% of adults find themselves, so no wonder it's common not to really know oneself beyond the context of one's social environment.)

This confusion between who people are and who they think they should be is also what leads to unreliable testing. Especially those who don't know themselves too well may easily answer according to social expectations or habits. It's probably the rare student who is on track to med school to admit to themselves that they're maybe more spontaneous than their environment allows them to be or has told them they should be. Take such a person from one environment and put them into another environment and their answers may change because they don't yet come from the inside. However, this is also what can lead to unhappiness. People thinking there's something wrong with them because they don't enjoy studying or talking to other people or whatever it is that others seem to enjoy so much.

From an ERE(1&2) perspective, if the goal is to maximize life satisfaction, understanding personal PREFERENCE is crucial when it comes to what one should do or not do. Not everybody has the same preference so people basically need different advice and different explanations and motivations. This requires both the ability to understand that others are different (before giving them advice along the lines of "since I like this, you must like it too" or "everybody likes this, so you must like it too"), but also the ability to understand oneself (a good indication that one has a understood oneself is a stable typing percentage score). If you don't know who you really are, how can you know what you want out of life? While this question is not important for those who sign up the standard life track, it becomes very important for those who choose to diverge from it.

[Ego]

And would you have mentioned Heidegger's brush with Nazism if we were discussing his philosophy?

This Early Retirement forum has become somethings of a cult of Jungianism so it is not unreasonable to look to the man himself and ask, "How's that working out for you?"

As far as I can tell, he was a despicable human being, so it did not work well at all. The proof is in the pudding.

It is true that a tool is only as good as its user. It is also true that a tool is only as good as how it is used.

This gets to @jacob's point about MBTI vs Big5/OCEAN. My MBTI criticism is not about whether it accurately shows preferences, it is about how people use the designation after they are told they have such preferences. MBTI and Big5/OCEAN are used very differently.

If my personal fitness test revealed that my posterior chain was weak from excessively focusing on running while ignoring squats, and I then used that information as an excuse to run more and do fewer squats.... that might not be good.

That is how the MBTI "I" in particular is used here on the forum and there are plenty of recent posts to show it.

@Jacob recently modified his stance on this, as reflected by the paragraph in the post above where he discusses preferences. A good step in the right direction. The problem is, a thread like this titled "Personality typing by brainscan", implies a fixedness that is not true.

To that I say, neuroplasticity and squats!

[daylen]

We have been talking about how they are preferences for years. Or at least I remember Jacob and myself both stating this as a core assumption at least once or twice in the last 5 years.

Although, it is important to keep this highlighted or capitalized every now and then.

The brain/body is somewhere between a liquid and a solid. Partially fixed and partially fluid in any number of features. Both are simultaneously true.

[jacob]

@Ego -

It's more than a little annoying that every time people take a strong interest in something around here and a someone disapproves, they start calling it a cult in a insulting fashion. IIRC, Wheaton levels, ERE2, index investors, ... and the forum itself has been called a cult. Never by the people who are into a particular subject---always by those who didn't join the party. If the definition of a cult is used that loosely, even political parties and soccer clubs are cults. Can we not do that? A good rule for respectful behavior is not referring to others in a way that they do not refer to themselves. Also maybe avoid logic like "Von Braun is a rocket scientist. Von Braun is a Nazi. Therefore von Braun can't design a moon rocket." There's a ton of doctors, bankers, coaches, ... with awful personal habits or associations who are otherwise good at their jobs.

Now, that aside ...

OCEAN and MBTI are really different in that the former is not a theory but rather a taxonomy. Now, it could be argued whether that's a feature or a bug. The answer depends on what you intend to use it for and that might be the root of the controversy: Academics vs Practitioners.

OCEAN is a statistical analysis of "experimental results" with no explanatory power. It tells the person where they fall on 5 spectra relative to the rest of the population and people/users are then free to interpret that as they will. An analogue (for one dimension) would be a test that measures where you are on a colorwheel and tells you that you are 57% purple, but then leaves it up to you to explain what purple means. Or having your blood pressure taken and the doctor telling you that your blood pressure is in the 64% percentile while leaving it up to you to figure out what to do with that information. Thanks, doc? This is more difficult and problematic than one might think. For example, many people still don't differentiate between introversion, shyness, and social anxiety, so three people being told that they are 75% introverted could and would interpret that in three different ways. OCEAN will not help with that.

MBTI takes [most of the same OCEAN] data and attempts to explain it using Jung's original 4 cognitive functions. (Most people are probably familiar with Jungian archtypes, but these are not the functions we're talking about.) Eysenck does the same/similar but use another theoretical framework. Theory gets connected to experiment by making sense of the experiment. It goes further by explaining what the data means ... not just what the data is.

MBTI is designed so that it's theoretical structure fits rather well with how some human minds are organized which makes it easy for them to apply it in naturally without constantly looking up what those letters mean. It does require that the user is able to think theoretically; not just follow rules or google results---and this is where many casual testers fail to step up. (This also means that the MBTI structure doesn't fit well with how other minds work. Those who are not proficient in abstract frameworks will struggle with the juggle. Not surprisingly, they also tend to be the ones who complain the most about it ... or any kind of theory.)

Now with some effort using those cognitive functions it becomes possible create descriptions of behavior and preferences that a) people recognize themselves in(*) and b) recognize other's in. (This is more useful/relatable than percentile scores.) This becomes useful when one can go c) from recognition to prediction. In other words, "based on what I've seen, you're much like the typical ABCD, and knowing that you're like ABCD, I can predict a few things about you that I haven't seen".

(*) Some claim the Forer effect that people are likely to recognize themselves in anything. (This is how astrology works.) However, the 16 types are sufficiently different and specific that I challenge anyone making that claim to actually read the 16 different type descriptions first!

I'm well aware that you seek a balanced approach to everything despite any inherent preferences (or in my view, more likely because of inherent preferences. I bet most of your scores are pretty centered.) Indeed you believe these preferences can be changed with enough practice. This is where I disagree. If I enjoyed doing gymnastics, which is not normal, and my personal fitness test revealed that I was 5 feet tall (assuming I didn't already know, humor me here), I would take that as a validation of my gymnastics preference. If I ignored that information because everybody around me told me that gymnastics sucks and basketball is the only game in town... that might not be good either.

I don't think we disagree on the methods as much as the goals. You seek balance in life (basically proposing that the only sport in town is decathlon). I seek satisfaction.

To clarify, I did not change my stance, but maybe now you see the nuance? If someone has a neurological [brain chemistry] preference for something, they tend to do it and as such they tend to get better at it as practicing anything will do. HOWEVER, if they're made to practice something that their neurochemistry doesn't find rewarding---and this happens all the time with well-intended advice or cultural expectations imposing themselves---they will never be as satisfied with the experience as they could have been. Indeed, they'll likely not be as good as someone whose brain rewards their behavior. As a result, they will be more capable but also less satisfied. Consider why society had to start using conscientiousness-enhancing drugs as every child was sent to get a college education. Consider why so many drink in order to party. They're basically altering their mind in order to make fitting their square peg of a brain into the round hole of a situation more tolerable. So yeah, we can take someone who just doesn't have the mind for conscientiousness and openmindedness (NJ) and send them to school with some adderall... and as a result, we get a kid who can pass an algebra test, but we also get a kid who is unhappier for the experience.

Now, since this is not a cult, people are free to use or misuse the information here as they can and want or don't want. You do not have to use MBTI (or invest with Vanguard ) to join the forum. You don't have to pay money or perform a ritual every time you log on. You're not prevented from believing in other things to stay around. You're not prevented from leaving or required to cut ties with your family. And so on...

Indeed, I think those who are super-into XYZ try to be very helpful in explaining XYZ over and over even though it would be much appreciated if people who are not into XYZ would put in a little more effort than "How come everybody believe in XYZ. I haven't really invested much time in understanding it myself but I heard it's bogus. And look I found a few links on the wiki that confirms it." That just gets old.

And insofar anyone isn't interested in answers from anyone from the supposed cults, they can just ask them to stop---"please stop telling me to invest in index funds"---and they'll do it. On the other hand, demanding that people only answer in a particular way---"please tell me how to invest without mentioning index funds"---is too much to ask. If someone doesn't want an MBTI or WL framed answer from me I'm probably just not going to answer. Live and let live.

[guitarplayer]

[ETA: I clarified the point on validity]

I read that paper on correlations between MBTI test scores and OCEAN test scores too.

I am not sure what is the full picture of critique of MBTI with likely many factors other than 'scientific' ones coming to play and you cannot really argue with factors such as vested interest, preconceptions, biases and such.

However, in terms of 'scientific' factors the academic critique of MBTI seems to essentially be that of the measuring tool, not the theory. There are heaps and heaps of theories in psychology either (1) because the field is relatively in its early stages or (2) because it is qualitatively different from hard sciences and there will never be a unified theory of psychology. This would be due to each theory being in the eye of the beholder, using subjective narratives to explain the the mental world.

Either way, since there are lots of theories the way to verify theories and try to say which one is better than another is to build a tool to measure constructs the theories are made of. For example Freudian theory is discredited because its elements cannot be consistently measured nor can they be consistently communicated and verified between subjects.

In Psychometry which deals with statistically capturing psychological constructs, two key concepts are validity and reliability. As mentioned above they correspond to concepts of accuracy and precision in STEM.

With this said, seems to me that MBTI academic critique is that of the measuring stick and not of the theory. For example here, the author talks about
* item homogeneity - you would want questions measuring the same dimension to be moderately correlated, neither uncorrelated so that they don't follow the same trend at all nor too correlated where there can be a claim that some questions are redundant (indeed the author here makes this claim)
* test-retest reliability - is how people score the same way from one time to another. Author here uses a normative statement (correlation should be between 0.8 and 0.9 because [source] said so)
* validity - but validity of the instrument. So the critique here is something like this: when the theory suggests that an INTJ will make a good engineer, when I test a person and they score INTJ, I should see them excel in engineering. Consider that someone scores INTJ but they turn out not to excell at engineering. This might be either because INTJs don't make good engineers, or because the test does not accurately spot an INTJ. Another way of testing instrument's validity is that e.g. I-E scale in MBTI correlates strongly with I-E scale in another questionnaire. The latter is maybe the commonest way of judging validity in research papers - you say 'this should correlate with that', then check. This validity is known as construct validity, it is to do with the instrument, not the theory.

Since you cannot see psychological constructs, it often boils down to criticizing the measuring stick, unless you are really off with your questions and on some common sense level they don't reflect the things you want to measure. There were some attempts of building tools with predictive power that were devoid of any theory whatsoever, MMPI being the main example.

I think that given the correlates between MBTI and OCEA and the potential one-to-one correspondence of factors, it would be possible to take a big dataset with OCEAN scores and do a cluster analysis (this is one statistical technique) forcing 16 clusters to end up with OCEA typology similar to MBTI typology. Or do an exploratory cluster analysis to see how many clusters one ends up with (I would for sure pull this one as well even if aiming for 16 clusters, out of curiosity!). As a bonus, you would also get where your sample clusters sit on the Neuroticism scale

[Ego]

And insofar anyone isn't interested in answers from anyone from the supposed cults, they can just ask them to stop---"please stop telling me to invest in index funds"---and they'll do it. On the other hand, demanding that people only answer in a particular way---"please tell me how to invest without mentioning index funds"---is too much to ask. If someone doesn't want an MBTI or WL framed answer from me I'm probably just not going to answer. Live and let live.

You are right. I wandered into the Emergent Renaissance Ecology neighborhood and graffitied it. I should not have done that. I apologize.

[CS]

Has anyone mentioned Clifton Strengths? This comes at from the paradigm of why develop something you’ll only ever be adequate (at best), when you can develop something you are naturally good at into something spectacular. In the end I find it as useful a tool as Mbti, although in different ways.

[OutOfTheBlue]

Thank you for expressing your thoughts. I now better understand where you're coming from.

First, I'd like to say: let's be a good sport and play the ball, not the man. That tackling was off-limits. We can do better than that.

Since the genie is out of the bottle though, I've dug into what you said about Jung. Haven't found anything yet concerning his daughters. If you have any source, could you please share it here or by PM? What is well documented is that Carl Jung had polygamous ideas and several extramarital affairs, often to the knowledge and/or chagrin of his wife (including a ménage à trois involving Toni Wolff, one the most important feminine figures in his life). We also know that he had been the victim of sexual abuse himself. Regarding his patients, there's a single phrase in Yalom's book "The Gift of Therapy" [2017] describing him as being sexually abusive towards patients [in plural], but so far, the only case I've found amply discussed in the literature is that of Sabina Spielrein, which became a psychiatrist/psychoanalyst in her own right. It seems that Jung didn't provide formal therapy for Spielrein after she was discharged from the hospital, and their involvement took place when he was her former psychiatrist and current university teacher and friend. Jung did become emotionally and physically involved with her (though actual sexual penetration is disputed; one press article even speaks of "rape", but her own words seem to dement such interpretation: "it reached the point where he could no longer stand it and wanted ‘poetry’. I could not and did not want to resist, for many reasons.". Note that she had a fantasy of having Jung's child. He probed into it during their encounters and ended up getting infatuated himself). Earlier accounts (including the popular version of the story from books "A secret symmetry; Sabina Spielrein between Jung and Freud" by Aldo Carotenuto [1982] and "A Most Dangerous Method: The Story of Freud, Jung, and Sabina Spielrein" by John Kerr [1993], the latter being essentially based on the former) are reported to be inaccurate in light of later research, evidence and closer documentary inspection. I'm basing this mostly on John Launer's paper "Carl Jung's relationship with Sabina Spielrein: a reassessmenent" [2015] (he is also the author of the book "Sex versus Survival: The Life and Ideas of Sabina Spielrein" [2014]). [Note: there is a later book, published in 2017, "Sabina Spielrein: The Woman and the Myth" by Angela M. Sells, which is written from a feminist perspective and seems to offer a different, but possibly more biassed portrayal]. So it seems that this didn't happen during therapy (she wasn't his patient anymore), and it wasn't exactly a case of sexual abuse but something more nuanced. Again, if you have other patient names/cases of abuse or any other relevant info, please share. By the way, I have no intention of doing Jung's apology, just of setting the record straight.

I will continue reading Heidegger even if I know he ended up embracing Nazism and the same goes for Jung even if it turns out he did awful or despicable things. I'm mostly interested in their ideas. Do I see value in them? If so, their biographies have little impact.

Of course, everybody has blind spots, biases, even delusions. However, having read Jung's autobiography (which is more about inner life than outer facts), I think it is fair to say that, despite whatever failings, he's probably done more "soul" exploration than most and that he went a long way in integrating his shadow (disowned/repressed) elements, working towards individuation, dialoging with other than ego inhabitants of the psyche and encountering the unconscious. There's a certain intellectual honesty that forces respect.

I have some more things to write in response and more in relation to the thread, but this was time consuming, and I reserve it for while later.

[Lemur]

One only needs to look at there own temperament to understand why mental models might be useful. Despite thousands of experiences, learning things, changes of habits and behaviors, different careers/jobs, heart breaks, pure moments of joy, - the 32 year old Lemur isn't that much different then the 7 year old version. Neuroplasticity is strong but I don't believe it overcomes your genes.

[Jim]

While thumbing through my dog-eared copy of Richard WIlhelm's translation of the I Ching (in an attempt to divine the best course of action for my next critical investment strategy) I was reminded that the foreword was written by none other than Jung himself, and so I spent some time revisiting those pages.

In the brief foreword, Jung compares causality (which he associates with western thinking and the scientific method) to the coincidental "subjective" associations of the writer of the Yi Jing (which he associates with eastern philosophical thought as well as his own ideas of synchronicity). Nowhere does he condemn either system of thought, rather, he is able to find space to embrace both.

I don't generally think of the internet as a place where people are able to thoughtfully share nuanced and detailed ideas, nor spell out the inner workings of complex systems to one another in a throughout way. It's mostly porn and selfies, the illusion of social connections, and shit slinging. I feel like my own reactions to MBTI and SD have probably come across as pretty critical, although it's mostly been an effort on my part to understand these ways of categorizing personality types or cultures, and voicing my quips about them is usually met with a reasonable (and detailed) answer on this forum, furthering my understanding of the system itself, or at least why someone else chooses to adopt that system of thought. To progress, I've tried to do my homework and made an attempt to understand systems that I'm not infatuated with. If we're going to speak intelligently with one another about them we have to understand at least the basic principles of the systems in question but also have a healthy separation of our ego from our system of preference to allow room for critique and context.

There's obviously a contingent that dislikes MBTI and another that embraces it wholeheartedly. One camp seems to think it's because MBTI is bullshit/hocus pocus. The other contingent at times asserts that most "normies" are incapable of mustering the abstract theoretical thought power required to comprehend the system. Well, I like BSHP. That's why I spend my downtime reading the Yi JIng and Psychological Types!

If we can extract a heuristic from SD or WL, it should be that when we run up into an argument (or create one), we're probably doing it wrong. I've seen a few examples of this being intentionally avoided here, which puts it head and shoulders above the rest of the shithole that is the modern internet. It seems like the real issue that we, ERE2, are attempting to contend with is the intercommunication between differing, seemingly incompatible ideas and ideals. A system that gives a model for that communication (SD and WL's are such great examples) taps into this. Maybe someone can steer me right on this, but I don't see how MBTI offers what WLs and SD do in this regard. On the contrary, that system seems to be preferred only by specific personality types, and by its own admission at that. I'm not suggesting that exclusivity makes it objectively wrong, but I can empathize with people who are less attracted to a system that isn't as scalable as WLs and SD.

When a system proselytizes itself, does it fail to adhere to the aforementioned heuristic? Is anyone here asserting that any specific system of thought is the only "right" way of organizing the human mind? I hope not and don't think so. Can we find a shared language for people that prefer to systematize their worldviews and those who prefer to avoid it? That's challenging and probably requires a degree of individual effort to engage with.

If I'm too thick to understand the MBTI, WL's say that you'll need to reach me at my second-grade comprehension level to eventually get through to me and elevate me to the third grade. If I'm an uncultured savage in some forlorn corner of the world, burning effigies to a cannibalistic god, then SD has a structure for elevating me to global consciousness rather than selling me diet coke. The principle is sound, but we have to be sure that our direction is valid. Let's avoid turning the third grader into an American consumer middle-class wage slave with a grossly outsized carbon footprint, and elevating the tribal member into a chainsaw-wielding deforestation machine. That involves individual and cultural introspection, which includes evaluating and potentially extricating ourselves from the systems and habits we are entrenched in.

The culture of embracing the individual comprehension and preferences of individuals or cultures is fantastic, and I celebrate the way that some of the systems talked about on this forum advocate that. I sometimes have reservations about the way some systems categorize people and cultures, and I think some others do as well. I think there is A LOT of misunderstanding around this particular point, on both sides of the debate.

[jacob]

The other contingent at times asserts that most "normies" are incapable of mustering the abstract theoretical thought power required to comprehend the system.

I think that's maybe taking those statements a little too far. The MBTI is simple enough (see viewtopic.php?p=257070) for everybody to comprehend it, in principle.

However, the ability to comprehend something using scaffolding is easier than the ability to use it without scaffolding which again is easier than the tendency to use it spontaneously. For example, even the mentally slowest human can be walked through the solution of 2x-4=0 if nothing else than some example like (Ann and Bob needs to share 4 apples equally, how many do they each get). Whereas only some 50-70% of adults (outside the scaffolded class room) would be able to solve it without help having regressed materially since the 7th grade. Whereas only a small fraction (say 10%) would spontaneously apply algebra to their optimization problems as opposed to using some other method. Yeah, it's the "mustering" problem.

Note in each category, people would have a very different opinion of using the method of algebra.
Group 1: Aka the fish out of water-group thinks it's "overly complicated". Just eat the apple already. (unconscious incompetence)
Group 2: Fish learning to swim thinks it's "just a theory" to be used in certain places and times (in the box thinking). (conscious in/competence)
Group 3: Fish not aware of the water thinks it's the natural and only way of seeing things. It frames their entire perspective (out of the box and into a bigger box) (unconscious competence)

It's the same with the abstract 4D space that is the MBTI. The internal logic is relatively simple, but at the same time not so simple that it doesn't require some fairly deep internationalization that is mainly suited for those brains that happen to think in theoretical abstractions. (Ni and Ti dominants in MBTI-speak.) Add: Not confusing the map for the territory requires Ni. Si is notorious for believing that the map is the territory and find it very frustrating when the two doesn't match up.

For example, another frequently discussed personality model on the forum is Plotkin's developmental model of subpersonalities. While I theoretically understand that a subpersonality is kind of subconscious character and people's minds are made out of such characters battling or influencing each other, I simply don't think spontaneously of humans in terms of characters (which is unusual compared to most humans). If I said that one of my subpersonalities is "the little professor", many would have an idea of what "little professor" means and could probably make up a character around this. [This is also why many believe that understanding a person means learning their history, personal likes and dislikes ... through conversation.] I can't do that very well---I would basically have to compute it based on MBTI---and so I generally don't, because I don't spontaneously relate to others via narratives (Si) or personal bonds (Fe) but rather in terms of logically judging (Te) their ideas (Ni) and ideals (Fi). If you ask me to "tell a story to make someone feel better", I would be quickly sunk.

I think a one-size-fits-all-thinking-styles is too much to ask. However, I do think a good model should be able to explain/predict how and why some people don't like the model. And MBTI does that. The people least likely to appreciate MBTI are people-oriented (Fe) concrete (Se/Si) types.

And so does SD. For example, being a largely Yellow theory, SD represents many things that Green find highly objectionable. (Naively, there's a human tendency to reject the entire theory whenever one finds its conclusions ideologically objectionable or incompatible!) For example, according to Green, SD is colonialist in its suggestion that cultures need to go through a process to develop; it is hierarchical because some cultures (colors) are more developed than others whereas Green thinks all cultures are equally wise; and it dares to make general statements about the unique and beautiful snowflakes that every Green believes himself to be. "You don't know me!" says Green defensively ... "Yeah, but I know your type", says Yellow, thus delivering the killing insult. Thus a so-called spiral wizard (master of SD) would be wise not to bring up those aspects of SD when talking to Green.

Of course, the problem with knowing this on a public forum is that while you can avoid bringing these aspects up to people who won't appreciate them, it is impossible to avoid people who don't appreciate them from bringing them up with you.

One solution is of course is to only discuss anything in terms of the anodyne intersection that all types and cultures can appreciate. However, in practice this defaults to catering to the majority (Orange and Green FeSi types). The minority may object, but they are drowned out by the majority who set both the rules (majority dominates, because democracy is an orange and green value) and the content (people-oriented narratives). In other words, that's an Orange/Green solution.

Another solution, Yellow, is that everybody understands/appreciates that the cost of having multiple perspectives means that some will inevitably have their sensibilities offended. This is what I'm trying to do with this forum.

There would also be an orange solution in which people accept that while there are multiple perspectives, only one perspective is correct. This is common! This leads to believing that debate will settle that question. The blue solution would be that I (jacob) as the leader of the ERE religion lays down what is true as literally written in the holy ERE book ("Thou shalt..."). Or we can adopt the Red solution, which describes much of the internet, and rochambeau for it.

And so on ...

[7Wannabe5]

I would like to note that although eNTPs are known for love of debate, it is definitely not with the goal of "settling the question", like some sort of my-way-or-the-highway ESTJ I think that maybe it helps wake up my slightly groggy secondary Ti (adult masculine quadrant),AKA The Snowy Owl. Obviously, I also find both MBTI and Plotkin/Jung-like models useful, and it seems to me that they kind of meet in the form of creative works of narrative with great characterizations. For instance, when I watch a popular series, I will ask myself which MBTI type best matches various characters, and then check to see to what extent the online MBTI community agrees with me. For instance, I correctly guessed that the main goofy character in "Castle" was towards ENTP and his love interest/partner in crime solving was towards more grouchy female INTJ. I could tell he was an ENTP, because of tendency towards having to babble long string of inanity before finally coming up with something insightful. Also, tendency to superficially seem like somebody who would be useless in a crisis situation, but actually be somebody who is very good in crisis situation due to ability to quickly triage chaos.

[jacob]

Also, answers to the "commonly complained complaints" are given on the MBTI website:
https://www.myersbriggs.org/more-about- ... ssessment/

I'd also note that while 16 different types doesn't sound like a lot to those who believe that everybody is a unique and beautiful soul, it is substantially more nuanced and deeper than the most commonly held conception of "everybody fundamentally seeks the same as myself (and my friends)". For example, until I was 20 I believed that "everybody strives for logically self-consistent conclusions based on idiosyncratic presumptions". This framework was so "obvious" to me that I didn't question my presumption, so it literally never dawned on me that other humans might choose differently simply because it felt good or because it followed tradition.

[berrytwo]

I think a one-size-fits-all-thinking-styles is too much to ask. However, I do think a good model should be able to explain/predict how and why some people don't like the model. And MBTI does that. The people least likely to appreciate MBTI are people-oriented (Fe) concrete (Se/Si) types.

And so does SD. For example, being a largely Yellow theory, SD represents many things that Green find highly objectionable. (Naively, there's a human tendency to reject the entire theory whenever one finds its conclusions ideologically objectionable or incompatible!) For example, according to Green, SD is colonialist in its suggestion that cultures need to go through a process to develop; it is hierarchical because some cultures (colors) are more developed than others whereas Green thinks all cultures are equally wise; and it dares to make general statements about the unique and beautiful snowflakes that every Green believes himself to be. "You don't know me!" says Green defensively ... "Yeah, but I know your type", says Yellow, thus delivering the killing insult.

Quite interesting to reflect on as a green, Fe as the first function, person. I vibe a lot with MB and SD. It has always been pretty easy for me to translate into my Fe. ERE, on the other hand, had a much too orange carrot for me at first (which translated to me thinking it was cringe and too individualistic) until I could see the yellow and turquoise within the framework.

MB is for me, about connecting and understanding others and also a map for looking at the world. Understanding others probably looks quite different between me and an INXJ, while there are some similarities for sure. Understanding the way people operate, what they are drawn to, and what motivates them, is for lack of a better word, sweet to me. While I am sure there are some Fe MB haters, conversations have mostly gone pretty smoothly in my experience probably in part because I am already using a Fe lens.

With just about any person I meet I enjoy mentally guessing their type, however, I have found it quite fun to have a conversation with some people and ask if they are open to me guessing. It has sparked some engaging (and connective ) conversations to say the least, even with virtual strangers. There have been for sure some awkward moments though especially if they don't know what MB is or a lot of truisms if they are an SP...

TLDR: My experience: Fe= almost always down for MB if translated well. Se/Si types=often don't know their type and it has not gone very well

[jacob]

Quite interesting to reflect on as a green, Fe as the first function, person. I vibe a lot with MB and SD. It has always been pretty easy for me to translate into my Fe. ERE, on the other hand, had a much too orange carrot for me at first (which translated to me thinking it was cringe and too individualistic) until I could see the yellow and turquoise within the framework.

I'd be very interested to know any comments you might have on the "green map project" in this thread: viewtopic.php?t=12146

[guitarplayer]

@Jim mentioned 'heuristic' twice in the post above. Maybe worth mentioning that heuristic is a rather new concept in psychology parlance. When I was learning about it I envisioned heuristics as 'local psychological theories' or 'experimental theories' that (lay) people devise on the go to aid with decision making. Work more often than not, might be based on wrong premises, still are true (in the sense of being better than a flip of a coin) according to 'if x then y'.