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Musings on NT/NF disagreements

onemoretime

Dreaming the life
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Now..let's look at the F-side. What's important to us? Understanding people. It's what we specialize at. And let's face it, that means we're generally better at it than you (yes I'm being arrogant :alttongue:) Which also means that to you, MBTI is probably useful as a basis to categorize people on and deal with them, and that's it for you. We find that MBTI is very much lacking on this, as we go a lot deeper.

So, plz, I know you didn't mean to generalize as much as we might have feared initially, but reread and consider what I said before. If you are to really understand and avoid the conflict with the NF before you at any given time, you need to invest just a little bit in understanding where the individual is coming from, and make sure you do not fall for the trap of: Oh, it's an ENFP, so that's why s/he does that, I get it. It's ok to do that..but...just to be sure, before you judge it that way, check. Coz they may just pleasantly surprise you. Consider it a tip from the 'specialists' in this field. (and yes, even NFs get tempted by taking the shortcut coz they're being lazy, and yes, it does yield a way higher probable chance of misjudging)

From an admitted 'non-specialist'...

Do you see why we might need to do this sort of typing? The reasons we might resort to what you might see as gross stereotyping? That while the instrument may be extremely lacking in your estimation, it would be exceedingly helpful in ours? Much like someone who for whatever reason does not drive a car may see cars as clumsy nuisances, does that mean that automobiles are not still effective and useful for many people?

Things have to make sense for us. Notice the word "have" there. It is quite literally a psychological need for things to make sense for us. When things don't make sense, it causes psychological pain, and this is not an exaggeration. What other types experience as "frustration" our types experience as a combination of rage at not understanding, pain at the barriers put up in our minds and our seeming inability to use it as normal, and agitation at not being able to get past something that should be so simple. We see human interaction being incredibly simple for so many people. It's not so simple for us, as our ways of thinking and interaction run contrary to many people in the world. Other people frustrate us because they consistently do things other than what seems logically consistent, and then when we ask for an explanation (to establish a rationale within our minds and reconcile the situation with what we already know), people become upset and act like we're cold and uncaring.

Then we learn about something like MBTI or other typing systems. We learn that people's brains are structured as to interpret information differently through different cognitive processes, and it all starts to make sense. Suddenly, rather than seeing an action as being stupid and irrational, we see it as "oh, he's much more of an intuitive-feeling type, and consequently, it's the emphasis on (internal values/group cohesion) that's informing his decision-making, rather than hard analytical logic. That makes sense".

The problem with miscommunication comes when your assumption is that through this process, we're making value judgments about the person. This is particularly the problem with the English language (and perhaps, all languages in general), as while we NT'ers are very good at understanding shades of meaning, we find the shades of meaning more important than the shades of emotional impact. So where I would think "oh, he's being very NF right now", meaning more "he's acting in a way that is consistent in what I know to be characteristics of the NF type, and consequently these actions can be interpreted as such to maintain a logical cohesion", you may interpret it as "oh, this guy thinks I'm just a box, a type, a stereotype. He has no interest in understanding me as an individual".

Which often in reality, isn't very true. The NT type, particularly in my own understanding of it, generally has only three categorizations of people they interact with - "trusted", which includes friends, family and other respected people; "neutral", which includes unknown people and public figures (as we only understand their actions, and cannot understand them as people with such a small set of information - thus, why there's a lot of iconoclasm and little hero-worship); and "untrustworthy", which most people would qualify as enemies; however, we have a tendency to think there is an explanation for their actions beyond personal dislike (which can often be incorrect).

Once in the "trusted" category, there's very little one can do to remove themselves from it beyond out and out blatant betrayal. In most situations, you'll get the benefit of the doubt, and if we're angry at you, we'll still get over it. You're not going to descend in our estimation - at worst, we'll be annoyed with you for a little while. That doesn't mean we don't like you, or like you less than we did before.

So if we make an observation about you, please, please do not interpret it as indicating that we think any less of you, or are dehumanizing you, or trying to fit you into some sort of a box. We're just trying to make sense of actions whose rationale does not seem immediately apparent. We want to know you better, understand who you are, and understand what motivates you.

I understand that this can be somewhat uncomfortable, because we're not inclined to settle for the surface explanation. Just keep in mind that we're not judging, we're learning.

Too often the point is made that we're the ones in the wrong, and we need to change our actions. I do not disagree that we need to be more conscientious of how our words impact people; hell, everyone could use that lesson. That being said, please do not make the assumption that we intend any sort of ill-will in the things that we say. As painful as insensitivity can be to you, so is frustration for us. A little tolerance and understanding can help everyone in this position.
 

OrangeAppled

Sugar Hiccup
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NTs often insist that they have a handle on what logic is operating behind the NF's behavior.

This is very true. :yes:

I will hold a belief or value, and I have had NTs try and tell me why this is supposedly illogical, assuming they know my reasons. If they actually allow me to explain my reasoning in full, without interjecting with their preconceived notions, then 9 times out of 10 they see they were wrong in their assumptions, and they just say "oh".
 

Amargith

Hotel California
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From an admitted 'non-specialist'...

Do you see why we might need to do this sort of typing? The reasons we might resort to what you might see as gross stereotyping? That while the instrument may be extremely lacking in your estimation, it would be exceedingly helpful in ours? Much like someone who for whatever reason does not drive a car may see cars as clumsy nuisances, does that mean that automobiles are not still effective and useful for many people?

Things have to make sense for us. Notice the word "have" there. It is quite literally a psychological need for things to make sense for us. When things don't make sense, it causes psychological pain, and this is not an exaggeration. What other types experience as "frustration" our types experience as a combination of rage at not understanding, pain at the barriers put up in our minds and our seeming inability to use it as normal, and agitation at not being able to get past something that should be so simple. We see human interaction being incredibly simple for so many people. It's not so simple for us, as our ways of thinking and interaction run contrary to many people in the world. Other people frustrate us because they consistently do things other than what seems logically consistent, and then when we ask for an explanation (to establish a rationale within our minds and reconcile the situation with what we already know), people become upset and act like we're cold and uncaring.

Then we learn about something like MBTI or other typing systems. We learn that people's brains are structured as to interpret information differently through different cognitive processes, and it all starts to make sense. Suddenly, rather than seeing an action as being stupid and irrational, we see it as "oh, he's much more of an intuitive-feeling type, and consequently, it's the emphasis on (internal values/group cohesion) that's informing his decision-making, rather than hard analytical logic. That makes sense".

The problem with miscommunication comes when your assumption is that through this process, we're making value judgments about the person. This is particularly the problem with the English language (and perhaps, all languages in general), as while we NT'ers are very good at understanding shades of meaning, we find the shades of meaning more important than the shades of emotional impact. So where I would think "oh, he's being very NF right now", meaning more "he's acting in a way that is consistent in what I know to be characteristics of the NF type, and consequently these actions can be interpreted as such to maintain a logical cohesion", you may interpret it as "oh, this guy thinks I'm just a box, a type, a stereotype. He has no interest in understanding me as an individual".

Which often in reality, isn't very true. The NT type, particularly in my own understanding of it, generally has only three categorizations of people they interact with - "trusted", which includes friends, family and other respected people; "neutral", which includes unknown people and public figures (as we only understand their actions, and cannot understand them as people with such a small set of information - thus, why there's a lot of iconoclasm and little hero-worship); and "untrustworthy", which most people would qualify as enemies; however, we have a tendency to think there is an explanation for their actions beyond personal dislike (which can often be incorrect).

Once in the "trusted" category, there's very little one can do to remove themselves from it beyond out and out blatant betrayal. In most situations, you'll get the benefit of the doubt, and if we're angry at you, we'll still get over it. You're not going to descend in our estimation - at worst, we'll be annoyed with you for a little while. That doesn't mean we don't like you, or like you less than we did before.

So if we make an observation about you, please, please do not interpret it as indicating that we think any less of you, or are dehumanizing you, or trying to fit you into some sort of a box. We're just trying to make sense of actions whose rationale does not seem immediately apparent. We want to know you better, understand who you are, and understand what motivates you.

I understand that this can be somewhat uncomfortable, because we're not inclined to settle for the surface explanation. Just keep in mind that we're not judging, we're learning.

Too often the point is made that we're the ones in the wrong, and we need to change our actions. I do not disagree that we need to be more conscientious of how our words impact people; hell, everyone could use that lesson. That being said, please do not make the assumption that we intend any sort of ill-will in the things that we say. As painful as insensitivity can be to you, so is frustration for us. A little tolerance and understanding can help everyone in this position.


Thank you for the insights you provided :)

First off, I want to start by saying that I do in fact understand why you use MBTI..or at least, I did, though now I have a more detailed understanding. I get that it is a very handy way to be able to make sense of people and god knows that I too am very happy to make use of it. So I don't blame you for doing this, that would be kinda hypocritical :D

Also, I'm not saying that you're going about it wrongly or you should change or whatever. What I posted was meant as a way of understanding NFs better and tips in how to handle it and refine your understanding of us. Clearly, this needs to be a two-way street, which is also the reason I'm here, discussing this. So the only suggestion I made was, use MBTI as a base, but also trust what you've learned about this particular person to refine your insights. For instance, if they are a Fi-user, take note of what his/her corevalues are, not just that they have them. And if they for instance are very much against lying and manipulating, chances are that if he/she appears to be doing so, they aren't OR they aren't aware of the fact that they are. And this in itself can then influence how you formulate your questions in your effort to make sense of their behavior. Instead of saying: I think you're lying for this and this and this reason (which is bound to get you yelled at), you could go: "So how this this and this (insert logical inaccuracy) make sense then? Or "Is it possible that there's somethign you're missing in this?" And actually refrain from concluding anything until you've heard what they said.

Again, I'll say that we should do the same when it comes to your feelings and intuiting them. It's...tempting, especially when you recognize a certain process in someone that you've seen several times before to call them on it, but unfortunately it does nothing but create hostility and misunderstanding.

I understand that frustration is your main emotion in these cases and frustration can indeed be incredibly painful. Unfortunately, that frustration shows through which we pick up on, and the pain from your words combined with the clear indication that you are sooo frustrated with us can truly make us feel demonized and misunderstood. And at that point we can indeed lash out and intuit your feelings and seek more than there is. We tend to reinterpret the frustration and find reasons as to why you are that frustrated with us, instead of just realizing it's because you're not getting anywhere with us. I'll fully own up and say we should keep that in check.

However, if you have someone like that in front of you, telling them that you are in fact not feeling anything and no emotion is influencing you is about the worst thing you can do, as it will make them paranoid and think you are either lying or in serious denial. Just fess up to the frustration and tell them where it comes from. Chances are the conflict will deflate. Again, I'm not saying that this should be your job, but let's be real. You're going to meet other people that havne't taken part in this journey and thread and will do this to you. At least you'll know how to not let it escalate then.

Plz keep going on how this looks from the other side as it does allow for a better understanding, and feel free to give some tips on how to handle your own 'species' on this when stuck in the middle. For instance, how on earth do I explain them why secondguessing our integrity will get you a raging bull on your hands? And how do I explain them that you might not see this as judging..but it very much feels that way. I can tell you now that it is virtually impossible to ignore the pain that comes from those judgements, or what you called 'learning'. I'm guessing it's comparable to the pain you guys feel when we tell you that we know you better than you know yourself and dismiss your input. And unfortunately, the only way to avoid the pain you're causing by trying to 'learn' that way, is to in fact intuit where these judgements are coming from and reacting in kind. Which doesn't help. I'm betting the same applies to you guys when we start with intuiting emotions and you guys respond in kind by trying to make sense of our reaction.

Nice talking to you :)
 

Salomé

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Hasn't this topic been done to death already...?
 

simulatedworld

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This is very true. :yes:

I will hold a belief or value, and I have had NTs try and tell me why this is supposedly illogical, assuming they know my reasons. If they actually allow me to explain my reasoning in full, without interjecting with their preconceived notions, then 9 times out of 10 they see they were wrong in their assumptions, and they just say "oh".

Isn't it neat how they actually do back off once you've explained though?



Hasn't this topic been done to death already...?

Apparently not enough because we still don't understand each other.

Thank you for the insights you provided :)

First off, I want to start by saying that I do in fact understand why you use MBTI..or at least, I did, though now I have a more detailed understanding. I get that it is a very handy way to be able to make sense of people and god knows that I too am very happy to make use of it. So I don't blame you for doing this, that would be kinda hypocritical :D

I know your post was to onemoretime but I think in pretty much the same way he does so I've got some relevant responses. Yeah, as much as NTs would have you believe that they have a perfect understanding of everything, we use impersonal analysis not because we fully grasp Fi language and consciously decide not to use it, but rather because we can't understand you without generalized, impersonal analysis. It's the only thing that even makes the sense the way our brains are wired.

Also, I'm not saying that you're going about it wrongly or you should change or whatever. What I posted was meant as a way of understanding NFs better and tips in how to handle it and refine your understanding of us. Clearly, this needs to be a two-way street, which is also the reason I'm here, discussing this. So the only suggestion I made was, use MBTI as a base, but also trust what you've learned about this particular person to refine your insights. For instance, if they are a Fi-user, take note of what his/her corevalues are, not just that they have them. And if they for instance are very much against lying and manipulating, chances are that if he/she appears to be doing so, they aren't OR they aren't aware of the fact that they are. And this in itself can then influence how you formulate your questions in your effort to make sense of their behavior. Instead of saying: I think you're lying for this and this and this reason (which is bound to get you yelled at), you could go: "So how this this and this (insert logical inaccuracy) make sense then? Or "Is it possible that there's somethign you're missing in this?" And actually refrain from concluding anything until you've heard what they said.

Yeah, we do that too. We just don't tend to discuss specific case studies as often because we don't know a lot of the same people in real life, since we're all just talking to each other on a message board. We find it much more useful to use generalized, impersonal analysis in order to accurately predict how people will behave.

In this way, NTs use long term statistics and the resultant "profiles" in order to use behavioral prediction to emulate Feeling functions until they become natural enough that we start to truly experience and understand them firsthand. It's tough though.

We do the same thing to emulate S abilities--for instance, in poker, S players actually have a better read on the person and all the Se-types body language and physical environment cues, so they can hone in better and read you for a specific hand.

As Ns we aren't really capable of that level of environmental awareness of present-moment precision, so we compensate for it by using long term, generalized, impersonal statistics to create profiles and predict behavior in order to emulate the reading skills that Sensing players use naturally.

Again, I'll say that we should do the same when it comes to your feelings and intuiting them. It's...tempting, especially when you recognize a certain process in someone that you've seen several times before to call them on it, but unfortunately it does nothing but create hostility and misunderstanding.

Once either of us gets upset we both just starting savagely holding the other to whatever ridiculous internal Ji standards that they clearly won't hold up to, and it's pretty counterproductive.

I understand that frustration is your main emotion in these cases and frustration can indeed be incredibly painful. Unfortunately, that frustration shows through which we pick up on, and the pain from your words combined with the clear indication that you are sooo frustrated with us can truly make us feel demonized and misunderstood. And at that point we can indeed lash out and intuit your feelings and seek more than there is. We tend to reinterpret the frustration and find reasons as to why you are that frustrated with us, instead of just realizing it's because you're not getting anywhere with us. I'll fully own up and say we should keep that in check.

Frustration with logical inconsistency is usually the closest Ti comes to actually getting upset, in all honesty...but if you poke us with repeated accusations of knowing how we're feeling better than we do, sometimes Fi will take over and we actually will get upset, which didn't need to happen in the first place.

However, if you have someone like that in front of you, telling them that you are in fact not feeling anything and no emotion is influencing you is about the worst thing you can do, as it will make them paranoid and think you are either lying or in serious denial. Just fess up to the frustration and tell them where it comes from. Chances are the conflict will deflate. Again, I'm not saying that this should be your job, but let's be real. You're going to meet other people that havne't taken part in this journey and thread and will do this to you. At least you'll know how to not let it escalate then.

We don't claim to be feeling absolutely no emotion, usually; since we're hardly even considering emotional implications at all in most cases, we're mainly get annoyed at what we perceive to be you derailing a productive conversation about something interesting and wandering into ethics critiques again, and then we get frustrated because we're largely uninterested in that and we want to get back to brainstorming with your Ne, not self-critiquing our social graces with your Fi. We largely just don't care about that stuff, the same way you don't really care about excessive impersonal analysis to the exclusion of personal empathy.

We're not choosing to exclude Feeling language; we're just far more fluent in Thinking language and so it's much easier for us to use.

Plz keep going on how this looks from the other side as it does allow for a better understanding, and feel free to give some tips on how to handle your own 'species' on this when stuck in the middle. For instance, how on earth do I explain them why secondguessing our integrity will get you a raging bull on your hands? And how do I explain them that you might not see this as judging..but it very much feels that way. I can tell you now that it is virtually impossible to ignore the pain that comes from those judgements, or what you called 'learning'. I'm guessing it's comparable to the pain you guys feel when we tell you that we know you better than you know yourself and dismiss your input. And unfortunately, the only way to avoid the pain you're causing by trying to 'learn' that way, is to in fact intuit where these judgements are coming from and reacting in kind. Which doesn't help. I'm betting the same applies to you guys when we start with intuiting emotions and you guys respond in kind by trying to make sense of our reaction.

Nice talking to you :)

We don't generally second-guess your integrity unless we feel like you may be lying to us when we want an honest opinion, just for the sake of sparing our feelings. We do appreciate the intent behind this but we still don't respond well to it very often. If we ask you to be totally honest, be totally honest and a lot more problems will be averted.

We see you as more likely to lie to save our feelings than other types because, well, you do it more often than other types. It's just in your wiring. We can't help but think you might be doing it sometimes, and when we ask for honest feedback we are trying to form an impersonal Ti picture of the objective quality of whatever it is we're evaluating--we must quantify things to understand them, and your personal evaluation ("I'd better tell him it's good so that he doesn't feel discouraged and give up!") just doesn't serve our goals in any meaningful way.

EDIT: If you truly don't ever do this, I apologize for any implication that you might...but it does seem to be associated with NFPs more often than any other group...from an NT standpoint, anyway.
 

onemoretime

Dreaming the life
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Jun 29, 2009
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Thank you for the insights you provided :)

First off, I want to start by saying that I do in fact understand why you use MBTI..or at least, I did, though now I have a more detailed understanding. I get that it is a very handy way to be able to make sense of people and god knows that I too am very happy to make use of it. So I don't blame you for doing this, that would be kinda hypocritical :D

Also, I'm not saying that you're going about it wrongly or you should change or whatever. What I posted was meant as a way of understanding NFs better and tips in how to handle it and refine your understanding of us. Clearly, this needs to be a two-way street, which is also the reason I'm here, discussing this. So the only suggestion I made was, use MBTI as a base, but also trust what you've learned about this particular person to refine your insights. For instance, if they are a Fi-user, take note of what his/her corevalues are, not just that they have them. And if they for instance are very much against lying and manipulating, chances are that if he/she appears to be doing so, they aren't OR they aren't aware of the fact that they are. And this in itself can then influence how you formulate your questions in your effort to make sense of their behavior. Instead of saying: I think you're lying for this and this and this reason (which is bound to get you yelled at), you could go: "So how this this and this (insert logical inaccuracy) make sense then? Or "Is it possible that there's somethign you're missing in this?" And actually refrain from concluding anything until you've heard what they said.

Again, I'll say that we should do the same when it comes to your feelings and intuiting them. It's...tempting, especially when you recognize a certain process in someone that you've seen several times before to call them on it, but unfortunately it does nothing but create hostility and misunderstanding.

I understand that frustration is your main emotion in these cases and frustration can indeed be incredibly painful. Unfortunately, that frustration shows through which we pick up on, and the pain from your words combined with the clear indication that you are sooo frustrated with us can truly make us feel demonized and misunderstood. And at that point we can indeed lash out and intuit your feelings and seek more than there is. We tend to reinterpret the frustration and find reasons as to why you are that frustrated with us, instead of just realizing it's because you're not getting anywhere with us. I'll fully own up and say we should keep that in check.

However, if you have someone like that in front of you, telling them that you are in fact not feeling anything and no emotion is influencing you is about the worst thing you can do, as it will make them paranoid and think you are either lying or in serious denial. Just fess up to the frustration and tell them where it comes from. Chances are the conflict will deflate. Again, I'm not saying that this should be your job, but let's be real. You're going to meet other people that havne't taken part in this journey and thread and will do this to you. At least you'll know how to not let it escalate then.

Plz keep going on how this looks from the other side as it does allow for a better understanding, and feel free to give some tips on how to handle your own 'species' on this when stuck in the middle. For instance, how on earth do I explain them why secondguessing our integrity will get you a raging bull on your hands? And how do I explain them that you might not see this as judging..but it very much feels that way. I can tell you now that it is virtually impossible to ignore the pain that comes from those judgements, or what you called 'learning'. I'm guessing it's comparable to the pain you guys feel when we tell you that we know you better than you know yourself and dismiss your input. And unfortunately, the only way to avoid the pain you're causing by trying to 'learn' that way, is to in fact intuit where these judgements are coming from and reacting in kind. Which doesn't help. I'm betting the same applies to you guys when we start with intuiting emotions and you guys respond in kind by trying to make sense of our reaction.

Nice talking to you :)

There's a lot to work with here, and I only have a limited amount of time, but I'll make a decent stab at it.

One of the problems with having our particular mindset is that after a while, if whatever F function is underdeveloped, people are seen as a collection of characteristics, rather than a holistic concept. This has to do with our adeptness at analytical thinking - breaking things down into their component parts and understanding how those parts interact with each other. Core values are another thing that is relatively unfamiliar, especially if you're a tert Fe such as myself. In my mindset, there are no core truths; everything's negotiable... but there have to be rules in place so everyone can trust each other. So where you're thinking "why would he accuse me of lying, everyone knows that I don't lie, and it's offensive that he would even think I'm capable of such a thing", we're thinking "it's perfectly understandable that she would lie in this situation, even though I know she's not a liar. I just want her to realize that I'm on the same page. Remember, it's a complete lack of judgment - we're observers, not dictators (well, everyone but the ENTJs, but they can't help it).

Pointing out logical inconsistencies is a dangerous game as well, as that constitutes the most devastating form of humiliation in our regard. Whereas you'd be thinking "oh, I guess he's right, hah", our interpretation is more "that prick, making me look like a complete ass right there. Yeah, I know it wasn't worked out that well, but I was doing it on the fly, and would get around to figuring it out later. Still, how dare that asshole make me look like an idiot". We're not going to use this manner of speaking forthrightly because it seems like going on the attack.

Also, using the intuition on our feelings often isn't a case of you being wrong, but it's just as intrusive as our dissection of how you were thinking. Our emotions are our own, and it takes a long time for most of us to truly get a hold of what they are and how they're interpreted. So for an NF to go "I know what you're feeling right now, maybe better than you do", it's not a case of "look how smart you are, jerk", it's more a case of "you do not belong in here. You are not allowed in here. Stop trying to barge in, or I will respond with force."

In regard to frustration - I understand your point, and I think it's a good one. However, I still think you underestimate the effect of frustration on an NT brain - whereas the perception is that most other emotions are experienced shallowly, I can promise you that frustration is much more profound than you might realize, for us. Imagine a metal spike jammed into your brain, along with a rage and primal need to not just complete the task as before, but undergo a shift to where the goal is now either destruction of the frustrating stimulus, or removal of self from the stimulus's impact area. Thus why even stressed out introvert NTs retreat, when the common wisdom is that they should start acting out.

When this comes to people, it usually means laying waste to their mood, or throwing a fist to the faces. That is simply to get them to leave and not bother us anymore, so we have some time to let the frustration subside and collect our wits again. Obviously, this can be a very self-destructive procedure, but then again, you don't know how much of a blow that being frustrated causes.

I'm going to be very plain in my speech here. When we say "I'm not feeling anything", even if its obvious that we are, that means "it's not your fucking business". Apologies for the vulgarity. Honestly, don't push any further. While you may think this counterproductive, you have to understand, like I mentioned earlier, you're trying to push into areas of the psyche that are ours, and ours alone. Very few people get into those areas. If you're one of those, we'll let you know what's going on. If not, stay out. Those of us with Fe will find this to be easier to circumvent as time goes on, but there still is a twinge of it. Still, it's much easier for you, and will spare us much anguish, if you just stay out of things that are just not your business.

Re: integrity. Just tell them that questioning your integrity is like if you told them that the thought they just offered was the most worthless thing you had ever heard. They'll get the message. The whole judging thing is all on you, unfortunately. We're not going to pull punches when we deem it necessary, because that would be acting in bad faith, by our estimation. Still, when this situation comes around, if you say something like "so-and-so, you know me. You know that's not me. You know there's another, better explanation somewhere, I just need you to believe me on that." Offer a choice, either you can believe me, or you can believe what you want. If you don't believe me, then I guess you don't know me as well as I thought you did. If you say that plainly and forthrightly, we'll get the message. It's not honest expression of deep feelings that bothers us, it's when the reactions are histrionics. Not only that, but we've learned something in the process - "so-and-so is not that way. I have no reason to think that they would act that way in the future"

And once again, because this really must be emphasized, when the reaction is "ok, I know you must feel X emotion", and the answer is something like "who the fuck said that I feel like that? Did I say that I feel like that?", just remember, that's not denigrating you for your intuitive emotional skills, that's saying "you are not allowed in here, get out". We don't even care that you're not taking our input into account, because it's fully defense mode at that point. You're trespassing on territory you don't belong in, and we don't care how you got there, because you're invading the privacy of our internal cognition. You see what I'm saying?

Finally, to repeat - making "judgments" is A. rarely genuinely judgmental (it's not our style, hard judgments preclude further learning) B. not intended with any malice (it's hard for us to be malicious, while being vengeful is easy - if you do think it's intended with negative impact, make sure you didn't do something to piss us off) and C. generally conceptual (so and so is being dishonest because it would make sense in this situation).

While I know those aren't necessarily the answers you want to hear, I will say this - NTers all need to develop their F functions in order to successfully operate in the world. It's much easier to learn things and understand people when you realize that things that offend you do the same to others, even when it comes out of your own mouth.
 

Amargith

Hotel California
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Isn't it neat how they actually do back off once you've explained though?

If they give you the chance to explain and don't misunderstand you, it's awesome :)

I know your post was to onemoretime but I think in pretty much the same way he does so I've got some relevant responses. Yeah, as much as NTs would have you believe that they have a perfect understanding of everything, we use impersonal analysis not because we fully grasp Fi language and consciously decide not to use it, but rather because we can't understand you without generalized, impersonal analysis. It's the only thing that even makes the sense the way our brains are wired.

Yeah, we do that too. We just don't tend to discuss specific case studies as often because we don't know a lot of the same people in real life, since we're all just talking to each other on a message board. We find it much more useful to use generalized, impersonal analysis in order to accurately predict how people will behave.

In this way, NTs use long term statistics and the resultant "profiles" in order to use behavioral prediction to emulate Feeling functions until they become natural enough that we start to truly experience and understand them firsthand. It's tough though.

We do the same thing to emulate S abilities--for instance, in poker, S players actually have a better read on the person and all the Se-types body language and physical environment cues, so they can hone in better and read you for a specific hand.

As Ns we aren't really capable of that level of environmental awareness of present-moment precision, so we compensate for it by using long term, generalized, impersonal statistics to create profiles and predict behavior in order to emulate the reading skills that Sensing players use naturally.

I understand, and I see the benefit. Can you see the disadvantages of doing this though? And are you able to learn in which situations you should anticipate and compensate for its shortcomings?



We don't claim to be feeling absolutely no emotion, usually; since we're hardly even considering emotional implications at all in most cases, we're mainly get annoyed at what we perceive to be you derailing a productive conversation about something interesting and wandering into ethics critiques again, and then we get frustrated because we're largely uninterested in that and we want to get back to brainstorming with your Ne, not self-critiquing our social graces with your Fi. We largely just don't care about that stuff, the same way you don't really care about excessive impersonal analysis to the exclusion of personal empathy.

We're not choosing to exclude Feeling language; we're just far more fluent in Thinking language and so it's much easier for us to use.

So maybe it's possible to mix and match? I mean, if we are to both enjoy the conversation, you should be a bit flexible and willing to discuss the personal empathy and values in it, and we should be willing to give you the information and facts you seek? I doubt that a Ne-dom cannot keep two conversations at once going. And at the same time, it would indeed pay to keep in mind that the other isn't fluent in your native language, and therefore patience is in order, instead of pressing for what you want to know as it has proven more than once counterproductive :)



We don't generally second-guess your integrity unless we feel like you may be lying to us when we want an honest opinion, just for the sake of sparing our feelings. We do appreciate the intent behind this but we still don't respond well to it very often. If we ask you to be totally honest, be totally honest and a lot more problems will be averted.

We see you as more likely to lie to save our feelings than other types because, well, you do it more often than other types. It's just in your wiring. We can't help but think you might be doing it sometimes, and when we ask for honest feedback we are trying to form an impersonal Ti picture of the objective quality of whatever it is we're evaluating--we must quantify things to understand them, and your personal evaluation ("I'd better tell him it's good so that he doesn't feel discouraged and give up!") just doesn't serve our goals in any meaningful way.

EDIT: If you truly don't ever do this, I apologize for any implication that you might...but it does seem to be associated with NFPs more often than any other group...from an NT standpoint, anyway.

Honestly, the more you pressure and scare me, the more likely I am to use a lie of omission. I personally have physical trouble lying. You can tell instantly. And it bites me in the ass more than you think.

I'll grant you that we're good at accentuating the silver lining in any situation. But personally, I consider that a good thing. If you do doubt my sincerity..don't fess up to it, at least not like that. Tell me to feel free to be completely candid with you, and tell me you won't judge me for anythign I might wanna add to whatever it was I said before. And then make sure you don't, no matter the answer. Give us space, don't hound us for info at that point.

It's not that we don't give you a straight answer (at least in my case). It's just that you sense that there is more to that answer, that you can get more detailed information. But that means earning our trust and once earned, not breaking it. And often, you guys just don't have the patience for that and force it out of us, causing us to a) formulate it incredibly badly if you do succeed to drag it out of us and therefore giving you every opportunity to just rip our most personal thoughts apart, b) distrust you after a) occurs and resenting you anyways for forcing it out of us in the first place. Realize that if it is on a sensitive topic, you will get to see a part of our soul, of our inner core. Of our Fi. Often, an unprotected part. One that if not treated with care, is incredibly easily scarred. You barging in like an elephant in a china cabinet is not exactly what we had in mind, nor something we will take kindly to.

Don't force it out of us. Earn it, or let go, if it's not worth the hassle. And don't accuse me of lying. I gave you a straight answer, though wrapped in a lot of bows and wrapping paper. If you want more, earn it. I have no problem being completely frank with you, if you prove worthy of my trust. And if you won't bother, tough. I don't owe you anything at that point. Not even to stop your head from exploding, going over and over a problem and you think I might have the answer. I'm not a thing, I'm a person. No offense ;)
 

Blank

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The problem with miscommunication comes when your assumption is that through this process, we're making value judgments about the person. This is particularly the problem with the English language (and perhaps, all languages in general), as while we NT'ers are very good at understanding shades of meaning, we find the shades of meaning more important than the shades of emotional impact. So where I would think "oh, he's being very NF right now", meaning more "he's acting in a way that is consistent in what I know to be characteristics of the NF type, and consequently these actions can be interpreted as such to maintain a logical cohesion", you may interpret it as "oh, this guy thinks I'm just a box, a type, a stereotype. He has no interest in understanding me as an individual".

Very eye-opening. I interpreted the first meaning and couldn't conceive of there being any other interpretations until I read the whole paragraph.
 

Wild horses

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In my experience disagreements between NTs and NFs usually arise from some sort of communication problems or misunderstanding. The NF usually looks for emotional motives in most things and will then take offense accordingly where as the NT usually tries to rationalise things and draws a blank when the NFs behaviour makes no rational sense... the two get together the NT argues in terms of logic and the NF argues in terms of emotions hence they are arguing in different languages and both end up with ess clarity than when they started!

On saying this I usually get on with NT amazingly well and I adore most of the ones in my life! :blush:
 
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