Baffled by Fi

[onemoretime]

I agree, but my contention was that ISPs don't suddenly gain Ni like it was a superpower, it doesn't need to be "awakened" - it's something to grow out of, because the influence it has on ISPs can be too selfish and negative. I'm not sure the Neo character really illustrates that development.

Ni also doesn't allow you to manipulate a computer system you're neurally locked into. In other words, it's still just a movie.

 

[SolitaryWalker]

I've made no such assumption. You chose one shade of meaning for the word "value" out of many and decided arbitrarily that that's the one I intended. It's not..

I chose this specific definition of "value" as a represenation for what you meant on the basis below.

So "using Ti", for instance, means holding the worldview that logic should be derived from an internal standard of innately consistent natural reason, and that logic exists and maintains its consistency independently of any external variables..

You clearly used the word 'worldview' which in all appropriate cases of the word's usage refers to an ideology or one's perspective regarding life and the world as a whole which is by definition underpinned by moral values that the holders of this worldview are aware of. Fascism, communism, or even Ti-ism is the folk typological sense are examples of a worldview. In the case of the first two worldviews, its clear that their adherents rely on clearly defined moral principles that maintain and expand their vision of the world. The same could be said about the third case, many MBTI enthusiasts see typology as a personality system where people belongning to a certain type endorse a clear set of values that are not shared by people of other types.

We all have these biases and we all have varying degrees of awareness of them--Jung did a lot of work on identifying the unconscious value systems that influence our behavior in ways we do not realize; I do not see why the term "value system" necessitates reference to conscious ethical decisions...

The term value in this case is too general as too often the word is used to character firm moral principles that guide a person's actions. Unconscious motivations are more precisely described as tendencies or inclination.

What evidence have you that Jung was focused exclusively on cognitive tendencies as they apply to intellectual endeavors.

I never made the claim that he was focused exclusively on tendencies that apply to intellectual endeavors, only that he focused exclusively on human thought rather than behavior.

He seems intent on describing the whole of cognitive tendencies and the way these unconscious biases lead to the construction of people's worldviews and value systems.

Correct.

He wanted to know how people see themselves and the world and how this translates into their behaviors and reasons for those behaviors--whether or not those reasons are consciously understood by people themselves. (Again, many value systems are unconscious and do not apply directly to ethics.).

Behaviors were merely means to the end of understanding the human cognitive constitution.

Well, I make no claim that anything I'm saying here is empirically verifiable. At the end of the day it's all just speculative and arbitrary interpretation..

No, not quite. There is a significant difference between unfounded conjecture and plausible apriori reasoning. That is how we separate a substantial typological notion from a folk one. Jung's system has conceptual integrity despite its lack of empirical support.

When you speak of "folk typology", are you referring to anyone who attempts to extrapolate Jung's ideas about cognitive tendencies to explain interpersonal behavior?..

I refer to thought-experiments that employ typology to explain common human behavior while paying little heed to their own internal logical consistency or grounding in factually accurate premises.

Is it your contention that none of Jung's ideas can actually be used to describe or understand anything about the belief systems or behaviors of real people? ?..

No, Jung described features of the mind that are regularly exhibited by people ot the temperaments that he has described. These features describe mere tendencies rather than behavior that must and will be constantly displayed by people to whom they apply. For instance, the material Jung was quoted on in the Extroverted Intuition description cites mere inclinations that people have rather than behaviors by which their type is identified. Thus, the following type of thinking would be mistaken. 'Oh look, Jon matches this, this and that quality Jung says an Ne type has, but goodness I have never seen him acting like he does not at all notice physical objects, so he cannot be an Ne type!' In other words, if you interpret Jung as describing rigid and obvious habits of thought and action, then yes his theories have very little application to description of real people. However, if you interpret him as describing mere cognitive tendencies, then his insights are indeed quite applicable.

Is Would you mind quoting wherever it is that he says his work in no way intends to describe the tendencies of actual people? If that is actually the case then I'll have to reread Jung's work and reconsider my interpretations.?..

Jung does not state that he is not describing the tendencies of actual people. I did not claim that either, I claimed that he is not describing the core of their characters, but merely their tendencies.

Right, but I don't claim that no one uses the inferior function--only that we don't use the so-called "shadow functions." Everyone has some use of each process N, S, T and F but very rarely in the direction other than the preferred one..?..

That claim seems rather counterintuitive. It is a fact that all functions are grounded in a person's mental constitution or what Jung calls psyche. A function is extroverted if it is most easily stimulated by interaction with the world than through solitary activity, and introverted if vice versa. The scenario that all functions can be stimulated only through one kind of activity and not another paints a grotesquely disorganized and desynchronized picture of the human mind. It simply does not reflect the basic facts about the mind. For one that all of us are easily able to become stimulated to use all of our cognitive faculties either in quiet group activity or active interaction with the world. If half of those functions were missing, one could be sure that a person of an SJ type would be absolutely incapable of any abstract reasoning alone. He would have no intuition at all unless he manages to become connected to the external world sufficiently. For example, an ISJ accountant would be almost altogether incapable of imagining anything when he is sitting at his desk alone, yet with a relative ease, he manages to reason and contemplate about his job tasks while alone. If his intuition was gone or nearly completely gone, he wouldn't be capable of any coherent thought at all, as all thinking requires intuition or basic imagination that we use in order to attain a mental conception of even the simplest and the most mundane of tasks.

Similarly, the idea of an INTJ scholar working in disciplines that require rigorous logical thinking would also be impossible as this person by his very nature would incur immense struggles to use Thinking or to see structure in his ideas when working alone and therefore receiving little stimulation from the outside.

Instead of advocating the absurdity above, I suggest that all eight functions exist, however, they are all in the state of antithesis with one another. There is also far greater conflict between the functions that are headed in the same direction than between those facing opposite directions. For instance, in the case of the INTJ, Si is more opposed by Ni than Se.

Thus, since the opposition from the dominant function is often very strong, it often seems as if the weakest function does not exist at all. However, not all 'shadow functions' are as weak as the weakest function. For instance, I'd posit that the other side of our dominant two functions is fairly advanced or we are at least somewhat comfortable using them. Consider the ENFP.

This is the model that I'd have for the type.

1.Ne
2.Fi
3. Ni
4.Fe
5. Te
6. Ti
7. Si
8. Se

Altogether, we often see this type naturally engaging in what Neo-Bebeans call Fe activity. Altogether it is conceivable that they were genuinely stimulating Feeling-wise by the external world often rather than in the way that is the most natural to them (Fi). However, since Fi predominates, the Fe way will always be less natural for this type and shall always be met with far greater internal opposition than in the case of an Fe type.

Yes, it does seem trivial--why would he bother pointing it out?..?..

The principle is that people have many functions that are opposed to one another and aren't committed to any one of them entirely.

Once he's described the nature of introversion and extroversion, it hardly seems necessary to further specify that introversion is not extroverted and vice versa. I took these descriptions to mean that those who exhibit a given introverted attitude (such as Ti) cannot simultaneously exhibit its opposite extroverted attitude (Te in this case.)

I'd modify the Jungian claim and maintain that those naturally exhibit introversion can't also exhibit extroversion just as naturally without any experience or training. However, with experience and training, they could become more comfortable exhibiting the extroverted attitude, however, rarely, if at all will it be more natural than their main attitude.

But if, as you say, Jung had no intention of describing any real human behavior whatsoever, and merely intended to describe each function in total isolation from the others, how can he be commenting here on the relationships between the functions?.)

This claim of mine referred only to his type descriptions where only one function was discussed in depth and not the entirety of his work.

Wouldn't discussing the relative emphasis on one function over another require him to describe the value hierarchies/behaviors of real people? ?.)

In principle you can discuss relations between functions in the regard of how they describe the cognitive constitution alone. However, some appeal to empirical experience is necessary to attain a basic understanding of how the human mind works. An appeal to behavior is minor and was reduced to the very minimum; it served the sole purpose of understanding the human cognitive tendencies rather than predicting and explaining their behavior.

Before I comment any further on this part, what exactly is a "type", if not a category of cognitive preference??.)

A solidified habit of cognition, in the Jungian sense it is one of the four habits that in a very broad sense define the basic elements of all human thought.

Why can't we translate common cognitive tendencies between people into common value systems regarding which types of information should be derived according to which methods??.)

A type can entail multiple value systems and methods of doing things. The common practices of INTPs in China in the year of 1500 are different from those of the U.S today. A type is simply a solidified tendency for people to respond to cognitive stimuli. This way of responding will create one value system and metods of operation in one environment and a wholly different one in the other. The nurture aspect is crucial to a person's identity as culture builds the core of an individual's character far more than his psychology or inner constitution. Surely your personality would be radically different had you grown up in China, although your type would have been the same.

This may just be a question of semantics. For instance, if all Ti people show a cognitive tendency to use Thinking in a purely subjective and internal way, can we not reason that Ti represents the value system that Thinking is best done internally???.)

That's not what Ti is, you've been infected with the germ of Neo-Bebbean typology that you've been severely criticizing. You ascribed too many illegitimate behavioral tendencies to type. Ti is just a tendency to be stimulated to think or perceive structure in the world by inner mental content more so than the external world. In principle, its possible for a person with this firm cognitive habit to behave in a way we expect a conventional Te type American behaves.

You could call Ti as a 'value system' of activating thinking in response to cognitive stimuli that are internal more than external, yet I still think that the term value is misleading in this context. First of all, its far too broad, as the conventional dictionary has 18 disparate definitions for this term, most of which refer to some kind of conscious cognition. Its manifest ambiguity would compel me to resist using the word as much as possible, let alone in a discussion of an abstruse philosophy of mind topic.

Jung may not have explicitly stated this, but I think it can be reasonably inferred from what he did say. ???.)

What textual support can you provide for this inference?

Indeed, I've agreed that the shadow functions may be used very rarely...if Ti is, for instance, "far more pronounced" than Fi, then use of Fi would have to be pretty unusual by comparison.

Yes, it is the most supressed of all cognitive faculties in the Ti dominated mental constitution.

I will concede that perhaps we can occasionally use the shadow functions, but they must necessarily be weaker and of vastly lesser influence than the preferred forms..

Not in all cases, I'd argue that in the case of an INTP, Te is stronger than Si and Se than Fe. Generally, if a certain function is strong, say Thinking for example, I see no reason why it would be by far more easily stimulated from within than from without. Otherwise, as I've mentioned, the human mind would be by far more disorganized and grotesque than it truly is. Functioning in an environment that requires competence with skills associated with all functions would be extremely difficult, if not impossible altogether.

So I don't see how one could have both strong Ti and strong Fi. Ti's strength necessitates Fi's relative great weakness and vice versa, does it not?..

To have a strong function means to be comfortable using it without making a conscious effort to. Generally, it takes a great deal of practice for a person to awaken the natural tendency to use the most supressed function without great discomfort. Most people do not achieve this feat until they are well past their middle age.

No, this would not lead to concluding that dominant intuition would lead to no sensing--it would lead to concluding that dominant Ne would lead to no Se, and dominant Ni would lead to no Si, and vice versa for each. ?..

Implausible conclusion for reasons mentioned above.

I'm willing to consider that perhaps these processes are used occasionally, but only weakly and certainly not in any capacity comparable to the preferred forms of each process.?..

As far as Se for the ENTP is concerned or the most supressed function, yes, yet as far as Ni and Te are concerned, most likely not.

Can you elaborate on what Thinking alone or Feeling alone actually does? .?..

Its in principle impossible because a creature that does not feel at all cannot have any desire conscious or unconscious to continue its own existence. It would be altogether devoid of motivation and therefore it will be impossible for this thing to be alive in the first place.

Fair enough--what sort of circumstances do you think might lead a person to choose the non-preferred orientation of any function, and how often do you think this might happen?.?..

Military and a fast paced busy city office work. Someone who has Te as the naturally supressed function could simply be forced to realize that operating in the Te way or receiving stimulation is simply the easiest way to prevail. Even animals have been known to unconsciously adjust even their most firmly grounded habits to embrace new, more conducive to their own survival dispositions. Over a great deal of experience one could be forced to tap into their least preferred function automatically, regardless of how unnatural that may seem. Similarly to how if an NTP was to join a skateboarding team, sooner or later he'd tap into Se or the tendency to be stimulated directly in response to the environment rather than through internal impressions. Though, in most cases, great stress is a prerequisite for such cognitive functioning.

Most of my disputes with the eight-function model are with those who define functions according to individual surface actions; e.g., "I looked around and saw what was around me" = "I used Se......I take most issue with the idea that any given action constitutes use of any particular function; rather, I think my use of the term "value systems" is very similar to what you mean when you say the functions represent "cognitive tendencies"--they can be conscious or unconscious and do not necessarily involve ethical decisions....So when an ENFP shows up and says something like, "Yeah guys I use Ti all the time!", it's usually because he's misinterpreted "using Ti" as "doing something logical", and it's this interpretation that bothers me most. If ENFPs do indeed use Ti, they would only do so in occasional instances of unusually stressful circumstances that force them out of the standard preference for Fi+Te...they are not "using Ti" on a regular basis every time they make a logical judgment

Oh, but that's just folk typology. Its far too shallow and confused to even be bothered with.

 

[Tamske]

I don't know about you, but I am positively baffled by Fi. When people tell me to "go inside myself and see what I want and need and feel and believe and blah blah blah," I just scratch my head and wonder what the hell that means.

Of course, I wouldn't say that I have no values or principles! I have very strong values and principles. I just find it hard to go 'inside myself' to see what 'I want' if it is not an 'instilled principle.'

Can anyone else relate? How did you overcome it?

Relate? Yes, very.
Overcome? Introspecting isn't for everyone. I can't find what I want, need, believe,... by "going into myself". Make me meditate and I'll imagine stories and physical theories. I've even worked out problems from theoretical physics while some psychiatrist wanted me to relax and think of nothing. I just can't do that!
However, I can find what I want, need, feel and believe by trying things out. I've been a reseacher and a teacher. I prefer teaching. I've been part of a religious group and it didn't go well - they made me meditate . I want to work for charity instead of trying to find God in my heart!
It's not necessary to be able to "look into yourself" to be a decent human being.

 

[simulatedworld]

I chose this specific definition of "value" as a represenation for what you meant on the basis below.



You clearly used the word 'worldview' which in all appropriate cases of the word's usage refers to an ideology or one's perspective regarding life and the world as a whole which is by definition underpinned by moral values that the holders of this worldview are aware of. Fascism, communism, or even Ti-ism is the folk typological sense are examples of a worldview. In the case of the first two worldviews, its clear that their adherents rely on clearly defined moral principles that maintain and expand their vision of the world. The same could be said about the third case, many MBTI enthusiasts see typology as a personality system where people belongning to a certain type endorse a clear set of values that are not shared by people of other types.

I don't agree with the assertion that the term "worldview" necessitates conscious moral values:

world·view (wûrld'vyōō')
n. In both senses also called Weltanschauung.

1.

The overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world.
2.

A collection of beliefs about life and the universe held by an individual or a group.

Since it's impossible for any person to be totally aware of all the unconscious biases in his own perspective, I reason that one's "overall perspective" must necessarily also include unconscious tendencies and biases of which he is not directly aware. Also, "overall perspective" or "collection of beliefs" does not necessitate strictly moral beliefs either--simply any beliefs about life and the universe.

The term value in this case is too general as too often the word is used to character firm moral principles that guide a person's actions. Unconscious motivations are more precisely described as tendencies or inclination.

You could just as well describe them that way, sure, but I don't think your choice of terminology is superior or more precise.

I never made the claim that he was focused exclusively on tendencies that apply to intellectual endeavors, only that he focused exclusively on human thought rather than behavior.

That's interesting, as it seems to contradict what you've said below about how, for instance, being in the military might motivate one to "behave in a Te way." How is it possible to behave in a Te way if Te is only a description of human thought and not human behavior?

No, not quite. There is a significant difference between unfounded conjecture and plausible apriori reasoning. That is how we separate a substantial typological notion from a folk one. Jung's system has conceptual integrity despite its lack of empirical support.

Sure, from a Ti standpoint it has conceptual integrity. I know plenty of Te people, however, who find Jung utterly ridiculous and irrelevant due to the lack of empirical support for his theories. Good luck convincing them to look at it from a Ti perspective instead.

I refer to thought-experiments that employ typology to explain common human behavior while paying little heed to their own internal logical consistency or grounding in factually accurate premises.

Isn't the insistence that they pay attention to internal logical consistency a Ti-biased request on your part? This seems to imply that you have some a priori knowledge of what constitutes internal logical consistency, but others might not agree with your definition, or even agree that internal logical consistency is an important value.

No, Jung described features of the mind that are regularly exhibited by people ot the temperaments that he has described. These features describe mere tendencies rather than behavior that must and will be constantly displayed by people to whom they apply. For instance, the material Jung was quoted on in the Extroverted Intuition description cites mere inclinations that people have rather than behaviors by which their type is identified. Thus, the following type of thinking would be mistaken. 'Oh look, Jon matches this, this and that quality Jung says an Ne type has, but goodness I have never seen him acting like he does not at all notice physical objects, so he cannot be an Ne type!' In other words, if you interpret Jung as describing rigid and obvious habits of thought and action, then yes his theories have very little application to description of real people. However, if you interpret him as describing mere cognitive tendencies, then his insights are indeed quite applicable.

How can one directly observe so-called "features of the mind"? The minds of others are not real physical things that can be directly observed; we can only observe their effects second-hand via their behavior and our (subjective) attempts to interpret it.

Clearly, assuming that Ne types never use any Sensing would be a mistake, but that is not and has never been my contention. I also interpret him as observing mere cognitive tendencies; however, I don't believe any function is directly responsible on its own for any given behavior, since no function ever acts alone or in a vacuum. All thoughts/behaviors/actions/values are the result of all (four) functions working in concert, with perhaps occasional influence from a "shadow function" during unusually stressful times.

Jung does not state that he is not describing the tendencies of actual people. I did not claim that either, I claimed that he is not describing the core of their characters, but merely their tendencies.

Would one's cognitive tendencies not comprise the core of his character? By what other means would one assess a person's character, exactly?

That claim seems rather counterintuitive. It is a fact that all functions are grounded in a person's mental constitution or what Jung calls psyche. A function is extroverted if it is most easily stimulated by interaction with the world than through solitary activity, and introverted if vice versa. The scenario that all functions can be stimulated only through one kind of activity and not another paints a grotesquely disorganized and desynchronized picture of the human mind. It simply does not reflect the basic facts about the mind. For one that all of us are easily able to become stimulated to use all of our cognitive faculties either in quiet group activity or active interaction with the world. If half of those functions were missing, one could be sure that a person of an SJ type would be absolutely incapable of any abstract reasoning alone. He would have no intuition at all unless he manages to become connected to the external world sufficiently. For example, an ISJ accountant would be almost altogether incapable of imagining anything when he is sitting at his desk alone, yet with a relative ease, he manages to reason and contemplate about his job tasks while alone. If his intuition was gone or nearly completely gone, he wouldn't be capable of any coherent thought at all, as all thinking requires intuition or basic imagination that we use in order to attain a mental conception of even the simplest and the most mundane of tasks.

I think your ideas here are based on overly rigid interpretation of what constitutes "use" of each function. You claim that an SJ type would be incapable of internal abstract reasoning without Ni; however, I don't think this is the case as I consider Si+Ne fully capable of performing internal abstract reasoning on its own. You seem to have connected functions directly to specific actions, which is exactly what we seem to agree is the greatest mistake of so-called "folk typology."

I posit that reasoning abstractly doesn't necessitate "using intuition" any more than looking around and taking in sensory information necessitates "using sensing." One cannot "use" any function in isolation from his others; each function is merely an arbitrary description of one aspect of his total worldview. If one is an Si type, then part of his worldview involves the unconscious tendency to perform introverted perception in a concrete manner--he seeks to associate signs and symbols with stable, consistent and predictable meanings.

I believe Ni would directly contradict this preference by seeking all possible meanings simultaneously instead of searching for the stability of interpretation that Si does, and so an Si user would rarely make any of use Ni unless forced to do so by unusual circumstances.

The Si user's abstract reasoning via Ne can still be used in private thought without communicating directly with the outside world--you say that he must be "sufficiently connected to the external world" in order to use Ne, which is true, but being "sufficiently connected to the external world" doesn't necessitate that he be talking to or interacting with others. So long as his private abstraction involves concepts of a nature that can be communicated and verified through external means, he is still "using Ne."

Similarly, the idea of an INTJ scholar working in disciplines that require rigorous logical thinking would also be impossible as this person by his very nature would incur immense struggles to use Thinking or to see structure in his ideas when working alone and therefore receiving little stimulation from the outside.

Similarly, the INTJ would still have access to rigorous logical thinking via Te; he would not need to be directly interacting with the outside world in order to be "using Te" so long as he is conceptualizing Thinking in terms of that which is objectively and empirically validated (as opposed to the subjective and internal validation of Ti.) When the INTJ needs to make an internal value judgment, he would call on the aspect of his worldview represented by Fi's deeply held personal values. Again, one can process the world in Te terms while receiving little to no external stimulation, so long as he conceptualizes Thinking in a manner that must (later) be externally validated.

You seem to have implied that an INTJ lacking Ti would be incapable of rigorous logical thought. I suggest that this is untrue, and that your belief in it simply signifies a limitation on your overly narrow functional definitions, and that "use of Ti" is not necessary for rigorous logical thinking.

Instead of advocating the absurdity above, I suggest that all eight functions exist, however, they are all in the state of antithesis with one another. There is also far greater conflict between the functions that are headed in the same direction than between those facing opposite directions. For instance, in the case of the INTJ, Si is more opposed by Ni than Se.

After discussing this with you and others, I would agree that all functions exist in each individual, but that use of the shadow functions is quite unusual as it implies adherence to worldviews that are in direct opposition with the way in which we prefer to perform each type of cognitive task.

I interpret Jung as saying that there are four types of cognitive tasks: Introverted Judgments, Extroverted Judgments, Introverted Perceptions and Extroverted Perceptions, and that each person (once he has reached maturity and solidified his tendencies) has a definite preferred method of performing each of these tasks. To contradict the preferred method is to expend considerable energy, and as such the non-preferred orientation of each process is used only occasionally when trying circumstances force it.

Thus, since the opposition from the dominant function is often very strong, it often seems as if the weakest function does not exist at all. However, not all 'shadow functions' are as weak as the weakest function. For instance, I'd posit that the other side of our dominant two functions is fairly advanced or we are at least somewhat comfortable using them. Consider the ENFP.

This is the model that I'd have for the type.

1.Ne
2.Fi
3. Ni
4.Fe
5. Te
6. Ti
7. Si
8. Se

Altogether, we often see this type naturally engaging in what Neo-Bebeans call Fe activity. Altogether it is conceivable that they were genuinely stimulating Feeling-wise by the external world often rather than in the way that is the most natural to them (Fi). However, since Fi predominates, the Fe way will always be less natural for this type and shall always be met with far greater internal opposition than in the case of an Fe type.

I agree with most of this, except your function order for the ENFP. If, as we have agreed, functions do not necessarily line up with particular surface actions, the phrase "Fe activity" should be all but meaningless in reference to a person who does not use Fe as his preferred method of Extroverting Judgment.

It is a common misconception that one who is behaving in a manner common to Fe users is "using Fe", but since functions represent not surface behaviors themselves but cognitive tendencies, one would not actually be "using Fe" unless he were making an extroverted judgment via Feeling for its own inherent value, and not because imitating the behavior of Fe users on the surface satisfies another more important function's values.

For instance, consider a Te dominant person who really wants to be included in his rich Fe dominant father's will. Since Te has defined, "Get the inheritance" as a goal that must be completed, the person may recognize that displaying an overt appearance of adhering to Fe values will increase his chances of getting what Te really wants--but does this constitute legitimate "Fe use"? I posit that it does not.

The only time such a person would be legitimately "using Fe" would be if he feels naturally motivated, purely for its own sake, to place inherent value in some external ethical standard--which is difficult and unusual for a person who normally prefers Te+Fi. I won't say it's impossible, but it's certainly not something that happens routinely. The way he prefers to extrovert judgment is in the form of Te, and only when Te's values have been temporarily set aside can Fe have any legitimate influence.

So I would suggest the following functional order for ENFP:

1) Ne
2) Fi
3) Te
4) Si
5-7) Some combination of Ni, Fe, and Ti that varies in priority order depending on the individual.
8) Se

The principle is that people have many functions that are opposed to one another and aren't committed to any one of them entirely.

Now this I would agree wholeheartedly with; however, I do believe through my own observations of others that each person shows a clear preference for how to perform each of the four cognitive tasks (Ji, Je, Pi, Pe) and that it takes an unusual amount of energy brought on by difficult circumstance for him to go against these preferences.

I'd modify the Jungian claim and maintain that those naturally exhibit introversion can't also exhibit extroversion just as naturally without any experience or training. However, with experience and training, they could become more comfortable exhibiting the extroverted attitude, however, rarely, if at all will it be more natural than their main attitude.

I'd agree with this too.

In principle you can discuss relations between functions in the regard of how they describe the cognitive constitution alone. However, some appeal to empirical experience is necessary to attain a basic understanding of how the human mind works. An appeal to behavior is minor and was reduced to the very minimum; it served the sole purpose of understanding the human cognitive tendencies rather than predicting and explaining their behavior.

Which makes it all the more confusing for me when you discuss such things as "Fe behavior." Fe behavior, it seems, can only refer to behaviors which Fe types are commonly predisposed to--but this doesn't seem to necessitate that anyone behaving this way must be motivated by Fe.

A solidified habit of cognition, in the Jungian sense it is one of the four habits that in a very broad sense define the basic elements of all human thought.

This seems consistent with what I've just written above.

A type can entail multiple value systems and methods of doing things. The common practices of INTPs in China in the year of 1500 are different from those of the U.S today. A type is simply a solidified tendency for people to respond to cognitive stimuli. This way of responding will create one value system and metods of operation in one environment and a wholly different one in the other. The nurture aspect is crucial to a person's identity as culture builds the core of an individual's character far more than his psychology or inner constitution. Surely your personality would be radically different had you grown up in China, although your type would have been the same.

Of course, but there must be some common thread in terms of cognitive tendency that relates all Ti users, or the term Ti would have no meaning. When I say that all Ti users share a certain value system, all I mean is that they share a similar preference in terms of the way they make introverted judgments. This, in concert with the enormous influence of nurture/upbringing, could lead to a virtually infinite number of different moral/social/political values. I've made no claim that all Ti users must share any characteristic other than what I've just described. You are still hung up on your misinterpretation of my use of the terms "value system" and "worldview."

That's not what Ti is, you've been infected with the germ of Neo-Bebbean typology that you've been severely criticizing. You ascribed too many illegitimate behavioral tendencies to type. Ti is just a tendency to be stimulated to think or perceive structure in the world by inner mental content more so than the external world. In principle, its possible for a person with this firm cognitive habit to behave in a way we expect a conventional Te type American behaves.

This is precisely what I mean when I say all Ti types share a certain type of worldview. As I've shown above, use of the term "worldview" does not necessitate conscious moral decision.

And yes, it's quite possible for a Ti person to behave in ways that are common for Te types--but one of my main points here is that doing this doesn't necessitate use of Te (and indeed, rarely constitutes genuine use of Te.)

You could call Ti as a 'value system' of activating thinking in response to cognitive stimuli that are internal more than external, yet I still think that the term value is misleading in this context. First of all, its far too broad, as the conventional dictionary has 18 disparate definitions for this term, most of which refer to some kind of conscious cognition. Its manifest ambiguity would compel me to resist using the word as much as possible, let alone in a discussion of an abstruse philosophy of mind topic.

Well, I suppose we'll have to disagree regarding use of the term "value" in this instance. Use "worldview" instead if that makes you more comfortable--the dictionary definition I've quoted above should make it quite clear that this term in no way necessitates conscious moral decision.

What textual support can you provide for this inference?

All I mean by "Ti represents the value system that Thinking is best done internally" is that Ti users all show a cognitive tendency to use Thinking in an introverted way (which I am sure we agree on.) It sounds like you're still taking issue with my use of the term "value system" and insisting that it must refer only to conscious moral decision, but I've already explained that it doesn't.

Yes, it is the most supressed of all cognitive faculties in the Ti dominated mental constitution.

I can agree that the absolute weakest function is probably the other method of the same cognitive task that the dominant performs--in most cases, anyway.

Not in all cases, I'd argue that in the case of an INTP, Te is stronger than Si and Se than Fe. Generally, if a certain function is strong, say Thinking for example, I see no reason why it would be by far more easily stimulated from within than from without. Otherwise, as I've mentioned, the human mind would be by far more disorganized and grotesque than it truly is. Functioning in an environment that requires competence with skills associated with all functions would be extremely difficult, if not impossible altogether.

I'm sure this is the case for some individuals, but I think that since use of shadow functions depends largely on training and conditioning, the INTP's relative emphasis on Se, Ni and Te probably varies significantly from person to person.

I don't agree with your statement about disorganized grotesqueness for reasons I've outlined in my descriptions of functional definitions above.

To have a strong function means to be comfortable using it without making a conscious effort to. Generally, it takes a great deal of practice for a person to awaken the natural tendency to use the most supressed function without great discomfort. Most people do not achieve this feat until they are well past their middle age.

Agreed.

Implausible conclusion for reasons mentioned above.

Fair enough; I will concede this point and admit that shadow functions are occasionally used.

As far as Se for the ENTP is concerned or the most supressed function, yes, yet as far as Ni and Te are concerned, most likely not.

I don't understand where you get the conclusion that the shadow forms of the tertiary and inferior functions are in fact stronger than the tertiary and inferior themselves. I think the ENTP's preferred method of extroverting judgment is Fe, and his preferred method of introverting perception is Si, so he'd have a harder time using Te or Ni as they contradict his natural preferences for each type of cognitive task.

By saying that he would have the hardest time with Se, you seem to be implicitly agreeing with my supposition about the preferred method of each type of cognitive task Je/Ji/Pe/Pi, and yet for some reason you've placed the non-preferred methods of the tertiary and inferior tasks above the traditionally preferred ones. Why?

I also don't understand your assertion that just because is Ti relatively strong, Te must be also. It seems to me that Ti is more similar to Fi than it is to Te, given that Ti and Fi both perform the same cognitive task (introverted judgment.)

Its in principle impossible because a creature that does not feel at all cannot have any desire conscious or unconscious to continue its own existence. It would be altogether devoid of motivation and therefore it will be impossible for this thing to be alive in the first place.

Fair enough.

 

[simulatedworld]

Military and a fast paced busy city office work. Someone who has Te as the naturally supressed function could simply be forced to realize that operating in the Te way or receiving stimulation is simply the easiest way to prevail. Even animals have been known to unconsciously adjust even their most firmly grounded habits to embrace new, more conducive to their own survival dispositions. Over a great deal of experience one could be forced to tap into their least preferred function automatically, regardless of how unnatural that may seem. Similarly to how if an NTP was to join a skateboarding team, sooner or later he'd tap into Se or the tendency to be stimulated directly in response to the environment rather than through internal impressions. Though, in most cases, great stress is a prerequisite for such cognitive functioning.

Or, as I suspect is a more accurate description, he might realize through a combination of Ti and his other functions that imitating the behaviors of apparent Te types will prolong his own survival and well-being in this situation. This doesn't mean he necessarily values Te over Fe, just that he has an ulterior motive for imitating the behaviors of those who do. This is an important distinction.

I believe your NTP skateboarder would learn to deal with/respond instinctively to his environment more through Ne than through Se--as that is his preferred method of extroverting perception. If he actually conditioned himself to respond more naturally with Se than with Ne, he would effectively change himself into an STP. I agree that great stress would be the most likely primary motivator for this kind of permanent change.

Oh, but that's just folk typology. Its far too shallow and confused to even be bothered with.

I'm glad you agree that performing an action commonly performed by people proficient in a given function doesn't necessitate use of that function.

 

[SolitaryWalker]

You could just as well describe them that way, sure, but I don't think your choice of terminology is superior or more precise..

A word is rendered ambiguous by the many mutually inconsistent definitions ascribed to it. Value is certainly one of those words, yet none of my key words had nearly as high of a number of conventional definitions.

That's interesting, as it seems to contradict what you've said below about how, for instance, being in the military might motivate one to "behave in a Te way." How is it possible to behave in a Te way if Te is only a description of human thought and not human behavior?

I don't recall using the phrase 'behave in a Te-way', though I do recall using the phrase of exhibiting behaviors typically associated with the Te function. There is a significant difference between the two remarks. Its not possible to behave in a Te way, only in a way that people expect persons of the Te type to behave.

There is no contradiction in claiming that Jung was concerned with describing human thought tendencies rather than actions and that its possible for people to behave in a way that Te people are expected to. There would be a contradiction if I embraced the Jungian view that cognitive functions merely describe thought-tendencies, yet there also is a Te way of behaving which would imply that cognitive functions are not only cognitive, but also behavioral. However, I made no such claim.

Sure, from a Ti standpoint it has conceptual integrity. I know plenty of Te people, however, who find Jung utterly ridiculous and irrelevant due to the lack of empirical support for his theories.

Perspective is irrelevant. What matters is whether Jung's theory is plausible, whether they refuse to believe that it truly is cogent has no bearing upon the conceptual merit of Jung's work.

Good luck convincing them to look at it from a Ti perspective instead..

Why bother?

Isn't the insistence that they pay attention to internal logical consistency a Ti-biased request on your part?..

Its just basic scholarship that all serious researchers are compelled to follow, whether someone is refusing to do so due to a certain biases of their is evidence of their shortcomings rather than that of the request.

This seems to imply that you have some a priori knowledge of what constitutes internal logical consistency, but others might not agree with your definition, or even agree that internal logical consistency is an important value.?..

Whether they agree or don't agree, there are objectively testable ways to discover what internal logical consistency is. If that wasn't so, no enterprise that relies heavily on logical reasoning could have succeeded, it would have been as arbitrary as a message expressed in poetry and paintings. Since we cannot say that about mathematics, logic and the natural sciences; we are compelled to conclude that there indeed is a way to objectively establish the nature of logical consistency.

How can one directly observe so-called "features of the mind".

Neuroscience is the most reliable path to take. Today, we have some behavioral testing which, if not terribly simplistic could shed light on how the mind works. For example, examine someone's behavior of pattern recognition by asking them to describe the objects they see in a fuzzy painting or what themes they can superimpose upon a classical work of art my Michaelangelo.

The main difference between my typological work and the folk pespective is not that they derive their insights from behaviors, but I don't. It is that I rely on cognitive behaviors, I observe how a person's mind works. Jung's approach was also similar and that is why he spent the first 330 pages seeking out cognitive tendencies in the works of literature, art and science.

The minds of others are not real physical things that can be directly observed; we can only observe their effects second-hand via their behavior and our (subjective) attempts to interpret it.

That's not a problem and will be even less of a one where neuroscience allows us to establish a more precise link between the neural patterns we see in the brain and mind-states we connect them to.

Would one's cognitive tendencies not comprise the core of his character? By what other means would one assess a person's character.

Yes, though not the essence of their character or the character in entirety. The contemporary folk typologists wanted to write a profile that will cause their respective readers to respond with 'wow, that is me in a nutshell!'. Jung was not in this business.

I think your ideas here are based on overly rigid interpretation of what constitutes "use" of each function. You claim that an SJ type would be incapable of internal abstract reasoning without Ni; however, I don't think this is the case as I consider Si+Ne fully capable of performing internal abstract reasoning on its own.

You're missing the point. Intuition is necessary for abstract reasoning whether introverted or extroverted, yet a person working in isolation usually does not have sufficient access to Extroverted faculties as they by definition must be stimulated from the outside.

You seem to have connected functions directly to specific actions, which is exactly what we seem to agree is the greatest mistake of so-called "folk typology.

Yes, I connected functions to specific cognitive activity, that doesn't constitute folk typology. For example, intuition with abstract reasoning. There is no problem in connecting functions with specific actions as long as they are cognitive.

I posit that reasoning abstractly doesn't necessitate "using intuition" any more than looking around and taking in sensory information necessitates "using sensing.

Missing my point. Any cognitive activity requires intuition, any use of the senses requires sensing. Looking around isn't just sensing as when you do that, you're performing some cognitive activity, that is making mental observations and using your senses. Inevitably, both sensing and intuition are in an intimate interplay even in an activity as mundane and common-place as looking around. Ultimately, intuition underlies all cognitive activity, whether it be thinking, feeling or sensing related as that in itself is the essence of conceptualization. Low-level thinking does require conceptualization, though much less of it than the kind of reasoning that is typically known as abstract.

One cannot "use" any function in isolation from his others; each function is merely an arbitrary description of one aspect of his total worldview..

You've got to stop using the word arbitrary this carelessly. I never even came close to mentioning that a function can be used in isolation.

If one is an Si type, then part of his worldview involves the unconscious tendency to perform introverted perception in a concrete manner..

No, if one is a sensing type, their most dominant tendency is to focus on sensations as they have made impressions upon his mind first and foremost rather on entities that can easily be sensed in the external world. Instead of 'concrete manner' merely using the senses should be used to describe the activity of sensation. Sensation alone does not exist in a human organism as it is inevitably accompanied by at least an unconscious hunch or a perceptual conception of what it is that needs to be sensed and how the new sensations are received. If a person is a dominant sensing type, all of his other faculties including the inferior intuition serve the purpose of better enabling him to focus on what can be sensed. Sensation alone does not even allow him to engage in the activity of sensing.

--he seeks to associate signs and symbols with stable, consistent and predictable meanings...

Folk typological twaddle.

--I believe Ni would directly contradict this preference by seeking all possible meanings simultaneously instead of searching for the stability of interpretation that Si does, and so an Si user would rarely make any of use Ni unless forced to do so by unusual circumstances....

Ni would be heavily supressed, though not to the point of non-existence.

The Si user's abstract reasoning via Ne can still be used in private thought without communicating directly with the outside world....

Extroverted functions require stimulation from the external world as that is the definition of extroversion; the tendency to be stimulated from without rather than from within. The person with an Si dominant type would not be able to use Extroverted Intuition adequately unless he managed to interact with the environment to a satisfactory degree. This does not mean talking to people or doing something loud, but nonetheless, it means doing something far more engaging than merely sitting alone at a desk.

you say that he must be "sufficiently connected to the external world" in order to use Ne, which is true, but being "sufficiently connected to the external world" doesn't necessitate that he be talking to or interacting with others.....

Certainly does not.

So long as his private abstraction involves concepts of a nature that can be communicated and verified through external means, he is still "using Ne."

The trouble is that most Si people sitting at an office job don't have that, yet they somehow manage to think at least on the lowest level of abstraction with insufficient stimulation from the outside.

Similarly, the INTJ would still have access to rigorous logical thinking via Te.

Only if he'd find the sufficient stimulation for Te in the external world.

After discussing this with you and others, I would agree that all functions exist in each individual, but that use of the shadow functions is quite unusual as it implies adherence to worldviews that are in direct opposition with the way in which we prefer to perform each type of cognitive task..

The bottom line is that the shadow functions are supressed as a result, not eliminated.

If, as we have agreed, functions do not necessarily line up with particular surface actions, the phrase "Fe activity" should be all but meaningless in reference to a person who does not use Fe as his preferred method of Extroverting Judgment...

On what grounds? The fact that it hasn't been listed by Jung and the folk typologists as a prominent cognitive faculty is no evidence of its non-existence.

It is a common misconception that one who is behaving in a manner common to Fe users is "using Fe",...

It certainly is, however, this shows that in principle it shouldn't be too hard for them to use Fe granted that they are behaving naturally. Ne-Fi is an altogether different cognitive habit that yields results similar to that of Fe. If the person in question is comfortable becoming stimulated by Ne-Fi route, it shouldn't be hard for him or her to learn to be stimulated the Fe route as well. A function's prominence in a person's psyche is defined by its low degree of opposition by other functions. Since cognition akin to Fe is not severely opposed, there is no reason why Fe should be opposed on the contrary. Since it is not opposed stringently, it follows that its not one of the shadow functions or faculties that are more supressed than most cognitive functions in the mind of the person in question.

but since functions represent not surface behaviors themselves but cognitive tendencies, one would not actually be "using Fe" unless he were making an extroverted judgment via Feeling for its own inherent value, ",...

One is not using Fe unless he is becoming inspired to emote by stimuli outside of him than within him.

For instance, consider a Te dominant person who really wants to be included in his rich Fe dominant father's will. Since Te has defined, "Get the inheritance" as a goal that must be completed, the person may recognize that displaying an overt appearance of adhering to Fe values will increase his chances of getting what Te really wants--but does this constitute legitimate "Fe use"?",...

That's not the same concept as my ENFP example. In this case the person is not behaving in a natural way, therefore there is no reason to believe that he could learn to use Fe easily. Furthermore, in my example I did not say that an ENFP who naturally displays qualities we associate with Fe is actually using Fe, but that they should have a very easy time actually starting to use Fe as cognitive actions similar to Fe are very natural to them.

So I would suggest the following functional order for ENFP:

1) Ne
2) Fi
3) Te
4) Si
5-7) Some combination of Ni, Fe, and Ti that varies in priority order depending on the individual.
8) Se
"?",...

Jung used the word function to describe Intuition, Sensation, Thinking and Feeling for a compelling reason. Functions by definition describe the cognitive tendencies themselves, as the word function simply denotes an entity that works, operates or makes an impact. To function and to operate mean the same thing. So the word cognitive function almost by definition refers to all entities that make the mind work. Extroversion and Introversion are not functions, but mere attitudes. They simply denote how a person's mind is most easily stimulated, from within or from without.

Thus, it makes little sense to claim that a cognitive faculty that is directly opposed on a functional basis by the dominant faculty is supressed less than the cognitive faculty that actually shares the same function as the dominant one. In other words, Ne and Si are opposed to one another on a functional basis, yet, Ne and Ni are not. Since functions are more definitive of a person's cognitive constitution than attitudes, it follows that a cognitive faculty that differs from the dominant one only in attitude must be less supressed than the one that differs in function. Thus, since Ni differs from Ne only in attitude, yet Si differs from Ne in its functional essence, it must be the case that Ni is less opposed than Si. Therefore, we must place Ni ahead of Si in the hierarchy of cognitive efficacy.

Similarly, we must place Fe ahead of Te because it opposes the auxiliary Fi only in attitude rather than functional identity, yet the latter and not the former is the case for Te.

Of course, but there must be some common thread in terms of cognitive tendency that relates all Ti users, or the term Ti would have no meaning.

The common link is the pronounced tendency to be stimulated to think or to seek out structure in response to the stimuli detected in the mind rather than the external world.

This is precisely what I mean when I say all Ti types share a certain type of worldview. As I've shown above, use of the term "worldview" does not necessitate conscious moral decision.

Are you prepared to claim that a microbe, a wasp, a fly or any completely unconscious creature has a worldview? If not, you're forced to concede that your term worldview at least includes a component of conscious judgment and therefore smuggles folk theory into your typology. Either that, or you ought to renounce the claim that the word worldview plays any role in the definition of a type.

And yes, it's quite possible for a Ti person to behave in ways that are common for Te types--but one of my main points here is that doing this doesn't necessitate use of Te.

Of course it does not.

(and indeed, rarely constitutes genuine use of Te.).

Learning how to use Te will be an extra step, just like learning how to use Si or Ni, or any function that occupies roughly the middle rank in cognitive efficacy.

(Well, I suppose we'll have to disagree regarding use of the term "value" in this instance..).

Please, just look it up in the dictionary and see for yourself how many different conventional definitions and subtle connotations the word carries!

(Use "worldview" instead if that makes you more comfortable.).

I don't think it does at all.

(the dictionary definition I've quoted above should make it quite clear that this term in no way necessitates conscious moral decision..).

I have two cats, are they conscious enough to have a worldview? If they don't have to be conscious enough, how do I find out what worldviews they endorse? Is there a chance that whatever it is that they espouse can be compared to the ideologies or worldviews of fascists and the communists?

(All I mean by "Ti represents the value system that Thinking is best done internally" is that Ti users all show a cognitive tendency to use Thinking in an introverted way (which I am sure we agree on.) ..).

No, we didn't agree on that. Ti is the tendency to be stimulated to think from within than from without. Its possible for one to learn to think externally or to think outloud while comfortably engaging in the cognitive process above. This isn't at all a peculiar phenomenon, as NTP philosophers, scientists and mathematicians quite comfortably think outloud. Since these habits are met with no natural cognitive existence, we can adduce that such an activity is in no way inconsistent with the cognitive faculty of Introverted Thinking.

(It sounds like you're still taking issue with my use of the term "value system"..).

I'd have fewer qualms with the word value system than with the world value. Its conceivable that a microbe or a fly has a value system or simply a way in which evolution has programmed it to respond to stimulus, yet I can't imagine anyone outside of madhouse earnestly claiming that insects have worldviews. I don't think you can claim that the word worldview contains no reference to consciously inspired cognition.

(and insisting that it must refer only to conscious moral decision, but I've already explained that it doesn't."..).

It does not imply a conscious moral decision, but it certainly does imply a conscious decision of some kind.

(I don't agree with your statement about disorganized grotesqueness for reasons I've outlined in my descriptions of functional definitions above.."..).

I've raised my objections to your descriptions at an earlier point in this post.

(I don't understand where you get the conclusion that the shadow forms of the tertiary and inferior functions are in fact stronger than the tertiary and inferior themselves. .."..).

See my ENFP example and pay close attention to how it differs from your ENTJ example.

(I think the ENTP's preferred method of extroverting judgment is Fe, and his preferred method of introverting perception is Si, so he'd have a harder time using Te or Ni as they contradict his natural preferences for each type of cognitive task..."..).

I'll explain again. Using Te and Ni contradict his dominant and auxiliary faculties only with respect to attitude. Si and Fe contradict them with respect to function which is by far more significant and therefore shall incur far greater opposition from the faculties at the helm of his psyche.

By saying that he would have the hardest time with Se, you seem to be implicitly agreeing with my supposition about the preferred method of each type of cognitive task Je/Ji/Pe/Pi,..."..).

I don't understand what that formula means. All I claimed with the supposition that the ENTP would have the hardest time using Se is that this faculty is opposed to the dominator both with regard to attitude and function and it is therefore caused to be more supressed than all other cognitive faculties.

and yet for some reason you've placed the non-preferred methods of the tertiary and inferior tasks above the traditionally preferred ones. Why?

The traditional theory mistakenly infers that the function that is opposed to the dominator attitude-wise shall be more supressed than the one that is opposed on a purely functional level.

I also don't understand your assertion that just because is Ti relatively strong, Te must be also.?

It must be because attitudinal opposition is not nearly as significant as the functional, hence Te must be stronger than the faculties that have been functionally countervailed.

It seems to me that Ti is more similar to Fi than it is to Te, given that Ti and Fi both perform the same cognitive task (introverted judgment.).?

Ti and Fi are fundamentally different on the account of their functional discrepancies, yet Ti and Te are only attitudinally distinct from one another.

 

[SolitaryWalker]

It seems to me that Ti is more similar to Fi than it is to Te, given that Ti and Fi both perform the same cognitive task (introverted judgment.).?

Ti and Fi are fundamentally different on the account of their functional discrepancies, yet Ti and Te are only attitudinally distinct from one another.

Or, as I suspect is a more accurate description, he might realize through a combination of Ti and his other functions that imitating the behaviors of apparent Te types will prolong his own survival and well-being in this situation. This doesn't mean he necessarily values Te over Fe, just that he has an ulterior motive for imitating the behaviors of those who do. This is an important distinction..

Evolution conditions creatures to learn to 'value' ways of functioning that are the most proficient. The INTP in question may not be conditioned significantly to change his type, but nonetheless, he may forced to learn to function altogether differently from how he normally does regardless of how unnatural or excruciating doing so is.

I believe your NTP skateboarder would learn to deal with/respond instinctively to his environment more through Ne than through Se--as that is his preferred method of extroverting perception...

In order to skateboard proficiently, one must be comfortable using all five senses and that's difficult to do when Sensing is one of your most supressed functions. As a result, the person would be forced to place a greater emphasis on Sensing or simply use S more than N under those circumstances.

If he actually conditioned himself to respond more naturally with Se than with Ne, he would effectively change himself into an STP....

Only if he conditioned himself to do so in a typical situation of his life. If he conditioned himself to cognitively function that way only in one type of an environment, then he didn't change his type. A change of type occurs only when one's solidified unconscious cognitive dispositions change, merely functioning naturally in a certain scenario does not amount to that. Such an activity is quite similar to that of an actor who when acting in a role of a person who is fundamentally different from himself, finds himself comfortably and quite naturally behaving in a way that the character he is impersonating would. For example, example a good ENFP actor should be able to be temporarily naturally stimulated to act like an ISTP, at least for several moments, yet this does not entail a change of type as this actor did not change his cognitive constitution on the fundamental level. As soon as he exits the role, he returns to the cognitive preferences that he had before taken on the role. Surely he may be profoundly exhausted or even nauseated afterwards as the behavior he engaged in was profoundly unnatural, yet nonetheless, he was able, for a very brief period of time at least, to function in a way that is indistinguishable from the cognitive functioning of people whose temperament profoundly differs from his. The same is the case with many NTPs who manage to succeed in the business world or the military. Surely, they may, as the actor may also, revert to their natural tendencies in the middle of the act, but the fact that they are able to embrace unnatural cognitive tendencies even if only for a moment shows that it is possible for us to condition ourselves to feel natural when engaging in decidedly unnatural cognitive functioning.

 

[simulatedworld]

A word is rendered ambiguous by the many mutually inconsistent definitions ascribed to it. Value is certainly one of those words, yet none of my key words had nearly as high of a number of conventional definitions.

Why don't you trying paying attention to context to discern which meaning was implied instead of assuming that all possible meanings are equally likely? That might make the wording a little clearer.

I don't recall using the phrase 'behave in a Te-way', though I do recall using the phrase of exhibiting behaviors typically associated with the Te function. There is a significant difference between the two remarks. Its not possible to behave in a Te way, only in a way that people expect persons of the Te type to behave.

There is no contradiction in claiming that Jung was concerned with describing human thought tendencies rather than actions and that its possible for people to behave in a way that Te people are expected to. There would be a contradiction if I embraced the Jungian view that cognitive functions merely describe thought-tendencies, yet there also is a Te way of behaving which would imply that cognitive functions are not only cognitive, but also behavioral. However, I made no such claim.

So why isn't it folk typology when you discuss ways in which Te cognitive tendencies manifest themselves in people's behavior?

Perspective is irrelevant. What matters is whether Jung's theory is plausible, whether they refuse to believe that it truly is cogent has no bearing upon the conceptual merit of Jung's work.

Right, but my point is that the conceptual merit of Jung's work is relative to one's perspective. Perspective is never irrelevant--you may find his work plausible, but that doesn't mean anyone who doesn't is automatically wrong. Many people find his theories totally implausible and they're not all definitively wrong simply because you disagree.

Whether they agree or don't agree, there are objectively testable ways to discover what internal logical consistency is. If that wasn't so, no enterprise that relies heavily on logical reasoning could have succeeded, it would have been as arbitrary as a message expressed in poetry and paintings. Since we cannot say that about mathematics, logic and the natural sciences; we are compelled to conclude that there indeed is a way to objectively establish the nature of logical consistency.

This is littered with Ti bias. The only objective way to establish logical consistency is through empirical evidence, for which Jung has very little (if any.) Your Ti-oriented idea of logical consistency is far more subjective than you seem to think (typical of Ti types.)

Neuroscience is the most reliable path to take. Today, we have some behavioral testing which, if not terribly simplistic could shed light on how the mind works. For example, examine someone's behavior of pattern recognition by asking them to describe the objects they see in a fuzzy painting or what themes they can superimpose upon a classical work of art my Michaelangelo.

That's interesting--why hasn't neuroscience or any other objectively measurable scientific field adopted typology yet? Why is it not taken seriously by the scientific community, if its plausibility can be objectively proven?

The main difference between my typological work and the folk pespective is not that they derive their insights from behaviors, but I don't. It is that I rely on cognitive behaviors, I observe how a person's mind works. Jung's approach was also similar and that is why he spent the first 330 pages seeking out cognitive tendencies in the works of literature, art and science.

You cannot directly observe how another person's mind works except through his behaviors and words. This is ridiculous. How exactly do you go about directly observing the inner workings of another's mind without using with behaviors to infer what you think is probably going on?

That's not a problem and will be even less of a one where neuroscience allows us to establish a more precise link between the neural patterns we see in the brain and mind-states we connect them to.

Yes, unfortunately that hasn't happened yet, so typology remains unscientific and not objectively verifiable.

Yes, though not the essence of their character or the character in entirety. The contemporary folk typologists wanted to write a profile that will cause their respective readers to respond with 'wow, that is me in a nutshell!'. Jung was not in this business.

Jung was also not in the business of belief that he could directly observe the mental tendencies of others without using their behaviors and speech as windows through which to infer mental tendencies. Your implication that you can simply directly observe the cognitive tendencies of others without observing behavior and attempting to infer the motivation for it is absurd.

You're missing the point. Intuition is necessary for abstract reasoning whether introverted or extroverted, yet a person working in isolation usually does not have sufficient access to Extroverted faculties as they by definition must be stimulated from the outside.

A person working in isolation is still receiving an extraordinary amount of information from the outside all the time. It's impossible not to be. The implication that a person working in isolation is somehow not receiving external stimuli is ridiculous.

Yes, I connected functions to specific cognitive activity, that doesn't constitute folk typology. For example, intuition with abstract reasoning. There is no problem in connecting functions with specific actions as long as they are cognitive.

I'm still waiting on an explanation for how your typological method is able to directly observe cognitive tendencies without using behavior or speech as a medium of inference of those tendencies. You'll have to share with me where you attained such extraordinary psychic abilities.

You've got to stop using the word arbitrary this carelessly. I never even came close to mentioning that a function can be used in isolation.

I never suggested that you did; rather, I offered that clarification in order to support my claim that Ni is not required for internal abstract reasoning. This can be done by Ne+Si just as easily.

No, if one is a sensing type, their most dominant tendency is to focus on sensations as they have made impressions upon his mind first and foremost rather on entities that can easily be sensed in the external world. Instead of 'concrete manner' merely using the senses should be used to describe the activity of sensation. Sensation alone does not exist in a human organism as it is inevitably accompanied by at least an unconscious hunch or a perceptual conception of what it is that needs to be sensed and how the new sensations are received. If a person is a dominant sensing type, all of his other faculties including the inferior intuition serve the purpose of better enabling him to focus on what can be sensed. Sensation alone does not even allow him to engage in the activity of sensing.

...which can be used to infer what I said about Si depending on past impressions of meaning. Whatever sensations have made an impression upon the Si dominant's mind in the past are likely to be recalled and trusted above other cognitive faculties.

Folk typological twaddle.

Sorry if I don't buy your pretentious dismissal of any idea you don't like as "folk typology." It's clear that you regularly engage in the practice of inferring typological ideas beyond those which Jung explicitly stated, and yet you conveniently dismiss any such ideas on anyone else's part, when you don't like them, as "folk typology."

Did you ever consider that some of these so-called "folk typologists" are doing the same thing as you by trying to identify cognitive tendencies in others? The only real difference seems to be that they are not delusional enough to believe they can directly observe cognitive tendencies without studying behavior and speech as a means of inferring those cognitive tendencies--but you apparently are.

You don't even have any method of taking in information about other people except through observation of their behaviors and speech patterns. How is it that you are able to study their cognitive tendencies without paying any attention to this?

Ni would be heavily supressed, though not to the point of non-existence.

Well at least we agree on that.

Extroverted functions require stimulation from the external world as that is the definition of extroversion; the tendency to be stimulated from without rather than from within. The person with an Si dominant type would not be able to use Extroverted Intuition adequately unless he managed to interact with the environment to a satisfactory degree. This does not mean talking to people or doing something loud, but nonetheless, it means doing something far more engaging than merely sitting alone at a desk.

Even sitting alone at a desk involves taking in a constant stream of information from the external world. It's impossible for a conscious person to stop taking in external information; the brain does this all the time with or without his consent.

The trouble is that most Si people sitting at an office job don't have that, yet they somehow manage to think at least on the lowest level of abstraction with insufficient stimulation from the outside.

What exactly constitutes "insufficient stimulation from the outside"? A person would have to stop taking in external information in order to be insufficiently stimulated from the outside--all he needs to do is look around him and consider possible observable connections between things in order to have fuel for Ne to work. I don't understand why you think sitting alone at a desk causes a person to stop taking in external stimuli to the degree that his extroverted functions cease to function.

Only if he'd find the sufficient stimulation for Te in the external world.

Sure, but he can do that later. Since the functions all operate together simultaneously, the INTJ might think, "Hmm, maybe there is a correlation between x and y; I will have to go and test for that empirically as soon as I can."

The bottom line is that the shadow functions are supressed as a result, not eliminated.

I've agreed with you on that several times now.

On what grounds? The fact that it hasn't been listed by Jung and the folk typologists as a prominent cognitive faculty is no evidence of its non-existence.

What exactly constitutes "Fe activity" if, in order to avoid the dreaded "folk typologist" label, we are to study only cognitive tendencies and not surface behaviors?

How might one engage in "Fe activity"?

It certainly is, however, this shows that in principle it shouldn't be too hard for them to use Fe granted that they are behaving naturally. Ne-Fi is an altogether different cognitive habit that yields results similar to that of Fe. If the person in question is comfortable becoming stimulated by Ne-Fi route, it shouldn't be hard for him or her to learn to be stimulated the Fe route as well. A function's prominence in a person's psyche is defined by its low degree of opposition by other functions. Since cognition akin to Fe is not severely opposed, there is no reason why Fe should be opposed on the contrary. Since it is not opposed stringently, it follows that its not one of the shadow functions or faculties that are more supressed than most cognitive functions in the mind of the person in question.

I would argue that cognition akin to Fe is severely opposed by the tertiary Te process, as that is the ENFP's preferred method of making extroverted judgments. Why have you assumed such similarity between Fi and Fe? Have you not observed in your own experiences with others that the values typically held by Fi dominant vs. Fe dominant people seem to wholly contradict each other regarding which sources of Feeling stimulus are worthwhile?

One is not using Fe unless he is becoming inspired to emote by stimuli outside of him than within him.

Agreed.

That's not the same concept as my ENFP example. In this case the person is not behaving in a natural way, therefore there is no reason to believe that he could learn to use Fe easily. Furthermore, in my example I did not say that an ENFP who naturally displays qualities we associate with Fe is actually using Fe, but that they should have a very easy time actually starting to use Fe as cognitive actions similar to Fe are very natural to them.

I would argue that Fi and Fe are far more different than you seem to believe. You can observe in real Fi dominant people that getting used to being stimulated toward emoting by internal means (Fi) builds up a stigma against being stimulated toward emoting by external means--the Fi user comes to believe that genuine feelings only come from the inside, hence the belief common among Fi users that "following your heart" is the most important thing and that the Fe style of emoting is disingenuous and superficial. If you don't really feel it from the inside, Fi users reason, it's not "real" feeling and thus doesn't deserve serious consideration.

Jung used the word function to describe Intuition, Sensation, Thinking and Feeling for a compelling reason. Functions by definition describe the cognitive tendencies themselves, as the word function simply denotes an entity that works, operates or makes an impact. To function and to operate mean the same thing. So the word cognitive function almost by definition refers to all entities that make the mind work. Extroversion and Introversion are not functions, but mere attitudes. They simply denote how a person's mind is most easily stimulated, from within or from without.

Thus, it makes little sense to claim that a cognitive faculty that is directly opposed on a functional basis by the dominant faculty is supressed less than the cognitive faculty that actually shares the same function as the dominant one. In other words, Ne and Si are opposed to one another on a functional basis, yet, Ne and Ni are not. Since functions are more definitive of a person's cognitive constitution than attitudes, it follows that a cognitive faculty that differs from the dominant one only in attitude must be less supressed than the one that differs in function. Thus, since Ni differs from Ne only in attitude, yet Si differs from Ne in its functional essence, it must be the case that Ni is less opposed than Si. Therefore, we must place Ni ahead of Si in the hierarchy of cognitive efficacy.

Similarly, we must place Fe ahead of Te because it opposes the auxiliary Fi only in attitude rather than functional identity, yet the latter and not the former is the case for Te.

I don't see that this explanation necessitates Fe being stronger than Te. You've made an assumption that one who tends to be stimulated to emote by internal means (an Fi user) must also derive external stimulation from Feeling more easily than he does from Thinking. Why?

I think if you look at people around you and the way they operate, you'll see that Fi dom/aux people respond with Te much more naturally than they do with Fe. I've outlined the reasons leading with Fi tends to lead to an anti-Fe worldview, but I'm sure you'll start whining about folk typology because I'm using my observations of and interactions with real people instead of sticking strictly to Jung.

Nonetheless, Te tends to lead to the view that logic comes from external stimuli, which is actually more compatible with Fi than is Fe, for reasons outlined above. Your reasoning seems to go: "Because Te is more different from Fi than is Fe, it must be lower in the cognitive hierarchy for an Fi dom/aux person", but I don't see what necessitates this. You can interact with real Fi dominant people and note that they almost always identify with Te over Fe--to the Fi dom, Fe seems disingenuous and runs counter to the near-ubiquitous Fi value that the only legitimate feelings come from the inside.

I don't really care if the concept of Fi alone actually implies this value, because I can observe Fi dominant people all around me who have, for whatever reason, all built up this particular value system throughout their lives. If being Fi dom tends to lead to this worldview, then it doesn't matter if Fi itself is or is not equivalent to that worldview, because for all intents and purposes in interacting with others, it may as well be.

I'm sure you'll dismiss this as "folk typological twaddle" and go on magically observing cognitive tendencies with no regard to behavior or speech, but for those of us who actually make a habit of frequently interacting meaningfully with other people, it becomes quite obvious that those who value Fi are almost ubiquitously against the Fe approach--they do not consider external stimuli toward feeling to be of any worth if these stimuli are not reflected internally.

On the other hand, they do consider external stimuli toward thinking to be of worth, given that they do not have a strong internal voice telling them that only internal stimuli toward thinking are worthwhile--so Te actually contradicts Fi's directives less than Fe.

The common link is the pronounced tendency to be stimulated to think or to seek out structure in response to the stimuli detected in the mind rather than the external world.

k, agreed. But through observation we can determine that most Ti users tend to adopt certain types of value systems in regards to logic, most commonly that logic is based on an internal and unwavering standard (as you have shown aptly describes your own value system above.)

It's amazing how everything becomes "folk typology" to you as soon as it involves heavy interaction with other people. Maybe there's something to this behavioral observation method that you simply don't grasp. Just how introverted are you, exactly?

Are you prepared to claim that a microbe, a wasp, a fly or any completely unconscious creature has a worldview? If not, you're forced to concede that your term worldview at least includes a component of conscious judgment and therefore smuggles folk theory into your typology. Either that, or you ought to renounce the claim that the word worldview plays any role in the definition of a type.

Well, since the dictionary doesn't say anything about "worldview" necessitating a component of conscious judgment, then yes, I am prepared to claim that a microbe has a worldview. Whatever it is that that microbe's biological instincts tell it to do is encapsulated in that microbe's worldview as being important.

This is the last time I'm going to respond to your complaints about my use of the terms value system/worldview, though. I've made my case and I'm going to continue using those terms.

Of course it does not.

Then how can you know that a Ti person is ever truly motivated by Te? Oh, I forgot--you have a magical psychic method of observing the cognitive tendencies of others unbiased by behavioral or speech tendencies. Of course.

Learning how to use Te will be an extra step, just like learning how to use Si or Ni, or any function that occupies roughly the middle rank in cognitive efficacy.

Learning to use Te will require the Ti user to admit that logic isn't always dependent upon his own self-contained idea of absolute consistency, which is difficult, though, as I have agreed several times now, not impossible.

Please, just look it up in the dictionary and see for yourself how many different conventional definitions and subtle connotations the word carries!

I really don't care how many different connotations it's capable of carrying; you should pay attention to context and recognize the one I'm using in this case for what it is. As long as just one of those possible definitions conveys the meaning I want in this case, I can and will continue to effectively use that word.

I have two cats, are they conscious enough to have a worldview? If they don't have to be conscious enough, how do I find out what worldviews they endorse? Is there a chance that whatever it is that they espouse can be compared to the ideologies or worldviews of fascists and the communists?

If they have "an overall perspective from which they see and interpret the world", then yes, according to the dictionary, they do have a worldview. A cat's worldview is pretty simple, and mostly includes things like "Eat food when hungry" and "Sleep when tired." And no, the cat's worldview cannot be compared to the complex worldviews and ideologies of humans, but that doesn't really matter--again, the dictionary clearly states that any overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world constitutes a worldview.

So anyone who sees and interprets the world from any perspective, no matter how primitive or simplistic, has a worldview. Case closed.

No, we didn't agree on that. Ti is the tendency to be stimulated to think from within than from without. Its possible for one to learn to think externally or to think outloud while comfortably engaging in the cognitive process above. This isn't at all a peculiar phenomenon, as NTP philosophers, scientists and mathematicians quite comfortably think outloud. Since these habits are met with no natural cognitive existence, we can adduce that such an activity is in no way inconsistent with the cognitive faculty of Introverted Thinking.

Indeed, so if Te is not necessary for thinking out loud and sharing one's thoughts with others, what makes you think Ti is necessary for rigorous logical thought?

I'd have fewer qualms with the word value system than with the world value. Its conceivable that a microbe or a fly has a value system or simply a way in which evolution has programmed it to respond to stimulus, yet I can't imagine anyone outside of madhouse earnestly claiming that insects have worldviews. I don't think you can claim that the word worldview contains no reference to consciously inspired cognition.

Don't take my word for it--check the dictionary definition again:

world·view (wûrld'vyōō')
n. In both senses also called Weltanschauung.

1.

The overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world.
2.

A collection of beliefs about life and the universe held by an individual or a group.

It does not imply a conscious moral decision, but it certainly does imply a conscious decision of some kind.

Why does "overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world" imply conscious decision?

See my ENFP example and pay close attention to how it differs from your ENTJ example.

What ENTJ example?

I'll explain again. Using Te and Ni contradict his dominant and auxiliary faculties only with respect to attitude. Si and Fe contradict them with respect to function which is by far more significant and therefore shall incur far greater opposition from the faculties at the helm of his psyche.

Already explained above why Fe is more contradictory to the worldview of most Fi-ers than is Te.

 

[simulatedworld]

I don't understand what that formula means. All I claimed with the supposition that the ENTP would have the hardest time using Se is that this faculty is opposed to the dominator both with regard to attitude and function and it is therefore caused to be more supressed than all other cognitive faculties.

The formula labels each of the four types of cognitive tasks:
1) Extroverted Judgment (Je)
2) Extroverted Perception (Pe)
3) Introverted Judgment (Ji)
4) Introverted Perception (Pi)

and posits that each person has a preferred method of performing each type of task. He will not resort to the non-preferred method unless forced to do so by unusual circumstances. Therefore, an ENFP will not use Fe unless circumstances have forced him to abandon his natural preference for Te in making extroverted judgments.

The fact that Fe is similar in functional identity to Fi does not circumvent the ENFP's preference for Te when extroverting judgment. Look around you and study real live ENFPs and watch what they do when make extroverted judgment decisions--they are rarely using Fe.

The traditional theory mistakenly infers that the function that is opposed to the dominator attitude-wise shall be more supressed than the one that is opposed on a purely functional level.

Why is this a mistake? You state above that "...functions are more definitive of a person's cognitive constitution...", but why is this necessarily the case? What if the dom/aux attitudes actually tend to lead to value systems that contradict use of the opposite attitudes of those functions?

It must be because attitudinal opposition is not nearly as significant as the functional, hence Te must be stronger than the faculties that have been functionally countervailed.

I would like to hear why attitudinal opposition is not nearly as significant as the functional.

If that is the case, why do I as an ENTP behave more similarly to ESTPs than to ENTJs? Why do we take more similar approaches to learning and interacting with others? I'd argue that the fact that ENTP and ESTP are both dominant in Extroverted Perception and auxiliary in Introverted Judgment creates more similarities between us than the fact that ENTP and ENTJ both prefer iNtuition and Thinking as their primary cognitive processes.

Besides, if this reasoning holds true--that functions which are opposed to the dominant in terms of functional identity as well as attitude must always be weaker than functions which are opposed to the dominant only in terms of attitude--then why isn't every Ti dominant's auxiliary function automatically Te? If the INTP makes most natural use of the Thinking function, why should Ne be his auxiliary function? Ne is different from Ti in terms of both functional identity and attitude, but Te is different from Ti only in terms of attitude, so by your reasoning, shouldn't Ti and Te both be stronger than all non-Thinking functions for every individual with Thinking as a dominant function?

Ti and Fi are fundamentally different on the account of their functional discrepancies, yet Ti and Te are only attitudinally distinct from one another.

Ti and Te are more different than you seem to believe. They do not deal with the same type of cognitive task (one is introverted judgment and the other extroverted judgment) and thus do not make the same kinds of decisions in practice.

You seem focused almost exclusively on Jung's ideas in theory, but if you want typology to accomplish something useful in terms of interaction with others, you need to pay more attention to how cognitive tendencies actually manifest themselves in practice, in terms of the value systems and behavioral tendencies they tend to produce in others.

Of course I'm sure you'll dismiss such study as the realm of trivial "folk typology", but you're missing out on a lot by deciding that any such study is worthless.

I have to wonder why you even bother stating your type as "INTP"--Jung never made use of any such four-letter type labels, as these are purely a product of the original "folk typologists", Myers and Briggs. Why would you descend so low as to describe yourself using terminology that is clearly rooted in folk typology?

Evolution conditions creatures to learn to 'value' ways of functioning that are the most proficient. The INTP in question may not be conditioned significantly to change his type, but nonetheless, he may forced to learn to function altogether differently from how he normally does regardless of how unnatural or excruciating doing so is.

And it's my contention that this might not necessarily constitute use of different functions unless he actually changes his most basic instinct regarding the best way of responding to these conditions.

In order to skateboard proficiently, one must be comfortable using all five senses and that's difficult to do when Sensing is one of your most supressed functions. As a result, the person would be forced to place a greater emphasis on Sensing or simply use S more than N under those circumstances.

I'm not sure how skateboarding involves much in the use of taste or smell, but okay.

Other than that I agree the person would be forced to pay more attention to Sensing, but that if he did this long enough that Se became his natural response over Ne in most areas of life, he would have changed himself into an STP.

Only if he conditioned himself to do so in a typical situation of his life. If he conditioned himself to cognitively function that way only in one type of an environment, then he didn't change his type. A change of type occurs only when one's solidified unconscious cognitive dispositions change, merely functioning naturally in a certain scenario does not amount to that. Such an activity is quite similar to that of an actor who when acting in a role of a person who is fundamentally different from himself, finds himself comfortably and quite naturally behaving in a way that the character he is impersonating would. For example, example a good ENFP actor should be able to be temporarily naturally stimulated to act like an ISTP, at least for several moments, yet this does not entail a change of type as this actor did not change his cognitive constitution on the fundamental level. As soon as he exits the role, he returns to the cognitive preferences that he had before taken on the role. Surely he may be profoundly exhausted or even nauseated afterwards as the behavior he engaged in was profoundly unnatural, yet nonetheless, he was able, for a very brief period of time at least, to function in a way that is indistinguishable from the cognitive functioning of people whose temperament profoundly differs from his. The same is the case with many NTPs who manage to succeed in the business world or the military. Surely, they may, as the actor may also, revert to their natural tendencies in the middle of the act, but the fact that they are able to embrace unnatural cognitive tendencies even if only for a moment shows that it is possible for us to condition ourselves to feel natural when engaging in decidedly unnatural cognitive functioning.

Agreed, unless he actually changed his preferred functions throughout all (or most) areas of his life, in which case he would actually change type.

I'm sure that an NTP skateboarder could learn to harness Se only during skateboarding and continue to prefer Ne for his extroverted perceptions otherwise. That's fair enough.

 

[ayoitsStepho]

That sure is a lot of info to read.

 

[evilrobot]

The underyling assumption of simulatedworld’s arguments on functions is that Jung’s original text on psychological types is the absolute truth. If someone makes a statement seeming to contradict something Jung originally wrote, sw pounds them with Jung quotes and paraphrases like a Christian fundamentalist quoting scripture. This goes against the grain of Jung, who wasn’t dogmatic about his theories like Freud was. Jung also believed individuals are too complex to fit perfectly into typologies. In other words, Jung saw his typology theory as an approximation, not a gospel. It’s also nearly a century old, and if he were alive writing about it today, Jung likely would have his own revisions to make.

Members posting on functions are usually referring to the revisions of Jung’s functions and overall system by Myers-Brigg (Gifts Differing) and Lenore Thomson (Pesonality Types: An Owner’s Manuel). I’m not saying simulatedworld is wrong to bring up Jung, who no doubt wrote some of the most profound and exotic function descriptions, especially compared to some of the generic mbti books, but to use Jung's original text like a fundamentalist is to engage in the selective literalism of a Christian fanatic with the Bible. Sw’s assumption is that because he knows Jung’s original text better than most people on this forum, and can split hairs with a fine razor over any word or phrase which seems to contradict it, his arguments are automatically correct.

 

[simulatedworld]

^ If you had read my posts in this thread in their entirety you'd know that I don't use a purely Jungian interpretation. But I've come to expect mouthing off before bothering to inform yourself from you, so I can't say I'm surprised.

 

[htb]

Here's a great example of Tertiary-Ni causing an ISP to go off the rails:

Very entertaining. Most unifying theories I've heard from ISTPs are complete gibberish. The men who miss nothing, who have an acute sense of what is in front of them, are unable to perceive the world around them.

[youtube=HOXeYGWWqvU]Inferior Fi versus Tertiary Fe[/youtube]

(0:01-1:32) Here, Joe Shea's enigmatic pining earns him a visit from Deke Slayton. Ironically, Slayton's concern is genuine but his affability and equivocation, otherwise invaluable for diplomacy, come off as oleaginous. Joe Shea calls him on it, repeatedly smashing through qualifying statements to reach the authentic position.

 

[evilrobot]

In much of the heady debate between SolitaryWalker and simulatedworld, simulatedworld continues to insist on a very literal interpretation of Jung, apparently believing people are actually more or less pure function types, which solitarywalker rightly disputes. Personally, and I’m not just being ironic about this, I’d find it fascinating to view an alternate universe containing the pure types simulatedworld envisions—in a way it would be like glimpsing the collective archetypes themselves rather than just the images they generate—but I don’t think I’d want to live there.

*

^ If you had read my posts in this thread in their entirety you'd know that I don't use a purely Jungian interpretation. But I've come to expect mouthing off before bothering to inform yourself from you, so I can't say I'm surprised.

Sorry I “mouthed off” to you, sw. I forgot how sensitive you are. Do you deny, then, that your standard formula in many of these function usage arguments has been to split hairs over words or phrases and use Jung quotes and paraphrases to give you authority?

 

[simulatedworld]

In much of the heady debate between SolitaryWalker and simulatedworld, simulatedworld continues to insist on a very literal interpretation of Jung, apparently believing people are actually more or less pure function types, which solitarywalker rightly disputes. Personally, and I’m not just being ironic about this, I’d find it fascinating to view an alternate universe containing the pure types simulatedworld envisions—in a way it would be like glimpsing the collective archetypes themselves rather than just the images they generate—but I don’t think I’d want to live there.

Can you read? Really? I've agreed with him several times that shadow functions do get some use, just that they're atypical. You keep brutally misquoting me and inaccurately summarizing my points in this thread. Reading every twentieth word and trying to fill in the meaning isn't going to help you understand what I'm saying here.

Also, I've gone into a number of typological implications that Jung never mentioned...which you'd know if you'd bothered to read the thread. Claiming that I use a strictly literalist Jungian interpretation is clearly absurd. Half of solitarywalker's posts in this thread have called me a "folk typologist" for breaking from Jung's method; if there's anyone who's displaying a purist, literalist interpretation of Jung it's clearly solitarywalker, not me. This is really turning into a pattern with you. Stop misquoting me and ascribing positions to me that I haven't taken; it's really obnoxious.

Sorry I “mouthed off” to you, sw. I forgot how sensitive you are. Do you deny, then, that your standard formula in many of these function usage arguments has been to split hairs over words or phrases and use Jung quotes and paraphrases to give you authority?

Yes. Your perception that I am splitting hairs over trivial distinctions is usually mistaken--these distinctions are often far more significant than you believe. As you yourself have admitted, some of the things I write on the subject are "so far over your head it's not even funny."

And seriously, if you want to complain about splitting hairs, look how much whining solitarywalker did over my use of the terms "value system" and "worldview" even after I repeatedly clarified the context in which they were intended.

Once again I'll point out that Te often thinks Ti is splitting hairs over trivial distinctions, when in reality Te just lacks the depth of precision that Ti has. This results in a lot of whining by NTJs about the degree of specificity that NTPs will insist upon in defining things, but try to consider that there might be a good reason for it that you haven't fully considered.

 

[Eric B]

No, Jung described features of the mind that are regularly exhibited by people ot the temperaments that he has described. These features describe mere tendencies rather than behavior that must and will be constantly displayed by people to whom they apply. For instance, the material Jung was quoted on in the Extroverted Intuition description cites mere inclinations that people have rather than behaviors by which their type is identified. Thus, the following type of thinking would be mistaken. 'Oh look, Jon matches this, this and that quality Jung says an Ne type has, but goodness I have never seen him acting like he does not at all notice physical objects, so he cannot be an Ne type!' In other words, if you interpret Jung as describing rigid and obvious habits of thought and action, then yes his theories have very little application to description of real people. However, if you interpret him as describing mere cognitive tendencies, then his insights are indeed quite applicable.

It is a fact that all functions are grounded in a person's mental constitution or what Jung calls psyche. A function is extroverted if it is most easily stimulated by interaction with the world than through solitary activity, and introverted if vice versa.

Altogether, we often see this type naturally engaging in what Neo-Bebeans call Fe activity. Altogether it is conceivable that they were genuinely stimulating Feeling-wise by the external world often rather than in the way that is the most natural to them (Fi). However, since Fi predominates, the Fe way will always be less natural for this type and shall always be met with far greater internal opposition than in the case of an Fe type.

That's not what Ti is, you've been infected with the germ of Neo-Bebbean typology that you've been severely criticizing. You ascribed too many illegitimate behavioral tendencies to type. Ti is just a tendency to be stimulated to think or perceive structure in the world by inner mental content more so than the external world. In principle, its possible for a person with this firm cognitive habit to behave in a way we expect a conventional Te type American behaves.

You could call Ti as a 'value system' of activating thinking in response to cognitive stimuli that are internal more than external, yet I still think that the term value is misleading in this context. First of all, its far too broad, as the conventional dictionary has 18 disparate definitions for this term, most of which refer to some kind of conscious cognition. Its manifest ambiguity would compel me to resist using the word as much as possible, let alone in a discussion of an abstruse philosophy of mind topic.

Military and a fast paced busy city office work. Someone who has Te as the naturally supressed function could simply be forced to realize that operating in the Te way or receiving stimulation is simply the easiest way to prevail.

I would argue that Fi and Fe are far more different than you seem to believe. You can observe in real Fi dominant people that getting used to being stimulated toward emoting by internal means (Fi) builds up a stigma against being stimulated toward emoting by external means--the Fi user comes to believe that genuine feelings only come from the inside, hence the belief common among Fi users that "following your heart" is the most important thing and that the Fe style of emoting is disingenuous and superficial. If you don't really feel it from the inside, Fi users reason, it's not "real" feeling and thus doesn't deserve serious consideration.

The whole concept of "stimulation" really clarifies it. I also wonder if Sim's concept of "value system/worldview" might have merit too, but I think the concept of stimulation of the psyche helps distinguish genuine "function" manifestation from everyday "undifferentiated" activity everyone does (kike everyone can "see", without necessarily "using Se").

So not only is a function determined by whether the stimulation is coming from the external or internal world, but also whether the stimulation is in the form of thinking or emoting, or sensing or abstracting.

So I posit that it is eight different complexes within each psyche that are stimulated by associated functions, which is what causes them to be differentiated.

So the ego's main faculty will take on a "heroic" complex, and if it predominantly chooses Thinking, and internal stimulation, then this "hero" complex will be stimulated by Ti.
The auxiliary will then take on a "parental" nature, and be stimulated by a perception function in the opposite orientation, and if is iNtuition, this "parent" complex will be stimulated by external abstraction
A "child" complex will be stimulated by internal concrete data.
Only semi-consciously, our deep soul will be stimulated by externally oriented emoting.
Four negative versions of these complexes will be stimulated by the same four functions, but with the orientation reversed.
Opposing Personality is stimulated by Thinking in the suppressed external orientation
critical parent by the internal abstracting ignored by the good parent
a negative child will be stimulated by external sensory data
and a negative soul will be stimulated by the internal emoting rejected by the hero.

This I believe is the heart of Beebe's teaching.

I don't see that this explanation necessitates Fe being stronger than Te. You've made an assumption that one who tends to be stimulated to emote by internal means (an Fi user) must also derive external stimulation from Feeling more easily than he does from Thinking. Why?

I don't think that's necessarily the case, but it's easy to see why that might occur. Think of four functions, without any "orientation", yet. An ego prefers two of them, and suppresses the others. The ego then chooses it's dominant orientation, and the auxiliary falls into the opposite orientation. If that ego chooses Feeling as the dominant, then that ego is foremost a Feeler. It happens to choose the internal world to receive the emotive stimulation from, and suppresses the external. But Feeling still remains preferred over Thinking. And the internal world is still preferred over the external. So it's true that the inferior Thinking in the opposite orientation may be weaker than Feeling in the opposite orientation and Thinking in the same orientation.

I think if you look at people around you and the way they operate, you'll see that Fi dom/aux people respond with Te much more naturally than they do with Fe. I've outlined the reasons leading with Fi tends to lead to an anti-Fe worldview, but I'm sure you'll start whining about folk typology because I'm using my observations of and interactions with real people instead of sticking strictly to Jung.

Nonetheless, Te tends to lead to the view that logic comes from external stimuli, which is actually more compatible with Fi than is Fe, for reasons outlined above. Your reasoning seems to go: "Because Te is more different from Fi than is Fe, it must be lower in the cognitive hierarchy for an Fi dom/aux person", but I don't see what necessitates this. You can interact with real Fi dominant people and note that they almost always identify with Te over Fe--to the Fi dom, Fe seems disingenuous and runs counter to the near-ubiquitous Fi value that the only legitimate feelings come from the inside.

The "tandem" (in this case, the "spine") by which Fi and Te "work together" is really tied more to the complexes I articulated above. Since the anima/animus associated with the inferior is considered ego-syntonic, then the Te it is stimulated by will ultimately carry a more positive connotation within the psyche. Yet, this will only be semi-conscious (especially before midlife), and it will basically be the most consciously suppressed (the other four are totally in the unconscious, remember). Hence, seeming the weakest, while the others may surface more strongly at times. This seems to be part of the basis of Lenore's "lasagna" stack, with the tertiary and inferior on the bottom.

So an Fi dom. will usually be sort of put off and intimidated by Te, because it lies in a vulnerable area for him. Then, in various situations, his mature, confident heroic Fi might degrade into its aggressive shadow, Fe which also "backs up" the heroic function and fills in its blind spots. After all, there is only one Feeling function. This ego has just chosen to suppress stimulation from one possible source. Yet the other source is still there, just below the consciousness in the psyche, and ready to erupt when the values of the hero are thwarted, or need reinforcement. Hence, Fe might seem to be stronger than Te. He consciously suppresses one, while the other is unconscious, and just comes up unconsciously.

So this is the key to all of this, and the way to resist falling into the dreaded "folk typology". We cannot make the "eight processes" into totally separate objects. That is the very mistake of the folk concept. There are four functions that stimulate an ego and its complexes in either an internal or external direction. The orientation stimulation is received from naturally lies in the ego, not the functions themselves.

 

[SolitaryWalker]

Why don't you trying paying attention to context to discern which meaning was implied instead of assuming that all possible meanings are equally likely? That might make the wording a little clearer..

I assumed that the most conventional definition of the word is used because you failed to specify that you were using the word in an idiosyncratic manner.

So why isn't it folk typology when you discuss ways in which Te cognitive tendencies manifest themselves in people's behavior?..

Because I make an explicit distinction between Te itself and the way it often manifests in behaviors. I would be guilty of a typological fallacy of behavioral observation as folk typologists usually are if I conflated those notions; however, I did not.

Right, but my point is that the conceptual merit of Jung's work is relative to one's perspective..?..

The merit of an author's work does not depend on the perspective of his reviewer for legitimation. A work of conceptual integrity would still be a work of conceptual integrity if noone even recognized it as such. A person's certain bias or perspective, as you put it, may prevent him or her from understanding the virtues of a meritorious work, however, this fact alone does not show that the work in question is implausible.

Perspective is never irrelevant--you may find his work plausible, but that doesn't mean anyone who doesn't is automatically wrong.?..

If I can provide a sound argument for my view, it does indeed follow that anyone who holds a view contradictory to mine is mistaken.

Many people find his theories totally implausible and they're not all definitively wrong simply because you disagree..?..

They're definitely wrong because I have an argument to refute them with. Its one thing to simply state your disagreement with their view and another to vindicate your views with a sound argument.

This is littered with Ti bias. The only objective way to establish logical consistency is through empirical evidence, for which Jung has very little (if any.) Your Ti-oriented idea of logical consistency is far more subjective than you seem to think (typical of Ti types.)..?..

What bias these statements contain is irrelevant, what is relevant is whether or not they are supported by a scientific bias.

That's interesting--why hasn't neuroscience or any other objectively measurable scientific field adopted typology yet? Why is it not taken seriously by the scientific community, if its plausibility can be objectively proven? .)..?..

Because Jung's work has been regarded as mystical and highly speculative, secondly, the notorious MBTI inkslingers have thoroughly vitiated his scholarly reputation. He is often seen as the grandfather of MBTI. Now, can you even begin to imagine any notion that is perceived as even remotely relevant to such rubbish as taken seriously by genuine scholars?


On that note, in Principles of Typology, I have rendered Jung a great service. First of all, I have framed his views in a very systematic as well as a verbally precise manner, thereby giving them their philosophical justification. Secondly, I have extricated his work from the folk typological bilge by showing that his work is not at all similar to that of contempory authors of MBTI books. Thirdly, I have shown how in principle his ideas could be justified by science.

The fact that scholars have not studied his work carefully does not show that it lacks merit, rather it shows that Jung has been severely misrepresented. In part due to his own rather circumlocutious, vague and unsystematic style of exposition and also due to the low quality work of those who are mistakenly regarded as his successors.

That's You cannot directly observe how another person's mind works except through his behaviors and words..)..?..

The trick is observing the words that best display their cognitive habits. Jung was performing the right technique when he was analyzing poetry, philosophy and biographies in his search for type. The MBTI writers were wrong to analyze people's behavior at common-place social gatherings.

This is ridiculous. How exactly do you go about directly observing the inner workings of another's mind without using with behaviors to infer what you think is probably going on? ..)..?..

Read above.

Jung was also not in the business of belief that he could directly observe the mental tendencies of others without using their behaviors and speech as windows through which to infer mental tendencies. Your implication that you can simply directly observe the cognitive tendencies of others without observing behavior and attempting to infer the motivation for it is absurd...)..?..

This is the key term for you to focus on: cognitive behaviors.

A person working in isolation is still receiving an extraordinary amount of information from the outside all the time....)..?..

Yes, but this does not mean that his extroverted faculties are working to the extent that they need to be in order to be fully usable. An extroverted cognitive function is by definition stimulated by action rather than passive activity. Merely receiving information will not be enough to ensure that it is engaged to produce its full potential.

It's impossible not to be..

A person working on isolation is generally forced to rely on the introverted faculties far more than on the extroverted. Hint: in order to receive information from the outside, you don't need to use an extroverted function. You need to use an extroverted function only to be stimulated to engage in a certain cognitive task from without rather than from within.

The implication that a person working in isolation is somehow not receiving external stimuli is ridiculous.

It certainly is ridiculous, I wonder what inspired you to include it in the discussion?

I'm still waiting on an explanation for how your typological method is able to directly observe cognitive tendencies without using behavior or speech as a medium of inference of those tendencies..

Observe cognitive tendencies by watching a person's activity where their mind is highly active instead of their mundane daily behaviors. Read their poetry, self-portraits or fantasy essays.

You'll have to share with me where you attained such extraordinary psychic abilities...

No psychic abilities.

I never suggested that you did; rather, I offered that clarification in order to support my claim that Ni is not required for internal abstract reasoning. This can be done by Ne+Si just as easily....

The trouble is that its terribly difficult to sufficiently activate Ne for a person committed to a solitary task.

...which can be used to infer what I said about Si depending on past impressions of meaning. Whatever sensations have made an impression upon the Si dominant's mind in the past are likely to be recalled and trusted above other cognitive faculties. ....

You need to use intuition to recall those impressions, just like you need to use intuition to perform any cognitive task, from the minute to that of Napoleonic complexities.

...Sorry if I don't buy your pretentious dismissal of any idea you don't like as "folk typology." It's clear that you regularly engage in the practice of inferring typological ideas beyond those which Jung explicitly stated, and yet you conveniently dismiss any such ideas on anyone else's part, when you don't like them, as "folk typology."....

The difference is that I support my views with a solid rationale. I don't have to adhere to the original Jungian views in order to avoid being called a folk typologist, I only need to ensure that my views are adequately supported.

...Did you ever consider that some of these so-called "folk typologists" are doing the same thing as you by trying to identify cognitive tendencies in others?."....

Good, they've matured past the behaviorist stage in their inquiry. However, where they look for these cognitive tendencies also matters a great deal. Are they looking for these habits of mind in the behavior of their alcoholic uncle Joe that they've seen at a family party when they were five? Are they looking for them in the behavior of Dr.House or Dr.Seus? Or, alternatively, are they genuinely examing the cognitive behaviors of people who were expressing their thoughts at leisure and were not forced to obey any external standard? If it is the latter, then their typological inference would indeed carry far more weight than that of the people in the former camp.

... The only real difference seems to be that they are not delusional enough to believe they can directly observe cognitive tendencies without studying behavior and speech as a means of inferring those cognitive tendencies--but you apparently are.?."....

I don't think I am directly observing cognitive behaviors either. What led you to believe that this is what I was doing?

... You don't even have any method of taking in information about other people except through observation of their behaviors and speech patterns. How is it that you are able to study their cognitive tendencies without paying any attention to this?
.?."....

Cognitive behaviors.

... Well at least we agree on that..?."....

... Even sitting alone at a desk involves taking in a constant stream of information from the external world...?."....

Correct.

... It's impossible for a conscious person to stop taking in external information; the brain does this all the time with or without his consent....?."....

Exactly and this vindicates the claim that every person relies on Introverted perception quite significantly when engaging in a solitary task. He simply is not active enough to sufficiently engage the extroverted faculties.

...What exactly constitutes "insufficient stimulation from the outside"?....?."....

The stimuli needed to get one's extroverted faculties to produce the output that he needs in order to rely on them.

...A person would have to stop taking in external information in order to be insufficiently stimulated from the outside--all he needs to do is look around him and consider possible observable connections between things in order to have fuel for Ne to work."?....?."....

Extroverted functions will need a lot more stimulation than that to ignite. For the meantime, the person you have in mind would have to rely on Introverted Intuition.

...I don't understand why you think sitting alone at a desk causes a person to stop taking in external stimuli to the degree that his extroverted functions cease to function.."?....?."....

The activity is almost by definition low on stimuli. Generally an extrovert tends to be drained altogether by such an activity unless he happens to have a rich inner life or a captivating mental task to be occupied with. Much of this is because of the nature of his cognitive functions as cognitive functions define his temperament. The extroverted function does not cease to function, but it would be inactive to the point where it appears as if it has stopped functioning.

...I've agreed with you on that several times now..."?....?."....

...What exactly constitutes "Fe activity" if, in order to avoid the dreaded "folk typologist" label, we are to study only cognitive tendencies and not surface behaviors?..."?....?."....

Becoming motivated to emote in response to external stimuli with little reference to the content of one's private thoughts.

...How might one engage in "Fe activity"....

By conditioning oneself to emote in response to the external emotive prompt while paying little attention to the private inner mind-states.

...I would argue that cognition akin to Fe is severely opposed by the tertiary Te process, as that is the ENFP's preferred method of making extroverted judgments. "....

In that case Ne-Fi activity that is very reminiscent of Fe should also be severly opposed by that Te process, yet it isn't. Its not because Ne-Fi are above Te in the hierarchy of cognitive efficacy.

...Why have you assumed such similarity between Fi and Fe? Have you not observed in your own experiences with others that the values typically held by Fi dominant vs. Fe dominant people seem to wholly contradict each other regarding which sources of Feeling stimulus are worthwhile?"....

Because the function is the same, just the attitudes are different. What the two have in common is that Feeling is the most efficacious cognitive faculty of their psyche, that is by far more important than the natural sources of stimulation for both of these.

...I would argue that Fi and Fe are far more different than you seem to believe. You can observe in real Fi dominant people that getting used to being stimulated toward emoting by internal means (Fi) builds up a stigma against being stimulated toward emoting by external means--the Fi user comes to believe that genuine feelings only come from the inside, hence the belief common among Fi users that "following your heart" is the most important thing and that the Fe style of emoting is disingenuous and superficial. If you don't really feel it from the inside, Fi users reason, it's not "real" feeling and thus doesn't deserve serious consideration.?"....

I see the differecen between the two functions, yet what reason does this give me to believe that the discrepancy is wider than the one between Fe and Ti and or Fi and Te?



I don't see that this explanation necessitates Fe being stronger than Te. You've made an assumption that one who tends to be stimulated to emote by internal means (an Fi user) must also derive external stimulation from Feeling more easily than he does from Thinking. Why?

...I think if you look at people around you and the way they operate, you'll see that Fi dom/aux people respond with Te much more naturally than they do with Fe.

I don't see that. What evidence is available to support that claim?

...I've outlined the reasons leading with Fi tends to lead to an anti-Fe worldview,.

What reason is there to suppose that this antithesis surpasses the one between Thinking and Feeling or other functionally opposed faculties?

...Nonetheless, Te tends to lead to the view that logic comes from external stimuli

which is actually more compatible with Fi than is Fe, for reasons outlined above. Your reasoning seems to go: "Because Te is more different from Fi than is Fe, it must be lower in the cognitive hierarchy for an Fi dom/aux person", but I don't see what necessitates this. You can interact with real Fi dominant people and note that they almost always identify with Te over Fe--to the Fi dom, Fe seems disingenuous and runs counter to the near-ubiquitous Fi value that the only legitimate feelings come from the inside.,.

How did you arrive at this view?

...Fi are almost ubiquitously against the Fe approach--they do not consider external stimuli toward feeling to be of any worth if these stimuli are not reflected internally..,.

Where do you see that? If that is true, you should also conclude that Te people are naturally opposed to Ti people and vice versa, Ne people to Ni and Se to Si. Can you furnish the adequate evidence to support all of those claims? You have to support them all or the underlying principle collapses.

...On the other hand, they do consider external stimuli toward thinking to be of worth, given that they do not have a strong internal voice telling them that only internal stimuli toward thinking are worthwhile--so Te actually contradicts Fi's directives less than Fe...,.

Now, that is folk typology. This paragraph contains no arguments, no references to purely cognitive behaviors, just expositions of behaviors of people who supposedly have this or that Jungian type.

...k, agreed. But through observation we can determine that most Ti users tend to adopt certain types of value systems in regards to logic, most commonly that logic is based on an internal and unwavering standard (as you have shown aptly describes your own value system above.)...,.

Yes, they tend to, however, this claim is significantly different from 'they do'.

...It's amazing how everything becomes "folk typology" to you as soon as it involves heavy interaction with other people. Maybe there's something to this behavioral observation method that you simply don't grasp. Just how introverted are you, exactly?.)...,.

Expositions of typology that focus on people's trivial daily behaviors and make no reference to purely cognitive tendencies tend to be labelled as folk typology, especially if they also lack the rigor of argument. There is nothing wrong with observing behaviors, as long as you separate the typologically relevant ones from the irrelevant.

...Well, since the dictionary doesn't say anything about "worldview" necessitating a component of conscious judgment, then yes, I am prepared to claim that a microbe has a worldview.?.)...,.

It implies the existence of a conscious component within the definition by defining worldview as a perspective according to which a person interprets the world. Interpretation is by definition conscious, an unconscious creature cannot interpret anything or contemplate how something it has observed should be understood, it can only respond on impulse.

...This is the last time I'm going to respond to your complaints about my use of the terms value system/worldview, though. I've made my case and I'm going to continue using those terms..?.)...,.

So much for the worse for you.

...Then how can you know that a Ti person is ever truly motivated by Te? Oh, I forgot--you have a magical psychic method of observing the cognitive tendencies of others unbiased by behavioral or speech tendencies. Of course...?.)...,.

That is a tough question. We would have to conduct a closer reading of the works in which they have had the freedom to be true to their unconscious tendencies and see whether their structure recognizing faculties are more easily stimulated from within than from without.

...Learning to use Te will require the Ti user to admit that logic isn't always dependent upon his own self-contained idea of absolute consistency,...?.)...,.

That may be one step of their training to use the cognitive faculty that is at least somewhat unnatural to them.

...I really don't care how many different connotations it's capable of carrying; you should pay attention to context and recognize the one I'm using in this case for what it is. As long as just one of those possible definitions conveys the meaning I want in this case, I can and will continue to effectively use that word.,...?.)...,.

If you're using a non-standard the definition, the onus is on you to make that perspicuous.

...If they have "an overall perspective from which they see and interpret the world", then yes, according to the dictionary, they do have a worldview. A cat's worldview is pretty simple, and mostly includes things like "Eat food when hungry" and "Sleep when tired.".,...?.)...,.

A cat is an at least somewhat conscious creature, so it has some interpretive abilities. Hence, its capable of making conscious judgments.

...And no, the cat's worldview cannot be compared to the complex worldviews and ideologies of humans, but that doesn't really matter--again, the dictionary clearly states that any overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world constitutes a worldview..".,...?.)...,.

The trouble is that the word worldview has no place in a definition of a type as it implies interpretation of the world which smuggles the notion of a conscious assessment into the discussion.

...So anyone who sees and interprets the world from any perspective, no matter how primitive or simplistic, has a worldview. Case closed...".,...?.)...,.

The microbe doesn't, it just acts on instinct.

...Indeed, so if Te is not necessary for thinking out loud and sharing one's thoughts with others, what makes you think Ti is necessary for rigorous logical thought?...".,...?.)...,.

I don't think that Ti is necessary for rigorous logical thought.

 

[SolitaryWalker]

Therefore, an ENFP will not use Fe unless circumstances have forced him to abandon his natural preference for Te in making extroverted judgments..

There are good reasons to believe that the Fe process is more preferred than the Te process because it is quite similar to the Ne-Fi process which externalizes Feeling.

The fact that Fe is similar in functional identity to Fi does not circumvent the ENFP's preference for Te when extroverting judgment...

It does because Fe is not opposed by Fi on the functional level, yet Te is.

Look around you and study real live ENFPs and watch what they do when make extroverted judgment decisions--they are rarely using Fe....

How they make decisions is irrelevant to whether or not they are using Fe. What is relevant is whether or not they are stimulated by the external world to engage in Feeling. To say that to use Fe is to make a decision is to employ the folk typological method that you've criticized before. Its akin to this: wohoo, I solved a math problem therefore I used Ti. Wohoo, I made a decision in consensus with the group, therefore I used Fe!

Why is this a mistake? You state above that "...functions are more definitive of a person's cognitive constitution...", but why is this necessarily the case?....

An attitude by definition states where the faculty functions and not how it functions. Where something is stationed is irrelevant to the question of the identity of the thing in question, how it works certainly is.

Why is this a mistake? You state above What if the dom/aux attitudes actually tend to lead to value systems that contradict use of the opposite attitudes of those functions??....

There is no reason why such a significant opposition should arise due to natural cognitive preferences and nothing besides that is relevant to a typological inquiry.

If that is the case, why do I as an ENTP behave more similarly to ESTPs than to ENTJs???....

Behave where? Their cognitive behavior isn't much different from one another. Both tend to be astract thought and focus on structure of reasoning rather than emotive valuations. Other behaviors aren't relevant. You've just lapsed into folk typology again, congratulations.

Why do we take more similar approaches to learning and interacting with others....

What basis is there for this judgment?

I'd argue that the fact that ENTP and ESTP are both dominant in Extroverted Perception and auxiliary in Introverted Judgment creates more similarities between us than the fact that ENTP and ENTJ both prefer iNtuition and Thinking as their primary cognitive processes.....

You're overlooking the humongous Intution-Sensing divide, one the significance of which not even Keirsey missed! Even he stated that this amounts to the biggest discrepancy between people.

Besides, if this reasoning holds true--that functions which are opposed to the dominant in terms of functional identity as well as attitude must always be weaker than functions which are opposed to the dominant only in terms of attitude--then why isn't every Ti dominant's auxiliary function automatically Te?.....

Because of the distinct strength of the auxiliary Ne. Ne is very strong because Thinking is mostly focused on the inner life, thus, it simply does not have enough energy to dominate both the inner world and the relations to the outer world. Thus, Ne is given an opportunity to rise. I don't see how my reasoning entails that Te must be second in the hierarchy. It clearly entails that Te must be strong, yet there is no reason to suppose that it must be strong enough to be the second in the order of efficacy.

If the INTP makes most natural use of the Thinking function, why should Ne be his auxiliary function? ].....

Because the weight of the first function is placed on the inner realm, it can't dominate both the external and internal faculties simultaneously. That is why if the dominant function is a judging one, the auxiliary must be a perceiving one.

Ne is different from Ti in terms of both functional identity and attitude but Te is different from Ti only in terms of attitude, so by your reasoning,,].....

See my response to your previous excerpt for the exception to this rule.

Ti and Te are more different than you seem to believe. They do not deal with the same type of cognitive task (one is introverted judgment and the other extroverted judgment) and thus do not make the same kinds of decisions in practice.,,].....

They do indeed deal with the same cognitive task and that is of unconsciously striving to perceive structure in the external world. The only difference is how they are stimulated to do so.

You seem focused almost exclusively on Jung's ideas in theory, but if you want typology to accomplish something useful in terms of interaction with others, you need to pay more attention to how cognitive tendencies actually manifest themselves in practice, in terms of the value systems and behavioral tendencies they tend to produce in others..,,].....

That's fine as long as these behaviors are cognitive rather than grounded in physical action.

I have to wonder why you even bother stating your type as "INTP"--Jung never made use of any such four-letter type labels, as these are purely a product of the original "folk typologists", Myers and Briggs. Why would you descend so low as to describe yourself using terminology that is clearly rooted in folk typology?..,,].....

I've slightly modified Jung's system and define INTP in a way that is different from that of the folk typologists and MBTI enthusiasts.

 

[Poki]

There are good reasons to believe that the Fe process is more preferred than the Te process because it is quite similar to the Ne-Fi process which externalizes Feeling.



It does because Fe is not opposed by Fi on the functional level, yet Te is.



How they make decisions is irrelevant to whether or not they are using Fe. What is relevant is whether or not they are stimulated by the external world to engage in Feeling. To say that to use Fe is to make a decision is to employ the folk typological method that you've criticized before. Its akin to this: wohoo, I solved a math problem therefore I used Ti. Wohoo, I made a decision in consensus with the group, therefore I used Fe!








An attitude by definition states where the faculty functions and not how it functions. Where something is stationed is irrelevant to the question of the identity of the thing in question, how it works certainly is.



There is no reason why such a significant opposition should arise due to natural cognitive preferences and nothing besides that is relevant to a typological inquiry.




Behave where? Their cognitive behavior isn't much different from one another. Both tend to be astract thought and focus on structure of reasoning rather than emotive valuations. Other behaviors aren't relevant. You've just lapsed into folk typology again, congratulations.



What basis is there for this judgment?



You're overlooking the humongous Intution-Sensing divide, one the significance of which not even Keirsey missed! Even he stated that this amounts to the biggest discrepancy between people.



Because of the distinct strength of the auxiliary Ne. Ne is very strong because Thinking is mostly focused on the inner life, thus, it simply does not have enough energy to dominate both the inner world and the relations to the outer world. Thus, Ne is given an opportunity to rise. I don't see how my reasoning entails that Te must be second in the hierarchy. It clearly entails that Te must be strong, yet there is no reason to suppose that it must be strong enough to be the second in the order of efficacy.



Because the weight of the first function is placed on the inner realm, it can't dominate both the external and internal faculties simultaneously. That is why if the dominant function is a judging one, the auxiliary must be a perceiving one.



See my response to your previous excerpt for the exception to this rule.





They do indeed deal with the same cognitive task and that is of unconsciously striving to perceive structure in the external world. The only difference is how they are stimulated to do so.



That's fine as long as these behaviors are cognitive rather than grounded in physical action.





I've slightly modified Jung's system and define INTP in a way that is different from that of the folk typologists and MBTI enthusiasts.

Fe from an Fi user to me seems like it maintains its subjective nature and strives to keep that subjective nature even when turned external. Fe from an Fe user remains objective, even when turned inside.

Its the same way with Ti. Ti turned external is still subjective, while Te turned internal is still objective.

 

[SolitaryWalker]

Fe from an Fi user to me seems like it maintains its subjective nature and strives to keep that subjective nature even when turned external. Fe from an Fe user remains objective, even when turned inside.

Its the same way with Ti. Ti turned external is still subjective, while Te turned internal is still objective.

You've got to keep in mind that neo-Jungian typology contains two distinct definitions of objective. One describes something that is purely physical as opposed to mental, or external to the mind and the other describes something totally different. It describes a simple distance from a person's biases. Only the first definition pertains to the distinctions you've cited, the second does not.

Fe in itself may be objective even when turned inside out, however, when Fe collaborates with an introverted function, a whole new cognitive effect is created: one that is in itself more reminiscent of Fi than Fe. This does not mean that Fe in itself changed, rather in combination with an introverted function, it contributed to a creation of a whole new cognitive entity.