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How NOT to do typology

SolitaryWalker

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I am sure we're all quite familiar with many of the absurd inferences people draw about a certain type. Common examples of such preposterous claims include the following.

Most of such claims imply that certain superficial behaviors are evidence that a person does or does not have a particular type.

1. I am a certain type therefore I have this or that quality. E.G, I am an INTJ and I am therefore very good at planning.
2. I am naturally good at X, therefore I am this or that type. E.G, I am always very imaginative, so I must be an N.
3. This person's line of reasoning is deplorable, so he cannot be a Thinking type.
4. This person is insensitive, chauvinistic, arrogant, repressive, so definitely not a Feeling type.
5. I am an Intuitive type, I've known my friend all of my life, he is too smart to be a sensor.
6. No way this guy is an intuitive type, he is too practical and pragmatic.
7. He takes control of his life, he thinks ahead, so he must be a J.
8. He is very judgmental and direct in his assessments of human behavior, J is for judging, right? So there you go, he is a judging type.
9. He is good at memorization, so he is definitely a Sensor.
10. This person is boring, so not an SP.

These basic statements merely represent a limited number of strategies that could be employed in spotting typological absurdities, but as a general principle, you can look for hasty generalizations, assertions that are almost completely divorced from the original Jungian theory, excessive personalization of type and so on.

What I ask you to do this in thread is the following, cite absurd typological statements without making any reference to their authors. The purpose of this thread is to shed light on how "folk typology" arises and hopefully motivate our members to think about this topic with greater care and precision. Individuals who uttered absurdities are more than welcome to make an appearance in this thread to defend their position or clarify their line of reasoning, however, it is not up to us decide if their identity is to be revealed. To avoid early polemics and accusations of trolling, I will not cite any statements that were made on this forum (at least not in the OP), I'll leave that to you!

When you cite the preposterous typological statement that was made on this forum, be sure to explicate your rationale for deeming it to be non-sensical and remain open to any possible objections that may arise.
 

Aesthete

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1. X does not like public display of affections, hence X is a T.
2. X is good in social situations, must be an E.
 

SolitaryWalker

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Thanks, but please remember, I asked you to cite actual statements that were posted on this forum.
 

Aesthete

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Thanks, but please remember, I asked you to cite actual statements that were posted on this forum.

My bad, sorry. I'm certain I've seen such statements around somewhere, but I won't be able to locate them.
 

SolitaryWalker

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This statement was actually made by one of our forum members roughly a month ago.
Forum member; said:
yes, I definitely would come to the same conclusion if I were born a Mayan. I abso-fucking-lutely would
you're clearly not an Fi user .
 
G

Glycerine

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You will find an abundance of such claims in the "What's My Type" sub-forum.
 

SolitaryWalker

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Great, let's move some of them here. Then we can make a video-compilation of the most preposterous of the claims that litter this forum and post it on YouTube.
 

miss fortune

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I do recall a member recently saying that the biggest difference that there is is between S and N because Ss can't see the big picture and have no vision... I'm going to be polite and not point out who it was who said it, but I definitely remember it because I thought "here we go again!" when they said it :doh:
 

RaptorWizard

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SW mentioned a "video compilation", so just to contribute to that and the preposterour claims that could potentially be made, here is one of me claiming to be one of 4 stereotypically 'hyper-rational' types, those being INTP, ISTP, ENTP, and INTJ; and you can say that outrageous claim I just made is a prime example of how not to do Typology!
 

Rasofy

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To avoid early polemics and accusations of trolling, I will not cite any statements that were made on this forum (at least not in the OP), I'll leave that to you!
/Inferior Fe

"There is not 1% sensor brain in me."
/Inferior Fi

You will find an abundance of such claims in the "What's My Type" sub-forum.
/Inferior Ti

and you can say that outrageous claim I just made is a prime example of how not to do Typology!
/Inferior Si
 

SolitaryWalker

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/Inferior Fe

Thank you, this assessment provides an instance of a non-sensical typological statement, as you already know. It is obviously a fallacy to assume that because somebody displays a particular behavior, they must belong to this or that type.


/Inferior Fi

Same here.


/Inferior Ti

Again



/Inferior Si

And again.

Can you find examples of absurdities uttered by others?

I do recall a member recently saying that the biggest difference that there is is between S and N because Ss can't see the big picture and have no vision... I'm going to be polite and not point out who it was who said it, but I definitely remember it because I thought "here we go again!" when they said it :doh:


Thank you, can you find the direct quote for us so that person can recognize their own utterance in this thread?
 

Lark

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There's a lot in the OP which I agree with and they probably have summed up the typological equivalent of "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing" but I can see this thread quickly nose diving into trolling or bickering.

A lot of the "hard typologists" or their threads are very old, gone or dropped off the page or something like that.
 

SolitaryWalker

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A lot of the "hard typologists" or their threads are very old, gone or dropped off the page or something like that.

We've got to transfer their material here, otherwise there may be a resurgence of folk typological bilges very soon. If one emerges anyways, we can refer their authors and aficionados to this thread, perhaps they'll learn a thing or two.
 

Lark

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We've got to transfer their material here, otherwise there may be a resurgence of folk typological bilges very soon. If one emerges anyways, we can refer their authors and aficionados to this thread, perhaps they'll learn a thing or two.

Interesting, I might subscribe this thread and when I find them browsing the forum I could link them to this thread.

The phenomenon of "folk typology" is similar to more "folkish" understanding or theorising in general, I've seen it in other personality or character trait theories, theres too much space for projection and personalisation a lot of the time.
 

Cellmold

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Shame it's just this forum, I have a nice memory bank of such statements from Perc.

But I suppose part of the fun is naming and shaming without the name, or at least it appears to be.

*EDIT*

Wait I found one from here: Besides that's a big heap of Fe.

*Double EDIT*

Found more!

That seems to be a hang-up of Fe

Although I must admit, those ESFJ's have the same chin as me

Does Ti sieve information for it's logical accuracy and consistency?

If so, is accuracy closer to truth?

If accuracy is closer to truth, does that mean Ti is anti-lying?


Ok so these are more functionally based, but I would have thought the same misconceptions apply.

Oh last *EDIT*#

This one JUST came up: How do you tell an ESFJ that the friendship is over without them going crazy on you?
 

SolitaryWalker

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Shame it's just this forum, I have a nice memory bank of such statements from Perc.

But I suppose part of the fun is naming and shaming without the name, or at least it appears to be.

*EDIT*

Wait I found one from here: Besides that's a big heap of Fe.

*Double EDIT*

Found more!

That seems to be a hang-up of Fe

Although I must admit, those ESFJ's have the same chin as me

Does Ti sieve information for it's logical accuracy and consistency?

If so, is accuracy closer to truth?

If accuracy is closer to truth, does that mean Ti is anti-lying?


Ok so these are more functionally based, but I would have thought the same misconceptions apply.

Oh last *EDIT*#

This one JUST came up: How do you tell an ESFJ that the friendship is over without them going crazy on you?

I am sorry, I am not sure what you're getting at here. Do you wish to provide a specific example how typology was abused on this site? Do you have a question regarding this topic or did you post here with the sole purpose of making a digression from our topic?
 

Jaguar

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I do recall a member recently saying that the biggest difference that there is is between S and N because Ss can't see the big picture and have no vision... I'm going to be polite and not point out who it was who said it, but I definitely remember it because I thought "here we go again!" when they said it :doh:

You'll like this old one:

"Am I the only one who finds it a little ridiculous that a self-described STP is lecturing a thread full of N-dominant types on 'seeing the big picture' "
 
G

garbage

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"There is not 1% sensor brain in me."
I'm looking for some of the sardonic exchanges we had wherein one of us sardonically made an absurd statement about the differences in type and the other rationalized it using type theory. Those kicked so much ass.
 

SolitaryWalker

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I'm looking for some of the sardonic exchanges we had wherein one of us sardonically made an absurd statement about the differences in type and the other rationalized it using type theory. Those kicked so much ass.

Bring them all in here, just make sure you keep the author's identity anonymous. Try to quote the exact verbatim, if possible. I'll soon go over all of our material and explain why all of our quotes belong in this thread, if they don't seem to belong, I'll attempt to dispute their placement here.
 
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