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Defending MBTi?

Synarch

Once Was
Joined
Oct 14, 2008
Messages
8,445
MBTI Type
ENTP
Occasionally, when I bring up MBTi or even the concept of personality types, people will express a certain degree of skepticism along the lines of comparing it to astrology or cold-reading.

Question: How do you defend the validity of MBTi or the concept of personality types? Or, your interest in it as a subject?
 

kyuuei

Emperor/Dictator
Joined
Aug 28, 2008
Messages
13,964
MBTI Type
enfp
Enneagram
8
I'll admit, I felt a bit lost and weary when hearing about it the first time.

Generally, once you start explaining, they'll either lose interest or gain it. I don't think there's much for inbetweeny on that aspect. I don't have much trouble defending it in my group, but I do have trouble talking about it with people who are unwilling to even learn what I have to say. That sort of stubborn-ness against a new subject frustrates me greatly.. and unfortunately, I Don't have a way of swaying them otherwise.
 

disregard

mrs
Joined
Apr 23, 2007
Messages
7,826
MBTI Type
INFP
I find the cognitive processes to be of merit as far as categorising various functions for acquiring and organising data goes, but the "personality type" bit (MBTT) takes things too far. People use it to confirm their own biases. I do not identify one bit with the INFP profile, nor do I identify with my INFP comrades on this forum.
 

Jack Flak

Permabanned
Joined
Jul 17, 2008
Messages
9,098
MBTI Type
type
Someone can always take the argument one step closer to provable fact, nullifying whatever your case was previously (in their eyes). So it's a bit of a washout to debate it.
 

GZA

Resident Snot-Nose
Joined
Aug 13, 2007
Messages
1,771
MBTI Type
infp
I don't defend it, because I do not seriously believe in any of it in any real way. I would never introduce it to someone...
 

entropie

Permabanned
Joined
Apr 24, 2008
Messages
16,767
MBTI Type
entp
Enneagram
783
I see no need to defend MBTI.

I see MBTI as an information source and what I will make out of the things gathered is yet to be known. The few things I have taken to be acceptable about it, like the explanations of functions and how people use them, I have assimilated into my understanding of the world and it works, it helps.

To pinpoint people down to find out what types they are, really does not intrest me, because it wont help me. And besides, if you recognize their function usage, you wont need it.

If you want someone to be intrested in something you are, make him crave the information. If he does not fall for that, let him stay in the shadows for all his life :D
 

Into It

New member
Joined
Aug 30, 2008
Messages
664
MBTI Type
ENFP
Question: How do you defend the validity of MBTi or the concept of personality types? Or, your interest in it as a subject?

I'm not sure that personality types are valid, so I describe MBTI as a system of "types" in which each individual type uses intelligences that we all possess in a certain order. That sounds a lot less threatening than if you were to use the word "personality." A lot of people don't want to be read, or do not understand that one can be simultaneously "boxed in" and "unique."
 

ajblaise

Minister of Propagandhi
Joined
Aug 3, 2008
Messages
7,914
MBTI Type
INTP
I've made my friends take the test, and some seem to have a smidgen of interest in it. And I'll bring it up sometimes if it's relevant to the discussion.

But to be honest, most of my friends aren't that intellectually curious, so I don't expect them to be as interested in psychology, politics, history, sociology..... as I am, which is one of the reasons I come here.
 

Anja

New member
Joined
May 2, 2008
Messages
2,967
MBTI Type
INFP
A little bit of all of the above.

The information is not necessarily at fault. It's what people do with it.

Just as there are different styles of the various individual personality disorders, there also falls a range of styles within each type from my perspective.

It would be a pretty narrow mind that would assume that it is written in stone.

I find it a useful method of imparting a great deal of information in a small space. Then it is up to the discernment of the observer to determine how much is applicable.
 

mlittrell

New member
Joined
Sep 3, 2008
Messages
1,387
MBTI Type
ENFP
Enneagram
9w1
i tell them its a flawless system. they say prove it. i do.
 
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