Blackwater's List of Controversial Philosopher Typings

[Blackwater]

A sort of preliminary concensus seems to have formed regarding the types of great thinkers and philosophers. - While I greatly appreciate the interest and concensus, I simutaneously wish to see if I might be able to shake up some of the established definitions a little. This list will primarily be controversial to those of you who don't believe that E's and/or S's can do philosophy and of course, to those of you who belive all philosophers to be INTP as well

Some of these claims are very well researched on my party, though these are primarily the ones of the Greek/Roman period. I am bothered by the persistant claim that Socrates was an Introvert, which has seemingly very little evidence to back it up.

Contradictions to this typing, as well as all the others are very welcome, especially if they are argued and not just corrected without any attempt to construct a case for the correction in question. - Happy reading

Homer INFP
Heraclitus INxJ
Parmenides xNxx
Empedocles ENxP
Buddha INFJ
Socrates ENTP
Diogenes ESTP
Plato INFJ
Xenophon ISxJ
Aristotle ENTJ
Epicurus IxTP
Cicero ENTJ
Galen ENTJ
Marcus Aurelius IxFJ
Origen ENTP
Tertullian INTJ
Augustine INFP
Milton INFP
Aquinas INFJ
Dante INFJ
Plotinus INFJ
Averroes ENTx
Muhammad ENTJ
St. Francis ISFP
Leibniz INTP
Descartes INTP
Machiavelli ENTP
Spinoza INTP
Voltaire ENTP
Da Vinci ENTP
Calvin INTJ
Erasmus xNxJ
Bruno ENTP
Locke IxTx
Hobbes IxTJ
Diderot ENTP
Tocqueville ENTP
Hume ENTP
Kant INTP
Hegel INTP or INFJ
Franklin ENTP
Jefferson INTP
Rousseau IxFP
Montesquieu xNTP
Newton INTx
Rousseau ISFP
Goethe xNFJ
Kierkegaard INFP
Nietzsche INTJ
Schopenhauer INFJ
Wagner ENxJ
Oscar Wilde ENTP
Benard Shaw ENTP
Marx INTx
Heidegger INTJ
Hannah Arendt ENTP
Freud ENTJ
Adler INTJ
Jung INFJ (I know he identifies himself as INTP)
Fromm ENFJ
Horney INFP
Sartre INTJ
de Beauvoir INFJ
Camus INFP
Husserl INTP
Briggs INFP
Keirsey INTP
Bertrand Russel ENTP
H.J. Eysenck ENTJ
I. Yalom INFJ
Rand INTJ
Dennett ENTP
Foucault ENTP
Derrida INTP
Deleuze INTP
Lacan ENTP
Luc Ferry ENTP
Richard Rorty INTJ
Popper INTx
Einstein INTP
Habermas INTP
Richard Dawkins ENTP
Christopher Hitchens INTJ
Zizek ENTP
Steven Pinker ENTP
Bluewing INTP
Blackwater ENTP
Leo Strauss INTP
Chomsky INFJ
Matt Ridley ENTP
Terrance Deacon ENTP
Richard Wiseman ENFP

 

[Matthew_Z]

I've usually heard Newton described as an INTJ, not INTP.

(will present reasons why later; short on time now)

 

[The_Liquid_Laser]

Lol at the last two on your list.

Good list overall. I'd agree with most of the people on your list. The only ones that raise questions from me are Aristotle, Jefferson, and Newton.

I've always seen Aristotle typed as an INTP, and I'm curious why you put him as ENTJ. I can't make a thorough case for him other than he seemed to be knowledgable about many different subjects and some of them with a large amount of depth. I thought his most remarkable attributes were all scholoarly in nature. Putting that together usually defaults to an INTP in my mind, so I'm curious why you'd put him as ENTJ.

Jefferson I think is INTJ, but I'm sure someone else can make a better case for him than I can.

Newton I'm certain is INTJ, and I do know quite a bit about him. He really was the first to have the insight into creating Calculus, but he wasn't terribly good at explaining it. Incredible insight and poor communication are both hallmarks of an INTJ. In contrast Leibniz developed Calculus at about the same time and his notation is still used today while Newton's for the most part is not. Newton was brilliant but a poor communicator. Also I know he invented a type of telescope, and invention is more a hallmark of N-dominant types. (That alone doesn't exclude INTP, but it's just another detail that labels him more easily as INTJ.) Also the famous anecdote of discovering universal gravitation while sitting under an apple tree is essentially a description of Ni in action.

 

[Sniffles]

Why ISFP for Rousseau?

 

[Z Buck McFate]

Socrates ENTP
Marcus Aurelius ISFJ
Freud ENTJ

Socrates ENFP
Marcus Aurelius INFJ
Freud INTJ

Socrates: I’m having a hard time explaining this one. Maybe it’s because- in school- I always read Socrates directly alongside reading Aristotle (who is clearly, clearly a T)- and the contrast between the two makes me suspect Socrates is an F.

Marcus Aurelius: The thoughts he put into his journal revolved around his preoccupation with maintaining composure of his feelings, and it’s like he was obsessed with keeping ‘the big picture’ constantly in mind in order to achieve this emotional stasis. It’s that ‘big picture’ perspective that makes me think he’s N.

Freud: The guy came up with a rather accurate template of the human psyche, all by himself, from scratch. He would have needed a really strong Ni for that much introspection.

Edit: having second thoughts about Freud. ENTJ seems somehow right. Maybe he was an Ni dom ENTJ.

This is all I have time for right now. I'll probably come back to hit some toward the bottom of the list later (like Foucault, I'm not sure I agree with ENTP).

[Does anyone else feel somewhat hesitant playing at ‘typing’ people from before the Age of Reason? Sometimes I wonder if the T/F polarity is different in people (present day) as a result of it.]

 

[Polaris]

Hegel INTP

I see Hegel as an INFJ. Infamous for his obscurity, a synthesizer of paradoxes, and someone whose ethics were rooted in society.

Kant INTP

This is another one I don't see. Kant's focus on how reality is limited by our perceptions is classic Ni, and while he explores logic, this exploration is aimed toward practical purposes, as we would expect from a Te-user.

 

[Malcontent]

Christopher Hitchens INTJ

Really? I thought ENTP

 

[Oaky]

There are many mistakes in the typings. I cannot trust the list.

 

[Z Buck McFate]

There are many mistakes in the typings. I cannot trust the list.

Why would anyone need to 'trust the list'? 'Typing' these people is just a game, we can't possibly begin to actually know what any of these people were. (Right?)

 

[Oaky]

Why would anyone need to 'trust the list'? 'Typing' these people is just a game, we can't possibly begin to actually know what any of these people were. (Right?)

Fine if you call it a game. But continuous research of some of the people on the list can tell us the proper type of them.

 

[Sniffles]

Hitchens is definately an ENTP.

 

[Z Buck McFate]

Fine if you call it a game. But continuous research of some of the people on the list can tell us the proper type of them.

My point is just that, given the nature of 'typing', no amount of research will ever yield anything more than speculation. To be sure- it could mean the difference between loose speculation and/or speculation that one can be absolutely confident about- but it's always speculation none-the-less.

I don’t mean to sound snarky- but I guess I don’t understand what the harm is in people practicing ‘typing’ with each other. I’ve noticed some people tend to get uptight about it when they see others ‘typing’ (i.e. Jaguar might be “some people”). But ‘typing’ people (celebrities, philosophers, whatever) is an effective way of getting to better understand MBTI types and functions. And I think philosophers are especially helpful to practice ‘typing’ because we have access to much more than their public persona.

[It's possible I should have started a separate thread for this. Sorry about the derailing.]

 

[Oaky]

^ Well there's no point to all this 'typing' if it's wrong. It's a double-edged sword. It may help you type people but at the same time it may cause the opposite affect and teach you to mistype people. Many people on these forums are not exactly 'fully knowledgeable' when it comes to typing people and as long as their half-assed knowledge is going around it can confuse a lot of people. I too may also get a bit uptight when I see others 'typing'.

 

[the state i am in]

deleuze not entp? he seems more Ne dom?
zizek my guess is entp
machiavelli entj
kant i became convinced about intj, but intp would not surprise me at all
jefferson i always heard intj, either way i like him
keirsey types himself as intj i thought
habermas makes more sense to me as intj

schopenhauer iv'e heard both intj and infj, don't know him that well but am interested
hannah arendt is entp? feel pretty good about that?
jung i'm still not sure about, the rigour seems intense but the feel i get is infj
sartre is an intj? he was such a public intellectual. the rigour is similar to intj rigour. i wouldn't be surprised about intp tho or even entp.

hegel i can see as an intp or an infj. but intp is my leaning, i think.

 

[Z Buck McFate]

de Beauvoir INFJ

I'm thinking Simone De Beauvoir is INFP. It's been a while since I read her work, but I remember thinking it was way too over-emotional for my own tastes.

 

[Jaguar]

^ Well there's no point to all this 'typing' if it's wrong. It's a double-edged sword. It may help you type people but at the same time it may cause the opposite affect and teach you to mistype people. Many people on these forums are not exactly 'fully knowledgeable' when it comes to typing people and as long as their half-assed knowledge is going around it can confuse a lot of people. I too may also get a bit uptight when I see others 'typing'.

Well said.

 

[Valuable_Money]

Diogenes ESTP

He always struck me as ISTP.

Although I could see ESTP considering his hatred of abstract theory definitly pointed towards a hardcore S.

 

[Blackwater]

Matthew_Z: Newton's fourth letter is especially hard, seems almost lost to history. - The fact that he was so neurotic also clouds out his type.

The_Liquid_Laser: When you look at what Aristotle did he was more of a compiler/catalogizer of previous thought than a thinker in his own right. I know this sounds strange, but the fact of the matter is that most of what we know of earlier Greek thought today, we know because of Aristotle's commentary. - He essentially systematized and preserved earlier knowledge. - He also seems to have been very competitive; what we have of his writings we have because of attempts to reign in students from other academies. - One example would be his "Rhetoric" which seems to be a work written purely for gain/ esteem in the outer world.

(I take it for granted that there can be no doubt towards Aristotle being a T-dom NT.)

Jefferson's cognitive processes could conform to INTJ in theory, yet his actual personality, timid and drivin by principles rather than by will suggests INTP to me.

Newton: I'm ready to cease the INTP typing. (see above)

Peguy: I'm curious as to what you'd type Rousseau? - Do I need to argue for him being Fi-dom? - Or just the S part? - I think S because he does not follow his reflections very far along but seems to stop at "once we abolish sin/ the discontents of civilization everything will be in order all by itself."

Z Buck McFate: Socrates is perhaps the most well-researced claim in my entire list. I can understand why you think he was an F compared to Aristotle, but look at it this way: Aristotle was a dominant T, Socrates a dominant N. Superficially, the wild associations and springy nature of N (especially Ne) can seem like F, but would a feeler ever set about questioning people like this:

Marcus Aurelius: If he was an N he was not a very visionary one. Remember, rather than he had access to the best philosophical schooling of his day, all the way from childbirth. - And would a person who naturally looking along the big lines of things really need to constantly remind himself to look at the big picture?

Still, he might be INFJ, though well-read, well-bread ISFJ is more likely.

Freud: Freud did _not_ come up with anything all by himself. Freud syntetizized existing abstract theories and crafted a very hands-on system of psychology from them. Introducing circular reasoning, this reminds me of Aristotle

de Beauvoir had her self-esteem etc. desvastated by Sartre on a regular basis, that might account for all the F in there. The surest demarcation line though, is the fact that there is *no* Ne in her what so ever.

Nunki: I'll buy Hegel as INFJ for the reasons you stated. Good one

Ragingkatsuki: You contribute nothing to this thread and when people like Z Buck McFate try to engage you constructively you just whine. Pitifully.

the state i am in: I'd totally take Deleuze to be ENTP from his writings, though in real life he was very shy, fragile, conservative, risk-avoidant and so on. Still, he could be a very strange ENTP.

Zizek: I tend to agree but we've got to leave some of the cool ENPs to the ENFPs, right?

I used to think that Machiavelli was ENTJ, but he is all about perception and historical comparisons and associations. - When ENTJs deal with history in their writings they tend to compile and mimick. Machiavelli extrancts original thoughts and recommendations from the historical litterature, without holding himself party to any historical actor.

Kant's last letter is hard. I think INTP because there is very little ego in his writings; he seems to be interested in pure reason for its own sake, rather than setting about to reason in order to accomplish something.

Keirsey types himself as INTP in Please Understand Me II. I have no knowledge of him outside of his books.

I know many people who for some reason thing that Habermas is a J, which is a pretty certain he is not. His core value is that people who argue openly, free of retorical antics and on conditions designed to make the rational position shine through. In short, he thinks everyone ought to be an INTP

Schopenhauer: *could* be a T, though INJ for sure. Still, his melancholy and suffering suggests F, compare with Nietzsche who champions might and power instead.

I am open to a better suggesion on Arendt. - I only read the Human Condition. - What's your take?

Jung many people have noted how he laboured to write in another manner than the one that came naturally to his. Concessions to science.

The next most likely type for Sarte was ENTP. INTJ/ENTP are mirror images of each other, remember - Though his wild inconsistancies and perpetual certainty in tandem suggest INTJ to a degree that is quite beyond doubt to me.

 

[The_Liquid_Laser]

@Blackwater, that is interesting about Aristotle. I want to look into him more now. Your description of him is different than my first impression.

 

[Blackwater]

Why I think Kant is INTP:

Kant: "Man is not so completely an animal as to be indifferent as to everything that reasons says on its on and to use it merely as a tool to satisfy his needs."

Nietzsche: "“What is good? – All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to power, power itself in man."

Ayn Rand: "Love is the assertion of your own needs and values. It is for your own happiness that you need the person you love.”