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[MBTI General] Doesn't this sound like something only a NF would say?

S

Sniffles

Guest
I brought this up in another thread, but I want to know the opinions of others here; doesn't this sound remarkably NF in character - if you can get over it's author?

"When I go to Obersalzberg, I'm not drawn there merely by the beauty of the landscape. I feel myself far from petty things, and my imagination is stimulated. When I study a problem elsewhere, I see it less clearly; I'm submerged by the details. By night, at the Berghof, I often remain for hours with my eyes open, contemplating from my bed the mountains lit up by the Moon. It's at such moments that brightness enters my mind."
--Adolf Hitler, cited in Warlords: An Extraordinary Re-Creation of World War II Through the Eyes and Minds of Hitler, Churchill, Roosevelt, And Stalin, pg. 50
 

disregard

mrs
Joined
Apr 23, 2007
Messages
7,826
MBTI Type
INFP
It indeed does. Heart may be right, that even INTJs have their prominent Fi moments.

But the question is.. which cognitive function(s) does that quote illustrate? Is it Fi? Si? Ni?

It seems like the more I learn, the more hazy it all seems. :doh:
 
S

Sniffles

Guest
Here's the larger context in which that quote is taken from the book, comparing the personalities of Hitler and Stalin:

"Stalin was trusting Hitler to act rationally; and to fight Britain and Russia at the same time was clearly irrational. However, he failed to realize that, despite their similarities, there was one profound difference between him and Hitler which made his perfect logic irrelevant. He himself was a methodical, calculating, hard-working man; a master of detail, personally signing death lists at one extreme, and at the other keeping the tiniest details of gold production in his notebook.

Hitler by contrast was at heart an idle dreamer. He once described why he loved the mountains of Obersalzburg. "When I go to Obersalzberg, I'm not drawn there merely by the beauty of the landscape. I feel myself far from petty things, and my imagination is stimulated. When I study a problem elsewhere, I see it less clearly; I'm submerged by the details. By night, at the Berghof, I often remain for hours with my eyes open, contemplating from my bed the mountains lit up by the Moon. It's at such moments that brightness enters my mind." For Hitler, the big idea was never to be disrupted by small facts. Now, having decided to attack Russia for tactical reasons, his mind began to stir in ways that would lead him back to the original and biggest idea of all - the ideological struggle against Jews and Bolsheviks."
--pg. 50


Is it common to characterise INTJs as idle dreamers? Just curious.
 

heart

heart on fire
Joined
May 19, 2007
Messages
8,456
I would think if they had poor Te development, yes they would be idle dreamers, but the quote you gave seemed at first just someone having a mystical moment, not indicative of someone who was simply a dreamer at all times.
 

DigitalMethod

Content. Content?
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
970
MBTI Type
INTJ
I could see myself saying that if I was extremely elitist like Hitler. No offense.
He referred to nature as petty though, which was annoying to me.
He referred to his imagination as imagination, I think a NF would be more poetic. IE, referring to imagination as more of a reality.
He mentioned his love for the details. Definitely more NT.
 
S

Sniffles

Guest
Well if it helps, here's another quote of Hitler's explaining his thinking process:

"Bear in mind that my mind works like a calculating machine. Each person who makes a presentation to me introduces into this calculating machine a small wheel of information. There forms a certain picture, or a number on each wheel. I press a button and there flashes into my mind the sum of all this information."
--pg. 26

This does sound a bit like Ni.
 

heart

heart on fire
Joined
May 19, 2007
Messages
8,456
Fi certainly isn't much of a number cruncher in my experience.
 

DigitalMethod

Content. Content?
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
970
MBTI Type
INTJ
Well if it helps, here's another quote of Hitler's explaining his thinking process:

"Bear in mind that my mind works like a calculating machine. Each person who makes a presentation to me introduces into this calculating machine a small wheel of information. There forms a certain picture, or a number on each wheel. I press a button and there flashes into my mind the sum of all this information."
--pg. 26

This does sound a bit like Ni.

That basically is Ni.
 
S

Sniffles

Guest
I prefer GK Chesterton's analogy to that of a vast uncatalogued library.
 

Mondo

Welcome to Sunnyside
Joined
Mar 1, 2008
Messages
1,992
MBTI Type
EsTP
Enneagram
6w7
Could be inferior Fi- I always thought Hitler was an ENTJ or INTJ.
I don't think there is any way he could be an NF.. no way..
An NF would most likely not abuse power like he did- he might have hoodwinked the Germans into thinking that he was an "F type" but I don't think so..
 
S

Sniffles

Guest
I don't think there is any way he could be an NF.. no way..

Well I believe somebody here classifed Lenin as ENFJ. If true, we have that precedent.

Much of what I know about Hitler's personal life seems compatible with possibly being NF.
 
S

Sniffles

Guest
Really? Why not? It only takes some narcissism, a self-serving ideal, and the passion/persistence to see it realised.

He was very much obsessed with the notion of the power of ideas to influence the course of history. Me meditates upon this for some time in Mein Kampf.
 

Magic Poriferan

^He pronks, too!
Joined
Nov 4, 2007
Messages
14,081
MBTI Type
Yin
Enneagram
One
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
I don't find it entirely implausible for Hitler to be an F. His reasoning for things was rather F. I mean, in his eyes, it was all one big epic war of that which is pure over that which is filthy. Good and bad, light and dark.

In terms of skills, Hitler was a brilliant manipulator of peoples' spirits, but he didn't know shit about commanding an army. He really bares a lot of responsibilities for Nazi millitary defeat, and he probably should have let his wiser generals make the decisions. In fact, it was often his inability to accept certain realistic, but depressing possibilities, that made him give crazy military orders. Again, this seems like someone with a lot more F than T.
I also think he was an Enneagram One.

The funny thing is, calling him an F(who have been mischaracterized as gentle) and a One(who are presumed to be "good guys") does not mix with the popular characterization of Hitler. Society isn't ready for a Feeling, type One villain, so it will deny their existence.
 
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