[MBTI General] Why do some thinkers demonize feelers?

[syndatha]

Maybe the OP is just a projection?

 

[Coriolis]

What gives you the idea that things exist in duality? May as well say cannot trust just physics because there must be an "anti-physics" which explains what physics cannot. Likewise, logical frameworks can take into illogical actions into accounts once they recognize that the sole source of illogical action is humanity.

Outstanding. This is worthy of a signature.

 

[OrangeAppled]

What gives you the idea that things exist in duality? May as well say cannot trust just physics because there must be an "anti-physics" which explains what physics cannot. Likewise, logical frameworks can take into illogical actions into accounts once they recognize that the sole source of illogical action is humanity.

And models of value can certainly take into account logical lines of reason, especially once they recognize them as valuable. The difference between the Thinker & Feeler is which angle they start from, not necessarily the conclusions they come to.

Another misconception some have is to say that Feeling is illogical, when it is alogical. It is not opposed to logic, it simply has a different function, one which is just as rational (as logic is only one form of rational thought). Something can be true factually, and logically consistent, but not be important. It can be a frivolous piece of info, or a line of reasoning, however accurate, that focuses on something trivial & blows it out of proportion; Feeling is what will gauge its significance. On the other hand, something may not be able to be proven as logical truth, but it may still prove to be very significant. Feeling too gauges value there. No wonder Feeling is associated with art, psychology, philosophy, spiritually, etc - areas chock full of significant ideas that fall outside the bounds of logic, but which don't necessarily contradict it either.

 

[Arclight]

What gives you the idea that things exist in duality? May as well say cannot trust just physics because there must be an "anti-physics" which explains what physics cannot. Likewise, logical frameworks can take into illogical actions into accounts once they recognize that the sole source of illogical action is humanity.

The sole source logical action is also humanity.. This is exactly what I am talking about.
We are not discussing physics, we are in fact discussing "humanity".

Everything "humanity" perceives exists within the spectrum of "human" perception.
Every spectrum is made up two extremes or opposites.
Good cannot exist without bad.
Love with out hate. Concern without apathy.
Intelligent without stupidity.
Scientific extremes are also included , Hot cannot exist with out cold.
Light cannot exist with dark, sound cannot exist without silence. Close cannot exist without far
Morally a lie cannot exist with truth.
And most certainly logical cannot exist without illogical.
And the great thing is? It's all relative an open to interpretation.


What don't you understand??

 

[The Machine Stops]

I closely interact with two people, two types, in a very deep way, and so my perspective on this is mostly based on my experiences with them. One of them is an ESTJ, the other an ISFJ. Both types that avoid experiencing emotion in their own way, for their own reasons. One through disconnection, the other through avoidance and repression of "negative" emotions.

I no longer see T and F on the opposite side of a spectrum, but on a line of potential progression and growth.

I reject the basis of thought that emotion is irrational. It is not easily understandable, hard to follow, especially when viewed from outside. One sees the tip of the iceberg, but not the massive weight that rests under the surface of expression. Bound by the same laws of causality as anything else emotional responses are as logical and rational as rationally thought out ideas. You can ask why, and you can find a reason. You can find out why and how A let to B let do a meltdown, or breakdown. The meltdown itself, in this example, is not an end of functioning, but serves it's own purpose, has a function of its own, consequences that follow both internal and external.

All the pieces of the puzzle are there to logically and rationally follow the trail of gut instinct, intuition, emotional responses and get a cohesive causality chain. Once you have that chain, you begin to understand a person as a whole and are able to predict their reactions and actions in the future. If F was irrational, how would it be possible to predict someone guided by it. I see it as a greater, deeper logic. T types are easy to understand, F types are a challenge, but follow the same set of rules. If I would put something on the opposite spectrum of this, it would not be human.

More than that though, I do not believe you can have change and growth, maturing, without connecting to F. Emotions are the drive, the energy that is expended that move the little pieces around within us that make up who we are and how we process. Often a painful process, a fundamentally scary one. Deeply aware of my own processes, seeing how the ESTJ is not, if we both went through a similar trauma, the loss of a child, for example, it would take him ten times longer to come to terms with it, if he ever would. That is not a different but equal way to process something.

As scary as it may seem, change and growth is something that I see as necessary. Repressed emotions pile up, rot, internal walls that are build grow taller, insurmountable, and the maturing, and growing that happens then... in the case of the ESTJ, he would have developed to a draconian, brutally out for efficiency, but deeply lonley and self loathing man, and the ISFJ would have eventually ended up in a prison of self imposed isolation to escape to external stimuli that exposes her own internal self to her, makes her feel "bad".

Hence I voted emotionally immature.

 

[Lauren]

The idea that feeling always equals emotions to some people bothers me. My reasoning process does not feel "emotional". When I feel emotional, I recognize it and don't just run with it. I can think, "I may feel this way, but logically I know that is true".

I am an emotional person, yes, but I am not totally run by emotions, and I think Feeling is a much more refined and complex function than simply feeling "happy" or "angry" or whatever.

I would say that thinkers use logic and feelers use discernment. One is sort of black & white, and the other is colored, and each has its advantages in reasoning out what is true and what is false.

I agree completely. I definitely use discerment and so does the only other person I know to be an INFP. The subtle difference between logic an discernment is: logic is fixed and discerment is not. I often say that such and such makes "sense." Discerment is fluid. Logic not so much so, at least from what I've observed. I don't believe logic to be an absolute, though I think it's very useful.

 

[Lauren]

This quote from Gifts Differing raises an interesting concept.....that Thinkers "demonize" Feeler because their own feeling is infantile, and most people think that others operate as they do, so they assume that F decisions must be faulty, as their own Feeling is not trusted due to its poorer development. It's never a surprise to me that Ts who do not "demonize" Feeling often are relatively more comfortable/good with their own Feeling process.

I agree and have observed the same.

 

[Lucas]

The sole source logical action is also humanity.. This is exactly what I am talking about.
We are not discussing physics, we are in fact discussing "humanity".

Everything "humanity" perceives exists within the spectrum of "human" perception.
Every spectrum is made up two extremes or opposites.
Good cannot exist without bad.
Love with out hate. Concern without apathy.
Intelligent without stupidity.
Scientific extremes are also included , Hot cannot exist with out cold.
Light cannot exist with dark, sound cannot exist without silence. Close cannot exist without far
Morally a lie cannot exist with truth.
And most certainly logical cannot exist without illogical.
And the great thing is? It's all relative an open to interpretation.


What don't you understand??

Everything.
The entire world acts in a logical fashion, following sets of rules. Humanity is the only exception.

Good can exist without bad, so long as good is something other than "not bad", and bad something other than "not good".
Love can exist without hate, as long as we define love as something other than "not hate".
If you insist on defining things by what they are not, then of course they cannot exist without an opposing concept.

As for the scientific extremes, dark does not exist, only light does. Dark is defined by the absence of light, but light is not defined by the absence of dark.
The same holds true for sound, hot, close and everything else.

As for the opposites of logical and illogical, what I contest is not that they exist, but the idea that they require one another, and that they are equally valid and important. If logic is defined as a sphere of relations in which actions or events relate to each other by a set of criteria, it will of necessity exclude other types of events or actions, otherwise it is meaningless. But that does not mean it is dependent on those other types of events or actions existing.

To insist that the entire world is logical would be incorrect I agree. This does not mean that the world cannot be entirely explained in terms of logic, or, if you so desire, in terms of illogic.

 

[Arclight]

Everything.
The entire world acts in a logical fashion, following sets of rules. Humanity is the only exception.

Good can exist without bad, so long as good is something other than "not bad", and bad something other than "not good".
Love can exist without hate, as long as we define love as something other than "not hate".
If you insist on defining things by what they are not, then of course they cannot exist without an opposing concept.

As for the scientific extremes, dark does not exist, only light does. Dark is defined by the absence of light, but light is not defined by the absence of dark.
The same holds true for sound, hot, close and everything else.

As for the opposites of logical and illogical, what I contest is not that they exist, but the idea that they require one another, and that they are equally valid and important. If logic is defined as a sphere of relations in which actions or events relate to each other by a set of criteria, it will of necessity exclude other types of events or actions, otherwise it is meaningless. But that does not mean it is dependent on those other types of events or actions existing.

To insist that the entire world is logical would be incorrect I agree. This does not mean that the world cannot be entirely explained in terms of logic, or, if you so desire, in terms of illogic.

The entire world acts in a logical fashion, following sets of rules.

Only By human definition. Nature breaks its own rules all the time. Have you heard of the X factor, chaos , miracles and those little unexpected exceptions to the rules. that seem to have been confounding humanity since it's genesis?

We think we have structural engineering down pat.. and so far it seems to be working , kind of. Things still fall apart.
I don't see one other science we have even come close to mastering.

Also We have yet to explore 98% of the ocean floors and still 11% of the land surface. We don't even know whats going on, on our own planet.
Our brain can't figure it self out .
I See your "rules" being broken all the time.

Good can exist without bad, so long as good is something other than "not bad", and bad something other than "not good".
Love can exist without hate, as long as we define love as something other than "not hate".
If you insist on defining things by what they are not, then of course they cannot exist without an opposing concept.

I am not defining anything by what it is not? (Although that is something Ni does) I am aware of "duality".. Every good scientist knows about spectrum . You obviously can't get your head around this concept, despite it being "out there" and well received in science , religion, philosophy and psychology.

As for the scientific extremes, dark does not exist, only light does. Dark is defined by the absence of light, but light is not defined by the absence of dark.
The same holds true for sound, hot, close and everything else.

Light is the absence of darkness, Now what? Definitions are human constructs.. I think the real argument here is you are arrogant in your humanity and I am not. You believe science has all the answers already, instead of understanding it I might have all the answers some day but not in your life time. And that's a scientific fact

As for the opposites of logical and illogical, what I contest is not that they exist, but the idea that they require one another, and that they are equally valid and important. If logic is defined as a sphere of relations in which actions or events relate to each other by a set of criteria, it will of necessity exclude other types of events or actions, otherwise it is meaningless. But that does not mean it is dependent on those other types of events or actions existing.

To insist that the entire world is logical would be incorrect I agree. This does not mean that the world cannot be entirely explained in terms of logic, or, if you so desire, in terms of illogic.

Yeah, my point is to not pick one over the other It's to understand that they have equal value. Which is what this thread is actually about. How people perceive and to not depreciate each other based on those perceptions, especially when we often end up at the same place anyway.

If science doesn't include what might exist outside of " necessity exclude other types of events or actions" then we get things like Mr Gore's Hockey stick graph, which was very controlled data that insisted only one possibility of the cause.
That's why 3 weeks ago he was saying "We always knew Global warming was going to cause Global cooling"
( I sat though his hour and half bullshit movie one more time just to make sure he didn't mention the word cooling, he didn't, not once)


Are we demonizing each other? No.. we just value different things. The problem is only when one human being thinks their perception is absolute.

The whole world could vanish tomorrow and the universe wouldn't even blink. How's that for your human arrogance??
If you died tomorrow , save for a few people who care for you. Your town wouldn't even notice.
Put things in perspective and be thankful you are alive and experiencing enough to ask these questions.
You puny carbon based brain is never going to figure it all out and neither is mine. If we work together instead of apart. we are one step closer to defying the abyss.

That is really what w are talking here. and Humanity is all about duality.

 

[cbizzi]

"Then again, most people are stupid." lol. Gotta love INTJ's. That sounds just like my dad. Thank you for the smile :')

 

[Coriolis]

As for the scientific extremes, dark does not exist, only light does. Dark is defined by the absence of light, but light is not defined by the absence of dark. The same holds true for sound, hot, close and everything else.

To insist that the entire world is logical would be incorrect I agree. This does not mean that the world cannot be entirely explained in terms of logic, or, if you so desire, in terms of illogic.

I was going to post something similar; thanks for saving me the trouble.

Light is the absence of darkness, Now what? Definitions are human constructs.. I think the real argument here is you are arrogant in your humanity and I am not. You believe science has all the answers already, instead of understanding it might have all the answers some day but not in your life time.

I agree with this, though I did not interpret Lucas' comments as a claim that science already has all the answers. That would imply that no further scientific discoveries will be forthcoming.

It is also worth contrasting science with engineering. Science is about understanding, while engineering seeks to apply that understanding. The gap between a potentially perfect understanding of something, and a flawless device or structure includes the many limitations on our abilities actually to fabricate what we can design. As for the idea of spectrum, spectrum implies a continuum, while a duality implies a a binary set of discrete choices. They are about as opposite as one can get when specifying the range of values a parameter can take on. Dualities make for compelling metaphor, but spectra make for more precise science.

"Then again, most people are stupid." lol. Gotta love INTJ's.

Thank you for your support.

 

[ChocolateMoose123]

We all are emotional beings. We just put different emphasis on the reactivity to those emotions. The issues that push an emotional reaction from me are not the same things that would push an NF to react.

For me, anger and frustration are emotions I'm more comfortable with showing publicly. For an NF warmth or hurt might be easier to openly show. Yet we are both reacting emotionally to whatever situation causes those feelings and we both feel all those different emotions. What gets shown is what brings us to a state of confusion concerning each other.

It is what it is. We are all different and deserve respect. Anyone who doesn't understand another's approach probably should just chalk it up to incompatibility and move on without insult.

 

[Juliette]

I had different experiences with the Feelers and I can tell two things from my INTJ's perspective:

- When I'm fine, I'm scared of the Feelers due to their unpredictability. Because you can predict how the Thinker will behave and how he / she will treat you if you do something good / bad. You cannot say the same about the Feeler and their empathy can win even with common sense. This scares me. For example, if I had a Feeler boss, I wouldn't feel confident as my results at work can be overshadowed by the fact that he / she doesn't like me as a person.

- When I'm down, I seek for the Feelers. The thoughs are leading to introspection / scenarios and are crossing somewhere between Pink Floyd's The Wall or NIN's Downward Spiral / Fragile. I don't need a rational advise at this time (I can give a million of rational advices myself), just need someone to tell "poor you", "it doesn't matter", "people make mistakes", etc. Hugging is also appreciated Anything that can switch off my rationality because this is rationality, which makes me feel so miserable now.
I know this is an egoistic approach, so I try to remember those cases when someone cheered me up (luckily, they happen rarely) and even feel in debt to those people with big hearts. If later there is an opportunity to help them, I try to.

 

[onemoretime]

I don't find thinkers are the ones prone to "demonizing" others. Take a look at this thread, for example. For those who do, perhaps it's because they think only demon possession can explain all the bitter, idiotic thinker-vilification that goes on under the "we thinkers are wise angels" banner.

We're not even that clever. This is nothing but Pavlovian bullshit.

Quick simple answer - Thinkers demonize Feelers, because often, from their perspective, the latter simply get in the way without offering the kind of resistance that improves what the Thinker wants to accomplish.

More complex answer - it comes across that way because there's a disconnect between an outcome-based perception and an impact-based perception.

 

[knight]

wonder if thinkers actions or words get taken the wrong way and they get exhausted having to worry about emotional upkeep of a feeler, constantly tending of fragile emotions?

 

[Coriolis]

I certainly find it exhausting when I do worry about the emotional impact.

 

[skylights]

I had different experiences with the Feelers and I can tell two things from my INTJ's perspective:

- When I'm fine, I'm scared of the Feelers due to their unpredictability. Because you can predict how the Thinker will behave and how he / she will treat you if you do something good / bad. You cannot say the same about the Feeler and their empathy can win even with common sense. This scares me. For example, if I had a Feeler boss, I wouldn't feel confident as my results at work can be overshadowed by the fact that he / she doesn't like me as a person.

that's really interesting.

from an F perspective, i think we do operate consistently, but we take into consideration different factors than Ts. you should be able to anticipate an extraverted Feeler with relative consistency as long as you understand the interpersonal factors that they are looking at... how your actions impact them, how they impact each member of the group, etc. an introverted Feeler will be a bit more difficult, but if you can understand their values, then you should be able to anticipate their responses as well.

 

[Juliette]

that's really interesting.

from an F perspective, i think we do operate consistently, but we take into consideration different factors than Ts. you should be able to anticipate an extraverted Feeler with relative consistency as long as you understand the interpersonal factors that they are looking at... how your actions impact them, how they impact each member of the group, etc. an introverted Feeler will be a bit more difficult, but if you can understand their values, then you should be able to anticipate their responses as well.

Thank you for this perspective. Can you tell if there's any pattern in how the Feeler operates? Or, where I can read more?

I'm interested because there are some people whom I can define as Feelers and there can be a situation when they need help (as I said, they helped me when I was down, and I feel being in debt) but I really don't know how. Also, there are 3 Feelers reporting to me (yes, we did MBTI at work) and one day I can get a Feeler boss (now, there's a Thinker and I feel confident).

I did a training at work to develop warmth to people but it only made me more rational. I learnt that everyone has a right for a mistake, so you cannot blame anyone if this is the first time.

Do you use the same criteria? People can make a mistake and first time doesn't count? Or, you can close your eyes on mistakes if the person is nice (whatever it means)?

Thanks.

 

[RDF]

Thank you for this perspective. Can you tell if there's any pattern in how the Feeler operates? Or, where I can read more?

Off the top of my head, I would suggest "The Lost Art of Listening" by Michael P. Nichols, PhD. It gives plenty of concrete examples for developing a more empathetic communication style. It also talks about what constitutes excessive emotionality (being overly defensive, manipulation, generating conflict, etc.) and how to handle that as well.

I did a training at work to develop warmth to people but it only made me more rational. I learnt that everyone has a right for a mistake, so you cannot blame anyone if this is the first time.

Do you use the same criteria? People can make a mistake and first time doesn't count? Or, you can close your eyes on mistakes if the person is nice (whatever it means)?

Thanks.

Subordinates are presumed to be in a training mode. So if they make a mistake, it may be because office policy on that issue is unclear or poorly disseminated, or maybe you yourself haven't been clear about exactly how to handle those particular kinds of cases. Or maybe something just got dropped through the cracks--for example, it wasn't made clear that the issue in question was a high priority.

So yeah, in general you tend to give people the benefit of the doubt on the first mistake: That is, you assume that there was some kind of miscommunication in assigning them the task or there was some kind of problem with training, and you use that first mistake as a training/counseling opportunity. And then you go into punishment mode only when the same mistake occurs a second time, in which case you can now assume that they do indeed have all the necessary training and tools but simply refuse to implement the policy for reasons of their own.

I think that's the general idea for what you're describing.

 

[Biaxident]

Most people suck, regardless of type. If you suck, you suck, T or F doesn't matter.

Too many people, of all types, seem invested in proving to everyone that their view of things is the " Only Right Way."

Hubris...