[INTP] INTP - not sensitive?

[jenocyde]

See, I would have smacked him in the head with a baseball bat the first time around, but I'm an extrovert. Then I would have gone back to foruming and pb&j sandwiches without a second thought or feeling about it, while he lays writhing on the floor covered in blood. But maybe that's just me.

 

[Verfremdungseffekt]

Yes, see, that's an exhausting and distracting response. As well as, er, probably more healthy.

 

[wildcat]

I noticed that Fi is the weakest function for INTP's.

INTP - Ti Ne Si Fe Te Ni Se Fi

What are all the ramifications of that?
Are you not hurt by criticisms from other people?

INTP function order?
Incorrect.

 

[bcvcdc]

Truth be told, I'm only emotional about the quality of life of certain animals and children. I really don't care about most people. Except family and certain friends I don't have anymore. Still, I love them, my friends I mean. I truly do.

 

[kelric]

I generally care about what my peers say about me. I'm a social INTP with the social need to be accepted. When someone says, "You Suck!" it hurts.
...
And I may seem like a stone, but I'm really a marshmallow inside of a hard M&M-esque shell.

However, someone that I want to impress or gain acceptance from? Man, they have all the power to crush me under the weight of a single misplaced word.

I'm like this as well. I don't generally express, but I'm pretty sensitive to quite a few things. I'm *not* the one who can just shrug off personal attacks or criticism (purely objective constructive criticism I do better with - not great, but better). I may not say anything, but it *will* bother me. A lot. When I was a little kid, I was the one who'd just fall apart in those situations. I don't flip out or retaliate with sarcasm (I might *want* to, and replay the sarcastic replies in my head after the fact, but I don't actually say them).

Most times, I am indifferent. Frustration at miscommunication or misunderstanding is probably the emotion that I feel the most. The other emotion is excitement. I get really happy and excited, really quickly. I love to laugh and one funny phrase can alter whatever frustrating situation I find myself in. But I'm not an INTP, so I guess it's not relevant.

Well, for me, it's very relevant - so much so that I quoted you instead of bothering to write it myself . I'm sensitive to personal criticism, yes, but most of the time I'm not being personally criticized (whew), and Jenocyde's description fits me to a T.

 

[Lauren Ashley]

INTPs have feelings too. They're just hidden quite well.

This, IME. Or really, the need to understand objectively, usurps all.

 

[Blank]

Ahaha, I would be that guy.

I have a terrible fascination for trying to find out where the line is. Thus, I will push, prod, and poke until I find out where the line is and until I'm about to cross it.

Then I have a terrible desire to cross the line out of glee.

Fortunately, I have sense enough not to......most times. Thus, I would have kept shooting your friend until I got a 'favorable' reaction.

*note: I also think angry people are funny.

 

[The Decline]

I can take most any vitriolic language imaginable from strangers and not bat an eyelash. Even if my good friends were to tell me something they think is a negative trait in me or criticize something I did - probably wouldn't bother me that much.

However, someone that I want to impress or gain acceptance from? Man, they have all the power to crush me under the weight of a single misplaced word.

Oh god this.

 

[ajblaise]

As an INTP, I think I'm more sensitive to when something disrupts my logical Ti framework. When I think I have something figured out and totally analyzed, and something comes out of nowhere and shatters it.

If someone's just trying to be hurtful, by that time I'm totally detached and my Fi is 1000 miles away. So, nice try.

Angsty teenaged INTPs can definitely be sensitive though.

 

[Alwar]

Constructive criticism is nice, in fact I seek people out who I can trust to criticize my ideas or perception of this or that. Outright mocking or aggression in general is something I don't take to anymore than anyone else. But if I can walk away or ignore the situation then I can brush it off. If I am cornered it is different.

I suppose I don't care what people think, but what they do.

 

[ChocolateMoose123]

The ramification of weak Fi, the best I can tell, is that I'm just not motivated by my feelings in any significant way. I've little concept of how I might personally be affected by things, and I have trouble seeing why it should matter. Often I can't tell if I like or dislike a thing. So long as it doesn't interrupt my train of thought, and doesn't generate any particularly interesting new thoughts, I tend to be profoundly impartial. I have trouble recognizing what mood I'm in, and rarely think of taking it into account. Because, you know, why? That's just me.

If something is important, I'll explain it in detail, so you understand the rationale behind it. If I don't do that, chances are I don't really care.

+ 10. Yes, Yes, Yes. This is exactly what it's like. I couldn't have described it better myself.

 

[Lithium Onyx]

Constructive criticism is nice, in fact I seek people out who I can trust to criticize my ideas or perception of this or that. Outright mocking or aggression in general is something I don't take to anymore than anyone else. But if I can walk away or ignore the situation then I can brush it off. If I am cornered it is different.

I suppose I don't care what people think, but what they do.

I second that, Mr. Ferrel.

Most don't realize that I actually am sensitive on the inside. But when someting hurts me, I usually don't show it externally. I have feelings, yes, but if you see them, you are either my best friend or the apocalype is at hand.

 

[Siúil a Rúin]

What are all the ramifications of that?
Are you not hurt by criticisms from other people?

That is one specific type of sensitivity, but it seems like people can have sensitivity in many areas that don't necessarily involve feeling hurt by criticisms. A person who is easily offended, annoyed, disturbed, or hurt by events they have no control over is sensitive in some way. People who have some invested ideal about how other people, events, or environments are supposed to play out and become upset when it doesn't happen in their projected way have a type of sensitivity. It doesn't have to be related to the emotional reactions of others, although I have noticed some Ts online who are easily offended or annoyed by emotional responses, which I interpret as some kind of sensitivity, but I'm not sure how to describe it exactly. The truly insensitive person would probably not care too much about any type of reactions from other people whether they appear overly brash, overly sensitive, or whatever.

For myself there is one corner of myself that can be hurt by criticism if it is personal and "unfair". The idea that no one can really see or know anyone else and so the opinions and judgments between people possess relative degrees of inaccuracy with no hope of ever achieving complete accuracy troubles me. I can see this as sensitivity because it is something I have no control over, so the rational thing is to simply accept it and deal with it.

 

[Fluffywolf]

I have a pretty high developped Fi, according to some tests.

Am I sensitive? Not in the sense people would think of. I say I am sensitive. But I'm not as breakable or abusable. And when the sensitivity line is crossed. I don't really care as much as it would another person.

So yeah, I'm only sensitive if I want to be and towards the people I wish to be.

 

[INA]

That is one specific type of sensitivity, but it seems like people can have sensitivity in many areas that don't necessarily involve feeling hurt by criticisms. A person who is easily offended, annoyed, disturbed, or hurt by events they have no control over is sensitive in some way. People who have some invested ideal about how other people, events, or environments are supposed to play out and become upset when it doesn't happen in their projected way have a type of sensitivity. It doesn't have to be related to the emotional reactions of others, although I have noticed some Ts online who are easily offended or annoyed by emotional responses, which I interpret as some kind of sensitivity, but I'm not sure how to describe it exactly. The truly insensitive person would probably not care too much about any type of reactions from other people whether they appear overly brash, overly sensitive, or whatever.

Great post. In this way sensitivity is like intelligence. Several types of gauges with variance in how acutely tuned each type is but whenever the word is mentioned, it is assumed we are speaking of one measure. E.g.: criticism from someone I haven't deemed worthy of listening to: no sensitivity. Watching that person misspell things constantly? Reasoning by frequent non-sequiturs? OMG:MUST get away. You must have a nose for the thing before you get offended by it. INTPs are not insensitive, just often differently sensitive.

On the criticism thing - I must have held the person in esteem first. And it must be something I'm ashamed of. Otherwise I will either not absorb it or fail to recognize that what they've given is criticism.

 

[Salomé]

INTP function order?
Incorrect.

Quite.

 

[Totenkindly]

I think Fi can often play itself out where the person is unaware or unable to determine their wants.

If you use Ti to construct what you "want," then whatever you want is what you can derive as the most "rational" want from information in your environment. Wants are derived, not internally spawned. I've been asked what I "want" so often and usually I don't have an idea, I just want whatever seems most rational at the time... and if the want in question cannot be derived, then I am usually ambivalent and unable to decide arbitrarily.

Fi seems to have more of an innate sense of emotional/personal wants, the personal values system itself is based on it.

 

[Magic Poriferan]

I think guiding oneself on Ti alone tends to result in thought processes like this:

I should do A to get to B.

Why get to B?

Because when I do B, I can get to C.

Why get to C?

Because when I do C, I can get to D...

[continue indefinitely]

By thinking in a strictly logical sort of way, you can only work out the feasibility of your plan, without ever explaining why acheiving any step of it is good.

There was some point in my life when I realized that an explanation fondness and desire, and it's related things, can never terminate in logic. It either just doesn't terminate, and goes into an infinite regression, or it terminates by simply saying "that's the way it is. I feel how I feel, and I have no reason beyond that".

I think Fi is much better at getting around to the second option.

 

[TopherRed]

Well, I mean. Everyone has emotions. The question is what you do with them: how much you acknowledge them, and then how much you factor them into your decisions. Of course, there are side effects to brushing your emotions aside. Unless you empty that garbage pail, it's going to overflow. Here's a bit of a recent conversation with a friend, also INTP:

> I have trouble dealing with situations like that, because I kind of try to be agreeable, but that only works up to a point. And then i suddenly snap. It probably doesn't make sense to the other party. You know, "He seemed okay with what I was doing before!"

* Yeah, I know. The sponge can only soak up so much. There was this moment in high school -- I was in a friend's room, in a kind of bad mood. I was slumped against his bed. Someone sneaked up in the hallway, and shot me in the face with a water pistol. I didn't react. I wiped my face, and kept lying there. He snuck up and did it again. Again I didn't react. He did it a third time, and I flipped out. Before I knew what I was doing, I was up and screaming and raging and kicking things with all my force. I don't know who did it. I guess he said "holy shit" and hid somewhere. But I didn't calm down for like ten minutes.

> What the fuck? Who does that three times? Or even twice?

* That guy.

> Once, i can understand. Yeah, it's retarded, but whatever. But to come BACK and do it AGAIN?

* I don't know.

> That is some fucking pathology right there.

* I know. I guess somewhere in my head, I just excused once. All right, someone's being an idiot. What else is new. Then a second time, fuck, what's wrong with that person? Oh well. But three times, it's like -- what the shit.

Woah. I guess a more positive mechanism for dealing with that would be humor. Find the kid, find the nearest bathroom and give him a swirly. Not only will you feel better, but the child would have learned a valuable lesson about teasing an INTP.

Don't get mad, get even.

 

[Willfrey]

For the most part I can brush people off who criticize me. There is no middle ground, I have a threshold and when somebody crosses it it deeply bothers me, and sometimes gets a pretty unfiltered response (if any at all).

For instance I was at the time unemployed and I had just applied at T-Mobile and screwed up the pre-screening test (admittedly I did terrible) so my application of course was never even considered. My best friend's girlfriend got wind of it and just would not leave it alone. Making small little cracks here and there, until one day..
".....you did just as well at that as you did applying for T-Mobile"
"What do you do that is so special? Oh, get food stamps, right."
I cleaned the smug smirk right off her fat, ugly head.