brainheart
New member
- Joined
- Aug 18, 2014
- Messages
- 77
- MBTI Type
- INFP
- Enneagram
- 4w5
- Instinctual Variant
- sx/sp
Anybody else checked it out? Objective Personality | Home
I have and reached some conclusions, hereby condensed into a rant-of-sorts I wanted to post on the Objective Personality Facebook Group page but I already officially left it because there is way too much groupthink going on there:
Remember that all personality theory is just a hypothetical construction of how our personalities function. It is not fact. It can be useful and provide insight, but it is contestable, just like all hypotheses.
Intuition operates as pattern gathering and organization from which insight can be gleaned. It is important and useful and necessary for us as humans. We grow via hypotheticals, and they lead to real innovation and life changes, as well as greater understanding. But they are also not set in stone and shouldn’t be treated as such. They may lead to future verifiable conclusions (Galileo hypothesized the earth revolved around the sun and was later proven correct) or they may not. (The Bible hypothesized the universe was created in seven days and was later disproven). In other words, it’s always best to be both open-minded and skeptical when it comes to hypotheses.
People with dominant Ni are insightful, charismatic and great leaders. People love to follow them. But it’s important to remember that what they put out there as truth is their subjective understanding of things. Their opinions are fallible, just like anyone else’s. Is there some truth in their insights? Sure. If there was no truth there, people wouldn’t follow them. But it’s essential to consider the viewpoints, perspectives, and info of others, including yourself. Don’t doubt other perspectives (including your own) because they differ from theirs. That’s how cults and autocracies are formed.
Dave (of Objective Personality) puts his hypothesis out there with the desired outcome that it will become mutually defined as objective. Maybe, as more data comes in (and more people come to the same conclusion through scientifically verifiable studies), that will eventually happen. But it isn’t there yet, and we don’t know that it will happen.
It would be good if Dave would be more honest and state, “This is how I believe we make personality theory more objective, and I am working on it,†rather than saying that it is objective. (You don’t have mutually agreed upon terms if you are the only one declaring them as such, for example, and he is still obviously in the testing stage.) Also, a scientist doesn’t require someone to pay to be part of an experiment. If anything, it works the other way around. When you are paying to be typed, and it is conducted by the two people who have devised the hypothesis, that isn’t conclusive scientific work, it’s people reaching the same conclusion based on their shared method of evaluation, and making money in the process. Maybe it will lead to something insightful, but it isn’t scientific.
Don’t get me wrong. I think Dave and Shannon are perceptive and they’ve got me thinking about personality theory in some different ways. I think they are motivated to do something life changing. But what they are doing should also be taken with a grain of salt. All scientific work requires scrutiny. I don’t see any evidence that theirs has had any yet.
(If you have any questions about the site, their methods, and their acolytes, feel free to ask.)
I have and reached some conclusions, hereby condensed into a rant-of-sorts I wanted to post on the Objective Personality Facebook Group page but I already officially left it because there is way too much groupthink going on there:
Remember that all personality theory is just a hypothetical construction of how our personalities function. It is not fact. It can be useful and provide insight, but it is contestable, just like all hypotheses.
Intuition operates as pattern gathering and organization from which insight can be gleaned. It is important and useful and necessary for us as humans. We grow via hypotheticals, and they lead to real innovation and life changes, as well as greater understanding. But they are also not set in stone and shouldn’t be treated as such. They may lead to future verifiable conclusions (Galileo hypothesized the earth revolved around the sun and was later proven correct) or they may not. (The Bible hypothesized the universe was created in seven days and was later disproven). In other words, it’s always best to be both open-minded and skeptical when it comes to hypotheses.
People with dominant Ni are insightful, charismatic and great leaders. People love to follow them. But it’s important to remember that what they put out there as truth is their subjective understanding of things. Their opinions are fallible, just like anyone else’s. Is there some truth in their insights? Sure. If there was no truth there, people wouldn’t follow them. But it’s essential to consider the viewpoints, perspectives, and info of others, including yourself. Don’t doubt other perspectives (including your own) because they differ from theirs. That’s how cults and autocracies are formed.
Dave (of Objective Personality) puts his hypothesis out there with the desired outcome that it will become mutually defined as objective. Maybe, as more data comes in (and more people come to the same conclusion through scientifically verifiable studies), that will eventually happen. But it isn’t there yet, and we don’t know that it will happen.
It would be good if Dave would be more honest and state, “This is how I believe we make personality theory more objective, and I am working on it,†rather than saying that it is objective. (You don’t have mutually agreed upon terms if you are the only one declaring them as such, for example, and he is still obviously in the testing stage.) Also, a scientist doesn’t require someone to pay to be part of an experiment. If anything, it works the other way around. When you are paying to be typed, and it is conducted by the two people who have devised the hypothesis, that isn’t conclusive scientific work, it’s people reaching the same conclusion based on their shared method of evaluation, and making money in the process. Maybe it will lead to something insightful, but it isn’t scientific.
Don’t get me wrong. I think Dave and Shannon are perceptive and they’ve got me thinking about personality theory in some different ways. I think they are motivated to do something life changing. But what they are doing should also be taken with a grain of salt. All scientific work requires scrutiny. I don’t see any evidence that theirs has had any yet.
(If you have any questions about the site, their methods, and their acolytes, feel free to ask.)