feeling physically ill over logic

[CharChar]

For the last two days, I have been laying in bed with nausea, dizziness, light-headedness, and a severe headache located behind my eyeballs. I even threw up once.

All of this is due to a conversation I had, in which the person was not making sense to me on many levels. I have gotten upset over illogic before but this is the first time it affected me on a physical level, and I don't know why this is happening to me.

I think (and I could be wrong) that what's eating me is my inability to make sense of the mindfuck, identify the actual logical errors, and sharply respond to them in time to attack the other person. I think it is intense confusion that is causing me to feel ill.

If there is a simple logical error (X contradicts Y), it is easier to pick it out, but sometimes illogic can be more complex. (An implication of X contradicts an implication of Y; X is ambiguous but each possible meaning has its own logical error, etc). When it is more complex, it feels like a mindfuck to me. I know it makes no sense, but I can't pinpoint why.

Like right now, if you asked me to write the parts that "don't make sense" in premise-conclusion structure to 'prove' why they are illogical, I would not be able to, or it would take a lot of stress and effort for me to sort through it. Am I stupid?

It makes me second guess myself....I definitely feel like they not making sense, but if I can't even pick out the errors in the mindfuck, maybe the mindfuck is actually correct, and I'm the wrong one?!?! If it is truly illogical I would be able to pick out the errors easily.

Anyway, I try and respond. But since I can't pinpoint the logical error in the first place, my responses fall short. They are usually able to evade my attacks using more illogic! How can they win like this! I must be an idiot, truly, to not even be able to call out something that doesn't make sense.

If they are being illogical, why can't I prove them wrong? Why can't I prove it? Why do I always lose?

Then, I try to make sense of what just happened. Trying to sort it out makes my head spin. This is when I feel most sick.

I can't trust myself to say "this person is bullshitting you, stop wasting your time". Because I can't pick out the errors and "prove" them wrong, I would keep thinking there is a misunderstanding that needs to be sorted out. I would need a third person to validate that I am correct in thinking they are being illogical.

Once I finally get a better understanding of the framework, I realize there were sharper responses I could have made to attack the other person. Or, there were sharper questions I could have asked to resolve the ambiguities. I feel terrible about handling the mindfuck poorly and get a very strong urge to contact the other person and call them out properly. I don't know if its my ego or what but I need to defeat the illogic. This strong urge makes me feel very anxious and desperate, which adds to my nauseated feeling.

Usually it is too late, and the other person doesn't care about the convo anymore and it would be annoying for me to keep at it. So, I just feel terrible and feel like a failure.

I feel like there's something wrong with me. How can illogic win over logic? How come I can't make sense of mindfucks? How come I can't come up with proper responses to call them out on their errors? If I'm truly a smart and logical person, I would be able to defeat the illogic. I'm an idiot who is confused and defeated by someone who isn't even being logical in the first place.

It feels like my entire world is falling apart in front of me, I'm losing my mind, I can't make sense of anything anymore, I'm just being swooshed around in giant waves of stupidity and I have no control of anything, I don't even have my own mind and intellect to help me anymore because the stupidity has conquered me.

 

[Terran]

fuck me don't study literature! (or maybe do? Might make you better at analysis of the abstract).

But anyway, this is really strange, you may have some-kind of inherent mental disorder if not just extreme emotional instability. Possibly autism? OCD?

But anyway, it's like computer scripts, if the outcome has flaws, the script has flaws, however that does not mean the flaws are obvious. Learn these: http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ and don't always trust your own implementation of pure logic, as you are only human and are greatly limited by your own intelligence.

 

[Terran]

Also, you're making an assumption correlating your illness to your distress. The distress may not be the cause.

 

[Terran]

Can you tell us/me the 'mindfuck' at hand? It seems a bit strange that you could determine something as illogical without knowing why, or maybe you do know why but can't articulate it to yourself. Either-way, we can determine what is wrong about it (if anything).

 

[Fukyo]

Your ego is too invested in proving yourself correct. As it stands, pure logic is not the only determinant of who 'wins' in an argument. People will try to pull all sorts of shit, distort the argument and will generally always paint themselves as the winner. They aren't being held to any objective standard, there are no referees in casual arguments and most people will walk off smugly believing they are correct and you are wrong, and of course they will let you know.


Yes, you should stop wasting your time. None of this shit actually matters.

 

[Haim]

Does their claim can be disproved at all?most people don't even use logic in arguments, logic is irrelevant to emotional claims(and be sure to will end up using emotional arguments) .Also you have things which you need to take a look back to the way humans work to understand, for example a mistake that some Nihilist people have is they claim that logically life is meaningless, while forgetting that meaning is emotion, a subjective thing that is not be true for everyone(meaning it is not a logical statement).

I know beforehand that people will not agree or understand what I say.It is an ongoing conversation with myself, I care not if I "lose", more than that a real lose is a bonus as it will allow me to develop myself.

 

[onesteptwostep]

This is where the concept of morality comes in handy, if you think your best chance at winning at an argument is logic. Morality and history together is powerful that it can invoke past occurrences of bad thinking. But this generally means that you have to be literate and educated not only in logic but in a vast array of knowledge.

 

[Terran]

But this generally means that you have to be literate and educated not only in logic but in a vast array of knowledge.

Yep, as I said, you can't rely on pure logic, you need to have an understanding of how to identify things wrong with an argument, and then articulate it. Learning various logical fallacies, et cetera, is good for this.

 

[Hadoblado]

I would like to see what they were saying.

"Logic" is a word many people use to mean "doesn't contradict my beliefs". Right now, the way you have it described, us readers can't tell whether you're using it to mean real logic, or ruminator congruent.

For what it's worth, I experienced something similar earlier in life. Specifically with sociality. While it's odd that you feel physically ill from it, I've had panic attacks from reasoning falling flat etc., almost as if people are willingly dismissing reason. You said you had anxiety, and that could perhaps serve as catalyst for your other physiological symptoms. Not that I necessarily think that's what happened. It seems more likely there's a correlation/causation error.

Logic is a skill. And the more complex the mindfuck, the more difficult it is to logic. People tend to think of themselves as perfectly rational, but logic is an operation that takes up meatram, and it's very possible for even self-professed rationals to be overwhelmed by a complex issue.

For instance:

It is not the case that it's not the case that not only are there not elves nowhere in the space between places in non-atmospheric conditions, but it is the case that not all elves are withing these non-atmospheric conditions. Therefore, elves are not not going to be in outer space, but they're not not not going to be there either.

Spoiler

It's nonsense I think. Given time you can probably decipher that it certainly doesn't make sense, but in the flow of a conversation it's overwhelming. If someone said this shit to me I'd have to work it out on paper

 

[Tannhauser]

Most people are not that interested in being logically consistent. Moreover, in my experience, when someone is inconsistent in their beliefs and you point that out to them, they typically double down on their inconsistency and just get emotional. You can observe a lot of bizarre behavior this way.

 

[CharChar]

Imo the people worth your time and worth arguing with are those who don't care if they silence or push their position on you and won't use rhetorical devices, confusion or other tricks to end the discussion.

Value your time and value your health, don't bother with nonsense or things that overly exhaust or annoy you, or have telltale signs of being meaningless.

That said, It might be enjoyable to participate in order to poke fun or joke around and based on countless other reasons.


Seems like you had an episode of migraine or something akin to it, were you overly sensitive to light and sounds as well? If you're thinking too intensely or you are deprived of nutrition or oxygen or tired it might onset, or it might come regardless of your situation. My worst migraine episodes can last an entire week and are intensified by the slightest physical or mental activity, usually only sleeping or meds can help it.

Also seems like you have pretty severe ocd-ish patterns of inescapable thinking, I know little about it but I think it's worth seeking professional consultation.

 

[CharChar]

So I was thinking about this post I made a while back and how I never gave you examples of what I was talking about. Here are a few that came up recently:

1. When a person makes two statements, and the implications of those statements contradict. I could just explain each statement, what it implies, and why those implications contradict. But I prefer to have a streamlined approach, if the implications contradict, that means the statements themselves must also contradict. So I struggle trying to find a way to point out the exact contradiction in the original two statements without resorting to explaining the implications.

2. If a person makes a statement that could imply two very different things, the statement is ambiguous. I could easily just point out - this statement could mean X or it could mean Y. But I prefer to get to the root ambiguity, rather than explaining the choics of what it could mean. If the statement is ambiguous, that means there must be some gap in the original statement itself, something must be missing. So I struggle trying to pinpoint the gap in the original statement, rather than resorting to simply explaining all the possible implications.

 

[CharChar]

So I was thinking about this post I made a while back and how I never gave you examples of what I was talking about. Here are a few that came up recently:

1. When a person makes two statements, and the implications of those statements contradict. I could just explain each statement, what it implies, and why those implications contradict. But I prefer to have a streamlined approach, if the implications contradict, that means the statements themselves must also contradict. So I struggle trying to find a way to point out the exact contradiction in the original two statements without resorting to explaining the implications.

2. If a person makes a statement that could imply two very different things, the statement is ambiguous. I could easily just point out - this statement could mean X or it could mean Y. But I prefer to get to the root ambiguity, rather than explaining the choics of what it could mean. If the statement is ambiguous, that means there must be some gap in the original statement itself, something must be missing. So I struggle trying to pinpoint the gap in the original statement, rather than resorting to simply explaining all the possible implications.

Here, I'll give specifics, but keep this in mind - in my OP, I was talking about "winning" and "losing" because I was referring to debates. In these examples, it's not a debate, and the issue is more about my inability to explain the inconsistency to myself.

An example of situation 1 (this one is actually related to the other thread I posted on here about that guy)

A while ago I asked whether he was just interested in a casual fling or was looking for something more.

He stated: "asking that shows insecurity. if you are an interesting person with a lot to offer someone, why would I just want something casual? wouldn't you expect me to want more? I want to get to know you and see what happens, which is more than just a casual fling."

He is making it seem like as long as I am an interesting person, there's no reason for him to not want more than a fling. As long as I'm an interesting person, that would be unimaginable, it just wouldn't happen, so it shouldn't be a concern.

Logical form = IF A THEN B. (A= me being interesting, B = him wanting more). [/B]

Now he decided that he no longer wants more than a casual fling. (Because he already gave it a chance and decided we have no future).

By his own logic, that would mean I am not an interesting person.

Because like he said above ^^ if I was an interesting person, he would want more. So the fact that he doesn't implies that I am not an interesting person.

Logical form = ~B THEN ~A.


An example of situation 2

If someone wanted to go to your party, and then recently backed out. You ask why they don't want to go anymore, they were so excited before, what happened, what changed.

They say : The party seems too wild for me, and that wouldn't be a huge deal if I had the energy for it, but I don't think I will because I have a lot of work that day.

This can mean two very different things:
- it could mean that they originally didn't think the party was going to be wild, but then realized it was
- or it could mean that they knew it was wild all along, but originally thought they'd have the energy, and recently realized they wont due to their work.

but there is no way to explain what the problem with the original statement is, why is the original statement ambiguous, what key piece of information did they leave out to make it ambiguous?

The only way to explain the ambiguity is by listing the options. but that shouldn't be the case. if something is ambiguous, it is a problem with the original statement, and one should be able to point out the gap in the original statement without having to explain the implications.

 

[cheese]

CharChar, I love your OP. Classic INTP.

Consider that the root of your frustration is not so much the illogic as your emotional reaction to perceived injustice and inability to resolve it. I see a few things happening here:

Your identity is rooted in your ability to sort truth from rubbish.
You see injustice in someone giving you a statement that is illogical, but if accepted as a premise and taken to its logical conclusion says something horrible about you - so they've both insulted you *and* didn't prove it properly.
You're hurt, but don't know how to approach this. Do you prove that his initial statement doesn't prove you're uninteresting, by pointing out its flawed nature? Or do you address the actual issue of whether or not you're uninteresting? And why would someone say something so confusing in the first place - were they being manipulative, or obtuse?
Casual-Fling-Guy made an attempt to lower your status in relation to him by calling you insecure, thus making it a competition between the two of you to determine who has higher status. You probably sensed this unconsciously, which added to your stress, but responded by trying to counter his statement logically when really this is an emotional/posturing game.

Basically, you're caught between your primary drive (sorting out truth from untruth), an emotional hurt which you are unable to navigate or find the answer to (because you're only looking at other people's statements), and conflicting impulses around socially appropriate behaviour (you know calling him out would be "weird", but you're also compelled to by who you are).

But the reason it's got you so strung up, and the reason you can't respond in time, is because you're overwhelmed - by your sense that something is logically wrong, by your emotional need to find what it is and point it out, by your underlying 'social radar' telling you you're losing ground with this person, by your confusion about what the other person is actually trying to signal, and by your frustration and disappointment in yourself at struggling.

If you were just a computer and not an actual person, you'd be able to find the error fine. It's having to deal with all the other stuff that real humans have to deal with - like navigating social interplay where two sides have different goals, dealing with internal frustration and stress at things not going your way, and dealing with hurt - that causes your lag. Under emotional overwhelm, the brain shuts down.

IMO, accepting that you're using different mental software to most other people is the first step towards overcoming this "overwhelm" response to bad logic. Once you accept that your impulse to respond is almost entirely social-emotional but the content of your response is irrelevant to most people's software, you'll be able to stop stressing yourself out trying to figure out the logical counter to statements even though generally that's what you're compelled to do. Then hopefully you'll see the game for what it is, leave your logic-ing for later, stop feeling like a failure to yourself, and go straight to responding with the social-emotional cues that are actually context-relevant.

Thoughts to consider:

Spoiler

Everyone is emotionally motivated to some degree, including you.
Most people are more emotionally motivated by people than by accuracy.
This means: gaining power over people, gaining status with people, being liked by people, etc.
This means: These people are going to say and do a lot of things that don't make sense to you, because your motivations are very different. And because of this, they will confuse you in ways you don't know how to fix using your current understanding of the world.

You, on the other hand, are motivated more by culling illogical forms and retaining logical ones for understanding the world. This *is* an emotional motivation for you (ie, you get distressed when you're unable to do it, or when you perceive it being uncorrected in the outside world).
Like any other human, you are motivated to maintain/protect your identity (which is rooted in whatever you most emotionally identify with - in this case, your ability to see logical truths).
When any person maintains their identity/ego in front of others, they feel validated, safe and stable.
This means: You're going to be at odds with most people's preferred form of interaction, and you will not be able to as easily maintain/protect your identity as other people. Their identity revolves not around precision but around being smooth socially, getting what they want, etc which they will achieve at the expense of reason and clarity, continually beating you down with social clout till you retreat.
This means: Interacting with others will make you feel unstable and insecure, whereas they will not, because they are meeting their identity goals fine - even though from your perspective they're "failing".
This means: Other people will appear to "win" more often than you, and it will appear unfair, unless you change how you perceive interaction and its goals.

What all this means is you've got to stop judging your social value by who is more logical or clear in their speech. This matters to you, but not so much to others. And because you're human, you'll be subconsciously on the lookout for whether you're doing ok socially, whether you're fitting in, whether you have equal value to others - but you're using all the wrong criteria to check. If your inner tribal ape is worrying about fitting in, look for the criteria others look for. When you fail your own standards of logic, you're only failing yourself - no one else notices.

Taking the example of Casual-Fling-Guy: You could have easily yelled at him and claimed he was bullshitting without trying to prove it. That's about as much "validity" as is required to have a stake in the game, based on his own lacklustre performance. Trying to win by your standards is much harder and will often fail anyway - because others don't recognise or accept your standards.

What really happened when he talked to you was that he called you insecure. He then won the social game because you didn't refute his status-lowering of you by countering with some posturing, either insulting him back or claiming you know your worth just fine, blah blah blah.

Like I said, this is classic INTP. You can see the logical errors, and it's super important to you that you identify exactly what they are and are then able to articulate them to other people. This "articulating errors to other people" is as far as your inferior Fe (relating-to-the-social-group) gets. The non-NTP world, however, is playing a far more sophisticated Fe game than you - that's why you're "losing", you're not playing the game you think you are. Everyone else is playing a social game. They're not fussed about their errors. They don't care if they make sense. All they care about is whether they can get away with it and convince others of it (I'm not even dissing this style of thought any more - there's a value to it that is real, though difficult for us to comprehend and accept).

Spoiler

I learnt this lesson eventually - that most people didn't give a fuck. I gave up trying to make sense myself because I realised it didn't matter and most people were really just looking for someone to throw a conversational ball back and forth. This actually made it a lot more fun for me to interact, since it let me take nonsense to the next level, unfettered by reason. Maybe you can do that too - just let go of the expectation and desire for other people to make sense in the way you need yourself to make sense, accept them for who they are, and see conversation as a Ne playground instead - a chance to surf the waves of what people say, rather than dive deep looking for the ground.

But this only works because I'm not really trying to get through to them in any way. I'm deflecting actual communication and depth with humour. If ever having a serious discussion where the stakes are real and someone comes to me with bullshit that doesn't make sense and a bunch of emotional/power posturing, I still lose my fucking mind. I can't handle it, I become emotionally overwhelmed, and more often than not I shut down completely and become unable to think or communicate.

Nothing makes me feel as helpless or as insane as being unable to get through in those instances. The only saving grace is my detachment - sometimes I go the other way and start laughing uncontrollably because their claims are so ludicrous.

Overall letting go and detaching helps, because I don't bother having arguments with people who don't matter. I work out what's going wrong with their reasoning in private for my own understanding, and whether or not they find out, it helps *me* going forward.

You don't *have* to play this game by their rules. You should just recognise that the rules are not yours, so you take the stress of "performing logically" off yourself. Because you failing to refute him logically does not cause you to "lose" - letting him determine your worth does.

Also, you can set your own standards for who *you* want to be involved with too, yknow. If someone can't be bothered being absolutely clear about what they want and places all the burden on you *and* makes jabs at your self-worth, you have all the freedom in the world to tell them to fuck off. Plenty of fish in the sea, and a lot of them have respect and concern for how they communicate in important matters.

 

[Cognisant]

A while ago I asked whether he was just interested in a casual fling or was looking for something more.

He stated: "asking that shows insecurity. if you are an interesting person with a lot to offer someone, why would I just want something casual? wouldn't you expect me to want more? I want to get to know you and see what happens, which is more than just a casual fling."

Why is asking insecure? If you don't know what he wants and you want to respect his emotional distance that's a perfectly logical question to ask.

He might want something casual for any number of reasons, the onus isn't on you to know.

I think you put him in a difficult position and he's being purposefully vague.

 

[CharChar]

CharChar, I love your OP. Classic INTP.

Thank you for the very thoughtful response, cheese. I never thought that emotion can actually blind my ability to reason. I thought they are two separate things that can co-exist. I thought that even though I am feeling feelings, I should still be able to see the logic clearly too.

I guess it's true that when dealing with others I just have to be able to resist the urge to disprove their logic, even though it's hard. That would be easier if I can just explain it to myself - but that's a main part of the problem. It's twofold, not only can I not disprove it to them, I can't cleanly prove/explain it to myself either. (in the two examples above, I touched on what I have a hard time explaining to myself).

Does whatever you said in your response also apply to my difficulty in explaining it to myself?

 

[CharChar]

Why is asking insecure? If you don't know what he wants and you want to respect his emotional distance that's a perfectly logical question to ask.

He might want something casual for any number of reasons, the onus isn't on you to know.

I think you put him in a difficult position and he's being purposefully vague.

I have no idea - I agree with you.

But the main issue was that if I took his statement to its logical conclusion, it would imply that I am not an interesting person. And I have no idea if that's really what he meant, or if I am misinterpreting.

And the frustration I have with myself is that I can't cleanly explain why his statement leads to that conclusion in a simple straightforward way.

 

[Sinny91]

People say seemingly illogical shit all day every day...

I say seemingly contradictory shit all the time, usually because I'm withholding the details which would make my statements logical.

I do that when we're venturing into personal territory, or when I feel like being unhelpful or evasive.

I find it concerning that you have given this subject and that dude so much thought...

Had you of said he brought up insecurity sooner, I would have called him a dick sooner.

My advice to you is that you stop thinking so much.

 

[Puffy]

I have no idea - I agree with you.

But the main issue was that if I took his statement to its logical conclusion, it would imply that I am not an interesting person. And I have no idea if that's really what he meant, or if I am misinterpreting.

And the frustration I have with myself is that I can't cleanly explain why his statement leads to that conclusion in a simple straightforward way.

I would take issue with your phrasing there. At most, if we accept the premises, the logical conclusion could be that *he* thinks you're not an interesting person. But his perception of you, other's perceptions of you, your perception of yourself, are all entirely different. You're interesting in the eyes of one, uninteresting in another -- that's transient and changing, and unreliable as a source of self-respect -- what matters more is how you feel about yourself.

You could just as easily say, "Actually, *I am* an interesting person, and if you think otherwise I don't need you in my life." Instead, you become anxious and begin to worry, because (I think) your self-worth is heavily invested in him (and others) thinking otherwise. If they can't think that about you, or desire your company, you must be worthless. He thinks you're uninteresting ergo you must be uninteresting, and so you need to search over what was said to prove/disprove, when that is not a necessary conclusion and if you believed otherwise it wouldn't matter.

I sympathise as I'm most certainly a person who historically has contorted himself around other people's perceptions of him. Every behaviour and opinion moulded to not offend, or not be perceived negatively, because the pangs of self-loathing are too painful otherwise. It's nightmarish, like being locked in armour; eventually you have to take steps towards self-asserting yourself, do the things you do because you love doing them, accept the anxiety that sweeps over you from doing so and learn to not care what people think of you.

Very often what we perceive as big mistakes are proportionally minor or even go unnoticed to the other person anyway. It's not about them, it's more about how you perceive yourself in relation to the event.

 

[CharChar]

I would take issue with your phrasing there. At most, if we accept the premises, the logical conclusion could be that *he* thinks you're not an interesting person. But his perception of you, other's perceptions of you, your perception of yourself, are all entirely different. You're interesting in the eyes of one, uninteresting in another -- that's transient and changing, and unreliable as a source of self-respect -- what matters more is how you feel about yourself.

You could just as easily say, "Actually, *I am* an interesting person, and if you think otherwise I don't need you in my life." Instead, you become anxious and begin to worry, because (I think) your self-worth is heavily invested in him (and others) thinking otherwise. If they can't think that about you, or desire your company, you must be worthless. He thinks you're uninteresting ergo you must be uninteresting, and so you need to search over what was said to prove/disprove, when that is not a necessary conclusion and if you believed otherwise it wouldn't matter.

I sympathise as I'm most certainly a person who historically has contorted himself around other people's perceptions of him. Every behaviour and opinion moulded to not offend, or not be perceived negatively, because the pangs of self-loathing are too painful otherwise. It's nightmarish, like being locked in armour; eventually you have to take steps towards self-asserting yourself, do the things you do because you love doing them, accept the anxiety that sweeps over you from doing so and learn to not care what people think of you.

Very often what we perceive as big mistakes are proportionally minor or even go unnoticed to the other person anyway. It's not about them, it's more about how you perceive yourself in relation to the event.

yes yes you're right - I should have said it implies I am uninteresting to him.

& the reason it matters is because all along I knew that his rejection of me could be either 1) personal (he didn't like me), or 2) neutral (he likes me but found some neutral incompatibility or personal reason to pull back). And I was just really really hoping it is #2 because 1 is really hurtful. I know you're right that it shouldn't matter what other people think, but.....why does it still hurt....even if I think I'm the greatest person on the planet it would still hurt if someone that means something to me doesn't see that.

But the main reason I posted that here is regarding my OP about my inability to explain things, and that issue came up so I thought it would be a good example.

I still don't know how to explain why his premise leads to that conclusion in lay-mans terms (without using formal logic). I tried it with a friend and she had no idea what I was talking about.

I know that if I didn't care about this dude, this example wouldn't matter, but this problem (my inability to pick out the logical flaw) goes way beyond this issue. If you look at example 2 it has nothing to do with this guy and was still a problem. It really makes me feel dumb that I can't explain things (especially to myself).

 

[Shieru]

Hi @CharChar, I do hope you're feeling better now and have been able to come to peace within yourself ^^

I want to let you know you're not alone in this, I've experienced very similar symptoms in the sort of circumstances you describe. It's always been when I'm incapable of resolving a problem which entails a great deal of emotional investment, especially when potential loss or harm are at stake.

I don't know if it's the same sort of thing for you, but for me it comes down to a few things. My sense of self-worth and security are rooted in being able to make sense of the world. And so lack of ability to do so can lead to panic or depression in the worst cases (although I've made progress with embracing ambiguity lately, so this doesn't happen as much anymore). Also, I must have a thought-out context to operate within before I can act upon something; there is a need to respond to life accurately. And so when it comes to emotions such as grief (or depression), it's almost as if they can't be properly processed until I feel I understand the situation for what it is. The emotion mentally goes on hold until I can make an ethical decision about how to handle it. But the body feels what it feels right now, its existence doesn't wait for rational decisions. And so lacking conscious release, it will bend under the stress of its emotional/chemical state, and become ill. All this is made worse by the tendency to self-deprecate and blame failure on myself by default. I think I may have experienced something you describe; a desperation to figure out what I may have said/done to warrant failure, especially if it's rejection. There is a genuine desire to learn from mistakes behind this, but also I think it's about self-deprecating suspicions which seep up from the subconscious and beg to be disproved. I've damned myself many times for being 'stupid', and since this challenges my identity so, I become quite fixed on knowing whether or not it's substantiated.

I can relate so much with the confusion you describe. Human beings can be frustratingly difficult to figure out, can't they? And what an inconvenience this is for a mind which operates by meticulous logical deduction of reality D: (it seems from what I've seen of you, that you have a mind like this). Unfortunately I think the truth is behavior often can't be deduced to cohesive causalities. Or at least, with our finite perception of reality, we are helpless to see the whole circumstance, and therefore understand it adequately. In many cases it seems people don't even attempt to unravel themselves enough to be able to explain their reasons, so what hope do we have of understanding them? I think, we seldom (if ever?) understand our own motivations fully, let alone those of others. Perhaps we must accept that as long as we are separate individuals, there will be some level of ambiguity in human interaction.

*looks forward to the development of machine-aided telepathy!!*

Sometimes it seems absurd to me, how much I stress over things. Such experiences can be so unpleasant, can't they, and so why do we bother? But I think in part it shows just how invested the INTP mind (and heart) can become in understanding. It seems imperative, doesn't it? Though, it may be healthier, if not more conducive to clarity, to attempt to back away from this obsession. I've always found solace in the dispassionate detachment of Ti. Whenever I feel myself spiraling into illness, I shift my awareness into this empty place. Funny enough, it doesn't stop the body from doing what it's doing, but it does allow for an understanding of it which can lead to resolution and healing in a briefer time.

 

[cheese]

Thank you for the very thoughtful response, cheese. I never thought that emotion can actually blind my ability to reason. I thought they are two separate things that can co-exist. I thought that even though I am feeling feelings, I should still be able to see the logic clearly too.

I guess it's true that when dealing with others I just have to be able to resist the urge to disprove their logic, even though it's hard. That would be easier if I can just explain it to myself - but that's a main part of the problem. It's twofold, not only can I not disprove it to them, I can't cleanly prove/explain it to myself either. (in the two examples above, I touched on what I have a hard time explaining to myself).

Does whatever you said in your response also apply to my difficulty in explaining it to myself?

I think so. My guess is that several different emotional problems are leaking into each other in the background, and affecting your ability to think. It looks like you might be putting pressure on yourself to "cleanly prove" other people's mistakes to yourself in order to 1) prove to yourself that you don't suck (because the guy's rejection of you is hanging over your head), 2) prove to yourself that you're not dumb (because your failure to put socially put the guy in his place hurts your inferior Fe, and proving things logically is how you derive your sense of worth), 3) prove to yourself that you're *you* (because your identity's been threatened - some idiot came off better than you despite making no sense, even though logic is your world).

So in essence you're still kinda operating under overwhelm, which would hamper your mental clarity.

What I do in these cases is go straight to the emotions, instead of trying to "prove" anything about anyone. If I'm feeling shitty, I just acknowledge that and sit with the emotions until I've identified every single one, and what specific event each one relates to. Then I work through each hurt/embarrassment/ragefest till I've fully understood my reaction to the event/person. That's how I move forward.

Basically, you've got a bunch of negative feelings your ego is trying to run from. But because you're an INTP, your mind is set up such that it tricks you into thinking some ridiculous roundabout method of processing (proving someone else logically wrong about something which is fundamentally irrelevant) will somehow get rid of those yucky feelings - when actually just dealing with the feelings directly is much more efficient.

When my head is clear, I can work logical things out more easily - and failure (if it comes) doesn't hit as hard because my sense of self-worth isn't all tangled up in it.

 

[Architect]

Most people are not that interested in being logically consistent.

True, I'd say it stronger though "Most people are not interested in being logically consistent

Moreover, in my experience, when someone is inconsistent in their beliefs and you point that out to them, they typically double down on their inconsistency and just get emotional. You can observe a lot of bizarre behavior this way.

I've found that people don't get emotional generally, but they won't budge. Ever. Point out the flaws and it goes nowhere. Take this US election, (disclosure I'm independent), my buddy paints a picture of Hillary's untrustworthiness, so I point out that there is an equal measure of that on the Trump side, and worse we have no political record to guide us. His vitriol against Hillary is just based on the fact that she actually has a political history, which is an advantage over her opponent where all we know is a serial bankrupter.

Logic? What does logic have to do with it? I can't make any headway with him because for him it's not about logic but feelings. Because of the history with Hillary he has feelings and that's all he cares about. With Trump there's no bad feelings like that, but he does acknowledge its a wildcard, so he figures "well it's possible it could work out great".

Dreck. There's nothing for it. People can't think and won't think.

 

[Artsu Tharaz]

I have a pretty bad headache at the moment, due most likely to being hungover.

I'd like to give a better response to this thread, but at the moment it's kinda painful to read much or express myself too deeply. Hopefully I am able to provide some insight later on.

It's also somewhat unsettling to me that this post was made just a minute before the hour... hopefully the psychological effect there is that I am more likely to remember to come back to it later.

 

[Artsu Tharaz]

so i came back to answer and i am too confused as to what you are even talking about because i fail to see what it has to do with logic really and i guess by changing my mind like that that it seems i am doing the same thing maybe there is stuff you can read about changing your mind and why it is or is not logical thing to do could be interesting to have a look at.

in saying that logical analysis does my head in too i was looking at dario nardi descriptions on a forum and just reading Ti did my head in however you say you are a Ti dominant so most likely if that is the case then there is not much someone of my particular personality type could really explain to you about logic except why it is hard so i guess the problem is you are trying to analyse logically something which lacks a logical structure which is rather silly.

yup

Spoiler

based on this post of mine, it seems that your type is actually ISTJ... which adds further evidence of you being the person I suspect you to be.

 

[CharChar]

I think so. My guess is that several different emotional problems are leaking into each other in the background, and affecting your ability to think. It looks like you might be putting pressure on yourself to "cleanly prove" other people's mistakes to yourself in order to 1) prove to yourself that you don't suck (because the guy's rejection of you is hanging over your head), 2) prove to yourself that you're not dumb (because your failure to put socially put the guy in his place hurts your inferior Fe, and proving things logically is how you derive your sense of worth), 3) prove to yourself that you're *you* (because your identity's been threatened - some idiot came off better than you despite making no sense, even though logic is your world).

So in essence you're still kinda operating under overwhelm, which would hamper your mental clarity.

What I do in these cases is go straight to the emotions, instead of trying to "prove" anything about anyone. If I'm feeling shitty, I just acknowledge that and sit with the emotions until I've identified every single one, and what specific event each one relates to. Then I work through each hurt/embarrassment/ragefest till I've fully understood my reaction to the event/person. That's how I move forward.

Basically, you've got a bunch of negative feelings your ego is trying to run from. But because you're an INTP, your mind is set up such that it tricks you into thinking some ridiculous roundabout method of processing (proving someone else logically wrong about something which is fundamentally irrelevant) will somehow get rid of those yucky feelings - when actually just dealing with the feelings directly is much more efficient.

When my head is clear, I can work logical things out more easily - and failure (if it comes) doesn't hit as hard because my sense of self-worth isn't all tangled up in it.

That's interesting and helpful advice. But if it is the feeling of rejection that overwhelms me, why would it happen during times when I'm not being rejected? The rejection with this guy was just one example but this happens all the time. The first OP I made was about a disagreement over something, not a rejection ...

Is it because of the #3 you listed?

 

[cheese]

I don't know, CharChar. That was just a guess, about your head. What do you think?

 

[CharChar]

I don't know, CharChar. That was just a guess, about your head. What do you think?

oh I know! I was just clarifying what you meant by that =D

I just wasn't sure whether your guess was meant to explain that specific circumstance (rejection), or the problem generally.

It felt a bit like when I gave that rejection example, people's advice was tailored to that particular scenario, so I didn't know if it applied to the broader problem, or was limited to that specific example


& ah I actually wrote a whole other response to Shieru that also explains your question of what I think and hit send but it never showed up, I'll have to rewrite it!