I Think, Therefore..

[MEDICaustik]

.. I am.

Is this more true for INTPs than other people?

I was thinking about this today, and how as INTPs, we largely live our lives in our heads.

A lot of the ways I define myself, people would call me out on. For instance, I think of myself as an adventurer and explorer. People would ask for examples, and my few experiences would have them calling "bullshit". But to me, I am an adventurer, though many of my adventures have been based in thought, and are thus not empirical. It doesn't change the fact that I know I am an adventurer, despite what is visible to others.

I, and I'm assuming most of you, compose and execute dozens of thought experiments everyday, and am constantly using thought experiment data to reach conclusions. Even though this data is completely subjective, given that it came from my mind and has no real measurable value, I still place a lot of value on it. Anyone else would say that data and the conclusions that follow are irrelevant, but I consider it to be highly accurate.

Are INTPs more sure of who they are than other people? Does thinking "I am" make us that? Is this a human occurrence, or an INTP?

^Just brain droppings, food for thought. (droppings and food used in the same sentence )

 

[Cognisant]

Adventures change people, if your inner explorations have changed you then it was an adventure.

 

[Ostriker]

I can very much relate to your experience with this. To be honest if not for your post I would never have even identified this phenomenon, but now that you've outlined it here I can see how many changes to my life I've made recently classify as purely internal. To me they are very real and tangible, yet they are immeasurable by outsiders.

Does thinking "I am" make us that? Is this a human occurrence, or an INTP?

A piece of advice I've been given before is "fake it 'til you make it". If you can look and act out a certain role you will eventually become it. While it certainly works, to me this sounds very inauthentic. To change yourself in such a way is to be dishonest with yourself.

I find that change must come from within. An example is my attempt at correcting my posture in recent months. From general low self esteem I've always slouched my back. When I tried to stand tall and walk proudly I found that it was very difficult because I didn't feel proud. So instead of faking self confidence, I decided to work at my self image first and over several months it has improved. Now that I am a little more comfortable with who I am as a person, inside and out, standing up straight has become noticeably easier.

I think my distaste for the "fake it 'til you make it" advice comes from my very strong self-awareness and a need to always be honest with my self. I definitely think this is an INTP trait, though not exclusively.

 

[Dapper Dan]

I am, therefore I think... among other things.

I'm not sure why we consider thinking to be the end-all, be-all of existence.

Oh wait, it's because most philosophers are INTP's.

 

[Words]

Even though this data is completely subjective, given that it came from my mind and has no real measurable value...

It confounds me why people have this perspective that subjective judgment is more subjective than subjective experiences. And, yes, even those that are measurable are subjective. Yes, im saying that Data outside and inside are both subjective. And both can be collectively scrutinized. I can check your maths and i can check whether your seeing a pink elephant in front of you or not.


Oh and Descartes being INTP is what i call "coherence."

 

[Architect]

Yes, I might put it at 80%/20%. Eighty percent of the time we live in our heads, twenty we live in the experiential world. Varying depending on the individual. In observing my INTP son I see kid who obviously prefers his head to the real world.

• Prefers being at home rather than going out, especially to events. There are exceptions, he did enjoy going to fireworks the other day, but was in agony the way home as we got stuck in traffic late at night.
• Wants to spend most of his time on the computer. Would spend all of his time if I let him.
• When not on the computer is building with LEGO's. Scenes and devices he imagined.
• Loves problem solving computer games, hates FPS's.
• Loves meeting his friends on the computer, playmates are usually a friend coming over and playing in a virtual world game right next to him on a different computer.
• Never goes outside. All the other Sensor boys are out goofing off in the street while he stays inside where the action is.
• I have to push him to exercise (weight lifting mostly these days). Forgets to eat, and then doesn't eat that much.
• Biggest worry is that something will happen to his brain. Hates stories where something happens to a persons brain.

Yes I'd say this is somebody who cares more about thinking then otherwise.

 

[Reluctantly]

It confounds me why people have this perspective that subjective judgment is more subjective than subjective experiences. And, yes, even those that are measurable are subjective. Yes, im saying that Data outside and inside are both subjective. And both can be collectively scrutinized. I can check your maths and i can check whether your seeing a pink elephant in front of you or not.

Yes, thank god, someone gets it. The act of measuring is both objective and subjective in that if the act of measuring is known, it can be scrutinized objectively, even though the point of reference for measuring is subjectively defined based on what that reference is decided to be.

This is why philosophy can only seem to show how thought is limited in various ways, but isn't capable of determining thought that isn't limited in any way; the reason then being because it's too busy showing how changing a point of reference can invalidate the conclusions drawn from another point of reference. It misses the point entirely, in that there is or can be meaning itself in just measuring.

What's incredibly ironic is that if one argues that everything is subjective, then the statement that "The objective can then not exist." is uncertain because its conclusion is then implied to be based on subjectivity. What is subjective then becomes a title for what is an assumption, but an assumption can be either true or false - it is unknown, meaning the truth of that statement is purely unknown. This is similar to how Kant talks about how there might be an objective reality, but whether we know it or can know it is uncertain, given how we are able to know things.

Then people who claim subjectivity for being false are making a coherency mistake. Because they are then trying to use what is deemed by them as 'false' (through their own individual subjectivity) in order to decide what is then 'true' (no objective reality); but how can something that is deemed false know anything about what is true? Logically, it can't, and then only by knowing what is first true, can one know what is then false. Logic itself is its own assumption, because it has to define truth, in order to measure what is false. Thus logically claiming that there is no objective reality because the subjective is defined as false is paradoxical to logic itself that first requires a measure of truth to determine what contradicts that truth. Logic is implicitly tied to definition.

The way people then use philosophy and logic to suggest then that there can be no objective truth or to suggest then that an idea can exist counter to another are making an assumption, as anything else, just as I am in making this statement. But it's incredibly beautiful to understand this, because it means we don't have to be strictly controlled or defined by any such thing because we can have a certain amount of freedom from ideas of fate...and from any idea really, if we seek such.

And thank you, Words. I had just about given up thinking anyone could actually understand any of this. But if you do, that's one person and I know other such people can exist.

 

[snafupants]

That whole ontological, cartesian premise seems breathlessly idiotic. Why couldn't the modality through which that thought arose (i.e., the self) be artificial? How does the thought, or meta-cognition if you like, prove anything, save one's own hubris? As one dreams, for example, there's normally a presumed persona, but that doesn't mean the dreaming persona possesses a corporal existence, or any existence at all. The undergirding to such a presumption is flimsy at center.

 

[opheliaesque]

That whole ontological, cartesian premise seems breathlessly idiotic. Why couldn't the modality through which that thought arose (i.e., the self) be artificial? How does the thought, or meta-cognition if you like, prove anything, save one's own hubris? As one dreams, for example, there's normally a presumed persona, but that doesn't mean the dreaming persona possesses a corporal existence, or any existence at all. The undergirding to such a presumption is flimsy at center.

dooode, r u makin' an argument 'gainst Descartes? hdu.

Obvious omission for the justification of the premise; "whatever thinks exists," aside, I rather hate that quote. I must not be INTP. Yay, finally some progress.

 

[Brontosaurie]

"I think therefore I am" is a fallacious basis for cartesian dualism and absolutism, nothing more.