Taking "INTP" too seriously (RANT)

[RadiantFlux]

This is me ranting. I'm sorry to anyone this offends, it's just something that bothers me about typology and what people do with it. Feel free to disagree, my ears are open to your opinions.
--


I hate this whole "I'm an INTP so I must be 100% introverted and never talk to anyone else ever" idea, also I hate this "No emotion" thing. It seems like people are taking their types too far, claiming that they are at the complete end of the sociability/emotional spectrum, in essence, a robot. Emotions and sociability are human characteristics. I respect that some people have disorders that do make them completely antisocial or unattached, but the majority of people do not have these disorders.

Being a human means that you are all of the types put into one person, even if one is stronger than the other. That's really what types are (your strongest characteristics). They aren't your ONLY characteristics. I'm very sensitive about how people feel around me, but still value logic over emotions and can't quite handle it when someone other than my S.O. is crying. I still have extroverted feelings, but always will chat with people and love spending time alone. Just because I relate most to the INTP, doesn't mean I do not have the opposite qualities.

A while back, I used to be really into this whole type stuff, and just recently came back to it. I used to do what I see a lot of people doing now, which was claiming I was emotionless, and was repulsed by most human life. After a while of soul searching, I realized that what I was after was an INTP ideal, without fully being myself. I am not emotionless. I am not anti-social. I think it's silly that people think there can only be one true form of INTP, when the whole system is a series of flexible boxes with room to move and change.

Your thoughts?

 

[DetachedRetina]

I think this is a recurring theme on this forum: We are intelligent reasonable people, why are we taking typology so seriously?

 

[Moocow]

While I don't entirely think of myself this way, we can still separately decide we're cold, empty shells AND INTPs then wonder if the two might be connected. It's hard to resist the urge to see them as related. I've had phases of extroversion and motivation which come and go regardless of my self-concept, which appears to drag along as an afterthought.
Maybe some individuals who are more desperately seeking a self concept than I am will be vulnerable to misunderstanding types and personal development. If this is the case, don't you think that if it weren't typology, they'd pick something else for a frame of reference anyways?

 

[RadiantFlux]

At least I'm not alone then. Taking it so seriously is just the same as taking astrological stuff seriously. People let it define them.

 

[Eido]

Typing yourself does often lead to a kind of self-fulfilling prophesy. I did it myself for a few months after first learning about the subject. Like most things, it has both good and bad effects. Learning I was an INTP allowed me to put some qualities of mine into perspective, but it also made me begin to act in ways that were "expected" of an INTP. I think most people figure this out and stop forcing themselves into a mold they don't fit.

 

[Auburn]

@RadiantFlux - You started using it as an identity-anchor.
Then you found the anchor limiting and rebelled against it. Fine.

The fact that you did this,
has nothing to do with the core of the theory itself.

And the theory isn't flawed for how people choose to use it.
That ('people') inclides Isabel Briggs Myers and David Kerisey.

This is about truth, not about application.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

" I used to do what I see a lot of people doing now"
Time traveler expressing frustration at those who live in the past

Not everyone does that(by the way do you mean here?), some people have been here a long time, and moved away from MBTI and focus more on themselves and whatever else. Those that are new to typology and this place may be prone to over-identifying if they come from a background of being misunderstood and out of place, but that being the case you have to realize it's the beginning for them while you have already passed that stage.

 

[snafupants]

I basically agree with the opening analysis, and I'd like to take this opportunity to remind everyone of shadow functions. That's right, every type has virtually eight functions. Anyway, I have noticed this propensity to filter every action through this self-fulfilling prophesy and ever-narrowing schema of one particular personality type. At some junction, this exercise becomes an excuse to forestall change.

 

[nedenom]

I mostly agree with you, OP. This is also my second time around this. And it is a natural conclusion to come to. There have been a time I too thought this shit is like astrology; tell me your type and I'll tell you who you are. But the MBTI is at least are more accurate than astrology in that.

Maybe it is also characteristic of INTP personality to enjoy finding systems in patterns, that's why people get so into the zone with it.

 

[Darby]

I'm 20, have done the tests multiple times over many years, I've always typed INTP, and I find I relate to it well (relate being the key word here). I don't find the MBTI system to be the end-all be-all of who I am, and where I will be. I do have a habit of coming on here often after long periods of emotional difficulty in order to ground myself and remember who I am.

I've never taken typology super seriously, the individual functions I find more interesting than anything else. I do think it has a bit more validity than astrology, but that's because for astrology you're looking at planets to describe a type, whereas with typology it seems to me that you are finding a description to fit a personality.

To describe better, Astrology to me is looking at what to me are unrelated factors such as tables, and attempting to describe something with it (like a sphere), while typology, you are looking at the object and saying "it's a sphere." You are finding a way to describe the object through your own experience, while astrology takes seemingly unrelated factors and tries to put them together and relate them to the object to form a description.

The whole thing is rather ambiguous and wishy-washy for me.

 

[Vrecknidj]

I hate this whole "I'm an INTP so I must be 100% introverted and never talk to anyone else ever" idea, also I hate this "No emotion" thing.

...

Your thoughts?

I believe that the vast majority of really extremist posts of this sort are coming from people who are younger than 30.

And, I think there are some very good reasons why many of these posts can be found coming from people who are still coming to terms with their own identities and are actually working out some pretty heavy issues.

Just a hunch. And, in that group, there's a lot of hoped-for bragging rights--but this is merely evidence of what I've asserted here, really.

Give them 30 more years and see how it works out.

Dave

 

[EditorOne]

"I hate this whole "I'm an INTP so I must be 100% introverted and never talk to anyone else ever" idea, also I hate this "No emotion" thing."

I think, if you have some patience, you'll see you've created a stereotype in your mind that doesn't actually have much presence on the forum. We have some here who are definitely introverted to the point of disability, and others not so much. We do have people wander in who think they are emotionless, and someone usually points out to them that they don't lack emotions, they simply aren't as good with emotion as they are with thought, so they shun emotions.

You kind of overstated the case. It is possible to use MBTI unwisely and it is very possible to misunderstand its implications, but not all who know they are INTP think it solves everything for them or defines who they are in a limiting way. Just the opposite. By knowing their strengths they can compensate for their weaknesses and that usually involves being able to at least figure out how emotions work or when they are appropriate, when it's better to mingle, when to keep their mouths shut. All the traits we prefer not to use, in other words.

 

[Dapper Dan]

I would argue that the people the OP describes don't take typology seriously enough. Someone who claims to be an emotionless INTP probably doesn't have a terrific grasp on MBTI.

If you take the time to learn and understand the system (including its limitations), you can see the functions people use in real life. You might even start to understand other people, regardless of whether you agree with or get along with them.

 

[snafupants]

I would argue that the people the OP describes don't take typology seriously enough. Someone who claims to be an emotionless INTP probably doesn't have a terrific grasp on MBTI.

If you take the time to learn and understand the system (including its limitations), you can see the functions people use in real life. You might even start to understand other people, regardless of whether you agree with or get along with them.

Yeah that would indicate some confusion. The order of the top four functions, in my mind, dictate the ease, comfort and perhaps skill whereby someone interacts with others and the larger world. Saying that the INTP doesn't have feelings does two interrelated things - it posits only four functions, by negating the shadow functions, and assumes that the fourth function (i.e., extraverted feeling) doesn't work in tandem with higher functions. I mean, even more obviously, thought and action in human beings are pretty inexorably tied; I have always felt uncomfortable at the widespread public misconception regarding this almost forced dichotomy between thinking and feeling: that's not how our central nervous systems or brains operate.

 

[Architect]

You're misunderstanding what type and INTP means, and or having some personal issues around it I would guess.

My observations through the years is how impressed I am with the profound effect type has on a persons outwardly behavior. By this I don't mean the fine grained behaviors such as you mention, like introversion and extroversion. Introverted types extravert, vice-versa so on and so forth. What I see with type is the functions coming into play, and fundamental orientation. The Sensors can't help being Sensors, for example. I went to a party yesterday where my wife, kid and I were the only intuitives (a common experience). The S's (everybody else) chatted about some reality TV show (Bachelorette, or something?), playing some kind of sport, talking about sports, telling funny stories, and consuming lots of food. We (my family) would have preferred interesting discussions about, well anything. Art, technology, economics, politics, religion ... my kid would have preferred playing on the computer with the boys rather than running around outside.

Anyhow, saying a person is some Type is like saying they're Human, instead of canine or equine. Being canine doesn't specify specific behaviors - well except for that tendency to want to chase balls - but it provides the framework upon which free will, personality and individuality decorate.

 

[Spaz]

What attracted me to the MBTI test was my search for a career that would fit my personality. However, I don't think it can be used to fully define yourself. I've found that, even after taking the test I'm still undecisive about careers, because I still do not have an absolute definition of myself. I don't think an absolute definition exists. The test does provide some insight, though. It also gives you percentage results of each function, although it is possible to score 100% on some of them. Reading more about this MBTI stuff- it appears that the shadow functions of your personality type can come out under certain circumstances, too. I still view personality as a fluid trait; i.e. our mental state is a product..of when we sleep, what we eat, activities we engage in, environment..etc. So even if we have some dominant personality traits, they are always subject to change.

 

[Sanctum]

I think this is a recurring theme on this forum: We are intelligent reasonable people, why are we taking typology so seriously?

I feel like you answered your own question, since we are intelligent reasonable rational people we require a scientific logical explanation for thing in this case the the way we act and interact with the world. And once again our introverted thinking causes us to dig deep into ideas that interest us, generally speaking

 

[Hadoblado]

I think this extremism is completely understandable given the number of people who have advocated it at some point in the past (myself and OP included). Particularly given the predisposition of an INTP towards conceptual experimentation, and the vast conceptual framework the MBTI offers.
People with statistically underrepresented personalities are unlikely to fit in, and before MBTI or some other understanding of personality, they are unlikely to understand why. I know I was extremely willing to gobble up any explanation as to why people in general seem so irrational, yet I remain so uninfluential regardless of the relative quality and clarity of my thoughts.
I don't see why this would make you angry, particularly since this infantile position parallels your own past conceptual development.

 

[pernoctator]

People with statistically underrepresented personalities are unlikely to fit in, and before MBTI or some other understanding of personality, they are unlikely to understand why. I know I was extremely willing to gobble up any explanation as to why people in general seem so irrational, yet I remain so uninfluential regardless of the relative quality and clarity of my thoughts.

For me, it's others who have seemed extremely willing to gobble up explanations for my strangeness. I've had all manner of nonsense attributed to me over the years, and probably partly because of that I'm very skeptical of psychology. While I'm thrilled to have finally found something I actually identify with, I still detest being put into a box. This thread suggests I'm not alone in skepticism.

 

[Hadoblado]

I would like to quickly distinguish pseudo-psychology and psychology. If someone is attributing a mental state or property without empirical evidence, they are in fact applying pseudo-psychology, as they are utilising a fundamentally unscientific approach under the guise of a scientific psychological one. I'm probably not telling you anything you don't already know, and skepticism of scientific process is definitive to the process itself, but dismissing the field out of hand for the inadequacies of the incompetent would be unjustified.

I'm probably straw-manning the fuck out of you right now... Can you tell my friends give me all sorts of shit about being a psychology major? /rant

 

[MissQuote]

Spoiler

 

[Jennywocky]

I hate this whole "I'm an INTP so I must be 100% introverted and never talk to anyone else ever" idea, also I hate this "No emotion" thing. It seems like people are taking their types too far, claiming that they are at the complete end of the sociability/emotional spectrum, in essence, a robot. Emotions and sociability are human characteristics. I respect that some people have disorders that do make them completely antisocial or unattached, but the majority of people do not have these disorders.

Again, that is allowing one's "type" to be prescriptive, rather than descriptive and helpful. I think there is some conformity pressure with the INTP population in terms of always sounding "rational" and not being open to emotional displays and having to hold certain religious/spiritual beliefs (i.e., agnostic and atheistic are acceptable, anything else is suspect), and there's a pride in being aloof and somewhat snarky and almost cynical of everything.

Not that these tendencies don't exist, but it's more that people seem to want to adhere to the extreme forms of the traits rather than allowing themselves to be complex and accessible human beings.

Yes, I'm typically rational; and I typically have a dry sense of humor and can be snarky; and I'm not prone to a lot of emotional drippiness or outbursts; and I tend to be skeptical and agnostic, I'll challenge things that do not seem to make sense in order to better understand them; and I tend to see social convention as somewhat arbitrary; and yes, I tend to be aloof, anxious in social situations, slow to warm up to some people, kind of scared to initiate and put myself out there until I understand the situation I'm in.

But I can be quietly warm, funny, pleasant, well-mannered, concerned, committed, kind, hard-working, searching for transcendence, able to shed tears in the right circumstances, and a bunch of other things that aren't the "stereotype" but still have a place in who I am.

Being a human means that you are all of the types put into one person, even if one is stronger than the other. That's really what types are (your strongest characteristics). They aren't your ONLY characteristics. I'm very sensitive about how people feel around me, but still value logic over emotions and can't quite handle it when someone other than my S.O. is crying. I still have extroverted feelings, but always will chat with people and love spending time alone. Just because I relate most to the INTP, doesn't mean I do not have the opposite qualities.

yes, that seems to be what I'm saying as well. Good for you.

A while back, I used to be really into this whole type stuff, and just recently came back to it. I used to do what I see a lot of people doing now, which was claiming I was emotionless, and was repulsed by most human life. After a while of soul searching, I realized that what I was after was an INTP ideal, without fully being myself. I am not emotionless. I am not anti-social. I think it's silly that people think there can only be one true form of INTP, when the whole system is a series of flexible boxes with room to move and change.

Your thoughts?

Do what you're been doing: Figuring out who you are, and being yourself, and don't let other people's conceptions of who you're "supposed to be" mislead you.

If MBTI empowers you to be a fully complex and nuanced person, embrace it; if it's just being used as a club or to dilute you or drag you down, take it out behind the chemical sheds and shoot it without mercy.

 

[pernoctator]

I would like to quickly distinguish pseudo-psychology and psychology. If someone is attributing a mental state or property without empirical evidence, they are in fact applying pseudo-psychology, as they are utilising a fundamentally unscientific approach under the guise of a scientific psychological one.

And I would like to distinguish between psychologists and scientists. If "a scientific psychological" approach to attributing a mental state exists, I have never heard of it. But that's another topic.

 

[TheGeneral]

I have been lurking the forums for a while, but you gave me a reason to register and make my first post.

I agree that it's somewhat boring and "inside the box" to put a label on personality and then limit yourself to specific rules.

For me, finding out I was an INTP made it more clear as to why I am the way I am and why I think the way I do. I used to think I had mental disorder for wanting to spend countless hours reading random info, or my fascination with patterns, or why I don't have 50 friends, etc etc.

I have noticed that a decent percentage of people on this forum believe that certain traits are only INTP specific, but they are actually not. And this seems to happen more often with the negative traits. Most people would rather just say "well this is who I am" than to actually deal with it as a real negative traits. Negative traits are more common in humans than positive traits. For example, anyone can bitch perfectly fine about 20 things at once. If someone said "bitching too much is INTP trait", then of course most people will just agree without considering that it's more universal than INTP specific.

 

[HDINTP]

Agree. I think that exact copying is almost useless. I would say that everyone is an original and be his/her self. In my opinion typology just tells me what is strongest in my case not exactly what i am it can't. I think you always have unlimited possibilities. Just because there appears something you have never seen before doesn't mean it is impossible so that can't be.

Just my opinion

 

[Coolydudey]

Ultimately, to describe perfectly any given person, you would have to have 7 billion types.... Clearly not very practical or useful!
16 is just a logical (based on certain axes) and convenient number ( as well as fairly accurate to stick with), so the bottom line is that while we are INTP's And have a tendency towards certain traits, they do not define our personality or put it in a box.

 

[Pyropyro]

I always assume that the MBTI is simply tools to get to the truth, not hard truths themselves. It's useful to fix flaws in your personality and maximize your potential.

Nice use for MBTI:
Hmm... weak Fe? perhaps I need to socialize a bit more before I get trapped in my own world.
Hmm... badass Ne and Ti? let's use them for brainstorming and make useful stuff

Bad use for MBTI:
I'm INTP, I'm different, leave me alone sob sob

 

[shortbuss]

I feel the same as OP. People act like it's an exact science. In fact, it is a very abstract concept that should take into account the nuisances of a person's personality.

The worst is when people almost treat it like something completely unscientifically substantiated like horoscopes. It's a disgrace to the actual science of psychology.

 

[shoeless]

the OP put my feelings on the matter more eloquently and potentially less offensive than i would have done so myself. that said, i do believe the behavior described can often be a manifestation of heavier problems in a person's life. a form of escapism, if you will. it's easy to mold yourself to what the results of your personality test tell you you are, and it's easy to act the extreme end of a spectrum, especially if you're already generally "bad" with people or have a hard time dealing with emotions. it's just an excuse not to change. i believe this has already been said before.

that was my experience, anyway, which i am grateful to have grown out of because it was not a fun place to be in. i try not to judge these people as much as i hope they'll eventually find their own way in life. i mean, if you're happy the way you are that's one thing, but i tend to believe extremist behavior that isn't the result of a disorder is just generally a result of unhappiness with one's life. again, not fun. sometimes necessary in the course of things, but definitely not fun.

 

[Rakshasa]

I can only speak for myself, however...

I think a lot of it has to do with indivudual circumstance. I've only recently come to terms with the fact that I've emotions. I shunned the prospect even before I knew what MBTI was.

I've observed a fair number like that, however. I often times try to deny, or at least seperate my emotions from my actions, and posts because they are not constructive. They aren't pragmatic, and cannot be trusted. So they may be enjoyed, observed, and weighed, but usually not enough to influence me. Because of that I often neglect to even mention them or make them apparent.

And the people who actually do think that they don't have emotions or totally neglect them still has things to work out. Like Vrecknidj said; they're probably young, still.

Once again we're individuals who happen to fall on this scale, the scale does not land on the individual. I've always found it an accurate description of me for the most part. Accurate, but not entirely comprehensive.

Were I to say "You're tall." you wouldn't get angry because I forgot to mention the color (And exact shade) of your hair. The core description of INTPs are mostly accurate across the board I think. However they often say we have a tendency to behave like... And a lot of people get confused on tendency and does.

TL;DR: INTP is a description of me. It is not me. You're reading into things too much. Don't assume that these people don't have reasons for acting as they do, it's not like they're punching babies.

 

[hafalla]

Don't hate on how people define themselves, bro.