Ti-Ne hypocrisy of language

[Brontosaurie]

we make efforts to be precise in our expressions. we feel like verbal chemists or mechanics, tinkering with a formula to achieve clarity, balance, consistency and desirable communicative performance. we sometimes wish mathematical operators were available in common language. we are enslaved to the bare essential denotations of words, even when we are trying to be more poetic.

yet we read in the opposite way. we get rough impressions, we "know where this is going" and skip portions of a text. we quickly assign a core proposition to any verbal message and proceed to engage that, without going through thorough calculations to unambiguously ensure this conclusion. maybe you figured that the stuff in this second paragraph would be coming from reading the first one, for instance.

what do you think? is this a problem? or is it just a natural aspect of precise language and its benefits/problems?

 

[Jennywocky]

Well, some observations:

1. The "tinkering" is usually of the form where we want to distill clumsy equations down to purest essence.... i.e., clearly expressing the concept. Things not related to essence, we're tempted to jettison.

2. With reading, we are also trying to distill essence and catch the "idea" behind the words. So they are related.

3. Ti = internal world, evaluating repeatedly to get things exactly right. Ne = external world, distilling ideas to "get the gist" without needing extra wordiness.

Are there problems with it? I don't necessarily see hypocrisy. However, there's a potential problem when we try to overly nuance something that is unnecessary (it stymies communication / muddies the clarity); and there's a potential problem when we skip over important nuance when skimming for ideas (since we can miss the authentic idea).

 

[Brontosaurie]

Well, some observations:

1. The "tinkering" is usually of the form where we want to distill clumsy equations down to purest essence.... i.e., clearly expressing the concept. Things not related to essence, we're tempted to jettison.

2. With reading, we are also trying to distill essence and catch the "idea" behind the words. So they are related.

3. Ti = internal world, evaluating repeatedly to get things exactly right. Ne = external world, distilling ideas to "get the gist" without needing extra wordiness.

Are there problems with it? I don't necessarily see hypocrisy. However, there's a potential problem when we try to overly nuance something that is unnecessary (it stymies communication / muddies the clarity); and there's a potential problem when we skip over important nuance when skimming for ideas (since we can miss the authentic idea).

1. yes. but our perception of essence can be fooled by how juicy words and concepts are to us. sometimes the clearest expression is obtained from a moment of passion and immersion in ones existential position, since facets elusive to the present conscious are then kept. i'm inclined to believe this is something INTP's often need to learn. it's a scary leap of faith and fears ought to be challenged. it's Ne, and Ne isn't fully appreciated if it is only used to connect dots for ones mental model and never to experience and express. agree?

2. yes. these tendencies are parallel in a way. i just wonder if it's sound to always (or nearly always) be meticulous in verbal production and loose in verbal reception. inversing the relation seems to yield equally fruitful potential approaches.

3. yes, it's a Ti-Ne thing. would you say Ni-Te is the opposite, being content with expressing a bundle of reasonably efficient and consistent (but not entirely cleansed from redundance and contradiction) hunches, while instead nitpicking others? the intellectual pride evident in the more decisive and charged Ni-Te expression seems more palatable to a general public. it's emotion to identify with, it grants the recipient a self-gratifying reward. that's an advantage in comparison to strange INTP robot talk.

hypocrisy was perhaps the wrong word. i was trying to emphasize and focus an apparent contradiction rather than firmly claim its truth. i agree that there's similarity and coherence too.

 

[Jennywocky]

1. yes. but our perception of essence can be fooled by how juicy words and concepts are to us. sometimes the clearest expression is obtained from a moment of passion and immersion in ones existential position, since facets elusive to the present conscious are then kept. i'm inclined to believe this is something INTP's often need to learn. it's a scary leap of faith and fears ought to be challenged. it's Ne, and Ne isn't fully appreciated if it is only used to connect dots for ones mental model and never to experience and express. agree?

I don't want to speak for all INTPs; but as a 5w4 variant, of course I see value in that. It's just an intuitive form of truth versus a massaged and distilled one... but as such, it has power. Ti might be rock and granite, and Ne might be wind and fire, but it's still all truth.

I'll say it's a weird place to live, though. I wish I could be one or the other. Instead, I end up feeling like the bedrock of Ti has the life massaged out of it, yet the intuitive leaps/bursts of Ne seem to be foundationless. So neither feels good when you're trying to weave a gestalt from them. You're smelting the law and structure of the urviles into the earthpower of the elohim (to borrow from some books I love).

2. yes. these tendencies are parallel in a way. i just wonder if it's sound to always (or nearly always) be meticulous in verbal production and loose in verbal reception. inversing the relation seems to yield equally fruitful potential approaches.

Well, I was mainly trying to answer the questions asked and find a potential sensibility between the two. In terms of how i actually live my life as I age, there's more continually growing experiential "in the moment" truth there versus the overly massaged theoretical.

3. yes, it's a Ti-Ne thing. would you say Ni-Te is the opposite, being content with expressing a bundle of reasonably efficient and consistent (but not entirely cleansed from redundance and contradiction) hunches, while instead nitpicking others? the intellectual pride evident in the more decisive and charged Ni-Te expression seems more palatable to a general public. it's emotion to identify with, it grants the recipient a self-gratifying reward. that's an advantage in comparison to strange INTP robot talk.

That sounds plausible. Interestingly, I'm dealing with an NiTe right now (elsewhere) on an issue of disgreement and that's how it feels when I have to engage him. I also feel like he's playing to the crowd even when the conversation is private... taking those hunches (some of which are completely wrong) but being able to convert them into a concrete structure that looks impressive the rest of the world until you chip off the veneer and realize the blocks are all empty or formless inside.

INTPs definitely have a PR problem -- we get solid internal ideas of how something works [ideas we find very convincing] yet convey them in vague ways, at least to the rest of the world, so we look a bit crazy and/or unattached to what is known.

hypocrisy was perhaps the wrong word. i was trying to emphasize and focus an apparent contradiction rather than firmly claim its truth. i agree that there's similarity and coherence too.

Well, that was my word, but I agree the negative connotations aren't what was intended; there's just an apparent contradiction, and we're exploring whether it really is.

 

[nanook]

tldr

i think it's a general problem of introversion. we appreciate subjectivity, but taking in someone else's subjectivity through language is still an extroverted process that can be down right painful to me.

there is strong competition between your subjective expectation and what you get from someone else.

i can only pay attention to what i read, when i feel that this is going to be extremely helpful with my special interest or when it's a subject about which i have no opinions of my own, but a rare utilitarian (extroverted) interest, like in the case of boring books about nutrition.

Ti precision may be misinterpreted as a fetish for objectivity, but it's certainly not, in the sense that typology uses the words subjectivity and objectivity as synonyms for introversion and extroversion. it's like "if you don't word it properly and efficiently i will assume that you don't know what you are talking about and i don't care for whatever facts you convey, i'm only interested in how you weave them together"

 

[Jennywocky]

Ti precision may be misinterpreted as a fetish for objectivity, but it's certainly not, in the sense that typology uses the words subjectivity and objectivity as synonyms for introversion and extroversion. it's like "if you don't word it properly and efficiently i will assume that you don't know what you are talking about and i don't care for whatever facts you convey, i'm only interested in how you weave them together"

Meh. You're mixing definitions in the two halves of your sentences.

Ti is subjective in the reality that, as with any other introverted function, the energy flow is from oneself to the external world and back to oneself as the reference. (And Extroverted functions start with the external world and ping back to that in the cycle.)

But when people use the term subjective, it's usually meant as "unattached to any kind of anchor" and, when used negatively, it's tossed out as being "arbitrary." Similarly, here, you're mixing the meaning of "objectivity" (from "fetish of objectivity") with the MBTI definitions of subjective and objective.

It doesn't mean there are not anchors for Ti, or that there's a difference between Ti and Ne in terms of what grounding exists. Ne might be an "objective" function but it's about how many connections you can accumulate among things in multiple frames of reference, which in itself can be far more arbitrary than Ti.

 

[nanook]

my use of the word is perfectly coherent in my mind. perhaps a misunderstanding. i was criticising a different but common usage of the word.

Ti is subjective in the deep sense in which typology comprehends the process.

and is only commonly and superficially misinterpreted as objective by people who think that for example math and logic belong into the realm of science and that all science is objective and that all that is rule based is also objective. that is to say some of Ti's products are considered 'relatively objective' (inter-subjective would be a better word for mathematical laws or similar rules) but that doesn't mean that Ti is interested in serving objectivity.

people are called subjective when their anchor principle is invisible to other people, because it's too introverted. or when the principle is made visible but still has no relevance to any other subject in the room.

if you insist that all information should be tied together logically, that is Ti subjectivity. Ti is only interested in the style of the tie, not in the information itself. hence, if the Ti user is offended by a particular way someone is knotig his ties, if that person is knotting too much or too little for the reader's liking, he will disregard the information along with the presentation.

according to math geek shinzen young, eukledian math fan harles dodgson had a dislike for the complex variables and imaginary numbers of victorian mathematics.

that's an example for taking subjective offense.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqwdLfL6u48&feature=player_detailpage#t=63

and only esfj are allowed to get away with that energy and internal/external world talk.

 

[The Introvert]

I think a lot of it boils down to the intended audience, and the specific reader.

For example, when reading a scientific article, some people will skip to the methods, whereas other people will be more interested in the results and conclusions. For the author, each section has to be written in a comprehensible manner, so that the people really trying to understand it (the people that will read it several times and make sure they understand what's going on) will be able to understand it. In these instances, people reading aren't trying to "get the gist" but actually understand what's going on; it's no surprise, then, that scientific writing is often the most technical and difficult writing to understand.

Of course, conversely, if you're trying to communicate en masse and relate your message to as many people as possible, being overly technical and descriptive is disadvantageous. People would rather "get the gist". As Jenny pointed out, the "tinkering" is just the author's attempt to make sure the style of writing is written so that a specific audience can understand without more effort than needed. I think that "tinkering" is just a result of this second style of writing.

 

[david251]

I ve found I constantly repeat things I ve written before. The result is paragraphs pf text ehich are totally unnecessary to the discussion. Yes definitely a problem.