Why MBTI? A rebuttal.

[Rune]

I mentioned this in my introduction but in my long time at PerC, I saw a tremendous amount of people claiming how set in stone the MBTI is, and I just want to share my argument about how theyre wrong in their conclusion.

Honestly, I am LIVING PROOF of their wrongness. Lol.

So I dont know whether I stumbled upon the theory when it was still in its infancy, but growing up knowing about it, and really and truly identifying with my INFP label, and feeling more like I knew where I fit in society or with humanity or whatever.. Ive always understood that there ARE clear benefits to having found your MBTI type..

However..
people saying it is set in stone are wrong because people still change over time.
Theyre still growing into who they will become. even then, theyre still growing and changing.
because people are multi-faceted.
I wasnt even like a super young child that got an MBTI type before my personality developed.
Ive just grown to become a much different person than the person I used to be.

And calling it a transformation based on trauma is.. well, I mean ive suffered traumas, but its not like I died and some INTP spirit possessed my body..
Im still "me".
I chose my own path and it just led me here..
Definitely didnt see it coming!

but here we are..

The thing is, MBTI is about personality archetypes.
Theyre just snapshots.
and cognitive functions are associated with those archetypes as an explanation for WHY people are the way they are.
but people still say those too are set in stone..

it has to be one specific way of thinking all the time.
You only have these CF strings.
Youre not thinking with these, because thats *impossible*!

but what use is MBTI or cognitive functions if you try to force fit yourself into that same archetypal box your entire life, even when the label no longer fits?
Just because people say it wont and cant change so youre screwed unless some traumatic event displaces your soul from its body??

I wasnt even trying to prove these people wrong..
but..
its just a matter of fact.
People are growing all their lives.
Maybe its true of people stuck in some specific mindset, but that cant be expected to fit for everyone.

If someone says *you just werent an INFP then* well there are a lot of people, including myself that will whole-heartedly disagree with you.
Just ask my old friends.
I was the epitome of the INFP archetype.

Now people see me as over the top logical and critical.
Thats a pretty big distinguishing feature between Fi and Ti.
Fi, broke down and cried in community college from all the stress of being a super slow learner. From feeling hated. but i was friendly and known as a sweet but naive person.

Ti, Now Im cold and distant and a person people prefer to avoid, even if I havent exactly meant to.
At the very least, theres no reason for me NOT to identify as an INTP.
because if the shoe fits, why try to force one on your foot that doesnt fit just for nostalgias sake?
Do people still wear the same shoes they wore as a baby?
The same pair of shoes all their lives?

I do think itd be pretty sweet if we could just spray on our shoes like that dude did in Cloudy with a chance of meatballs.. xD
kidding.. im not sure thatd be hygenic.

btw, people may see a crapload of Fi in this post.. and thats FI-NE.
[lollll]
but.. my more Ti argument which inspires this rant is on my tablet right now and its more mean than this is..

and well, I PREFER not to come across as someone unlikable if i can avoid it.

 

[Black Rose]

I personally think we do not change our main function but that it is that we have extreme difficulty figuring out what the main function is. No test like MBTI can give you your real type and all it does is cause confusion. Many areas in life type does not even apply causing more confusion. And we only have our own lens by which we view the world. We never know what is happening subjectively in other people. Language is a barrier because we can say the same things yet mean completely different things.

I had difficulty understanding I had introverted intuition. Only looking back at all my psychic excressions of what I did and produced can I understand what it is I was doing. What was going on inside my head. I think in images and meaning but invisible because I lack a minds eye. I thought because I could not see anything in my head I was not introverted intuitive. But I was not extraverted sensing because I could not draw. It is really hard to figure this out but all I had to do was look at the symbology of what I was doing to figure it out.

People just do they do not reflect. Even reflecting they just do it don't question why. The mind is complex it takes time and effort to figure it out. We just do not know enough about ourselves and others to really get it. We are not really changing our perspective but instead directing it in a new direction.

 

[Deleted member 1424]

I'm in the camp that mbti can serve individual purposes, but that it is fundamentally flawed. It's just another product of human pattern seeking gone awry, like astrology. It spawns more cults than legitimate research at the end of the day. It's wildly limited because of it's imprecise and constructed nature. It cannot be used as a fine tool, but it is fun after a fashion and it can be a useful for internal categorization. MBTI is more language than phenomenon.

Say I ascribed a bunch of traits to circle people, and then to square people; to triangle people and so on. After prescribing enough traits I could certainly come to self identify as a shape (hexagon). It would useful, other self-identified hexagons would likely share my interests and just the fact that they have an interest in shape personality theory suggests a compatibility. I could use this system as a short hand to help me understand and catalogue the world around me with demonstrable (to myself) success. It could help me navigate situations and coordinate plans for the future, but it's still not real. MBTI is relatively harmless, but this can go poorly. Consulting your horoscope over a medical procedure isn't wise. Understanding human dating through the lens of a discredited study of wolves as interpreted by an infinite game of telephone between grifters and their lonely audience is probably even less wise. Yet here we are.

I don't mean to be too much of a killjoy of course, it can and does have personal utility. It helped me accept that there wasn't an objectively 'correct' or 'optimum' way to be and that chasing that was foolish (and stressful). People are wonderfully diverse and strange, 16 types doesn't come anywhere close to covering it, and that's to the benefit and joy of our species. So get what you get out of it, but don't stress I guess.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

I'm in the camp that mbti can serve individual purposes, but that it is fundamentally flawed. It's just another product of human pattern seeking gone awry, like astrology. It spawns more cults than legitimate research at the end of the day. It's wildly limited because of it's imprecise and constructed nature. It cannot be used as a fine tool, but it is fun after a fashion and it can be a useful for internal categorization. MBTI is more language than phenomenon.

Say I ascribed a bunch of traits to circle people, and then to square people; to triangle people and so on. After prescribing enough traits I could certainly come to self identify as a shape (hexagon). It would useful, other self-identified hexagons would likely share my interests and just the fact that they have an interest in shape personality theory suggests a compatibility. I could use this system as a short hand to help me understand and catalogue the world around me with demonstrable (to myself) success. It could help me navigate situations and coordinate plans for the future, but it's still not real. MBTI is relatively harmless, but this can go poorly. Consulting your horoscope over a medical procedure isn't wise. Understanding human dating through the lens of a discredited study of wolves as interpreted by an infinite game of telephone between grifters and their lonely audience is probably even less wise. Yet here we are.

I don't me mean to be too much of a killjoy of course, it can and does have personal utility. It helped me accept that there wasn't an objectively 'correct' or 'optimum' way to be and that chasing that was foolish (and stressful). People are wonderfully diverse and strange, 16 types doesn't come anywhere close to covering it, and that's to the benefit and joy of our species. So get what you get out of it, but don't stress I guess.

I run into this perspective a lot, especially from (unidentified) istx and intx individuals.

What I've tried to point out, is that as humans, we tend to adopt general problem-solving-strategies, and these strategies are identifiable.

Your MBTI is a general problem-solving-strategy, NOT a "personality".

Another important thing to keep in mind is that your type is relative to the people you interact with.

For example, even when I find myself around other INTPs, they often seem like ESFJs relative to my rather extreme INTP perspective.

Also, the "lack of precision" is actually a strength of MBTI.

The "more detailed" systems end up reading like an autobiography, which often ends up turning the conversation a little too personal for my tastes.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

I mentioned this in my introduction but in my long time at PerC, I saw a tremendous amount of people claiming how set in stone the MBTI is, and I just want to share my argument about how theyre wrong in their conclusion.

Honestly, I am LIVING PROOF of their wrongness. Lol.

So I dont know whether I stumbled upon the theory when it was still in its infancy, but growing up knowing about it, and really and truly identifying with my INFP label, and feeling more like I knew where I fit in society or with humanity or whatever.. Ive always understood that there ARE clear benefits to having found your MBTI type..

However..
people saying it is set in stone are wrong because people still change over time.
Theyre still growing into who they will become. even then, theyre still growing and changing.
because people are multi-faceted.
I wasnt even like a super young child that got an MBTI type before my personality developed.
Ive just grown to become a much different person than the person I used to be.

And calling it a transformation based on trauma is.. well, I mean ive suffered traumas, but its not like I died and some INTP spirit possessed my body..
Im still "me".
I chose my own path and it just led me here..
Definitely didnt see it coming!

but here we are..

The thing is, MBTI is about personality archetypes.
Theyre just snapshots.
and cognitive functions are associated with those archetypes as an explanation for WHY people are the way they are.
but people still say those too are set in stone..

it has to be one specific way of thinking all the time.
You only have these CF strings.
Youre not thinking with these, because thats *impossible*!

but what use is MBTI or cognitive functions if you try to force fit yourself into that same archetypal box your entire life, even when the label no longer fits?
Just because people say it wont and cant change so youre screwed unless some traumatic event displaces your soul from its body??

I wasnt even trying to prove these people wrong..
but..
its just a matter of fact.
People are growing all their lives.
Maybe its true of people stuck in some specific mindset, but that cant be expected to fit for everyone.

If someone says *you just werent an INFP then* well there are a lot of people, including myself that will whole-heartedly disagree with you.
Just ask my old friends.
I was the epitome of the INFP archetype.

Now people see me as over the top logical and critical.
Thats a pretty big distinguishing feature between Fi and Ti.
Fi, broke down and cried in community college from all the stress of being a super slow learner. From feeling hated. but i was friendly and known as a sweet but naive person.

Ti, Now Im cold and distant and a person people prefer to avoid, even if I havent exactly meant to.
At the very least, theres no reason for me NOT to identify as an INTP.
because if the shoe fits, why try to force one on your foot that doesnt fit just for nostalgias sake?
Do people still wear the same shoes they wore as a baby?
The same pair of shoes all their lives?

I do think itd be pretty sweet if we could just spray on our shoes like that dude did in Cloudy with a chance of meatballs.. xD
kidding.. im not sure thatd be hygenic.

btw, people may see a crapload of Fi in this post.. and thats FI-NE.
[lollll]
but.. my more Ti argument which inspires this rant is on my tablet right now and its more mean than this is..

and well, I PREFER not to come across as someone unlikable if i can avoid it.

I was also an INFP.

 

[BurnedOut]

Your MBTI is a general problem-solving-strategy, NOT a "personality".

MBTI tries to transcend beyond neuroscience and psychology altogether. Notwithstanding the fact that there are tomes of literature lying around that talk about how difficult it is to measure even a single personality trait and its phenotypic expressions, MBTI happily lumps people into categories as if it has successfully integrated psychology with neuroscience. MBTI should be restricted to TV Show character analyses. It lacks all the theoretical moorings required to be even called a science.

Despite being an 'INTP', I show traits of various personality types across the MBTI - INTJ, INFJ, INFP and all of them apply equally likely to me. My sensory perception is also strong enough to get me deemed as a Sensor. In fact, I kept receiving ISTP for a long time until I realized that the sadass questionnaire tries to implement a zero-sum strategy that can be better applied to microorganisms' rudimentary functions.

MBTI should be represented with caricatures. For example - An INTP has a big brain and an ISTP has big hands and an ESTP has a big dick and an ENFP has big lips, etc

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

Despite being an 'INTP', I show traits of various personality types across the MBTI - INTJ, INFJ, INFP and all of them apply equally likely to me. My sensory perception is also strong enough to get me deemed as a Sensor.

It has more demonstrable utility than most people realize (and it is not and can never be a "science" because the entire framework is qualitative).

For example a good friend of mine and I think a lot alike and while we don't always agree, we rarely take any counter-arguments personally.

One key difference between us is that they always have this inexplicable need to apply their theories to "real life". Before they really invest the mental energy into an idea, they want it to be at least somewhat grounded in some potential practical application.

They also like to do things IRL. Not often, but they believe that certain things must be done IRL, or at least they believe the IRL experience should be the goal and is OBVIOUSLY superior.

This drive to make imagination serve reality is an "S" trait.

When I realized they were an ISTP (and I'm INTP) this weird "quirk" just clicked and now I no longer think they're insane.

Also, when I first started investigating MBTI, I thought this same friend was an ESFJ because they are more outgoing than me, more aware of their surroundings than me, more emotional than me and more judging than me.

But later I realized that I was only weighing those factors relative to myself, which is exactly how people should evaluate MBTI and that's why it seems different to other people and your assessment may not always match how people view themselves (and your type will shift based on your context).

 

[BurnedOut]

@LOGICZOMBIE
Even Astrology sounds accurate to most people. An absolutely context based test that claims to measure a universal is not valid and MBTI has a poor track record in being consistent. Every description provided by MBTI is valid for everybody in some sense. I have the official MBTI manual and it is similarly filled with such statements. It's called using Barnum statements.

Compare this to Big 5, it is reliable and consistent but has a lot of difficulty prescribing certain sets of behaviours with complete definiteness. They are correlations and that's all but correlations are often not too strong and they are always open to interpretations. Few Big 5 traits yield proper diagnoses and even those are common sense at times. For example, people high in Neuroticism are very easy to observe and spot and get measured as such. That's more sciency than calling someone 4-lettered words. MBTI is a gateway for lazy stereotyping because every type ends up competing with another.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

every type ends up competing with another.

I disagree.

I'm not suggesting it be used for "clinical analysis" or whatever.

It's a conversation starter for GENERAL PROBLEM SOLVING STRATEGY.

It's NOT "science", and it's a little strange that anyone would think that it was pretending to be "science".

They're not "barnum statements". The generalizations of one or two adjacent types usually "fit" a person "better" than others.

I mean, even just dividing people into "more J" and "more P" alone, just that one aspect was a game-changer for me.

I always had just called the "more J" people "assholes" and the "more P" people "reasonable", but after giving this MBTI stuff a chance, now I realize that the "more J" people are actually extremely important and help "keep-the-ball-rolling" so to speak.

Look, I think I get what you're aiming at, "don't lump people into little boxes" and "people change" and "not everyone is the same today as they were yesterday" and "people look different to different people at different times" and "people are often not particularly good at identifying themselves due to obvious blind-spots".

HOWEVER,

Instead of being boxed in by my job title and my skin-tone and gender and sexual orientation and my body mass index and my professional accomplishments and my marital status and political affiliation and my bank account...

I WOULD PREFER TO THROW ALL THOSE AWAY AND BE BOXED INTO INTP.

also, i noticed you chose an robot as your avatar and you seem rather analytical, so i'm glad you're here, even if you don't personally identify with any mbti type.

 

[BurnedOut]

I WOULD PREFER TO THROW ALL THOSE AWAY AND BE BOXED INTO INTP.

And have 16 new castes? Don't worry, we already have a variant of this in my state and it is called the varna system which started off exactly as MBTI and ended up turning into a rigid caste system (jati) which transcended race, income, talent, etc.

In the jati system, it is assumed that you are simply born a type - An intellectual (Brahmin) ; A warrior (Kshtriya) ; A tradesman (Vaishya) or A worker (Shudra). As funny as it sounds, the original intention of the author was to never ruining the moral fabric of the society but to properly structure it and see what happened.

I am a contradiction as far as I have been described formally and informally because I am very analytical and also very emotional and the latter drives the former and the former drives the latter like ouroborus - no start, no end. However, there is a reason why I turned out this way and it is because of emotional suppression with curiosity. I would have jolly well been an ENFP had my upbringing been different.

Also, you don't sound like a stereotypical INTP and I don't sound like a stereotypical INTP either. I sound like an INTJ but if you check some of my other posts, I easily seem like an INFP or sometimes even INFJ.

Anyway. MBTI is good for chitchatting and shitting on others. It is really fun when you converse with another 'INTP' about 'SJs' and their 'robotic nature'.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

I WOULD PREFER TO THROW ALL THOSE AWAY AND BE BOXED INTO INTP.

And have 16 new castes? Don't worry, we already have a variant of this in my state and it is called the varna system which started off exactly as MBTI and ended up turning into a rigid caste system (jati) which transcended race, income, talent, etc.

In the jati system, it is assumed that you are simply born a type - An intellectual (Brahmin) ; A warrior (Kshtriya) ; A tradesman (Vaishya) or A worker (Shudra). As funny as it sounds, the original intention of the author was to never ruining the moral fabric of the society but to properly structure it and see what happened.

I am a contradiction as far as I have been described formally and informally because I am very analytical and also very emotional and the latter drives the former and the former drives the latter like ouroborus - no start, no end. However, there is a reason why I turned out this way and it is because of emotional suppression with curiosity. I would have jolly well been an ENFP had my upbringing been different.

Also, you don't sound like a stereotypical INTP and I don't sound like a stereotypical INTP either. I sound like an INTJ but if you check some of my other posts, I easily seem like an INFP or sometimes even INFJ.

Anyway. MBTI is good for chitchatting and shitting on others. It is really fun when you converse with another 'INTP' about 'SJs' and their 'robotic nature'.

Yeah, I'm not sure it's fair to compare MBTI with a skin-tone based DOGMATIC repressive slavery system.

MBTI is dynamic and RELATIVE, not prescribed and written in stone.

I do notice that online, I tend to present as ENTP (debater).

But the important bit is that I personally don't feel like an ENTP.

And I am quite thoroughly introspective, (typical of INTP) which means I understand the significance of E-MOTION, not only within myself but also in other people. This can make me appear to be INFP at times (not most of the time).

I find MBTI a useful framework (much more useful than "religion" or "political affiliation"). Especially when evaluating the operation of "other" types, now I look for the divergent strategies the "others" are utilizing instead of dismissing people who see things differently as simply "illogical" or "stupid" or "short sighted" or "impulsive".

 

[ZenRaiden]

Jung used to say its a map not the territory.

This idea applies to MBTI as well.

You see a map is not actually the world and the way it works.

The size of the mountain on the map is not equal to the size of the mountain in real life.

Walking up the mountain is not the same as looking at the path on the map.

Even language is the same. You can talk about doing 100 push ups, but you probably cannot figure out how hard it is to do so many until you actually start doing them.

MBTI is a symbolic simplistic representation of given individual.

Unfortunately I am not sure when people criticize MBTI if they actually know what they are saying.

Its not accurate enough???? Well maps too have different accuracy.

You have simple maps, precision maps, naval maps, globes, gps coordinate maps, etc.

Some people say there is only 16 types.

Well would you rather there be 150 types? You want a pokemon colleciton?

Some people say it does not really tell you much about people and it tends to box people in.

Well hate to say this, but most people will stereotype you and put you in a box, instantly MBTI or no MBTI.

Most of you guys are in peoples boxes and fulfill their own personal or common stereotype.

Some of you maybe considered nerds or something.

Most of you stereotype others.

Human brains cannot handle complexity in social situations.

They act now and quick.

In fact despite people shitting on MBTI for it being too simple and stupid, people still manage to shit on MBTI for being to complicated.

I mean if MBTI is complicated imagine trying to work with real personality theories.

Good luck with that kind of complexity.

If anything people should be happy its literally that simple and easy.

Also lots of people actually think MBTI talks about personality.

There are different ways of looking at personality.

One is as a individual the other as a social person.

MBTI looks at people as social creatures.

NOT as individuals. It does consider individual qualities, but not in individualistic sense, but in how people behave and interact in group settings.

 

[scorpiomover]

I mentioned this in my introduction but in my long time at PerC, I saw a tremendous amount of people claiming how set in stone the MBTI is, and I just want to share my argument about how theyre wrong in their conclusion.

Honestly, I am LIVING PROOF of their wrongness. Lol.

So I dont know whether I stumbled upon the theory when it was still in its infancy, but growing up knowing about it, and really and truly identifying with my INFP label, and feeling more like I knew where I fit in society or with humanity or whatever.. Ive always understood that there ARE clear benefits to having found your MBTI type..

If it was 100% certain that you were NOT an ESFJ, but you thought you were an ESFJ, and you convinced yourself that you identified with your ESFJ label, and you felt like you knew where you fit in society or with humanity or whatever, would you still think that there are CLEAR benefits to having found your MBTI type?

I think the clear benefits you found, were feeling that you knew where you fit in society and humanity.

However..
people saying it is set in stone are wrong because people still change over time.

It sounds like you are arguing that because some people think that MBTI is set in stone and you disagree, that everything about MBTI is wrong.

Is that logical?

Theyre still growing into who they will become. even then, theyre still growing and changing.

Lots of children want to be astronauts and then change their minds as adults. What you believe about yourself as a child, is often not representative of who you become as an adult, and even who are are as a child.

because people are multi-faceted.

Humans are multi-faceted, which means humans should look at MBTI as if it's a classification system for multi-faceted people.

You seem to be describing that the people you encountered, used it to pigeon-hole people.

I wasnt even like a super young child that got an MBTI type before my personality developed.
Ive just grown to become a much different person than the person I used to be.
And calling it a transformation based on trauma is.. well, I mean ive suffered traumas, but its not like I died and some INTP spirit possessed my body..
Im still "me".

If you've changed enough that if your consciousness were transferred to a different body, then people would say you are a different person, then your personality is different, like Phineas Gage, who was still "me", but still had a completely different personality to the one that went before. Then it would make sense if your MBTI changed, because your personality type has changed.

If your personality has not changed, then it hasn't changed. Then if you are an INTP, you were an INTP, and you mistyped yourself when you were a child.

it has to be one specific way of thinking all the time.
You only have these CF strings.
Youre not thinking with these, because thats *impossible*!

but what use is MBTI or cognitive functions if you try to force fit yourself into that same archetypal box your entire life, even when the label no longer fits?
Just because people say it wont and cant change so youre screwed unless some traumatic event displaces your soul from its body??

MBTI is about PERSONALITY, like how some people like to talk to 20 people at a party, and some prefer to talk to 2 people all night.

How well you do in life, is dependent on CHARACTER TRAITS. Whether you are "screwed" is dependent on your CHARACTER.

Like many people, you have associated personality typology with CHARACTER. E.G. Big Five is clearly written to dictate CHARACTER.

This is a form of competition. Put down others so they won't even try, so you're the only one applying for the job, and you get a job that pays you a lot of money just because you're the only one who applied.

We live in a highly competitive society.

If someone says *you just werent an INFP then* well there are a lot of people, including myself that will whole-heartedly disagree with you.
Just ask my old friends.
I was the epitome of the INFP archetype.

Now people see me as over the top logical and critical.
Thats a pretty big distinguishing feature between Fi and Ti.
Fi, broke down and cried in community college from all the stress of being a super slow learner. From feeling hated. but i was friendly and known as a sweet but naive person.

That sounds like most INTPs.

Ti, Now Im cold and distant and a person people prefer to avoid, even if I havent exactly meant to.

That sounds like INTJs, ENTJs, and many ISTJs and ESTJs.

If you have changed type, it was NOT to be an INTP.

At the very least, theres no reason for me NOT to identify as an INTP.
because if the shoe fits, why try to force one on your foot that doesnt fit just for nostalgias sake?
Do people still wear the same shoes they wore as a baby?
The same pair of shoes all their lives?

No. But they generally keep the same name, the same parents, the same blood type, the same personality, etc.

I do think itd be pretty sweet if we could just spray on our shoes like that dude did in Cloudy with a chance of meatballs.. xD
kidding.. im not sure thatd be hygenic.

btw, people may see a crapload of Fi in this post.. and thats FI-NE.
[lollll]
but.. my more Ti argument which inspires this rant is on my tablet right now and its more mean than this is..

and well, I PREFER not to come across as someone unlikable if i can avoid it.

Ti-doms don't like to upset people if they can avoid it.

Fi-doms believe in their values. If their values are being violated, then it's the right thing to do to protest, even if people think that you are unlikeable as a consequence.

From what it sounds, you used to be Ti and are now Fi.

Or, you were always Ti, and you are just more outspoken now.

Or, you were always Fi, and you just lacked confidence when you were younger.

 

[scorpiomover]

I WOULD PREFER TO THROW ALL THOSE AWAY AND BE BOXED INTO INTP.

And have 16 new castes? Don't worry, we already have a variant of this in my state and it is called the varna system which started off exactly as MBTI and ended up turning into a rigid caste system (jati) which transcended race, income, talent, etc.

In the jati system, it is assumed that you are simply born a type - An intellectual (Brahmin) ; A warrior (Kshtriya) ; A tradesman (Vaishya) or A worker (Shudra). As funny as it sounds, the original intention of the author was to never ruining the moral fabric of the society but to properly structure it and see what happened.

I am a contradiction as far as I have been described formally and informally because I am very analytical and also very emotional and the latter drives the former and the former drives the latter like ouroborus - no start, no end. However, there is a reason why I turned out this way and it is because of emotional suppression with curiosity. I would have jolly well been an ENFP had my upbringing been different.

Don't worry. Big Five will follow the same pattern. After all, it's based on SCIENCE. So it HAS to be right.

Also, you don't sound like a stereotypical INTP and I don't sound like a stereotypical INTP either. I sound like an INTJ but if you check some of my other posts, I easily seem like an INFP or sometimes even INFJ.

Anyway. MBTI is good for chitchatting and shitting on others. It is really fun when you converse with another 'INTP' about 'SJs' and their 'robotic nature'.

I read the same sorts of things said about SJs, that people used to say about black people and the Irish in the 1970s.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

Unfortunately I am not sure when people criticize MBTI if they actually know what they are saying.

Its not accurate enough???? Well maps too have different accuracy.

You have simple maps, precision maps, naval maps, globes, gps coordinate maps, etc.

Well stated.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

I read the same sorts of things said about SJs, that people used to say about black people and the Irish in the 1970s.

The key difference here is that MBTI is DYNAMIC (not static) AND MBTI is SELF-IDENTIFIED (not prescribed).

 

[scorpiomover]

I read the same sorts of things said about SJs, that people used to say about black people and the Irish in the 1970s.

The key difference here is that MBTI is DYNAMIC (not static) AND MBTI is SELF-IDENTIFIED (not prescribed).

Being a Jew is DYNAMIC (you can convert to atheism) and SELF-IDENTIFIED (for the same reason). So you are OK with anti-Semitism?

 

[BurnedOut]

Don't worry. Big Five will follow the same pattern. After all, it's based on SCIENCE. So it HAS to be right.

Big 5 is far from turning into MBTI. Extremely far.

There is no science in MBTI. Rather it is common sense applied just like the varna system but common sense can be moronic too.

It is as good as weather forecast - intuitive but everchanging but it is too haughty and religious to accepts its dogmatism to even try neuroscience (LOL).

If you are defending MBTI then state its actual usage and logically justify its logic to non MBTIers instead of stating it ends without describing its process.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

Being a Jew is DYNAMIC (you can convert to atheism) and SELF-IDENTIFIED (for the same reason). So you are OK with anti-Semitism?

Being a Jew is a function of blood (at least according to the haters).

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

If you are defending MBTI then state its actual usage and logically justify its logic to non MBTIers instead of stating it ends without describing its process.

It certainly has more utility than telling someone your job title and or marital status and or sexual orientation and or religious affiliation and or skin-tone.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

Or, you were always Fi, and you just lacked confidence when you were younger.

Well stated.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

It sounds like you are arguing that because some people think that MBTI is set in stone and you disagree, that everything about MBTI is wrong.

Is that logical?

Nope.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

Some people say there is only 16 types.

+ 100 variations within each of the 4 characteristics.

is 100,000,000 enough "variation" for you ?

100 x 100 x 100 x 100

 

[Black Rose]

If you are defending MBTI then state its actual usage and logically justify its logic to non MBTIers instead of stating it ends without describing its process.

It seems you want something internally consistent and empirically verifiable. But "state its actual usage" suggests that knowledge is pragmatic so it matters not what consistency it has if it is not useful. Dead knowledge is forgettable. If it can't do anything why bother, it isn't even real at that point.

The Ti Te conflict between Jung and Freud very much deals with usage vs inquire. What terms exist stem as axioms on which the theory rests. One must accept that the functions exist (TFSN) that they are judgment (rational) and perception (irrational) and that they are separated into either introvert or extravert. It all fits but has no practical application. It's just a way of putting together what Jung saw in people.

The main source I read about Jung can be googled at "Jung chapter x".

 

[BurnedOut]

It certainly has more utility than telling someone your job title and or marital status and or sexual orientation and or religious affiliation and or skin-tone.

It is like telling a bald guy he's bald because he doesn't have hair. Serves no utility right? If an ESFJ happens to be very good in, let's say, Physics and she happens to top her university time and time and ends up being a glorified researcher, was she a hidden INTP? Bullshit. Because all the work in the world does not require 'intuitive, creative, insightful, thinking' in 99% of the cases as almost everything you think off has been already established and if you have enough knowledge, it is often about deriving utility by using the right combinations which is mostly figured by trial and error and prudence and none of that requires any of the supercharged thinking traits of an INTP but determination, knowledge and experience.

Many of the apparent Ps I know turned out to excel in their lives despite being P because they were determined and many Js despite their uptightness ended up doing nothing significant because they lacked the will and planning and funnily enough most NTs I have seen are no better than SJs in their life except their nerdiness which turns out to be pretty useless in practical terms.

I knew one ESTJ woman who was very ESTJ but loved science but was not brainy enough but was still academically bright and quite quick with grasping. Despite my INTPness or INTJness, I don't have much of an edge over anybody in life except for some lifestyle quirks where perks fizzle out when objectively compared to the perks of the other types. If I am a great guitarist, I am not socializing enough (in my case) which causes me to lose out on potentially beneficial networks and if I am very social but not academically successful, I lose out on verticall trascending.

You think about it. People who got tested as an NT are no objectively better than any other type.

Now certainly being nerdy makes you at least somewhat smarter right? Not really. Nerdiness can at most boost your crystallized IQ which is useless without networking. Activities like reading voraciously or aggressively practising music can give you a fluid IQ boost of a paltry 3-4 points. You won't spot much of a difference between a 110 and 113 person. In toto, you are either intelligent or you are not but you can determine your wisdom with your knowledge and experience and prudence.


Question: So what about ENTJs? They are built for leading.
That's the classical bullshit routinely found in statistical correlations. Think of the 'Halo Effect'. It is really hard to determine if being at an authoritative position makes you behave like an ENTJ or whether being an ENTJ puts you there.

Research points towards the suggestibility of contexts. If a leadership role is associated repeatedly with 'openness', 'extraversion', 'analytical ability' then even a dog would test for an INTJ or for that matter an ass. If being a leader requires those traits to be 'practised' then ENTJ is a skill than a personality type.

Now think about this Halo Effect in case of all personality types.

People happen to be extremely nuanced in what they are. An INTP can spend a lifetime of mediocrity and posthumorously get diagnosed as an ISTJ for having a mundane. Similar an ISTJ with too much adventure will get misdiagnosed as an ISTP. Can you understand the havoc this can cause if used sociologically?

If Einstein loved science, it does not make him an INTP automatically. An ENFP can be equally invested in science insofar being quirky.

Personality is a superstructure still in the making. It does not have enough power to influence something as rudimentary as raw tendencies and intelligence. And that is why MBTI is not scientific. It cannot yield consistent results. Big 5 despite being approved always warns about different results.

Sure personality can predict some stuff but that is more related to the interactions of consciousness and biology and it is hard to say what causes what - if personality leads to certain tendencies or tendencies lead to certain personalities. It is space and time. Space and time inseparable. So is our personality with our biology and environment.

But fucking no. MBTI nowhere talks about any of this. It is just personaliticist (like racist) with no real utility other than some bullshit primitive classification that is irrelevant in the world given our development.

 

[BurnedOut]

Apologies for the spelling and grammar errors. I was typing in a hurry.

Just wanted to add that this is what I understood after thoroughly analyzing MBTI for 5 years of my life and trying hard to make improvements but it just lacks internal consistency.

Sure all scientific theories are based on one unexplainable rudimentary assertion but either by falsification or induction, the understanding is built upon as a coherent structure which can be picked apart and analyzed. All the successful sciences lend themselves to the benefit of doubt because they are built piece by piece. Then certainly even mbti is science right?

It is pseudoscience because rather than an actual one because it is entirely based on the agent of testing than itself. This means that there is heavy selection bias in the research it uses. It is like asking a religious person to state why he believes in god when his answer is going to precisely be what you want. This is why religious people are easily pissed off. Their fundamental basis of thinking comes into Q rather than some branch in its superstructure that can be examined.

Jung based his theory on observation which were absolutely unverified and he himself did not explain why he chose the following parameters or what was the exact basis of it. MBTI took it and added some garbage logic which was completely arbitrary in order to fit the varna-system style categorical descriptions they wanted. There is no explanation why Ti-dom cannot have a Ni-secondary. Internal logical consistency can perfectly complement being 'intuitive connections' and can even boost it.

MBTI is religious because it builds itself on the belief and whims of the agent than adjusting itself to be more pragmatic.

 

[The Grey Man]

No exponent of MBTI has ever been able to explain to me what reason there is to assume that the functions of the human soul can be exhaustively categorized as thinking, feeling, sensing, and intuition, or that each of these is independent of the others (why can't sensing be a mode of intuition, as has been claimed by certain philosophers?). The whole thing seems to be a wild guess.

 

[scorpiomover]

Being a Jew is DYNAMIC (you can convert to atheism) and SELF-IDENTIFIED (for the same reason). So you are OK with anti-Semitism?

Being a Jew is a function of blood (at least according to the haters).

For over 2,000 years, Jews suffered with anti-Semitism. Jews who converted to Xianity were welcomed by Xians. Jews who converted to atheism, were allowed to succeed to a point by atheists (but there was a glass ceiling. Alfred Dreyfuss fell foul of that).

In that time, only for 12 years between 1933 and 1945, was it based on blood.

The rest of the time, both before and after, it was about their religion, their culture, and their choices to keep their religion and their culture.

 

[scorpiomover]

Don't worry. Big Five will follow the same pattern. After all, it's based on SCIENCE. So it HAS to be right.

Big 5 is far from turning into MBTI. Extremely far.

There is no science in MBTI. Rather it is common sense applied just like the varna system but common sense can be moronic too.

It is as good as weather forecast - intuitive but everchanging but it is too haughty and religious to accepts its dogmatism to even try neuroscience (LOL).

If you are defending MBTI then state its actual usage and logically justify its logic to non MBTIers instead of stating it ends without describing its process.

Read Jung's Chapter X of Psychological Types. You can find it online by googling it.

You might have to read it a few times before it sinks in, that it's not a cookie-cutter technology designed to make you sound better and other types sound worse.

It was not invented for people who are living in a very competitive time (nowadays), when lots of people are going for the same jobs, and lots of people are getting the same types of qualifications, and whose main aim is to find and use things that make them sound better on the internet, and others worse, so that they would be more likely to get a job than others, not because they are smarter or more competent or more capable at their job, but solely because they have a better public image.

Jung was NOT a psychologist. He was a clinical psychiatrist treating people with extreme mental illness. Some of the patients he would deal with, were schizophrenics who had been locked in padded cells for over a decade!

He was part of the Psychological Society set up by Freud. The 2 most prevalent and successful psychtherapies at the time, were Freud's, and Adler's. Freud's theory focussed on the libido, the objective sex drive that nearly all humans have, and how that could end up twisted to produce mental illness, and how to untwist it.

Adler focussed on the ego, on subjective feelings of superiority and inferiority and how those 2 tendencies of the subjective could be warped to turn into complexes that caused mental illness and how to untwist it.

Freud and Adler naturally disagreed on the causes and treatments of those with mental illness.

Jung saw that Freud's approach worked amazingly well on many patients who were incredibly difficult to treat. Adler's approach also did amazingly well. But neither approach worked well enough that it worked on so many, that it made the other unnecesssary.

So there were 2 distinct, successful approaches, neither of which worked on everyone.

Jung's theory was that there were different types of people. The Freudian approach worked on extraverts. The Adlerian approach worked on introverts.

Know which one someone is, and you can treat them successfully and quickly.

Don't know their type, or get it wrong, and you could treat an intravert forever with the Freudian approach and get nowhere, or treat an extravert with Adler's approach and similarly get nowhere.

Equally, his reasons for different therapeutic approaches having different effects on different types of people indicated to him that "to err is human". We're all human. We all have limitations. So we all have weaknesses. In the mentally ill, those weaknesses get over-stressed and unbalanced, leading to an extreme of those weaknesses, which makes them too extreme to be functional.


Thus, even people without any mental illnesses still have those weaknesses. But by balancing those weaknesses out, you get to overcome your inherent weaknesses of your psyche.

If you're a strong P, your weakness is not understanding, but acting on what you already know to be true.

If you're a strong J, your weakness is not acting on your beliefs, but taking the time to ensure that you properly understand what is going on before acting.



Likewise, if you can spot someone's type correctly, then you can take their natural tendencies into account, and balance out their weaknesses in your conversations, leading to much smoother communication.

If you know you're a Thinker, and your girlfriend is a Feeler, then if you take the emotional content of a situation also into account, you'll find it much easier to get on.

If you know you're a Feeler, and your girlfriend is a Thinker, then if you take the impersonal content of a situation also into account, you'll find it much easier to get on.


A modern example is INTPs v INTJs. INTJs respect Te, cold, hard, physical testing. INTPs respect Ti logic and consistency. If you are talking to an INTP, express logic. They will not be impressed by scientific studies. If you are talking to an INTJ, they will be impressed by scientific studies. They will not be impressed by clever logic.

If you are an INTP, don't forget to do experiments to test your theories IRL.

If you are an INTJ, don't forget to check your plans for logical inconsistencies. Your plans may work half-way, and then stop, because your plan is logically inconsistent and so can never work from beginning to end.

 

[scorpiomover]

@LOGICZOMBIE
Even Astrology sounds accurate to most people. An absolutely context based test that claims to measure a universal is not valid and MBTI has a poor track record in being consistent. Every description provided by MBTI is valid for everybody in some sense. I have the official MBTI manual and it is similarly filled with such statements. It's called using Barnum statements.

Compare this to Big 5, it is reliable and consistent but has a lot of difficulty prescribing certain sets of behaviours with complete definiteness. They are correlations and that's all but correlations are often not too strong and they are always open to interpretations. Few Big 5 traits yield proper diagnoses and even those are common sense at times. For example, people high in Neuroticism are very easy to observe and spot and get measured as such. That's more sciency than calling someone 4-lettered words.

As of yet, I've not seen or heard of any reliable unbiased studies regarding Big Five.

Science is about the evidence. If a theory is untestable, the evidence will tell you nothing about its validity and soundness.

A scientific theory is one where you are 99% sure it is wrong, but where it is more accurate to the evidence than anything you have to offer.

E.g. Newtonian heliocentrism. Look out the window. The sky and the stars move around the Earth. But when you look at the movement of the planets in detail, they move as if we're moving in an elliptical orbit and so are they.

E.G. open-mindedness. If everyone in the world was sure that there was no such thing as open-mindedness or closed-mindedness, and Big Five scientists looked at the evidence and proved there was such a thing as open-mindedness and it changed from person to person, then it would be a scientific theory.

MBTI is a gateway for lazy stereotyping because every type ends up competing with another.

That's just people being competitive and using MBTI to help them, just like they'll try to claim that other people are inferior and they should get the job because they're not black, not a woman, not racist, not sexist, have a high IQ, are uber-rational, uber-competent, never wrong, always have a solution, support BLM, support gay marriage, are tall, good-looking, sexy, and are go-getters, who "get things done".

Now, show me people who are NEVER competitive in ANY way, and most of them still compete on type, and THEN you can say the above.

But IME, people who don't like to be competitive, do so by choice, not because they can't. Even if they can compete using MBTI, they still won't, because they CHOOSE not to be competitive.

People who are competitive, will use lots of things to help them compete, MBTI being only one out of many.

So it strikes me that those who compete over MBTI, compete over 1,000 other things, and those who don't compete over MBTI, don't compete over 1,000 other things.

So MBTI is independent of the competition. The competition is a result of the person who uses it, not MBTI.

 

[Black Rose]

Jung's theory was that there were different types of people. The Freudian approach worked on extraverts. The Adlerian approach worked on introverts.

What is it they would do?

 

[ZenRaiden]

After many years of consider MBTI bull ....
I kind of decided to look at it seriously.
I just thought its odd that after some 6 years I have not once gave it serious consideration.

So I thought it would be wrong of me to make fun of a theory until I gave it good look.

So I did. Turns out its not easy to understand, but once you do understand it it does make sense.

Unfortunately lots of people and information when they talk about MBTI have tendency to gloss over the most important parts of MBTI as if they were either too obvious or simply not important.

This creates a group of people who know about MBTI and know what it is, but don't actually know how it works or what it is for.

 

[scorpiomover]

Jung's theory was that there were different types of people. The Freudian approach worked on extraverts. The Adlerian approach worked on introverts.

What is it they would do?

1) Freud:

Freud's approach was to put someone on a couch and get them to talk about their childhood. His experience was that when patients who suffered with sexual problems talked about their earliest sexual experiences that formed the basis of their sexual dysfunction, having talked about it, their dysfunction went away as if by magic.

Freud's view was that the expression of the libido was being repressed, due to the initial experiences being socially unacceptable (some of them included bestiality). As a result, the libido could not grow and mature and appreciate that the initial experiences were not indicative of an unusual sexual nature, because they could not get any feedback from anyone else.

So the result was a warped fixation that the initial experiences happened to them but no-one else also said they had had the same experiences, because these things didn't happen to normal people, that they must have been different to most people to have that happen to them at all, and thus had to be of an unusual and socially unacceptable sexual nature.

Once they were able to express these experiences, merely being able to reflect on them with someone else, allowed them to observe that they weren't being stoned to death as they imagined, that their experiences were normal if rare, and were not indicative of anything about themselves, and were just something that had happened to them, but could just as easily have happened to anyone else.

So they were able to perceive that they were normal people with normal sexual desires who had had unusual experiences that had nothing to do with who they were as people.

2) Adler

Adler believed that most people's problems were due to either having an inferiority complex or a superiority complex.

Some people had bad experiences, that convinced them that they were damaged/defective and incapable of a normal, healthy life and relashionship.

Others had had bad experiences, and felt they were damaged/defective. But they pretended that they were perfectly all right to avoid social discrimination. So they went to the other extreme and claimed to be completely without even the slightest fault, so no-one would even think that they might be defective.

Both had lasting effects.

The people with inferiority complexes would usually under-perform, which made people judge them negatively as lazy or incompetent, which reinforced their feelings of inferiority, causing a vicious cycle that could get progressively worse and worse over several years.

The people with superiority complexes would over-perform and constantly talk about their successes and never their failures, which made lots of people assume they must be super-competent and super-successful, which in turn meant their pretence seemed to be working, and so reinforced their belief in their strategy. In turn, they became more and more unwilling to listen to other people and more and more adamant that things had to be completely their way, which made them more and more difficult to be around.

I am unaware of Adler's preferred method of treatment. But I recall that Adler had a habit of picking on certain things that a patient had said, and then getting the patient to examine his reasoning on that particular issue, until it became clear to the patient that his reasons for saying and doing things that were not what most people did, were because of his subjective feelings of inferiority/superiority, and not because of some rational or emotional justification.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

It is like telling a bald guy he's bald because he doesn't have hair. Serves no utility right?

Now imagine that same guy thanking you, and saying something like, "that must be why i keep getting sunburned scalp".

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

After many years of consider MBTI bull ....

Same here.

 

[BurnedOut]

@scorpiomover mover
You have not falsified any of the core arguments I have provided. You have also spectacularly failed at convincing anybody here that MBTI is actually useful. You are not explaining the logic behind MBTI or Jung. You explicitly mentioned that Jung is not a psychologist which destroys MBTI completely.
@LOGICZOMBIE and @ZenRaiden all this horn tooting about MBTI not being bull, there is not a single practical usage you have mentioned. I laid out a rough exposition that adequately expresses my gripes with MBTI without making it a complete harangue. All three of you keep harping like fucking ISIS converts about MBTI being useful without explaining why it is actually useful. Oh and the greatest irony! All three of you have tested INTPs. Is it not fucking stupid that none of you have your 'Ti' which is suppose to 'make things make sense logically internally and fit in a consistent internal framework' is working here? All I can see is a bunch of 'religious ISFJ' fighting tooth and nail with pebbles as arguments in front of my fairly big rocks as arguments in which I am putting in a thousand times more effort to be objective laying out logical inconsistencies in a manner that is easily understandable. For the sake of your own INTPness, stop being fucking zealots. It is annoying.

So MBTI is independent of the competition. The competition is a result of the person who uses it, not MBTI.

Such logic adequately explains why social media has increased depression rates right? Or why marijuana abuse is increasing because the plants are more potent? Of course, these things have to do with people and not social media or marijuana. Kudos to your logic. As if people are not capable of using more resources to make themselves more miserable. Oh, why don't you explain to all of us why polar partisanship in US keeps increasing due to social media?

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

You have also spectacularly failed at convincing anybody here that MBTI is actually useful.

This is somewhat of an obvious overstatement.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

there is not a single practical usage you have mentioned.

I've repeatedly presented you with real-world examples of how this framework has enhanced practical inter-relational understanding.

What specific "practical usage" are you personally looking for ?

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

All I can see is a bunch of 'religious ISFJ' fighting tooth and nail with pebbles as arguments in front of my fairly big rocks as arguments in which I am putting in a thousand times more effort

Try sticking more to specific errors in logic and less to broad characterizations.

 

[BurnedOut]

I've repeatedly presented you with real-world examples of how this framework has enhanced practical inter-relational understanding.

What specific "practical usage" are you personally looking for ?

It has empirically 0 value. It is sociologically useless and has not been employed for any serious political analysis. Which is a joke for a 'psychological' framework that has been around since 1923ish. Any person who takes psychology and the value of statistics seriously enough does not care about MBTI or refrains from endorsing it in any manner. If your MBTI has at least an iota of practical value at enhancing anybody's understanding in the world, it may be hidden in the Mariana Trench. You have not mentioned your own musings of its usage which I effortlessly managed to debunk not because of your lack of intelligence but rather the lack of foundation of the source of your defence.

It has no bearing on interpersonal understanding but rather a possibility of causing more problems in relationships by using this ridiculous system of categorization. Most of its categorization can be figured by something known as 'rapport' and that is an instinctive habit developed by human beings and many other social creatures thus eliminating the need of MBTI at predicting stuff in a relationship. In managerial settings, DISC has proven to be more practical and it is preferred to MBTI.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

You have not mentioned your own musings of its usage which I effortlessly managed to debunk not because of your lack of intelligence but rather the lack of foundation of the source of your defence.

Please be slightly more specific.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

Any person who takes psychology

What system do you personally prefer ?

 

[BurnedOut]

This is somewhat of an obvious overstatement.

Overstatement? Tell that to the multitude of serious psychology researchers who tried to find any empirical value to this bullshit by performing real experimentation. I have read actual research papers debunking MBTI very effortlessly. It is like the frail kid in the alley who gets beat by the drug dealer for failing to pay up.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

This is somewhat of an obvious overstatement.

Overstatement? Tell that to the multitude of serious psychology researchers who tried to find any empirical value to this bullshit by performing real experimentation. I have read actual research papers debunking MBTI very effortlessly. It is like the frail kid in the alley who gets beat by the drug dealer for failing to pay up.

You can only speak for yourself.

You might say something like, "I am personally unconvinced".

 

[BurnedOut]

If any consolation, it is called one of the worst personality tests ever made and is a laughing stock. Much of the mental biases have already been found lurking in its questionnaires.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

If any consolation, it is called one of the worst personality tests ever made and is a laughing stock. Much of the mental biases have already been found lurking in its questionnaires.

Oh, that's nice.

What system do you personally believe is superior ?

 

[BurnedOut]

Big 5 without a single doubt. However, you cannot really use it in daily life. Again, EQ counts to be more important. More than anybody's personality type, a good understanding by rapport, empathy and simple logic work a thousand times better. As a matter of fact, psychology of groups is much more interesting.

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

Big 5 without a single doubt. However, you cannot really use it in daily life. Again, EQ counts to be more important. More than anybody's personality type, a good understanding by rapport, empathy and simple logic work a thousand times better. As a matter of fact, psychology of groups is much more interesting.

These questions were just as vague as the MBTI,

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

Big 5 without a single doubt. However, you cannot really use it in daily life. Again, EQ counts to be more important. More than anybody's personality type, a good understanding by rapport, empathy and simple logic work a thousand times better. As a matter of fact, psychology of groups is much more interesting.

And this seems to reflect my general lack of "S",

 

[LOGICZOMBIE]

Big 5 without a single doubt. However, you cannot really use it in daily life. Again, EQ counts to be more important. More than anybody's personality type, a good understanding by rapport, empathy and simple logic work a thousand times better. As a matter of fact, psychology of groups is much more interesting.

Nothing new here either,