Why MBTI has merit?
When I bring up the topic of the MBTI, or classification of people in general, the most common objection I hear is that I am unfairly putting people into predefined groups. The idea that people can be classified into sixteen, or any arbitrary number of basic personality types, seems to go directly counter to the assertion that every person is unique. I have two reasons to believe this argument doesn't hold: firstly, a macro level classification system still allows for a considerable amount of variation within; secondly, I think people give themselves too much credit for uniqueness.
In my experience, the people who would argue most passionately against such classification are the ones who have been taught since a more impressionable age that they are unique, and should never let anyone tell them otherwise. But personality profiling does not require that there only be so many variations in people as there are axes on the profile results. It also does not insist that there only be two values along each of the axes; the distributions are continuous, but can generally express a tendency one way or the other.
MBTI testing, along with other classification systems, purport a measurable indicator of a few behavioral and cognitive preferences, without making any claims to the traits it doesn't measure. And the traits it does measure are quite specific. To borrow my own profile for a moment, I stated before I am an Introverted Intuitive Thinking Perceiving type. These are very specific adjectives, each of them suggesting a narrow scope in describing who I am. And by knowing my classification, it can provide insight into how I might develop going forward, and how I may react in an unfamiliar situation.
For example, take the noun intuition. In the MBTI, Intuition is contrasted with Sensing, as one trait becomes dominant the other recedes. From Wikipedia:
Intuition are the information-gathering (perceiving) functions. They describe how new information is understood and interpreted. Individuals with a preference for sensing prefer to trust information that is in the present, tangible and concrete: that is, information that can be understood by the five senses. They tend to distrust hunches that seem to come out of nowhere. They prefer to look for detail and facts. For them, the meaning is in the data. On the other hand, those with a preference for intuition tend to trust information that is more abstract or theoretical, that can be associated with other information (either remembered or discovered by seeking a wider context or pattern). They may be more interested in future possibilities. They tend to trust those flashes of insight that seem to bubble up from the unconscious mind. The meaning is in how the data relates to the pattern or theory.
I might have picked a slightly different word than Sensing, perhaps Abstract contrasted with Concrete. But the idea is there, and my experiences suggest that people will show a tendency toward one or the other for gaining knowledge. And showing preference for one indicates, by definition, a preference against the other. And so the classification at least seems sound, even if the validity is questionable.
But then I am comfortable with the idea of classification in general, whereas many people tend to feel discomfort. The idea of classification tends to rest in peoples' minds near the idea of premature judgment and bigotry. Each piece of data that exists about you provides them with yet another opportunity for them to exclude or marginalize you in some way. We already have classification systems for intellectual ability, creditworthiness, academic achievement, athletic achievement, driving ability, and several others. We are being classified every day and lumped into aggregate groups. The only difference objections tend to be the loudest against those classifications we can least control. But the ability to work at changing one's classification is orthogonal to the validity of the classification. The classification we have the least control over is that of us being Homo sapiens, but I don't know of anyone who would argue against that classification's validity.
Outside of personality testing, the classification that tends to draw the most scrutiny is that of intellectual ability. The arguments tend to be largely the same as that of personality classification; the ultimate uniqueness of each person makes the test invalid for anything but detecting the most extreme cases of cognitive dysfunction. I tend to believe that the current methods we use to measure intelligence do provide useful information, though they may not correlate perfectly to every person's mental ability; what data I've seen on such tests suggests that there is noticeable correlation. The issue with gathering this sort of a metric is that any individual person only has so much control over their cognitive abilities. If they are measured at an IQ of 105, for instance, there may not be much they can do to modify that score. The issue comes when someone they know is measured by the same test to have an IQ of 130. Neither of them really had an substantial amount of control over the eventual outcome of the test, and so to feel anything but indifference is unfair. But human emotions care little about fairness, and a situation like this is bound to breed envy and spite. This seems to be the biggest argument against attempting to gauge intelligence in the general population, and it has absolutely nothing to do with the validity of the tests involved.
But personality profiles do not intrinsically carry the concept of ordering. A person with personality profile A is not immediately determined as "better" than a person with personality profile B. The implications of which is the "better" personality comes from societal pressures. These pressures would exist whether or not such a concrete measure existed. All that profiling allows for is people to explicitly state what they already knew intuitively. But it provides something substantive for detractors to point out, specifically the profile result. Outside of accuracy, which I spent some time arguing about earlier, this is the other big argument against profiling. But it lacks in even the most basic common sense. It is like insisting that if we ban racial profiling, racism will go away. People will continue to judge each other, the only difference will be the lack of tangible evidence that they are doing so.
So those are the two big arguments I see against personality profiling: that they unfairly lump people into presized boxes, and that they can be used as a means of selectively excluding people. As I've demonstrated above, I don't think we can hold profiling guilty of either of these, and definitely not to the point that it's usefulness is overshadowed.
The Portrait of the INTP
So, what traits make someone an INTP. Joe Butt provides an excellent summary of what drives an INTP, and what you can expect in dealing with one. Another good summary is provided by Paul James. The executive summary is as follows: INTPs are much more interested in logical arguments than emotional appeals. We enjoy playing with and creating complex systems, and will tend to get bored with simple drudgery. We try as best we can to develop models based on what we see around us, to attempt to discover the underlying mechanisms which drive the world around us. We tend be very non-social (which is different from anti-social), and spend large amounts of time alone with our thoughts. The products of those thoughts can be discovered in things like the objects we build, the conversations we have, and the essays we write. So now that I've hopefully made clear how I'm approaching this topic, what follows is the product of my thoughts.
How People Misinterpret an INTP
Why am I going on about classifications and personality types. Because of a misunderstanding of motivations I seem to keep encountering. Specifically, misunderstanding when communicating with other people. So, what follows are a few misinterpretations I seem to keep encountering, and my responses:
The first misinterpretation I encounter is when I express my disagreement with another person's claim, and they counter with the assertion that I am arrogant. Please do not confuse my disagreement and solicitation of a debate with you as arrogance. Please understand that I do not come to the table assuming without any doubt that I am right and you are wrong. By presenting arguments and assertions to support my side, I am soliciting two things: arguments and assertions to support your side, or arguments and assertions to refute my side. Keep in mind, these may not be the same, and I'd like to hear both.
To solicit a debate isn't arrogance, anyway. Arrogance would be asserting that you are wrong, and then refusing to listen to your defense. Continuing to disagree is not the same thing as ignorance. Instead I assume that both you and I have good reasons for holding our stance, and that we may have something to learn from one another. We may end the debate with one of us realizing they are in the wrong. We may each solidify our stances further, and realize there isn't a prayer of reconciliation. We may realize we misunderstood one another, and agree once we achieved common understanding. In any case, it's highly probable we both have a more informed position. The problem comes when I refute something, and am told to stop being arrogant and respect the opinions of other people. If you assert something and then assert that I am arrogant for refuting it and offering to debate it, I am not the one being arrogant. I'm not the one defending his pride by refusing to defend his beliefs.
The second misinterpretation is that I do not care about your emotions because I don't seem to be taking them into consideration. Please do not confuse my rejection of your emotional arguments as a sign that I don't not acknowledge your emotions. My goal in arguing with people is not to ignore or inflame emotions or instigate a fight. However, emotions are subtle and do not spring up from a conscious train of thought. They can cause people to form conclusions that don't make sense when considered without the anger, fear, greed, pity, joy, or sorrow that drove them. They may form part of the human condition, but they cause us to do or believe things that are ultimately destructive to ourselves, our friends, and our society, while providing little or no benefit to anyone. And people will defend these emotional claims irrationally, either by refusing to offer them up for inspection, or by attacking the person who might disagree. There may be an underlying reason for the emotion, but while the reason appears unapparent, emotion can only defend itself by further emotion. Logical argument does not suffer from this vague, impulsive compulsion to protect any particular claim from needing a defense. The argument must stand on its own, and if it fails to do so, it must be dismissed.
To quote Sam Harris, who I think sums my thoughts up rather well on this, "No society in human history has ever suffered because it has become too reasonable." The implication of this quote, due to there existing suffering, is that it increases due to a reduction or lack of reason; from what empirical evident I can witness, I wholeheartedly agree.
Thirdly, please do not confuse who you are with what you believe. The smartest people in history have been wrong on more than one occasion. From Wikipedia, Isaac Newton once made the mistake of believing all prisms will produce spectra of the same length. There was Einstein's assumption of the need for a cosmological constant, discussed more in this article. I won't go into further detail, but even those people we might deify were not perfect in their life -- even Jesus , Yahweh, and Muhammad was arguably not without error, and yes, I can hear the flame train departing. I'm not debating people's beliefs because I want to prove them in error; my goals are not so nefarious. As I've stated above, my main goal in debating is learning. If it turns out I am mistaken about something, I can leave the debate with a better, more accurate understanding of things. Thus, I am less likely to commit an error later based on an incorrect belief, and means I can approach problems relating to what I learned with a greater confidence. If you attach your feeling of self-worth to believing what you know is correct, you leave yourself vulnerable to committing avoidable blunders later in life, and you give yourself even more rationale to defend what you believe from any sort of scrutiny.
I'd like to highlight this distinction between defending a belief, and guarding a belief; I think it's vital to the differences in thinking I describe in this post. In the former case, you debate the accuracy of the belief; in the latter case, you assert the belief is not open to debate. I think the latter case is severely detrimental, as it indicates either pride or vulnerability based on one's belief. It indicates that you've attached emotional value to the belief, and so you will have a negative emotional reaction if you are proven wrong. I think it is far better to attach value not to the beliefs you hold, but to the means by which you arrive at those beliefs and your openness to learning and better understanding. Don't be proud that you hold a particular political, religious, or work ethic, be proud of how you arrived at that ethic. If you can feel assured about the methods you use to develop the ideals you follow in life, I think you are well on your way. But, if you worry that your methods would not stand under scrutiny, take the time to introspect, and discover what seems lacking.
I hope the above paragraphs provide a slightly better understanding of where I, and likely other INTPs are coming from when communicating. It is not our goal to make you feel inferior or defensive. When we seem not to understand why you are feeling hurt or attacked, it is because we had no intention of doing so. What we saw as an opportunity for collective thinking and reasoning becomes, without our expecting it, an argument about why we believe the other participants are deficient in some way. This is not our goal, but we also will not accept the argument that soliciting such a reaction makes us inferior. It is a product of a misunderstanding, and a misunderstanding implies both people share responsibility for it. My goal in this essay was to describe how at least one INTP perceives this misunderstanding, in hope that others will understand me better, and that they will reciprocate in kind so I can understand them better. It is possible that philosophical debates will arise out of this, but realize it is all part of the greater process of understanding and learning from one another. And, as if anyone needs to be told, we could use a lot more of both of those.
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