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Any INTP composers?

Anti-intellectualism is a terrible drift in modern society and the popularity of these horoscope-like classifications is ample proof. Wise up people, it's in our duty.
Yes, those pesky millenials with their mobile games and innocuous personality tests need to get off our lawns and back into school! Thin out the sheeple and bring back Theodore Roosevelt!
 
Yes, those pesky millenials with their mobile games and innocuous personality tests need to get off our lawns and back into school! Thin out the sheeple and bring back Theodore Roosevelt!

Well that was somewhat anti-intellectual as well, I must say.
 
Myers-Briggs is astrology for people with degrees. It's meaningless nonsense, debunked many times over. You are not defined by four letters any more than you are by a 'which Disney character are you' buzzfeed quiz. As with horoscopes though, some people like to offload personal responsibility on to a feeling of 'well I'm an (insert nonsense here) so I'm born this way, really - and that won't change'.
 
Myers-Briggs is astrology for people with degrees. It's meaningless nonsense, debunked many times over. You are not defined by four letters any more than you are by a 'which Disney character are you' buzzfeed quiz. As with horoscopes though, some people like to offload personal responsibility on to a feeling of 'well I'm an (insert nonsense here) so I'm born this way, really - and that won't change'.

Exactly. Much like with the horoscope, people love to read themselves into meaningless platitudes and factoids that can be applied to anyone and anything, and it's a favored pastime of unassuming folk. Which is fun and entertaining and I get all that, but there's a growing tendency to taking memes, infotainment, coffee cup reading, pop psychology, pseudo-sience and misinformation at face value, and that's where it gets silly. The same types also love to excuse their shortcomings with baseless references to supposed "human nature" or ridiculous nonsense that allegedly, alleged "scientists" have "proven".
 
I agree that it becomes an issue when used as a scapegoat for not dealing with any personal shortcomings. Short of that, I fail to see any merit to shit on self-assessment forms like the Myers-Briggs thing.
 
I agree that it becomes an issue when used as a scapegoat for not dealing with any personal shortcomings. Short of that, I fail to see any merit to shit on self-assessment forms like the Myers-Briggs thing.

How about it being over-simplified and in no way reflecting how human psychology, let alone genetics, really work?

All these questions and presumed characteristics in these tests are treated as mutually exclusive. They assume that if you have a tendency A, you cannot possibly have a tendency B later that day, tomorrow or possibly simultaneously. Which is however what happens with humans all the time! They assume that people's conscience, decision making and personal characteristics are linear on/off switches, while in reality, any personality has several modes and layers of "truth" always running in tandem.

Whenever I did one of these, I noticed how it just didn't pan out and ended up contradicting itself. However, people like conforming to patterns, groupings and stereotypes, and are arguably conditioned to do so to a significant degree. Which is why they tend to respond to such tests and answer those questions "accordingly", experiencing an underlying affirmation of doing it "right". The result is the impression that the test works.
 
Myer-Briggs has got a lot of criticism due to how hard it is to prove it's worth scientifically. To call it rubbish because it is anti-intellectual raises two questions:

1. Is everything that doesn't fit into the container "intellectualism" rubbish and should be thrown out?
2. Is everything that can't be proven scientifically anti-intellectual?

If the answer is yes to both 1&2, then it's rubbish. Let's throw it in the bin. Let's add the perception that all things can be rationally explained and that the scientific method is the only valuable tool to distinguish between right or wrong, since there is no way of scientifically prove that. Ah, moral and ethics is also going in the bin, why would being good to someone be better than being bad? Anti-intellectual bullshit, all of it! Feelings should also be ignored and put in the bin, they can't be proven to be valid. Well, let's throw out thoughts as well.

Myer-briggs is a tool that springs from the theories of Carl Jung as I'm sure many of you know. Yes, psychological theories, they are not facts, but theories. A simplification of these theories was made by two women and happens to provide people with tools to understand themselves and others. It doesn't say that one way is better than another, it just says "if you are like X maybe you will react like Y, and that would be weird to person Z". Similar to "if you are a person that gets hungry often, it might be good to eat often, but others might be different". A totally non-scientific statement, but very practical.

So if there are tools that help people understand themselves and others, why would we have issues with it? Take ADHD, it's a very non-scientific disease, we have simply observed humans and noticed that "there is a group of people that acts and feels in this certain way, and it seems to be an obstacle for them, let's see if we can help them". Such anti-intellectual bullshit, who are we to group these people into square boxes and put labels on them!

Structured science came as a very valuable tool a couple of 100 years ago, and we should treasure it for all it has given us. But the most important thing is not what science can prove, but what makes us happy and what works. If Myer-briggs doesn't work for you, don't use it. Same goes for taking Concerta pills if you have ADHD. Or deciding that hugging your child all the time is a good or a bad thing. Let's not be right. Let's be happy.
 
To call it rubbish because it is anti-intellectual raises two questions:
I'm calling it rubbish because its whole premise (people can be categorised into neat personality types) is demonstrably wrong. Not because it's not 'intellectual' or scientific. Because it is a nonsense science with no basis in reality other than perhaps confirmation bias. And Jung had barely anything to do with it in the first place.
 
Well that's a bit of stretch @erikradbo. Not to say a red herring. It almost sounded like an esoteric plea or argument for Myer-Briggs, which I'm pretty sure it doesn't claim for itself. I hardly believe that it's based on the fact that there are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. Which is something I'd happily subscribe to. But Myer-Briggs is most certainly meant as a "scientific", grounded tool.

The argument isn't that Myer-Briggs can't be scientifically proven so it must be nonsense. The argument is that it's a superficial, simplistic and demonstrably misleading tool and that's why it shouldn't be taken seriously beyond "trivia" level.

Edit: @Richard Wilkinson was faster.
 
I'm calling it rubbish because its whole premise (people can be categorised into neat personality types) is demonstrably wrong. Not because it's not 'intellectual' or scientific. Because it is a nonsense science with no basis in reality other than perhaps confirmation bias. And Jung had barely anything to do with it in the first place.

Well that's a bit of stretch @erikradbo. Not to say a red herring. It almost sounded like an esoteric plea or argument for Myer-Briggs, which I'm pretty sure it doesn't claim for itself. I hardly believe that it's based on the fact that there are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. Which is something I'd happily subscribe to. But Myer-Briggs is most certainly meant as a "scientific", grounded tool.

The argument isn't that Myer-Briggs can't be scientifically proven so it must be nonsense. The argument is that it's a superficial, simplistic and demonstrably misleading tool and that's why it shouldn't be taken seriously beyond "trivia" level.

Edit: @Richard Wilkinson was faster.

Fair point, I think both of you are saying that you dislike it not because it's not scientific, but because it's plain wrong. Do you mean that it's scientifically proven wrong, or do you mean that a common public opinion is that it's superficial and that you cannot group people like that?
 
What's the risk/reward ratio of using it? What's the worst that could happen to someone from doing the test, what's the best, how likely are both?
 
Fair point, I think both of you are saying that you dislike it not because it's not scientific, but because it's plain wrong. Do you mean that it's scientifically proven wrong, or do you mean that a common public opinion is that it's superficial and that you cannot group people like that?

Common public opinion is often a very bad thing to rely on - especially given the last few years of world politics...

I mean it's been shown to be based on little actual study or evidence, with demonstrations that people taking the test at different times will get different results - which contradicts the whole idea of the test.

My annoyance is more with companies who spend money using it to decide how to direct and manage their employees. It has a sort of pseudo-scientific reputation still, which means not enough people are actually taking the time to stop and go 'hang on a sec, this might be bollocks. Let's check before we spend a load of money and make business decisions based on it...'
 
Common public opinion is often a very bad thing to rely on - especially given the last few years of world politics...

Word.

I mean it's been shown to be based on little actual study or evidence, with demonstrations that people taking the test at different times will get different results - which contradicts the whole idea of the test.


Got it. I don't think we disagree. I agree that it is by default based on very little evidence, as is almost every theory in management and psychology (cognitive behavioral therapy perhaps being the exception). I also get annoyed when people claim things to be scientifically sound when they are not. Or when they are used in a weird context, such as you are describing.

And answering those questions is not a test. You can decide for yourself what 4 letters you are. If you find it hard, there is an indicator to help you wrap your head around it. You might get different results each time, and hopefully each time it helps you understanding a little more about how you prefer things, if you do find you have any preferences at all.

My annoyance is more with companies who spend money using it to decide how to direct and manage their employees. It has a sort of pseudo-scientific reputation still, which means not enough people are actually taking the time to stop and go 'hang on a sec, this might be bollocks. Let's check before we spend a load of money and make business decisions based on it...'

I did first come across it at uni, and then as a consultant at McKinsey&Co. There everyone - voluntarily - can do the test. Every time a new team is put together you get the opportunity to tell the rest in your team your MBTI profile. This gives everyone a socially accepted way to explain to everyone else some personal preferences, and sparks a discussion early on around certain issues that can arise in the team due to our differences. I would happily have used another tool for this, but I am pretty sure that having a tool at all increased the understanding in the team. I have a hard time seeing management consultants on the first day of a new project stand up and say:

"Hello, I'm Mike, and I'd like to tell you that I need quite a lot of time by myself to function. I also have a tendency of making big decisions based on my feelings, and I hate getting stuck in the details too much. Oh, and by the way, I'm a planner, so please help me out with setting the schedule as early as possible".

Since those companies know the importance of getting teams to work by meeting the needs of the individuals, they use a tool. Because hes fine with saying: "Hi I'm Mike, and I'm INFJ".
 
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Even if that other tool was, say, astrology? :)

Everyone picking a kind of "spirit animal" or Emoji that represents them would probably be a lot more effective, because it involves an element of choice and expression, wheras astrology is essentially randomly picking and assigning attributes. The thing is, even though I think astrology is bogus, in an A/B controlled study I'd not be surprised if it actually works as a positive influence in a company setting, because it gets some kind of conversation going about people in a team being individuals with different character traits and needs. If the control group doesn't have any impulse to assess and address individual needs, I wouldn't be surprised if they are worse off in productivity and happyness.
 
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