# Describe the other NTs!



## Holunder (May 11, 2010)

My little remark about INTPs seems to have derailed the whole thread... :mellow:
Oh well...




amnorvend said:


> It's more accurate to say that NTPs are focused on the _whole_ picture.


That's _exactly_ what I meant!
Me: INTPs construct the big picture out of facts, the INTJ extracts facts out of the big picture.
INTP: INTPs don't see the _big_ picture, they see the _whole_ picture!
Me: What? Isn't that the same, only in other words? What about my idea!?




Elwood92 said:


> An INTP wants a truthful or perfected idea, they want ‘the big picture’ and they hate to limit their view to the usefulness of ideas. They are the seekers of general truths and these general truths are ‘the big pictures’.


I think this is one of the keys to this problem: For you, the 'big picture' is a general truth. To an INTJ, the idea of a 'general truth' is in itself limited. For us, the truth is always shifting and multifacetted. That is what we see as the 'big picture' - the evershifting continuum of meaning in our heads.
And yes, we can pick out one meaning to apply to a situation - but that is not what we are, it is only what we show.


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## Protagoras (Sep 12, 2010)

Holunder said:


> I think this is one of the keys to this problem: For you, the 'big picture' is a general truth. To an INTJ, the idea of a 'general truth' is in itself limited. For us, the truth is always shifting and multifacetted. That is what we see as the 'big picture' - the evershifting continuum of meaning in our heads.
> And yes, we can pick out one meaning to apply to a situation - but that is not what we are, it is only what we show.


You are correct. It was a problem of different definitions, which is why I tried to explain myself and my position in this analysis of the differences between INTPs and INTJs to the best of my abilities (which took quite a lot of words).Well, to conclude: it's safe to say that both INTPs and INTJs see each other's views as limited in some way or another... rofl


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## lirulin (Apr 16, 2010)

Elwood92 said:


> Whether you use, belief in, are convinced of or do something else with your idea doesn't make a huge difference to my argumentation, it's the same to me. The problem you are describing (if it really is a problem) is a problem of semantics and nuances, however it doesn't change my ideas about how INTJs use their ideas constructive while INTPs seek a 'truth' rather than an implementation. Even if you simply 'use' the idea as a tool to 'construct' something, you still take the idea for granted in order to do something with it (you're not likely to attack it once you have adapted it). Whether your innermost self actually beliefs it doesn't matter, you take it for granted and therefore you 'believe' in it on some level of your consciousness. This is not wrong, it's something we all have to do in order to function in this world, we all take ideas for granted on a daily basis. But *you INTJs have made a way of living out of it*.
> 
> Exactly! Which is why you are INTJs and we are INTPs. We need the idea to be 'truthful'/'seemingly perfect' while you need it to be 'useful'. We are the ones with the ultra-high standards.
> 
> I'm glad you agree with me. I already said the your thinking was VERY subjective while our thinking was based on finding the truth. You justly pointed out that INTJs deconstruct their ideas too to some extend, and once again I'll have to say that EVERYBODY does that... *We INTPs just made a way of living out of it.* That's what I'm talking about and that's where all personality theories are based upon: our ways of living/ our ways of perceiving the world/our ways of thinking. The INTP way of living is more that of the truths-seeking (read: big picture making), in some ways absolutist type while the INTJ way of living is based around realism, usefulness and plans. Both ways of living are respectable; I was just pointing out the differences between the two and arguing that INTPs are the ones making 'big pictures' of universal truths (_meta_- level thinking) while INTJs are more 'utilitarian and realistic' in their approach.


It's _not_ the same and your failure to acknowledge this is the central reason we disagree. Taking something as a working hypothesis is _very_ different from conviction. It really isn't taking it for granted in the way you mean. "Good enough to start working on" is very very different from a stubborn conviction limiting our thought. We want to work on it, after all, and we remember that it has flaws. (When healthy) You portrayed it as too intense & _too _limited since you only really see Te, not the craziness that is Ni. 
Frankly, I find the idea of an absolute truth completely subjective (and limited), whereas practicality - ie interacting with outside reality - to be more objective, for that matter. And I don't think "big truths" (which are never going to be completely true or proven) is more meta - it's just bigger in scale (since there is only one that tries to be all-encompassing) and more anal-retentive about details of proof. The Ni part - that you are paying much less attention to - is entirely meta- too, we just have more worldviews that we do not completely adhere to that do not try to account for everything since that ties them down - we'll use a different one depending. No less meta- - it is still thinking about thinking about thinking about cognitive frameorks about perceptions about thinking about conceptions about... you get the idea.
But yes, we do both see each other as limited in different ways. I'll give you that for sure.
You describe INTP really well - I'll grant that too.


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## Protagoras (Sep 12, 2010)

lirulin said:


> It's _not_ the same and your failure to acknowledge this is the central reason we disagree. Taking something as a working hypothesis is _very_ different from conviction. It really isn't taking it for granted in the way you mean. "Good enough to start working on" is very very different from a stubborn conviction limiting our thought. We want to work on it, after all, and we remember that it has flaws. (When healthy) You portrayed it as too intense & _too _limited since you only really see Te, not the craziness that is Ni.
> Frankly, I find the idea of an absolute truth completely subjective (and limited), whereas practicality - ie interacting with outside reality - to be more objective, for that matter. And I don't think "big truths" (which are never going to be completely true or proven) is more meta - it's just bigger in scale (since there is only one that tries to be all-encompassing) and more anal-retentive about details of proof. The Ni part - that you are paying much less attention to - is entirely meta- too, we just have more worldviews that we do not completely adhere to that do not try to account for everything since that ties them down - we'll use a different one depending. No less meta- - it is still thinking about thinking about thinking about cognitive frameorks about perceptions about thinking about conceptions about... you get the idea.
> But yes, we do both see each other as limited in different ways. I'll give you that for sure.
> You describe INTP really well - I'll grant that too.


Perhaps you are right, perhaps there really is a big difference in believing in an idea and using the idea... But from my perspective they don't differ that much, to me "believing in something" is just showing a slightly deeper conviction to an idea. Maybe that's my limitation, but I just can't see why you are making a point out of this, to me this really is a discussion of semantics rather than principals. 

Whether the seeking of truth of the INTP is actually a good or a bad thing is a whole different, rather difficult discussion but right now I'm just adressing their need to do this (whether you see this need as legitimate is up to you).


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## lirulin (Apr 16, 2010)

Elwood92 said:


> Perhaps you are right, perhaps there really is a big difference in believing in an idea and using the idea... But from my perspective they don't differ that much, to me "believing in something" is just showing a slightly deeper conviction to an idea. Maybe that's my limitation, but I just can't see why you are making a point out of this, to me this really is a discussion of semantics rather than principals.
> 
> Whether the seeking of truth of the INTP is actually a good or a bad thing is a whole different, rather difficult discussion but right now I'm just adressing their need to do this (whether you see this need as legitimate is up to you).


Yep, it's a huge difference. Huge. The limitations are different - elsewhere. Frankly, belief annoys me.
Think of it like the scientific method. You need a hypothesis to test in order to do an experiment, which is in itself a distillation of a lot more thought - but it is dumb as toast to believe said hypothesis, particularly _before_ the experiment and it'll warp the design of said experiment anyway. The entire point of the hypothesis' existence is to be tested, to try to disprove it and, if it's a good one, fail to disprove it. No belief at all in the beginning, just a postulate. You can accept theories as credible and support them once a number of experiements have been done - but if you're a good scientist you abandon them when you have better proof. Not quite belief really even that though some people react that way - but belief at the beginning is _really _not the point.

Legitimate - whatever. I don't see it as a task that has an end - so it's not my thing. I'm not saying it's wrong, I just think your reference point is a pipe dream. At least it's _thought_ though. I mean, it is limited, sure, but this whole conversation is about limitations, is it not? And persectives - you see Truth as something bigger, I see it as an arbitrary limitation. Just as you see refining thought to make it useful as a limitation & I see it as one of my few connections to something bigger, to "reality."


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## nevermore (Oct 1, 2010)

Elwood92 said:


> Perhaps you are right, perhaps there really is a big difference in believing in an idea and using the idea... But from my perspective they don't differ that much, to me "believing in something" is just showing a slightly deeper conviction to an idea.


*What!?*

Elwood, this way of thinking is alien to me. Very. I don't think it is representative of most INTP's. I don't even honestly believe you think this way. I don't think anyone _can_. Of any type. And if someone does, oh boy, it's a limitation all right. One of the biggest I have ever seen. In the words of INTP Richard Dawkins, nothing is ever true, only highly probable. (That isn't how an INTJ would refute the notion of absolute "Truth", of course, but you know what I mean). 

But I'm probably the one misunderstanding things here. Do you _actually_ mean to say you have to believe in an idea to use it? I must be mistaken here. Can you clarify?


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## Protagoras (Sep 12, 2010)

nevermore said:


> *What!?*
> 
> Elwood, this way of thinking is alien to me. Very. I don't think it is representative of most INTP's. I don't even honestly believe you think this way. I don't think anyone _can_. Of any type. And if someone does, oh boy, it's a limitation all right. One of the biggest I have ever seen. In the words of INTP Richard Dawkins, nothing is ever true, only highly probable. (That isn't how an INTJ would refute the notion of absolute "Truth", of course, but you know what I mean).
> 
> But I'm probably the one misunderstanding things here. Do you _actually_ mean to say you have to believe in an idea to use it? I must be mistaken here. Can you clarify?


Yes, I think you are misunderstanding me (although I may have been a bit too vague on the subject). I don't mean that there _actually is_ an absolute truth nor do I say that INTPs are absolutist in the philosophical sense of the word. However, the INTPs do have an absolutist wish: they want to find general 'truths' to serve as fundamental pillars for their understanding of the world. This need to understand the world is actually the source of the deconstructing of ideas and the probability thinking which are so very typical to INTP thinking. We are constantly coming up with new probabilities because we want to understand our world; we do this so that we can cancel out the ideas which seem illogical (by coming up with alternatives we can test ideas). This testing of ideas serves the INTP's main goal: to understand. And understanding requires truth; this may be a theoretical truth or an empirical truth, a general truth or an absolute truth, an instrumental truth or an intrinsic truth. The key characteristic of the INTP is his searching for a truth (no matter how subjective or objective this truth is).

I don't mean to say that you have to believe in an idea to use it, but before you use an idea you must have accepted it as a logical or at least as an acceptable idea (otherwise you wouldn't use it in the first place), and believing in an idea is just the extreme version of this accepting of an idea. Basically I'm saying that you need to accept an idea to some extend in order to use it and that believing in an idea is ultra-acceptance or even introjection of an idea.

I don't feel as though I'm explaining myself very well here, since this is largely a repetition of the things I have argued before... but I can't tell it any clearer than this.


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## nevermore (Oct 1, 2010)

Thanks. That was much clearer.

But if you're just accepting it hypothetically, is that really acceptance per se? To me, it's more of an "ok, assuming this is true" and working on that 'assumption' because it is useful at the moment. I don't that's belief at all, and I don't think belief is just an extreme of using/accepting an idea. I think it is sort of an added "personal" (for lack of a better word) "conviction" (again, for lack of a better word), or at least an investment in something, if that makes sense. I might use an idea because it is expedient, but I don't _believe_ in it...


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## lirulin (Apr 16, 2010)

nevermore said:


> Thanks. That was much clearer.
> 
> But if you're just accepting it hypothetically, is that really acceptance per se? To me, it's more of an "ok, assuming this is true" and working on that 'assumption' because it is useful at the moment. I don't that's belief at all, and I don't think belief is just an extreme of using/accepting an idea. I think it is sort of an added "personal" (for lack of a better word) "conviction" (again, for lack of a better word), or at least an investment in something, if that makes sense. I might use an idea because it is expedient, but I don't _believe_ in it...


Exactly. How many ENTPs believe in what they are arguing all the time, for instance? They use an idea to poke holes in other ideas and/or test their strength - ideas they may well consider more _likely_ to be reasonable than their own devil's advocate position. But they still want to test so they pick a position they don't believe in as a tool.

Ditto picking an hypothesis - it needs to be something that can be tested & one wants to be strategic about picking a test that will tell you something. The hypothesis that you get out of all the other stuff you've been thinking has to be functional more than anything. Plus it generally helps if there is more than one test since each hypothesis & each test have functional limitations. The limiting in this case is a way to externalise it effectively in order to let reality get at it and beat it down. Different from the cognitive structure that is belief which starts out with an internal limitation. If you know there are probable flaws and want to find them, then that's not belief. It's a far cry from it being personal or part of oneself.


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## Protagoras (Sep 12, 2010)

nevermore said:


> But if you're just accepting it hypothetically, is that really acceptance per se? To me, it's more of an "ok, assuming this is true" and working on that 'assumption' because it is useful at the moment. I don't that's belief at all, and I don't think belief is just an extreme of using/accepting an idea. I think it is sort of an added "personal" (for lack of a better word) "conviction" (again, for lack of a better word), or at least an investment in something, if that makes sense. I might use an idea because it is expedient, but I don't _believe_ in it...


This is a recurring counterargument to my notion that "belief is the same thing as ultra-acceptance or introjection". People always say that my acceptance-belief spectrum is flawed because believing in something is more personal, spiritual or somehow deeper than accepting a thing, but when I ask these people to tell me what the exact difference is they can't really put their feelings into words. Maybe I just don't have this kind of beliefs... It could very well be that a lot of people really have some alternate experience when they believe in something but to me believing is just accepting an idea to such an extend that it becomes a part of oneself/one's thinking (introjecton).

EDIT: By becoming a part of oneself I mean becoming a part of one's psychological identity.


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## amnorvend (May 16, 2010)

Holunder said:


> My little remark about INTPs seems to have derailed the whole thread... :mellow:
> Oh well...
> 
> 
> ...


Maybe I misunderstood what you were saying, but I don't think it's the same thing. What I'm getting at is that your framework for understanding these things is wrong. It sounds to me like you're saying "INTJs break big things into small things and INTPs make small things into big things".

What I'm getting at is that this is a totally INTJ way of approaching the issue. It's not that we're just putting things together in a different order. It's that we genuinely are more concerned about those details. We don't tend to think in terms of big picture versus small picture. That's something INTJs do because they like focusing on one thing at a time. We INTPs aren't as hesitant to consider everything at once.:happy:


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## Holunder (May 11, 2010)

amnorvend said:


> Maybe I misunderstood what you were saying, but I don't think it's the same thing. What I'm getting at is that your framework for understanding these things is wrong. It sounds to me like you're saying "INTJs break big things into small things and INTPs make small things into big things".


That's basically what I meant. Maybe it just looks like this from an INTJ perspective. I understand that this distinction between 'big picture' and 'whole picture' is meaningful to you. It just isn't to me, because I think in broad terms, and for me, a term like 'big picture' also comprehends similar terms like 'whole picture'. All I really wanted to do is point out this difference between INTP and INTJ thinking, which can make discussions a bit wearisome for me.



> What I'm getting at is that this is a totally INTJ way of approaching the issue. It's not that we're just putting things together in a different order. It's that we genuinely are more concerned about those details. We don't tend to think in terms of big picture versus small picture. That's something INTJs do because they like focusing on one thing at a time. We INTPs aren't as hesitant to consider everything at once.:happy:


Here's where you are wrong: INTJs _never_ focus on one thing at a time. They cannot. The way their brain is wired, they always think about loads of things at one time, it's just largely unconscious and the end result may look very linear, as it is filtered through Te. I guess it is rather hard for Ti dominants to comprehend such a thinking process, because it is such a very different way of thinking. As far as I understood from the descriptions, Ti considers lots of information, but connects it piece by piece. That is what I meant by saying that INTPs create the big picture out of single facts.


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## Phoenix Down (Jul 2, 2010)

INTPs- Adorable
INTJs- Adorable
ENTJs- Also Adorable

:tongue:


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## nevermore (Oct 1, 2010)

Phoenix Down said:


> INTPs- Adorable
> INTJs- Adorable
> ENTJs- Also Adorable
> 
> :tongue:


*sigh* If only we realized it...


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## NiDBiLD (Apr 1, 2010)

This, ladies and gentlemen, is what we call a _derailed thread_.


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## iKicker (May 29, 2010)

Are we still talking about NTs?


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## nevermore (Oct 1, 2010)

It's been a while since the Ti-Ne/Ni-Te war. I think it's safe to come out of the trenches.:wink:


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## wafflecake (Aug 30, 2010)

NO, LET'S ARGUE SEMANTICS MORE!

I propose that it's not a matter of Ti vs. Te, but rather of Ne vs. Te., as those are the functions most apparent to observers.


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## Trainwreck (Sep 14, 2010)

OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH


I'm so down for this war. I dibs double agent! ... Hold on.. Just gotta switch to ENTJ in my user CP....


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## Immemorial (May 16, 2010)

Since this thread is so far off topic, let us watch the haterz dance.










And if we're having a war, I call dibs on the penguin army.


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