# The Harold Grant Stack Was A Mistake



## Aluminum Frost (Oct 1, 2017)

reckful said:


> Jung hisself talked about differing preference strengths. He didn't use _percentages_ (he didn't have a test), and he may not have used the word "preferences," but his type portraits in Psychological Types differentiate between people with mild and strong degrees of what he called "one-sidedness" with respect to their dominant functions, and he talked about the neurotic downsides of too strongly preferring the dom.
> 
> Where have you gotten the impression that every Ne-dom prefers (or "favors," or whatever word you _prefer_) Ne to the same degree?
> 
> It's also worth noting that, contrary to what you say, lots of function tests (including Nardi's) give you percentage scores for the functions, just like the official MBTI gives you percentages for the dichotomies. (But note: the official MBTI position is that those percentages shouldn't be taken as measures of _preference strength_.)


Stop shoehorning Jung into this, we're not talking about Jung.

Where did you get this idea that they don't?

Nardi, Grant, etc use functions stacks so that's a moot point.


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## Wisteria (Apr 2, 2015)

Aluminum Frost said:


> It's the same thing, but when it comes to functions for whatever reason (probably the idea of loops and inferior function eruptions) people think they're a certain type for exhibiting traits that they're supposed to be weak in. Cause this doesn't happen with letters.


The reason that people seem to want to be a certain type on here is because of that confusion with MBTI though. Members might insist they are like a sensor when typing someone, but the person will try to reason why they are an intuitive type, because when they take an MBTI test and just in general, they have a preference for iNtuition.

MBTI isn't about strengths. You might prefer the cognitive functions stack and think it's a better theory which is fine (I get the impression you do prefer it) but that doesn't MBTI isn't simply dichotomies and preferences. The two theories shouldn't be collaborated.



Aluminum Frost said:


> Letters are stupid cause if we use letters and percentages than an ISFP could potentially be more similar to an ENTJ than another ISFP.
> 
> I 60% S 60% F 60% P 60%
> 
> ...


It just means that the preference for ISFP isn't that strong imo.


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## soop (Aug 6, 2016)

Your logical fallacy is appeal to authority, several times over.


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## Wisteria (Apr 2, 2015)

soop said:


> Your logical fallacy is appeal to authority, several times over.


That sentence doesn't make any sense and I don't know who you are talking to.


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## NT the DC (May 31, 2012)

soop said:


> Your logical fallacy is appeal to authority, several times over.


I think when using empirical evidence in any social science you're bound to defer to experts in the field but I wouldn't say the arguments I've seen in this thread are a fallacy as much as they are a deferring to an authority. I actually value the information both sides have shared and how they've presented their arguments.

As a fly on the wall I appreciate the passion both sides have on the topic.


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## soop (Aug 6, 2016)

NT the DC said:


> I think when using empirical evidence in any social science you're bound to defer to experts in the field but I wouldn't say the arguments I've seen in this thread are a fallacy as much as they are a deferring to an authority. I actually value the information both sides have shared and how they've presented their arguments.
> 
> As a fly on the wall I appreciate the passion both sides have on the topic.


The OP was just qualifications he has followed by his opinion and how other people in the field agreed with him, he did not attempt to actually disprove or prove anything.


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## soop (Aug 6, 2016)

Wisteria said:


> That sentence doesn't make any sense and I don't know who you are talking to.


Lol if you don't think it makes sense you're incorrect, and I wasn't talking to you, so buhbye.


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## Kizuna (Jul 30, 2011)

soop said:


> The OP was just qualifications he has followed by his opinion and how other people in the field agreed with him, he did not attempt to actually disprove or prove anything.


I've seen this so often, this "This is fact and end of discussion" from Te-users it's not even funny. A Ti-user, in my experience, would be much more inclined to go as far as deconstructing his own theory/opinion/idea just to show you it can be put back together successfully, with every little thing in its place, the machine running smoothly. Not "The sun is RED. You don't like it? It's true though, and now deal with it. I will not comment on it, go to [authority s/he accepts] if you want proof. I'm only here to state this fact, not to debate it with you. End of discussion. "


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## Aluminum Frost (Oct 1, 2017)

Kizuna said:


> I've seen this so often, this "This is fact and end of discussion" from Te-users it's not even funny. A Ti-user, in my experience, would be much more inclined to go as far as deconstructing his own theory/opinion/idea just to show you it can be put back together successfully, with every little thing in its place, the machine running smoothly. Not "The sun is RED. You don't like it? It's true though, and now deal with it. I will not comment on it, go to [authority s/he accepts] if you want proof. I'm only here to state this fact, not to debate it with you. End of discussion. "


They do this stupid correlation thing too which is beyond annoying cause it's not even 100% true. "Oh you don't know if you're an ISFP or an INFP? Well you said that you like art and music and most artists and musicians are intuitives 65% of the time therefore you're an intuitive."


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## Retsu (Aug 12, 2011)

Aluminum Frost said:


> They do this stupid correlation thing too which is beyond annoying cause it's not even 100% true. "Oh you don't know if you're an ISFP or an INFP? Well you said that you like art and music and most artists and musicians are intuitives 65% of the time therefore you're an intuitive."


Kek'd

#notallteusers


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## Wisteria (Apr 2, 2015)

The OP clearly couldn't care less about typology anymore. They even retired shortly after making this thread. That's why they didn't bother to explain why they disagree apart from referencing reckful's posts.

What you're describing is mental laziness, not Te.


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## Octavarium (Nov 27, 2012)

Aluminum Frost said:


> They do this stupid correlation thing too which is beyond annoying cause it's not even 100% true. "Oh you don't know if you're an ISFP or an INFP? Well you said that you like art and music and most artists and musicians are intuitives 65% of the time therefore you're an intuitive."


On one interpretation of your post, your criticism doesn’t make sense because everything in type theory is about probabilities, and nothing is 100% certain.

But maybe you weren’t saying type analysis should be restricted to things that are 100% certain. Maybe your criticism goes something like this. If somebody trying to decide between ISFP and INFP says they’re an artist, and, let’s say, we know that 65% of artists are Ns, that should increase our estimated probability that the person is an N by a certain amount. However, the person doing the typing will usually increase the probability by too much. They increase the probability, let’s say, to a degree that would be appropriate if 95% of artists were Ns, not 65%.

If that’s what you meant, that might be a fair criticism. Most people aren’t very good at thinking about probabilities. It might help to encourage a more quantitative, Bayesian approach to typing, where the typer starts out with a probability, as a percentage, that the typee is a given type, and then updates that percentage in light of new information about the typee. Would that help to answer your criticism? I’m not sure what I think of that approach myself, but it might be worth a try.


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## Aiwass (Jul 28, 2014)

Kizuna said:


> I've seen this so often, this "This is fact and end of discussion" from Te-users it's not even funny. A Ti-user, in my experience, would be much more inclined to go as far as deconstructing his own theory/opinion/idea just to show you it can be put back together successfully, with every little thing in its place, the machine running smoothly. Not "The sun is RED. You don't like it? It's true though, and now deal with it. I will not comment on it, go to [authority s/he accepts] if you want proof. I'm only here to state this fact, not to debate it with you. End of discussion. "


Exactly. Te can look lazy, or like shallow thinking. "This is what this authority said", "this is what X source said..."
I don't want to know about who said what. Give me something that makes sense, not outside sources. I don't care about consensus.


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## Aluminum Frost (Oct 1, 2017)

Octavarium said:


> On one interpretation of your post, your criticism doesn’t make sense because everything in type theory is about probabilities, and nothing is 100% certain.
> 
> But maybe you weren’t saying type analysis should be restricted to things that are 100% certain. Maybe your criticism goes something like this. If somebody trying to decide between ISFP and INFP says they’re an artist, and, let’s say, we know that 65% of artists are Ns, that should increase our estimated probability that the person is an N by a certain amount. However, the person doing the typing will usually increase the probability by too much. They increase the probability, let’s say, to a degree that would be appropriate if 95% of artists were Ns, not 65%.
> 
> If that’s what you meant, that might be a fair criticism. Most people aren’t very good at thinking about probabilities. It might help to encourage a more quantitative, Bayesian approach to typing, where the typer starts out with a probability, as a percentage, that the typee is a given type, and then updates that percentage in light of new information about the typee. Would that help to answer your criticism? I’m not sure what I think of that approach myself, but it might be worth a try.


I view it as irrelevant, even with 5% somebody has to be in that 5%. When it's something like 35% it's like not even worth bringing up. Unless it's legitimately rare than I don't see the point but this isn't something like the lottery. It's literally just looking at if you're more S or N, why is the probability of it a factor? People 7 feet tall are incredibly rare but if I see one I'm not gonna be like "No, I don't think so, too rare."


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## Octavarium (Nov 27, 2012)

Aluminum Frost said:


> I view it as irrelevant, even with 5% somebody has to be in that 5%. When it's something like 35% it's like not even worth bringing up. Unless it's legitimately rare than I don't see the point but this isn't something like the lottery. It's literally just looking at if you're more S or N, why is the probability of it a factor? People 7 feet tall are incredibly rare but if I see one I'm not gonna be like "No, I don't think so, too rare."


Then how do you suggest we type people? All we can ever say is that this person has said things that are more typical of N types than S types, or more typical of J types than P types, or more typical of Te users than Ti users, or whatever, and so this person’s most likely best fit type is x.

I do agree with some of what you’re saying here. We shouldn’t be making definitive statements about people’s types based on a single factor, such as “you’re an artist, therefore you’re an N”. 35% isn’t very rare, and even things that _are_ rare do happen, so we shouldn’t be telling people “that’s rare, so you can’t possibly be that.” General tendencies are only tendencies, and there will always be lots of people who don’t fit into whichever trend or pattern is being discussed. But general tendencies are all we have to go on in type, so all we can do when typing someone is consider various things about them, and decide which type best fits all the data we have about them, weighing up contradictory evidence where necessary. If we restrict our type analysis to things that are absolutely certain, we’ll have nothing to base our type analysis on.


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## tanstaafl28 (Sep 10, 2012)

So is the OP advocating we chuck the entire Grant-Brownsword stacking model out the window? If we want to get nitpicky, just about all of MBTI has been discounted by science. It's only popular with businesses because the MBTI institute is making too much money to quit now. 

I think it's a tool, and like any tool, it has uses for which it works well, and uses where it's like trying to use a Flathead screwdriver as a chisel. As a conceptual model, it is useful, perhaps not necessarily as a literal one.


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## Abraxas (May 28, 2011)

Wisteria said:


> The OP clearly couldn't care less about typology anymore. They even retired shortly after making this thread. That's why they didn't bother to explain why they disagree apart from referencing reckful's posts.
> 
> What you're describing is mental laziness, not Te.


I didn't "retire", I'm just not interested in the debate. This might sound strange, but something us INTJs are fairly good at is predicting the outcome of an activity _before_ engaging in it, and when we see no outcome "worth" the struggle to obtain, we walk away.


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## Bastard (Feb 4, 2018)

Abraxas said:


> I didn't "retire", I'm just not interested in the debate. This might sound strange, but something us INTJs are fairly good at is predicting the outcome of an activity _before_ engaging in it, and when we see no outcome "worth" the struggle to obtain, we walk away.


To be fair, you said all that was worth saying in the OP:



Abraxas said:


> The Harold Grant stack has been all but _disproven_. The MBTI Foundation does not endorse it. Jungian Psychology does not endorse it.
> 
> It is a meme at this point.


My eyes glaze over when people pull out the Harold Grant stack. :laughing:


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## Wisteria (Apr 2, 2015)

Abraxas said:


> I didn't "retire", I'm just not interested in the debate.


Ok



> This might sound strange, but something us INTJs are fairly good at is predicting the outcome of an activity _before_ engaging in it, and when we see no outcome "worth" the struggle to obtain, we walk away


Sure, but we were talking about your OP. 



Bastard said:


> To be fair, you said all that was worth saying in the OP:
> My eyes glaze over when people pull out the Harold Grant stack. :laughing:


If you use the cognitive functions theory then aren't you also using the harold grant stack?


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## Bastard (Feb 4, 2018)

Wisteria said:


> If you use the cognitive functions theory then aren't you also using the harold grant stack?


Did cognitive functions theory exist before Harold Grant?

Either or. I don't place much value in it.


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