similarminds.com

[O++]

ghost-logic: They weren't work associates. As far as what I do, I do research. What do you do?

That's really funny what you say because my brother is "ESFP" too. I've given up trying to talk to him about theories a long time ago lol. He never understood my "interests".

It's true, alot of that abstract thinking drains more "down to earth" people. My brother sometimes tells me "stop speaking like in books" lol, because for him that kind of stuff reminds him of his studies. For me, my idea of "fun" is exchanging ideas, discussing in constructive ways around possible intepretations of a theory, trying to capture the "essence" of things by confronting my ideas to other people's.

I strongly believe truth is like a crystal - multifacetted. You can only see one side at a time. For me, conversations with other people are an occasion to shift my viewpoint to an alternative angle and increase understanding. So sometimes I deliberately will "annoy" my brother and ask him lots of questions to really understand where he's coming from. It's like I want to know how's life through your glasses?

Sometimes it works

[ghost-logic]

im 16, still in school. What do you research?

yeah, I've sat my brother down and made him listen to me and answer my questions to better understand him(and to piss him off a bit:P). He says that my questions are impossible to answer, he dosen't know and he wont try. As far as I can see is that he is only intrested in things that are practical and easy to understand. Things that he can use only at that moment. If he dosen't need to know something, he will avoid it at all costs. Learning and thinking is a job for him, associated with school/work. He wants to be a doctor, but only for the money. He has no intrest in learning about medicine or helping people(at least not that I've seen) but, he spent a semester in medical school and said it was too much so he quit. These types are very goal orrentated but their own pleasure comes before anything and get depressed when they don't see their life improving, but they can't see that it is no one but their own fault. My brother would blame everyone around him before he even thinks that it is his fault that he failed at something. And, he is a pathelogical liar, so when I don't believe something he says he says I'm paronoid.

any commen views in your brother?

[O++]

lol yeah

He really likes to party, always been more busy having fun rather than studying. He's a people guy. He made it through university by doing everything at the last minute. Today he's very succesful in his job!

[Amathya]

[troubled]

The Hine quote is great... The word "intellectual" could use some more rounding out. The words "rational" and "reason" and "logic" that keep showing up don't adequately express the colloquial use of the term. I think "engaged" might be a much better term -- engaged minds. I think of an intellectual as a person who has linked what he or she says to a broader perspective and constantly tries to synthesize the new data and arguments, that come out of books and journals, to that perspective, might be a better definition. So an intellectual is a type or a mode, not a particular opinion and not even one single methodology. The Brookings Institute is full of intellectuals who are center-left in their politics; The American Enterprise Institute is full of intellectuals who are center-right in their politics. But they both stack up pretty equally when it comes to the number of Almighty Ivy League PhDs wondering around the hallways with their shoes untied. Many of these folks have defined areas of expertise, but if you look long enough, you'll notice they can't exactly keep their mouths shut about topics that aren't within the boundaries of their expertise. They have a kind of faith -- no, the better word is vision. They have a vision of what the world is; what human nature is; what we can actually know; what we can honestly hope for; what we should really worry about doing (the last three courtsey of Kant). It's not that hard -- in some cases, probably too easy -- to connect the dots of all kinds of data once you have a certain worldview. An active engagement in all these things is the mark of an intellectual, I think. Look at Atlantic Monthly and The New Yorker and National Review and The New Republic. Most of the writers are "intellectuals" in our colloquial sense. The caraciture of an Enlightenment rationalist doesn't adequately define these folks.
Historical example: Kierkegaard was brilliant, but he "used intelligence against intelligence" to show that things like Hegel's "system" wasn't worth a thing, and that logic alone wouldn't sustain us as human beings. So Kierkegaard was a smart man who wouldn't have liked Voltaire. Both were intellectuals. ...OK, two pints of beer and I ramble. Did that make any sense?

[invicta]

Well...Hine didn't put the intellectual part on there, the non-italicized part was mine. It's a belief deconstruction technique--truly listening to others, no matter who they are, what they look like, or where you meet them, is the only intelligence there is, imo. I guess I was saying that the minute one considers themselves an intellectual is the minute they stop questioning their beliefs, or themselves. If one knows everything, how can they learn?

I think, also that the term "intellectual" has come to mean "academic" in the understanding of many. I don't think that's even close to the entire definition, so what did I do? I went and got an academic definition. No mention of collegiate study whatsover within that definition.

I felt a need for clarification before pontification. Thank you for the kind words, Amathya. I have at times wondered whether I might not be INTJ but INFJ. I think INFJ gets a deeper understanding from their experiences. Well, so much for wishful thinking! I'm kind of jerk, though, so there goes F.

And troubled, Kierkegaard was likely a Faustian Introvert. That being said, I value his veiwpoint over Voltaire's.

[O++]

Interesting... but coming back to Meta's question: What is life like when your primary orientation is intellectual? This doesn't me as per se that you are an intellectual, as the word is commonly thought of in our culture, although it can.

They way I understood it was: What is life like when your preferences, interests, are intellectual. That could mean a number of things: reading, cinema, art, abstract thought, philosophy, psychology, science, etc. Clearly people who have alot of those interests are marginalized from others (I don't know alot of people into philosophy, abstract thought, art, etc.). What is life like when your naturally tendency is to be drawn to the intellectual?

But it also means What is life like when your mental processes prefer the intellectual. As opposed to "common sense", or "down to earth", etc.

From my personal perspective, this encompasses the mbti "N" preference/ big five "Openness to New Experience".

So, how's life beeing an N?

The agreeableness/disagreeableness (or whatever F/T) for me has no relevance.

Also, I believe part of having intellectual interests is to be open (hence, openness to new experiences!), and to listen to other points of view to gain knowledge because no one will ever have sufficient knowledge of anything. Again, depending on what you are, agreeable of disagreeable, you'll come out to other people as more or less arrogant or not.

Do not forget that challenging and accomodating are not compatible. If an intellectual is engaged, he will come out a minimum disagreeable - from his challenging of common views and argumentative attitude.

Troubled: I think you nailed it right. Alot of writers are considered intellectuals and are not your typical "rational" type at all. I think your example on philosophers is a good one. They are, by nature, intellectuals - but they can use that sometimes against reason and logic, and other times just to build systems and paradigms. Kierkegaard is a good mention. I believe all existentialist philosophers, with their deconstruction of social reality, are challengers of the rational and the obvious - forcing us to think differently. Just think about Nietzsche - alot of academics just hate him. He just made it a point to destroy everything, destroy logic, destroy reason, destroy "truth" in favor of your own values, subjectivity, appearance - life! How un-intellectual!

[troubled]

In response to O++: Thanks for rounding out that perspective about intellectual life, Nietzsche, etc. That's what I was aiming at. I think there ought to be room for the intuitive types to be proper intellectuals. Separately, I think Nietzsche and other existentialists may yet get some academic respect, but we'll see. A friend recently took a post-doctoral program in psychoanalysis, and he said the analysts were raving about Heidegger! Who would have thought?!?!?

In response to Invicta: I thought you might think of Kierkegaard as a Faustian Introvert! That's cool. And I love the Hine quote. The beer probably blurred my intentions with my last post. I meant to say "amen!" to Hine, and then as a completely separate issue, try to unpack a broader definition of "intellectual." Anyway, I think what you said was right on. And wow, reading Kierkegaard's "Sickness Unto Death," I cannot imagine a more introverted intellectual. But back to your post, you know, you can still get a "deeper understanding from experiences," meaning you can be an NF, and still be a jerk to others! Theoretically. You don't really come off like a jerk even if you think you are one.

[Guest]

[invicta]

[troubled]

Ha! That's awesome: philosophers generally have higher IQs than scientists or doctors! I'm not doubting you but would love a reference for that if you've got it.
I've been reading Kierkegaard, who claimed to use "intelligence against intelligence," so I find Jung's remarks interesting. (What an incredible piece of intellectual history, in and of itself, that Jung commented on all these folks.) I think some underlying themes of Kierkegaard would dovetail nicely with Jung's point that the personality of the philosopher is an issue in the philosophy. "Truth is subjectivity," K. said, in the sense that a true Self must find that for which it can live and die.
I have liked some of Jung's theories from a distance, but on the counts raised in that particular letter, he can bite me. I recently read Walker Percy's essay "The Coming Crisis in Psychiatry" in his collection Signpost in a Strange Land, and he makes an interesting point: That Freud and Jung and their intellectual/professional offspring essentially see the goal of therapy as a way to adjust everyone to either a certain social or a certain biological norm. Adjusting to these norms still doesn't address The Individual as it exists as a Self; it's a little more involved, but that's an overview. Percy follows Eric Fromm's critique up to the point where Fromm suggests a Marxist solution. Marcel, K., and Pascal are summoned for supporting points. If you can get your hands on that essay, you'll probably appreciate it if not completely agree with it. While I'm at it, just read the first few paragraphs of Percy's Lost in the Cosmos and The Message in the Bottle. You'll know right away if you're hooked.

[O++]

[invicta]

Sure..

"[In the biographical reviews made by Catharine Cox and assistants of the world's 300 most eminent people, having at least some intellectual achievement and being born after 1450,] the mean [IQ] was highest for philosophers (170), and next highest for poets, novelists, dramatists and revolutionary statesmen (160). The lowest was for soldiers (125), the next lowest for artists (140) and musicians (145). The mean for scientists (155) was identical with the mean for the total group. (It will be understood, I trust, that IQ estimates of this kind are not to be taken too literally. For a majority of the subjects the information on which the estimates were based was far short of what could be desired.)....
People like to believe that the genius as a rule is no better than the rest of us except in one particular. The facts are very different. Except in music and the arts, which draw heavily on specialized abilities, there are few persons who have achieved great eminence in one field without displaying more than average ability in one or more other fields."
Lewis M. TERMAN, 1940, Psychological Approaches to theBio-
graphy of Genius. Published as an Occasional Paper on
Eugenics. London : Eugenics Society & Hamish Hamilton, 1947

Yes, concerning Jung's authoritarian attitude; I wonder how many of the truly brilliant throughout history Jung would have preferred institutionalized? And, how many psychiatrists/doctors (and, worse, educators) today hold the same views? Sad, really, to think that there is currently a generation on antidepressants or ADD meds full time and as a matter of course. In fact, in Britain, the use of Prozac is so common that the water supply is now tainted with measurable levels of Prozac, which has built up in rivers and groundwater.

BBC News article

I could go on a rant here, so I'm stopping now.

I probably will check out the Percy essay. I'll let you know what I think of it after I read it.

[O++]

[troubled]

Invicta: Thanks much for the source! And, that BBC article was insane. Something's really wrong if all we do is pop pills now. We didn't always do that. We were much more sane in previous generations, choosing instead to drink ourselves silly with scotch.
O++: Yes, in its first-generation forms, Freudian and Jungian psychoanalysis are nearly dead and I would say, yeah, that's good. However, there is some room for existentialism and psychoanalysis to dialogue. I've stayed away from Sartre because I always perceived him as trendy, however, I did recently pick up an ancient paperback of his Existential Psychoanalysis, and have only read Rollo May's introduction which (oddly enough for an introduction funded by a publisher) was NOT a full endorsement, but a grounded appreciation. But that's as far as I've gotten, so I can't vouch for Sartre!
I thought it was weird, as I might have mentioned before, that in a post-doctoral program in psychoanalysis (recently completed by a good friend; I think the program was affiliated with CUNY in NYC), the docs and shrinks in the program were deep into Heidegger. Granted, this is completely anecdotal, but this same friend is also trying to turn me on to Gadamer! Go figure.
Could some respectable synthesis be at hand? Maybe. Or the synthesis could end up looking like Frankenstein. Or a pig with lipstick. Twenty years from now we might start to see the results.
Wager on the outcome?
Just kidding. I'll probably still be broke.