Subject Object: Letter to my INTJ friend

The following is an extensive letter I wrote for my best friend (the one who made the Ultra-Risk game) to explain some of my insights into typology at the time. I cannot promise that these are the exact ideas that I hold right now, but I feel that they may be useful to enthusiasts nonetheless.

E vs I

The basic definition I have generally worked with for extroversion and introversion is respectively, "objective" vs. "subjective". Now, subjective has a negative connotation in our society, but Jung is taking a neutral, philosophical approach: in order for anything to happen in psychology, what do you need? An object to be perceived, and a subject to perceive it. If there is only an object, then nothing is happening because no one can see it or think about it or do anything to it. If there is only a subject, then nothing is happening because there's nothing for the subject to think about or do anything to.

So, extraversion refers to a focus on the object in the subject-object relationship. Introversion, however, refers to a focus on the subject in the subject-object relationship. So what does that mean?

Extraversion bases its ideas and notions off of what objects tell it. It relies on objective data. So, in extreme examples, extroversion can either be like a crazy awesome surfer who is so in tune with the objective nature of the wave that he can just glide across it…or it can be like a lemming following all of the other lemmings off of a cliff. Sometimes being in tune and allowing oneself to be affected by information from objects is good. Sometimes, not so much.

Introversion bases its ideas and notions off of what the subject tells it. It relies on 'subjective data'. What that means is it relies on factors, either inherited or acquired over time, which arise within the person's mind, in the moment, independently of any objective experiences or stimulation. For example, introversion could be like a crazy awesome genius thinker or beautiful poet who is so in tune with his own subjective ideas about the world that he can figure things out that the people around him, being so focused on only what they objectively experience, couldn't know. He's the lemming who goes "wait a second, this goes against a principle I've developed on my own". Alternatively, it can be a stark-raving lunatic with completely wrong ideas, or a stubborn old man who won't leave his house even though a volcano is exploding next to it.

In a word, my conception of E vs. I is the same as adaptive vs. stubborn.

Another way to look at E vs. I is as respectively 'dancing vs. dreaming'. That is to say, E seeks to lose itself in objects: it wants to reject all of its personal, subjective notions, get rid of all that "bias" (as it perceives it) and become wholly and completely adapted to the nature of objects. The surfer loses himself in his surfing -- the performer loses himself in the moment -- the extraverted scientist ('extraverted' does not have to mean 'social') loses himself in his observations and calculations, never settling into any definite conclusions. In a word, E dances -- losing itself in whatever function it's dancing with: thoughts, feelings, sensations, intuitions.

I (introversion) on the other hand dreams -- that is, it isolates itself from the dance and dreams up its own ideas. It wants, in some sense, to leave the inconsistency of the outside world and meld entirely with the inner world that it experiences, the inner world which it feels provides a far clearer picture of how things are, despite being a dream. The genius becomes a recluse whose ideas frequently lack any practical application. The lemming becomes a social deviant proclaiming the superiority of the lemming race and how it will someday evolve and reach the moon.

It is important to note, however, that the act of dancing, as well as extroversion, is not by necessity uncreative, neither is introversion necessarily creative -- for a dancer can be very creative and innovative within the bounds given by the rhythm and mood and space and so forth; these bounds they perceive as the natural bounds of the world, and the dreaming of introversion seems arbitrary and fruitless to them. Introversion, on the other hand, perceives extroversion as bound down, conforming, and limiting itself to the rules of the dance, though it may itself be purely reactionary in nature, and only stimulated to dreaming by other people's ideas or assumptions drawn from their surroundings.

The main difference is not creativity, but where the attitude draws its raw material from: outside or within?

Now, there are the four functions I mentioned earlier: T, F, S, and N. I define these as follows:

-- Sensation tells you 'that something is there', and gives a detailed description of it as it stands, without any judgment or formulation of any conclusions about it.

-- Thinking does formulate conclusions: it is a process by which we figure out 'what something is'; that is, what its function is, its structure, how it ought to be categorized, whether it makes sense, etc.

-- Feeling formulates a different sort of conclusion or judgement: it asks 'how something feels', or 'whether something is desirable or not'. It is concerned with values and evaluations. Things are felt, rather than just figured out; value is placed on things, whether because of subjective data (I) or objective data (E].

-- Intuition does not formulate a judgment, but like sensation is merely an act of perception: but rather than perceiving the thing itself, it seeks to perceive what we might call the 'essence' of the thing. It wants to get past the details and get at what it thinks is the actual thing. This grasping of the actual thing can be equated to viewing it through a special lens that blurs the details and actual nature of the thing in order to see what it 'essentially' is. This kind of perception naturally lends itself to seeing all of the things that the thing is like or could be, in other words, what associations or possibilities may be made with this thing. Hence, intuition tends to perceive everything but the actual thing itself: it skirts over, under, and around, looking to what the thing relates to, or what it could become.

With the above definitions, we could then roughly define Te as "figuring out what the object is". More specifically, it is seeking to draw proper conclusions from objective data, data gleaned from outside. These objective conclusions become a sort of 'formula' by which it lives its life, and is also the origin of its driven nature:

"…a man whose constant endeavor…is to make all his activities dependent on intellectual conclusions…[He] elevates objective reality, or an objectively oriented intellectual formula, into the ruling principle not only for himself but for his whole environment…Everything that agrees with this formula is right, everything that contradicts it is wrong…His moral code forbids him to tolerate exceptions; his ideal must under all circumstances be realized, for in his eyes it is the purest conceivable formulation of objective reality…"

Fe is also trying to draw proper conclusions from objective information, but rather than 'intellectual' or 'scientific' or purely logical principles, it is forming value judgements based on objective information; in other words, just as Te develops a logically based formula to which it must conform (because it just makes perfect sense), Fe makes its own value-formula of what is appropriate and how to act around others in order to maintain a positive, smoothly working environment:

"…[it] is always in harmony with objective values…I may feel moved, for instance, to say that something is "beautiful" or "good", not because I find it "beautiful" or "good" from my own subjective feeling about it, but because it is fitting and politic to do so, since a contrary judgment would upset the general feeling situation. A feeling judgment of this kind is not by any means a pretense or a lie, it is simply an act of accommodation…Without [Fe], a harmonious social life would be impossible."

Se can be roughly defined as "awareness of reality as it is". So, what is good for Se is, quite simply, whatever produces the best or strongest sensations. Think Steven Spielberg (director of Jurassic Park, Jaws, and Indiana Jones) who showed a lot more realistic and extravagant (and bloody) special effects than ever before. The blood is there because the Se type is naturally very realistic. You can also think of General Patton and his colorful use of language:

"…those objects that excite the strongest sensations will be decisive for the individual's psychology…The sole criterion of their value is the intensity of the sensation produced by their objective qualities…No other human type can equal the extraverted sensation type in realism. His sense for objective facts is extraordinarily developed. His life is...simply real life lived to the full. His whole aim is concrete enjoyment, and his morality is oriented accordingly…he is conspicuously well adjusted to reality…extraverted sensation strives to reach the highest pitch of actuality…"

What is good for Ne is similar to Se, except instead of whatever produces the strongest sensations, it's whatever produces the most possibilities; that is, whichever object's intuitive 'essence' allows for the most associations. They are naturally entrepreneurs, visionaries and initiators of great ideas, but don't have the patience to stick around to see it develop. Think Leonardo da Vinci with his bazillion sketches and ideas, very few of which he actually built:

"…intuition is...an attitude of expectancy, vision and penetration; but only from the subsequent result can it be established how much of what was "seen" was actually in the object…Sensation...[directs] attention to the physical surface, to the very things round and beyond which intuition tries to peer…intuition tries to apprehend the widest range of possibilities…It is constantly seeking fresh outlets and new possibilities in external life…If only he would stay put, he would reap the fruits of his labors; but always he must be running after a new possibility, quitting his newly planted fields..."

Unlike Te, which bases its conclusions on objective facts, Ti bases its conclusions on subjective "facts". These subjective facts we could call pure theories or premises. While Te draws its conclusions from data outside itself, regarding ideas developed without data to be ungrounded and arbitrary, Ti is the opposite, regarding outside data as always untrustworthy and ever-changing, and the internal ideas as rationally inviolable. Ti loves beginning with a priori premises, that is, premises that it believes are logically infallible and must be true independently of experience, for example, "I think, therefore I am", or "parallel lines will never meet". Ti is very logical and mathematical in this way: it builds systems inside of its mind, independent of any objective evidence to support it: it wants to know what the pure idea is itself, and then compare it with reality to see if it matches up:

"…new views rather than knowledge of new facts are its main concern…what seems to it of paramount importance is the development and presentation of the subjective idea, of the initial symbolic image hovering darkly before the mind's eye. Its aim is never an intellectual reconstruction of the concrete fact, but a shaping of that dark image into a luminous idea…It's task is completed when the idea it has fashioned seems to emerge so inevitably from the external facts that they actually prove its validity…introverted thinking shows a dangerous tendency to force the facts into the shape of its image, or to ignore them altogether in order to give fantasy free play…"

Fi is very, very similar to Ti, in that both develop principles which they regard as true independently of experience or objective data. If the objective data is wrong, it’s the objective data's own fault. In the case of Ti, the principle is wholly logical, concerned with "what the principle is". But with Fi, the principle is evaluating and feeling, concerned with "how the principle feels" or "whether the principle is desirable". Hence, Fi, through its own methods, develops its value principles independent of experience. For this reason, Fi is known for being very individualistic because it constantly feels that the general, objective, common evaluations of things are wrong; its value principles are always being impinged on, and it feels driven to act very differently from the rest of the world (Ti is this way too, but is more like a mathematician watching people constantly get a math problem wrong than a humanitarian constantly watching African children starve to death):

"...it seldom appears on the surface and is generally misunderstood...It's aim is not to adjust itself to the object, but to subordinate [the object] in an unconscious effort to realize the underlying images. It is continually seeking an image which has no existence in reality, but which it has seen in a kind of vision...It strives after an inner intensity, for which the object serves at most as a stimulus...Everything, therefore, that we have said about introverted thinking is equally true of introverted feeling, only here everything is felt while there it was thought...[they have] no desire to affect others, to impress, influence, or change them in any way...their feelings are intensive rather than extensive."

Whereas Se seeks for the clearest, more real sensations, Si seeks for clearest, truest subjective sensations. For example, a Se type like General Patton uses his bombastic language to paint an image of how things actually stand: the actual blood and the actual horror and glory of war and so forth. Si, however, paints an image, not of how things actually stand, but of how things stand for it. It does not experience reality, but subjective reality. Another example: if both Se and Si perceive a red balloon, Se would describe the balloon as red, and latex, and other detailed descriptions. Si, however, would be stimulated by the balloon; the balloon stirs up the bottom of their mind and sends all this sparkling silt into the air, and Si perceives that instead of the actual balloon. This silt represents the nature of the balloon, because it was the balloon that stirred it up, but it is a subjective object, not an objective object that is being perceived; hence, all of Si's perceptions have a highly personal nature to them because Si is not perceiving actual things but how they themselves relate to actual things. This is why Si is so often related to memory and recall. Si tends to remember specific details about things that struck them more than others, which is why they tend to be detail oriented in general, being able to pick out things that Se doesn't, because Se sees it all in equal HD magnificence. In short, Si is a very personal kind of perception:

"[Sensation], too, has a subjective factor, for besides the sensed object there is a sensing subject who adds his subjective disposition to the objective stimulus...If, for instance, several painters were to paint the same landscape...each painting will be different from the others...chiefly because of different ways of seeing...[he] concerns himself with the subjective perception excited by the objective stimulus...The decisive thing is not the reality of the object, but the reality of the subjective factor...which...constitute a psychic mirror-world...introverted sensation...does not so much reproduce the object as spread over it...age-old subjective experience and the shimmer of events still unborn...he may be conspicuous for his calmness and passivity, or for his rational self-control...The too low is raised a little, the too high is lowered, enthusiasm is dampened down, extravagance restrained..."

Now for the big one: unlike Ne, which perceives objective possibilities, Ni perceives subjective possibilities. The difference is analogous to Si vs. Se, where Si is highly personal, picks certain details out over others, doesn't actually perceive reality, etc., as opposed to Se which is strictly impersonal, sees it all in HD, actually is paying attention to reality itself, etc. So, while Ne looks at the 'essence' of objects themselves and their related associations, Ni looks at the essence of the silt kicked up by the object they perceive. They look at the essence of what the object personally means for them. A perceived event kicks up dust in their mind, and they immediately begin working to see how all these dust particles relate to each other and what it all means (as opposed to looking at the dust particles themselves, as Si does). So while Ne is chasing after every actual possibility, Ni is chasing after every possibility within their own mind; and while Ne becomes an entrepreneur and innovator of objective data, Ni becomes an entrepreneur and innovator of subjective ideas. This is why so many philosophers are Ni types, because they are a bit like 'idea cookers', combining and recombining all the bits and pieces of subjective stuff kicked up in their mind by things and eventually synthesizing something new and introducing it into the world:

"...it does not concern itself with external possibilities but with what the external object has released within him...[it] perceives all the background processes of consciousness...[it] moves from image to image, chasing after every possibility in the teeming womb of the unconscious...The extravert would say: 'Reality does not exist for him, he gives himself up to fruitless fantasies'...But since these images represent possible views of the world which may give life new potential, this function...is...indispensable to the total psychic economy...through its perception of these inner processes, [it] can supply certain data which may be of the utmost importance for understanding what is going on in the world..."