SWeakness and strength
Tintp@egroups.com
-
Hi Fellow INTPs !
 I know now more rationally what I may have ''intuitively'' somewhat
 seen/felt out in one of my very-recent my previous mails 
 (Re: Grudges, Self-mockery, and Taking things personally), i.e. 
 about this : 
   I have a feeling (and no more than an admittedly irrational feeling) 
   that this ''naiveté'' must be the shadow aspect, i.e. the 
   other-side-of-the-coin, of some other personal characteristic.  
 I think now that I know what the other side of the coin is, and I 
 think I'm rationally convinced now that I would indeed loose 
 some significant ability when I'd turn that coin over.
 IMO, naivete is the basic tool that enables me to solve problems
 (''problem'' in the sense of a mathematical or programming problem,
 which IMO must be definitely isomorphic with any other analyzable
 or design or engineering problem).
 A problem I solve by the means of throwing my *WEAK* side, which is my 
 naiveté, at it.  Not at all I in any way  solve a problem by force. My 
 naiveté IMO sincerely is the ability or tool that enables me to look at 
 the problem in such an unbiased way that the problem becomes no longer a 
 ''problem'' but instead becomes a rather nice chatotical situation, 
 similar to a big box of Lego pieces in which one can rummage at ones 
 heart's desire. 
 I say the above, that I believe that my naiveté enables me to become 
 truly unbiased, not at all to brag in any way.  My naiveté is also very 
 often a damn nuisance -- if I hadn't had it, I'd probably have a good 
 high-paying job by now, a big car, a ''wife and family'', a ''status'' 
 in some companies/institutions, etc. I couldn't care less about those 
 things.  If I had any such ''status'' position, I'd probably immediately 
 trow it away and trade it in for the 1st nice puzzle to solve. 
 I believe that any worthwhile engineer already, if maybe only 
 ''instinctively'', knows the above thing about ''wielding'' one's 
 naiveté in that way.  Naiveté is a weapon -- you focus you naiveté on a 
 problem, or rather maybe use it as a light beam to trace over the 
 problem to seek out the next aspect/item in it that might ''yield'' to 
 analysis. I also believe that any SCIENTIST knows the above, and 
 operates in this way.  To my mind, INTPs are 
 engineers-scientists-analyzers-philosophers (IMO, all of these 
 4 things are definitely basically the same ''job'' or ''skill''.)
 So because of this I think that as a ''programmer'', I earn my 
 livelihood fairly directly (well, minus all the stupid frills of the 
 stupid senseless commerce and ego-licking) from using my naiveté as a 
 ''tool'' in this way.  IMO, every engineer/programmer basically does the 
 same.  (Obviously, there exist MANY, MANY different  ''shades'' of 
 programmer/engineer/designer -- each with their own *MIX* of skills.  A 
 100% scientist-like person would IMO not be an optimal programmer for a 
 small internet company that needs to have its software programmed 
 basically as a thing that only ''looks cool'' so as to maximize sales, 
 fairly irrespectively of whethet the program is internally constructed 
 anywhere near soundly or maintainably or elegantly.)  IMO, the 
 INTP-versus-SJ ''battle'' has MANY MANY parallels in the world of 
 engineers fighting with their commercially much more capable managers. 
 (Myself, I clearly can tell you a lot about silly misunderstandings
 between engineers/programmers and managers.)
 IMO, the basic thing that constitutes Dilbert's weirdness and wich
 is the thing because of which everybody makes fun of him, is the
 central cause/source of the most powerful and useful tool/skill
 that Dilbert possesses.
---
 More replies coming up, especially on the Martial Arts, and also
 (a) repl(y)(ies0) one or more mails of Stephen.
---
 By the way, I gotta say that I find having been in this ml for how long 
 ? a week or so now ? *surprisingly* educational to myself. I suscribed 
 here rather as an experiment, to gain experience in what it's like to 
 communicate with this particular MBTI type, and to see what ''they'' are 
 like in ''real'' interaction (i.e. as compared to the descriptions of 
 typical INTP behaviour as described on some webpages). 
---
 Best regards,       Menno (xxxxx@xxxxx.xx)
http://www.rubinghscience.org/