Extroverted Intuition Ne (subjective description )

[xerx]

Ne is an implicit function. It involves understanding the internal essence of objects.

Cognitive
A "total" Ne state feels like complete detachment from reality. You don't notice the need to eat and drink, what's happening around you, or any sensory information that reaches your brain. The world loses its luster as you become fixated on solving a problem in your mind.

It feels like you're sinking away from reality towards the subconscious. At first, you feel like a worthless waste of skin because you can't fully conceptualize the problem. Every time you picture it, the picture is hideously incomplete, or worse, complete but primitive. You keep trying and trying until, all of a sudden, the subconscious erupts in a burst of revelation and fleshes it out before your eyes in full light... and Eureka!! You feel joy as you understand the problem in its full complexity. Unfortunately, this inspiration is random and only comes when it wants to.

Ne is an extroverted function. It gorges on information from the external world. The more possibilities, information and impressions you collect, the more you can examine an object of thought from multiple dimensions. The information is used to encircle the object and to triangulate its internal essence.

The "internal essence" of an object is a magnification in scope of the real, hidden objective qualities inside an object, greater than what can be normally perceived.

Ignoring Ni means that you prefer not to utilize abstract structures, or generalized abstractions that can cover a slew of situations. Instead, you treat each problem on its own merits and try to give a uniquely authentic solution to each problem. To use Ni would feel like brushing over crucial details that might be different this time around.


Social
Since I can remember, I've been able to intuitively recognize how people organize their thoughts. Whenever I meet someone new I try to unlock the vault of their thoughts, understand their mental structure, mental abilities and mental defenses.

I don't do this to harm them. Far from it. I'm just curious about their internal mechanism and how they operate. I'm completely galvanized and drawn to people that are complex. They represent a difficult challenge to solve. I'm attracted to fucked up people that have severe emotional problems (which is how SEI duality works ). One sad outcome is that, as soon as I understand someone, or if I've solved someone like them, I lose interest in them as a person.

I compare Ne to being able to see the hardware connections inside someone's brain. I can't always tell the content of what someone is thinking (that's software, which is Fe "internal processes"), but I'm attuned to how they think about X. And this allows me to evaluate someone's potential for grasping a problem.

I piece together someone's "potential" by the concepts they emphasize and the conceptual trade offs they make when explaining something, as well as the level of sophistication with which they frame their ideas. These ripple to the rest of their world view.

All this happens within seconds.

If I'm teaching, I can steer someone to the right solution by custom-fitting the lesson to how he processes information. If I'm being an obnoxious asshole, I'll make sure that he understands just enough to keep him interested, but not enough to ever understand what I'm saying.

I'm attracted to people that have potential talents I can help develop, but who are humble and don't believe in their own potential. I try to be friendly and not an asshole to them, but in my experience weak Fi still makes me seem like an asshole.


disclaimer: This is a subjective description of Ne. It's not a function description, just some collected observations (with the help of socionics) about my mental state that I endorse. Whatever I write is about myself only, and will be tainted with some Ti. By no means is this description complete and I could be completely wrong. It's entirely possible I'm not even ENTp.

[Krig the Viking]

Awesome. I especially like the "Social" section; I'm exactly the same way. I particularly like that mental hardware analogy. You've clearly and concisely put into words something that was kind of fuzzy and indistinct in my mind, and I was having difficulty explaining to people.

[Creepy-male]

Isn't this "Logical Ne"? I'll reread what you're saying when I'm awake (and sic Akra on you ) and try and get "Ethical Ne" as well.

[Marie84]

This is really good, you should put it on the wiki

I particularly like how you worded this, "It feels like you're sinking away from reality towards the subconscious"

[Blaze]

gold, pure gold. +25

[Azeroffs]

wouldn't Ne be more a detachment from the physical self, while Ni is a detachment from reality?

focus on all the implicit characteristics causes you to lose touch with the impression of details on yourself. But you're still focused on the outside world in a semi-definable way.

[ArchonAlarion]

I like that Jxrtes, especially the cognitive part. Ne for me is really detached from the physical world. I think about the world, but its never what is going on right now. I generate content in my mind based on all the things I've observed and then I alter and combine them to produce something different.

Maybe this is just me personally, but I end up feeling like there are more things, places, events, and settings in my head, than there are in reality, and I keep creating more all the time.

[tcaudilllg]

Ignoring Ni means that you prefer not to utilize abstract structures, or generalized abstractions that can cover a slew of situations. Instead, you treat each problem on its own merits and try to give a uniquely authentic solution to each problem. To use Ni would feel like brushing over crucial details that might be different this time around.

This sounds more like choosing 4D Ne over 3D Ti. 3D Ti is content with generalizations; 4D Ne, in contrast, works through each possibility each in its turn, seeking to illuminate each application of Ti.

[Steve]

Maybe this is just me personally, but I end up feeling like there are more things, places, events, and settings in my head, than there are in reality, and I keep creating more all the time.

Same. I don't know what it's from. It could be an intuitive-thinker thing, and combined with being a 6w5, that could magnify it.

[The Greeter]

jxrtes, that was excellent, and the "subjective" descriptor is so consistent with what Ne entails.

wouldn't Ne be more a detachment from the physical self, while Ni is a detachment from reality?

I would say that Ne is both detached from reality and from the self. I can see why you may think that Ne would be somewhat "anchored" to reality since it is external information that allows us to evaluate an object's internal essense. However, the essence of an object is not solely defined by how reality chooses to represent or utilize said object. Ne seeks out alternative manifestations independent of what is currently considered the reality of an entity. This can only be done by knowing as much as possible about the entity in question.

It is difficult to pin down how Ne operates exactly because it seems random; almost as if, for one reason or another, two or more neurons in the brain suddenly decide to connect and we get a new breadth of knowledge.

Hence why Ne is often associated with "[hidden] potential", or "insight" and, by a fair number, perceived as unrealistic (even useless); it is what is considered "real" that Ne discounts when it reaches a conclusion. Paradoxically, these reality-independent conclusions are seen very much as "real" by Ne-egos.


In terms of Socionics, keep in mind that Ne is in direct opposition to the function that is often associated with crude reality, Se. Thus, it makes more sense to conclude that pure Ne is "detached" from it.

focus on all the implicit characteristics causes you to lose touch with the impression of details on yourself.

No offense, but this statement makes little sense (and seems very artificial). Could you explain this phenomenon you claim Ne exhibits more clearly?

[Wynch]

Wow, this hit right on the money for me. Particularly impressed with the social part, which I never would have attributed to Ne.

[xerx]

Thanks for the support everyone!

This is really good, you should put it on the wiki

I'd like polish it first, add to it and test it. Also I don't think it's complete.

Ne is an extroverted function. It gorges on information from the external world. The more material you collect, the more you can examine an object of thought from multiple dimensions. The information is used to encircle the object and to triangulate its internal essence.

I want to change the bold to: "The more possibilities, information and impressions you collect,"

I particularly like that mental hardware analogy.

I didn't give a complete analogy, because I'm only brainstorming the rest of what I'm about to write.

Hardware connections have a fixed shape (rational). Also the connections function as a field, a changed or rerouted component can alter the functionality (ie. meaning). Hardware itself seems more Ti and Fi.

Explicit connections that have a fixed shape: Ti ("ideology:" explicit world view)
Implicit connections that have a fixed shape: Fi ("values:" implicit world view)

Ne might be about how hardware interacts with the world (and with itself?); ie. how receptive the hardware is to different types of information. Ne is the operating system that goes over the hardware.

A more complete analogy (for Alpha at least) might be:

Ji (Ti) - hardware (the physical structure)
Je (Fe) - software (the programs that are running)
Pe (Ne) - operating system (determines which programs can interact with the hardware)
Pi (Si) - circuit layer (allows all the above components to intercommunicate)

[anndelise]

The following are the parts that really hit home to me and some of my own comments. jxrtes' words are bolded.


Ne is an implicit function. It involves understanding the internal essence of objects.

Cognitive

Every time you picture it [a situation/problem], the picture is hideously incomplete, or worse, complete but primitive.
(I find it a bit irritating when I'm asked for an opinion or sympathy on an issue but I'm only given a partial view of it. I ask questions and more and more questions, attempting to flesh it out so that I can see the situation from multiple perspectives. Often times the person who asked me for my opinion will get irritated with me because I spend more time asking questions and fleshing out my understanding of the situation/problem than I ever do on forming an opinion. I don't have a set opinion on stuff because it all depends on the situation and what all is involved in that situation. And even then, once I've gained a better picture of the situation/problem, I'd rather try to help the other person see the full picture and encourage them to see it from different perspectives than to form a set opinion on it.)

Ne is an extroverted function. It gorges on information from the external world. The more possibilities, information and impressions you collect, the more you can examine an object of thought from multiple dimensions. The information is used to encircle the object and to triangulate its internal essence.
As I mentioned above, I'm constantly asking questions of people and their situations/problems. It's like, the more examples I have of people's experiences, then the quicker I'm able to form possible pictures or scenarios and what their essences might be. At the least all that info helps to guide me into the types of questions to ask a person. It also helps me have some possible answers/solutions that I can pass on. If I'd talked with someone else who had solved a problem a certain way, and read elsewhere of another possible solution, then I can pass those on to the current person who may find them useful. Honestly, I sort of perceive this as my "job", the collecting and passing on of information and impressions to those who may find it useful.

Instead, you treat each problem on its own merits and try to give a uniquely authentic solution to each problem. To use [a generalized theory/abstraction] would feel like brushing over crucial details that might be different this time around.
This has led to a number of arguments and disagreements between me and some beta NFs I speak with, as well as a couple of possible gamma NTs. They'll have these over-generalized views of something, usually along a theoretical foundation, and they often fail to take into consideration the aspects involved in a specific situation. They don't ask questions, they don't try to see the picture more fully, they don't seem interested at all in exploring the situation more fully, and especially seem to have a difficult time stepping out of their own preconceptions to view something an alternative way. I know that their way is useful for them, to do what they do. But when they push those preconceptions onto others (whether intentionally or unintentionally), I tend to get irritated about it. lol, but then I recognize that in a way I'm pushing my preconceptions and personal views onto others by expecting them to WANT to see the whole picture and gather that information before jumping to conclusions about it. One of the 'worst' arguments usually involve them saying "well, in this kind of situation MOST people do X" and I'll be trying to inform that "this kind of situation" isn't the kind they are perceiving it to be, nor is the ACTUAL person involved doing X and has never shown signs of ever doing X, etc.


Social
Since I can remember, I've been able to intuitively recognize how people organize their thoughts. Whenever I meet someone new I try to unlock the vault of their thoughts, understand their mental structure, mental abilities and mental defenses.

I don't do this to harm them. Far from it. I'm just curious about their internal mechanism and how they operate. I'm completely galvanized and drawn to people that are complex. They represent a difficult challenge to solve. I'm attracted to fucked up people that have severe emotional problems (which is how SEI duality works ). One sad outcome is that, as soon as I understand someone, or if I've solved someone like them, I lose interest in them as a person.

I compare Ne to being able to see the hardware connections inside someone's brain. I can't always tell the content of what someone is thinking (that's software, which is Fe "internal processes"), but I'm attuned to how they think about X. And this allows me to evaluate someone's potential for grasping a problem.

I piece together someone's "potential" by the concepts they emphasize and the conceptual trade offs they make when explaining something, as well as the level of sophistication with which they frame their ideas. These ripple to the rest of their world view.

All this happens within seconds.

If I'm teaching, I can steer someone to the right solution by custom-fitting the lesson to how he processes information. If I'm being an obnoxious asshole, I'll make sure that he understands just enough to keep him interested, but not enough to ever understand what I'm saying.

I'm attracted to people that have potential talents I can help develop, but who are humble and don't believe in their own potential. I try to be friendly and not an asshole to them, but in my experience weak Fi still makes me seem like an asshole.
A lot of this was pretty darn close to hitting home for me. With slight possible differences. I'm not so much interested in how people organize their thoughts, mental structures, mental abilities, nor mental defenses. And yet, one I can't seem to find the word that describes what it is I'm looking at/for, and some may even say that using the term "mental" and "thoughts" fits it as well. For me it's their experiences, their values, their priorities, their interests, their sense of self, their beliefs, their views, etc. It's basically how they are oriented within a situation/relationship/problem. If I want to fully understand them, and their situation/etc, then I need to be able to step into their shoes. But to do so, I need to be able to see things through their eyes, with their experiences, their interests, their values, etc. Once I get all that info, then I can step out of my own shoes and into theirs and look at the world or the situation/etc through THEIR eyes, heart/mind, and soul.

Unfortunately, I won't ALWAYS do this. Particularly if a person seems more interested in attempting to gain sympathy, refuse to acknowledge their own responsibilities for a situation, or are in it just to complain without trying to find a solution or understanding of the issues involved. At this point, they aren't receptive to input and so I'm placed in a position as being nothing more than a recorder to play back key phrases once in a while. I don't like being in this position, and will either attempt to retake my preferred role, or end the conver if my preferred role isn't wanted by them.

And as you had mentioned, once I've gathered the information that I can from them (their experiences, problems, solution attempts, etc), once there is no more info to be gathered from them, then I lose interest, get bored, or find something/someone else to explore/gather info from. (I get distracted basically, lol)

Someone's potential is generally based off their experiences, values, interests, etc. A lot of people do things because it's expected of them, they feel that they are supposed to do something, or have to do something. I like to show them that a) they don't have to do those things, and/or b) they have other alternatives open to them that would be better fits for them. By gathering all the info from other people and readings, then I'm aware of more options that a person may have and some of the problems that they might run into, and some of the solutions others have used to get around those problems.

Unfortunately, I can also overwhelm others (and myself) with all the options available. Sorting through which options would be the best ones, or which path to take is more difficult for me.

[xerx]

then I need to be able to step into their shoes.

Exactly! I do this automatically. Like for instance, where someone is coming from ideologically.