Brilliant example of Fi v Ti

[discojoe]

READ FIRST:

This is a clip from the recently filmed Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie (SPOILERS btw).

Near the end of the film Christie's famous detective, Hercule Poirot (pwar-OH), discovers that the murder was committed by all twelve suspects, who collectively sought revenge against the victim, a child murderer whose actions resulted in the deaths of five innocent people. He was arrested and tried, but because of some legal loophole he walks.

So now there are twelve people all closely related to the victims in one way or another. They are bitter that the law did not mete out justice, so they resolve to take the law into their own hands and carry out a vigilante execution while on board the Orient Express.

Poirot represents Ti. I believe him to be LSI-Ti 1w9 sp/so. He strongly believes in the rule of law and is outraged at the twelve passengers taking it into their own hands. His position is that if we ignore the law then civilization will break down into anarchy. The passengers represent Fi, and see Poirot's viewpoint as inhumane and unjust, as it resulted in the freeing of a psychopathic murderer.

Here's the showdown. And by the way, he very reluctantly capitulates and lets them go free at the end. The last shot is him walking away from the suspects while tearing up, devastated at violating his principles. He takes a role/polr hit but I think he did the right thing, seeing that though his moral convictions are sound, there are indeed gray areas in life.

[jughead]

Ewww, seriously too much IJ of any type for me. Law failed, its not perfect DURRRRRRRR.

[rat1]

That is Ti vs Fi but the law is more of a personal law than a countries laws per se.

[jughead]

A personal law not to kill people? Dispensing justice? I would extrapolate in this instance that the guy was an inspector because he fit in that niche and was so worked up because the law reflected his own personal principles. My point is your seeing the IJ inability to adapt to actual circumstances. He only ALLOWS others to adapt, he does nothing himself. What would he do if this man killed his son and got away? I don't neccesarily see the 12 as Fi. The law failed all of them so they created their own justice. Seems more creative Ti off the cuff. Whats Agatha Christies type btw? Ti-LSI or Ti ILE?

[Lobo]

The thing with Ijs is that while they can favor Fi more than Ti, or vice-versa, it's hard to just separate the two altogether most of the time, imo... Both are logical functions, dealing with different inputs. If Poirot was demonstrating "pure" Ti, then I doubt he would have been so outraged about what they did. The emotional attachment to the law, his beliefs being in question, comes off as Fi to me. On the other hand, the people involved in the murder arrived to what they saw as a reasonable decision based on their feelings on the matter.

If you think about it, Poirot's argument against what they did was only based on the fact that he saw it as unethical and that he believed that it would cause anarchy, etc. He doesn't provide a reason other than that. I'd actually put him to represent Fi favoring Ti Info-element of order/system, and the people who murdered the guy as representing Ti favoring Fi IE, justice/wronging. They raised logical points based on how they felt, which aren't solely Fi. There's a difference between "yeah let's kill the sonovabitch cause what he did was wrong" (Fi reasoning) and them arguing that the system isn't working, etc etc, and that it seemed like the only option available to them for justice.

[munenori2]

Eh, I don't view this as being a pure dichotomization between the two. He's definitely IJ as hell though. ReGuLaRiTy SaVeS uS fRoM cHaOs!!!!

ISxj. Ti > Fi I can buy. I don't see much inconsistency in feeling that laws should generally be upheld because they allow predictability in punishment to disincentivize crime and then just taking the law into your hands when the particulars of a legal system allow someone that (I would assume since it was a technicality) was shown to be guilty but nonetheless is legally set free. It's a gray area, and you could argue the implications of these kind of actions if everyone performed them in some deontological or utilitarian sense, but if you take for granted that guilt is demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt I could easily see a Ti type executing someone that killed their kid and feeling justified in doing so. Like someone else pointed out, Ti isn't necessarily about preserving standing laws so much as it is about subjective logic that maintains a very consistent character. It aims for exceptionlessness. There may be overlap and there may not.

Sidenote, I will say that the person that's the most law abiding stick in the mud I know is my IxFj sister.

[discojoe]

Guh, too tired to respond now, but tomorrow I will lay out how you guys are over-analyzing 2 + 2 to the point that it = clam chowder.

[silke]

Fi as leading function supervising other elements including Te can lead one to follow "higher law", what one feels is morally right, and take justice into own hands whereas the guy represents Te attitude ruling over Fi, makes sense

[munenori2]

Guh, too tired to respond now, but tomorrow I will lay out how you guys are over-analyzing 2 + 2 to the point that it = clam chowder.

I'm tired and drunk and your mom is clam chowder.

[Creepy-male]

The guy you pegged as Ti I could empathize with more, it mainly wasn't the fact he needed rigidity but the self-assured nature of the other people being like "we are right, you must accept our moral arguments".

That just kind of annoyed me, I could understand their argument though, people to a certain extent feel it necessary to stop people from murdering children even if it requires going outside the law.

The problem is I question people's motives, I mean are people doing that out of a sense of indignation and anger or are they doing it out of self-preservation of the community? What's the difference between feelings of indignation and anger and self-preservation instinct, perhaps its biological evolution to disguise self-preservation instinct as moral indignation. In that case a person self-aware of this conclusion would say nothing is wrong with what the guy did (murdering children), it was only the fact he got caught and it triggered the self-preservation instinct in the community. That's it, it was just nature. The guy murdered some people and this created feelings of righteous indignation towards the system which lead people into an emotional decision to take action by killing the guy for their self-preservation. In that case its really not "justice" no more than a wolf killing prey to survive is "justice", just merely self-preservation in nature.

The key distinguishing concept of justice is the fact people tend to perceive it as being something more than simply self-preservation. It is a means of establishing harmony with one's environment. Harmony is different from the concept of self-preservation, so where do these two concepts overlap and where do they diverge?

I think that's largely the issue. To me the people seem very unalarmed and self-assured by such an act in such a gray area, that it makes me loathe them and empathize with the supposed Ti guy. I think that was the point of the drama tbh, since it shows him as the investigator and him walking away crying, I think its the writers intent to make you feel for that guy and produce a sense of drama and there being some message or moral to it.

At any rate, I think the Ti guy is supposed to represent an justapoxed view, being a hardliner that worships the system and the ideal of justice. His challenge is ultimately being able to emotionally handle the fact that justice is not black and white in practice. The people though are less idealistic and more organic, preferring to act on their human urges and impulses, or earthy urges and impulses, they feel threatened and abused by the guy's crimes and feel a sense of indignation for the system so they take matters into their own hands, with little regrets or second thoughts concerning the moral justifications of their actions. The two opposing extremes drives the tension to its pinnacle, producing a successful drama. Although honestly I personally empathize with the Ti guy more.

I personally loathe the mob mentality of certain people to polarize around a common agenda. I guess what upsets me is while it seems like a perfectly sensible viewpoint for a realist living in the present, it doesn't seem like a suitable viewpoint for a visionary looking to the future.

[Brilliand]

Here's the showdown. And by the way, he very reluctantly capitulates and lets them go free at the end. The last shot is him walking away from the suspects while tearing up, devastated at violating his principles. He takes a role/polr hit but I think he did the right thing, seeing that though his moral convictions are sound, there are indeed gray areas in life.

IMO letting them go free was the job of the jury, not of the detective. They should have been taken to court (as the law required) and acquitted by the jury for moral reasons - that's pretty much the point of letting common citizens make important decisions like innocence/guilt. (Or, alternatively, the jury - who being a sizable group of people, would be less vulnerable to group influence - might have decided that their moral justification was not good enough.)

BTW, I didn't actually watch the clip - I'm just responding to the summary in the OP.

[The Ineffable]

Whats Agatha Christies type btw? Ti-LSI or Ti ILE?

Agatha Christie and her character Hercule Poirot are listed as representatives of SLI (Gabin) by Reinin, in his book.

[Ezra]

READ FIRST:

This is a clip from the recently filmed Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie (SPOILERS btw).

Near the end of the film Christie's famous detective, Hercule Poirot (pwar-OH), discovers that the murder was committed by all twelve suspects, who collectively sought revenge against the victim, a child murderer whose actions resulted in the deaths of five innocent people. He was arrested and tried, but because of some legal loophole he walks.

So now there are twelve people all closely related to the victims in one way or another. They are bitter that the law did not mete out justice, so they resolve to take the law into their own hands and carry out a vigilante execution while on board the Orient Express.

Poirot represents Ti. I believe him to be LSI-Ti 1w9 sp/so. He strongly believes in the rule of law and is outraged at the twelve passengers taking it into their own hands. His position is that if we ignore the law then civilization will break down into anarchy. The passengers represent Fi, and see Poirot's viewpoint as inhumane and unjust, as it resulted in the freeing of a psychopathic murderer.

Here's the showdown. And by the way, he very reluctantly capitulates and lets them go free at the end. The last shot is him walking away from the suspects while tearing up, devastated at violating his principles. He takes a role/polr hit but I think he did the right thing, seeing that though his moral convictions are sound, there are indeed gray areas in life.

YouTube - My Movie

Really good post, and very good point. Poirot is the quintessential LSI.

As a side point, fuck Fi. It's the reason that society would break down, and the reason there is so much corruption in Italian and Brazillian politics - to name the worst culprits - and to a lesser extent US and UK politics. These countries, in my eyes, are a breeding ground for personal ties and old boy/elite networks, massively hindering any notion of social mobility or meritocracy. It's not that pure capitalism itself is Fi, it's that in its real world form, "it's not what you know but who you know" is an inevitable result of the system + human nature colliding. (As much as I love Ayn Rand, her utopia could never work, quite simply because humans are generally lying, backstabbing cheaters who can't honour shit, and her heroes are all too rare in today's society.)

[Ezra]

Guh, too tired to respond now, but tomorrow I will lay out how you guys are over-analyzing 2 + 2 to the point that it = clam chowder.

+1

[discojoe]

It's simple.

Poirot's position is one in which moral gain is achieved through a rigid adherence to a system. He acknowledges that such a black and white world view will let evil seep through the cracks, but maintains that even more evil would get through if we were to apply case-by-case moral sentiment to the legal procedure (and he's right, just look at the supreme court). He agrees with the suspects regarding the evil of the victim and the injustice of his going free, but he sees an even greater evil being unleashed by setting a bad precedent in the justice system. I think the reason he finally gives in is because he knows that in this case he can make an exception without there being any serious consequences. No one will find out, so why not this once? It's a painful grey line for an LSI to cross, but... sometimes. Maybe.

At the end, he somehow knows that he did the right thing, but his ego can't reconcile it with his principles, which he also knows are right. It leaves him discombobulated, off-balance. It's painful, probably agonizing. It won't leave even leave a scar, since the wound can't heal to begin with.

[Ezra]

At the end, he somehow knows that he did the right thing, but his ego can't reconcile it with his principles, which he also knows are right. It leaves him discombobulated, off-balance. It's painful, probably agonizing. It won't leave even leave a scar, since the wound can't heal to begin with.

Ahh yeah I hate that.

[Slacker]

I have had similar discussions with LSIs, so I see your point.

Another thing that might be Fi/Ti is the golden rule. My ILE daughter was asking about it, and said it doesn't make sense to do to someone else what you would want to have done, that you should consider only that person's situation and try to figure out from that what someone else would want. I personally feel like that involves more guesswork than just figuring we all have enough in common to want at least roughly the same things, but that is how I think things through - by filtering things through my own feelings. Whereas she though it made more sense to consider the specifics and deduce from them what should be done, and that what she or I would want is not relevant.

[discojoe]

Agatha Christie and her character Hercule Poirot are listed as representatives of SLI (Gabin) by Reinin, in his book.

I also think Christie is SLI. Poirot, on the other hand, is fucking obviously LSI.

And when I think about it, if I were to write a series of books based around the adventures of a single character, I probably would make him SLI. A character like Indiana Jones is someone I'd very naturally conceive. I'm not trying to assert any kind of relevant relationship between quasi-identical relations here, nor am I using this as an argument for Poirot being LSI. But it is interesting to me, and it might perhaps have something to do with being able to let out the id without consequence through literary expression.

I don't know. It would make sense. Christie's books feature a large number of Beta characters who are usually portrayed negatively. Even Poirot is presented as highly eccentric, his LSI characteristics put on display as absurd fripperies that mainly serve make him seem flawed yet lovable. The stories feel very Delta too, with a sort of ambient focus on Fi.

Yeah, I could see myself using a sort of endearing SLI character who exists in a backdrop of ridiculous (from a Beta perspective) Deltas. That's interesting.