Hypothetical Scenarios and Type

[Begoner]

Are there any particular types which would be uncomfortable with hypothetical situations being used in conversation? In particular, I'm fond of using hypothetical situations to cut through extraneous details and get to the heart of an issue, or to try to illustrate certain concepts. As an example of the former, if we are discussing some economic system, I might say: "Suppose the system is free of corruption and political interference, and all participants strictly adhere to the law. Then...." This would reflect not reality, but an idealized version of the system which shows its intrinsic advantages or flaws, and would give us an understanding of its basic properties. As an example of the latter, there are cases in which an isolated aspect of reality can be modeled as a system wherein certain inputs yield certain outputs; a hypothetical situation might alter one of those inputs to see the effect on the outputs, and thereby allow us to gain a better appreciation of the system's functioning as a whole. One such hypothetical scenario would be: "Suppose men became pregnant instead of women; how would this affect gender roles?" This obviously ignores biological processes, but that doesn't matter, because we are only interested in social ones. However, someone I've typed as ILI is fond of saying "false implies anything" when I posit such situations (which is a misappropriation of a theorem in logic -- namely, the principle that from several contradictory axioms one can derive any statement whatsoever -- to a situation in which it does not apply; hypothetical scenarios may be counterfactual, but they are not logically inconsistent in their premises, given their scope). I thought that maybe - or -PoLR types would tend to be the ones who dismiss such hypothetical scenarios out-of-hand, but I'm evidently mistaken. So are there particular categories of hypothetical scenarios that do or don't appeal to certain types? Is an affinity for hypothetical scenarios in any way type-related?

[ashlesha]

the way you described your use of them sounded like Ti and Ne to me.

i have sort of a conception of different types being more or less tolerant of hypothetical scenarios (like, i imagine higher tolerance from alphas), but i dont have any reason for this except for the pictures i have in my head of the types which are just mine. i can see an Ne slant in them in that being unrealistic is overlooked for the sake of dealing with the issue as a concept. if that makes sense.

i sometimes am cool with them, moreso if i can see the purpose. sometimes theyre irritating too. i prefer posing them to answering them.

[Azeroffs]

Yeah it seems that the way you're using it may have an Ne+Ti bent.

If you were discussing this with me, I'd probably have a similar reaction to the ILI. They may not be logically inconsistent, but they are no longer relevant when you start pulling in assumptions which don't apply. I can see how this might be interesting for some to think about for the sake of the idea, but the way I see it you can make any idea work in you head, and for your specific example, any economic system can be ideal if the right parameters are set up for it. Personally, I don't think it's worth the energy to seriously consider, though I may humor you if we were just joking about it or mentioning it light-heartedly.

Hypotheticals can be quite useful, and I'm sure everyone uses them from time to time.

[The Ineffable]

I think hypothetical scenarios in the general sense are the mark of NTs, however, the case described in the OP is related mostly to Ti but also Ne, IMO. The fact is that Alpha and Beta types are inclined to try implementing utopias, like "why not if it makes sense?". IMO that particular case means Ti-Valuing. Ti-Base are the best types to draw a priori technically correct decisions, for instance when activating in law or architecture, they are basically virtual scenarios. I'm also thinking about authors like Jules Verne (probably LSI).

I think there are two conditions for the cases similar to the described:
- one that necessitates the acceptance of Extroverted Internal (Ne, Fe) information: empirical data that is not fully verified and therefore immediately usable.
- the other necessitates to draw sensible but conceptual conclusions, namely Introverted and External: Si, Ti.

The way I see this case is along the lines of being ready to argue about being right in the conclusion you drew using the scenario, and even taking action (but serious security measures too! - which means refrain from some actions) based on it, this is why Introversion paired with Externality are required. This is what IMO makes the Alphas the most cautious types, on one hand they see more into actual things than there apparently is (Ne, Fe), on the other their inferences are strict: their concepts don't allow any leap of faith cause they are based on actual deductive reasons.
---

Using Alpha NTs as a reference, because they use this kind of reasoning as their default:
- Beta STs don't consider objects that are not "real", it is not useful to start of something that does not exist, neither prospect something that will end-up in contradicting reality as it is empirically known already. In the conceptual realm they are very active, though (eg very capable in preventive measures, security and failproof actions).
- Delta NFs don't draw strict conclusions. Although they can see objects in the big picture and can see them differently with time. Ne's can see something in two opposing manners based on 1% of the details, though not at the same time, like Ni, because it's all out there, in their observations, this is why I said "with time" and "details". Nevertheless, their judgment is flexible and personal, there is nothing external constraining it - like contradictions - to a certain conclusion.

[Korpsy Knievel]

if we are discussing some economic system, I might say: "Suppose the system is free of corruption and political interference, and all participants strictly adhere to the law. Then...."

If you're presenting an idealized image to illustrate a principle then it might amuse me to play along, possibly by holding up real-world data to stress-test the model, but unless some practical insight or other useful result came of it I'd eventually tire of building castles in the air and turn my attention elsewhere.

One such hypothetical scenario would be: "Suppose men became pregnant instead of women; how would this affect gender roles?" This obviously ignores biological processes, but that doesn't matter, because we are only interested in social ones.

On a lark I recently made a similar argument to Bardia, who played the realist-traditionalist contra the iconoclasm of my devil's advocate. He did a fine job of holding his ground against my contention that the meaning and institution of motherhood will eventually be made obsolete by bio-med science that enables a form of male pregnancy. Once we circled that particular square enough times the entertainment value waned, and that was that. We now possess a better understanding of the other's argument style and views on various social and linguistic conventions, yet we are no closer to producing a change in society, motherhood, or medicine.

However, someone I've typed as ILI is fond of saying "false implies anything" when I posit such situations (which is a misappropriation of a theorem in logic -- namely, the principle that from several contradictory axioms one can derive any statement whatsoever -- to a situation in which it does not apply; hypothetical scenarios may be counterfactual, but they are not logically inconsistent in their premises, given their scope).

The issue I have with dwelling entirely within the whimsical realm of what-if is that one can introduce, define, and eliminate variables at will, resulting in peek-a-boo with idiosyncratic meanings and previously hidden factors. This can allow one to "win" a debate by remaining logically consistent while being substantially incorrect. In other words, you can draw whatever conclusions suit your fancy when you're just making things up. Though I don't mean to pick on tcaud, his recent "Two ILIs" has high potential for both this sort of jiggery-pokery and the production of nothing more useful than the routine heat and noise of inter-quadra NT clashes.

So from a Te standpoint, or at least mine, juggling hypotheticals is usually fine provided they've got some practical application, even if that's nothing more than a few minutes entertainment.

[Jonathan]

Are there any particular types which would be uncomfortable with hypothetical situations being used in conversation? ... However, someone I've typed as ILI is fond of saying "false implies anything"

It might be a mistake to assume that the people are reacting to the use of hypotheticals themselves. I'm often typed as ILI (although there are different schools on that), and I use hypotheticals all the time. In your case, you're using hypotheticals in a straightforward way to control for variables, so to speak. However, I suspect from your writing that your speaking style is complex. So if someone doesn't have the patience, he might say "false implies anything," not because he doesn't like hypotheticals, but because he's not willing to give what you have to say a fair hearing.

It sounds though that this ILI person you know is not ILI in the same system in which I'm ILI. That is to say, supposing that there is more than one Socionics, and in one of them, I'm ILI, then that isn't the Socionics in which this other person is ILI. I wonder if perhaps he's LIE, LSI, or something. Nevertheless, perhaps in another Socionics he is ILI.

In an odd way, I'm reminded of the great physicist Richard Feynman (often typed as LIE) who heckled the cognitive scientist Douglas R. Hoftstadter during a talk. Hofstadter (ILE?) was trying to show that people innately pick up the rules to solve analogies by context...e.g., 1234321 is to 4 as 123454321 is to __. Most people say "5," but Feynman reportedly insisted it was 4, because there was no rule by which one could prove that it's anything but 4.

That form of "being difficult" is something I've encountered in some LIEs, but some may appear to be introverts and hence could be mistyped as ILI? I'm just guessing...

[The Ineffable]

And Feynman was right, there is no rule. But that's not the case presented by Begoner, IMO, where in fact the scenario is imaginary but there are rules you can use.

For instance, in some movies there is the severed head of someone talking. I see the Alpha NT approach Begoner use is like ok, we assume the head can live without a body, but how can it talk? On the other hand, the Gamma NT one, as presented by Azeroffs is like why not, it's anyway imaginary already, why not talk too?

[krieger]

i could see the case for 454. Feynman is just being obnoxious and wrong.

[FDG]

i could see the case for 454. Feynman is just being obnoxious and wrong.

Yeah, although I would condone him if Hoftstader was just being a bit of a smartass douche.

[The Ineffable]

i could see the case for 454. Feynman is just being obnoxious and wrong.

Perhaps only in the context of an IQ test, in such circumstance Feynman would have probably answered 5 too.

The 454 association with 5 is not "correct" by any logical means (necessary), it is only intuitively the "right" answer, since the "obvious" rule which makes the isolated digit being the one in the middle of the array (or the square root of their sum) has the same weight with the one which makes the digit being the fourth digit in the array. A different case would be when you have this progression:

A: 12321 is to 3 like
B: 1234321 is to 4 and like
C: 123454321 is to X.

Obviously X is either the middle digit or the square root of the sum of the digits in the array (though true only unless some other possibility is discovered that satisfies A, B and C with a different value of X than 5, so neither this one can be considered absolutely correct).

[tcaudilllg]

Are there any particular types which would be uncomfortable with hypothetical situations being used in conversation? In particular, I'm fond of using hypothetical situations to cut through extraneous details and get to the heart of an issue, or to try to illustrate certain concepts. As an example of the former, if we are discussing some economic system, I might say: "Suppose the system is free of corruption and political interference, and all participants strictly adhere to the law. Then...." This would reflect not reality, but an idealized version of the system which shows its intrinsic advantages or flaws, and would give us an understanding of its basic properties. As an example of the latter, there are cases in which an isolated aspect of reality can be modeled as a system wherein certain inputs yield certain outputs; a hypothetical situation might alter one of those inputs to see the effect on the outputs, and thereby allow us to gain a better appreciation of the system's functioning as a whole. One such hypothetical scenario would be: "Suppose men became pregnant instead of women; how would this affect gender roles?" This obviously ignores biological processes, but that doesn't matter, because we are only interested in social ones. However, someone I've typed as ILI is fond of saying "false implies anything" when I posit such situations (which is a misappropriation of a theorem in logic -- namely, the principle that from several contradictory axioms one can derive any statement whatsoever -- to a situation in which it does not apply; hypothetical scenarios may be counterfactual, but they are not logically inconsistent in their premises, given their scope). I thought that maybe - or -PoLR types would tend to be the ones who dismiss such hypothetical scenarios out-of-hand, but I'm evidently mistaken. So are there particular categories of hypothetical scenarios that do or don't appeal to certain types? Is an affinity for hypothetical scenarios in any way type-related?

Seems like LSEs have little patience for hypotheticals.

[krieger]

i could see the case for 454. Feynman is just being obnoxious and wrong.

Perhaps only in the context of an IQ test, in such circumstance Feynman would have probably answered 5 too.

The 454 association with 5 is not "correct" by any logical means (necessary), it is only intuitively the "right" answer, since the "obvious" rule which makes the isolated digit being the one in the middle of the array (or the square root of their sum) has the same weight with the one which makes the digit being the fourth digit in the array. A different case would be when you have this progression:

A: 12321 is to 3 like
B: 1234321 is to 4 and like
C: 123454321 is to X.

Obviously X is either the middle digit or the square root of the sum of the digits in the array (though true only unless some other possibility is discovered that satisfies A, B and C with a different value of X than 5, so neither this one can be considered absolutely correct).

truth is by definition intuitive and logic is but the means by which we structure it's expression.

[Jonathan]

truth is by definition intuitive and logic is but the means by which we structure it's expression.

That's a pretty good quote. You're good coming up with those.

[The Ineffable]

truth is by definition intuitive and logic is but the means by which we structure it's expression.

Bullshit, truth by definition necessitates validity. Only the axioms are intuitive.