Caste Types

[tcaudilllg]

In the thread "Political type theory and Immanence", I briefly touched upon several traits which shape how we respond to criticism. I want to flesh that out as a distinct dimension of personality, which I call "caste".

Simply speaking, your caste is your measure of social potential. Social potential is determined by your motivation to satisfy the desires of many people. As such, people who are more concerned with satisfying desires that are not common to a lot of people do not meet with a lot of success.

Caste is measured in 4 dimensions.

• the relevance dimension measures attentiveness to direct vs indirect concerns, is defined in terms public (for indirect) vs private (direct).
• the engagement dimension measures attentiveness to persons who are opposite oneself with respect to the relevance dimension, and is defined engaged vs disengaged.
• the expansion dichotomy measures attitudes towards expansion (at the information level), and is defined bold vs cautious.
• the resistance dichotomy measures attitudes towards persons who are opposite oneself with respect to the expansion dichotomy, and is defined conditional vs unconditional.

(note: immanence also used an "engagement" dimension. Do not confuse the two.)

The relevance dimension is most important. The other three dimensions define suitability for specific roles in the context of both the relevance dimension and sociotype.

The relevance function divides information between that which is directly relevant to oneself, and that which is indirectly relevant. Directly relevant information includes such matters as, what you plan to eat; where you work; what your job is; your hometown; your hobbies and interests; and, your family. Information that is indirectly relevant includes politics, science, world events, and usually the news. We think of directly relevant information as private to ourselves, and not anyone else's business. Indirectly relevant information is general public knowledge which, unless the law says otherwise, is free to disseminate.

The relevance dimension must be considered in the context of the engagement dimension. Disengaged people are generally disinterested in people who are opposite them on relevance, seeing little use for the information those people produce. Engaged people take great interest in both public and private information, finding it immediately important and useful. Disengagement is the dominant trait; engagement has the function of making disengaged people with different relevance orientations see the need for each other.

Engagement appears to be helpful to becoming a celebrity. The private engaged may have remarkable singing ability, and may win American Idol if given the opportunity. (disengaged competition helps, too). The public engaged have a desire for public attention which motivates them to educate the public about matters of importance.

Engaged people specialize in relating the public and private worlds. They tend not to concentrate on developing either public or private information. They like attention: they want both to be recognized and to receive recognition. The public engaged acts as the "wards" of pop culture. They are open to many points of view (with political type and their own attitudes towards disagreement being mitigating factors), eagerly accepting others' information and distilling it for its practical relevance. Questions they may ask: can people use it? Will it make their lives better? Does it have "scale"? And most of all, why should people care? Once they have settled on a set of particularly practical ideas/developments, they will dictate them in a medium for teaching to others. (if they desire to be influential; otherwise they will probably just borrow somebody else's book). They are excellent teachers, having a real and sincere interest in every one of their students. They are motivated not only to replicate knowledge in another's mind, but to make sure that their student "gets it", to guide the incoming information into place perfectly in sync with the internal environment. It is not for their own knowledge that they labor to learn, but that others may learn through them.

If the public engaged person is the fount, then the private engaged are the medium. The private engaged person is always trying to make sure that the people in their lives know about the latest developments -- they are "inquiring minds". They are well informed, either from books or word of mouth. And they will be word of mouth, making sure that everyone else has the latest news, is using the latest gadgets, and is generally keeping pace with the Joneses.

And of course, they support which they deem the most interesting and neediest. They are the fan boys, the otaku, the front-row tickets buyers to the opening movies and concerts. Hardcore fandom, these people. Although there are not enough of them to assure success for their idols themselves, they are, despite their small numbers, the spark and enthusiasm for countless private/disengaged types to get in on the action... if the work is "good".