General Principles of the Dominant Functions

[717495]

transcripted from Page 25 of Understanding The People Around You - An Introduction to Socionics - by Ekaterina Filatova and Betty Lou Leaver

...this program outlines the general principles that guide the conscious of the individual belonging to a certain psychological type.

- Reality comes first. In order to survive, humans have to work efficiently, producing material profit. The only value of an idea is the possibility of its realization.

- Everything in the world must comply with a certain order and system. This is the core of life on which everything else relies; if it is taken out, everything else collapses. It is crucial to understand this system, to develop and improve it, and to find everyone's place in it.

- All actions are influenced by emotions such as happiness, anger, grief, depression, etc. Emotions dictate everything a person does. Due to this, controlling one's own emotions and those of the others is very important.

- A normal life requires harmony in human relations. The most important thing is to determine the ideals of human life and human relationships. The norms of ethics and morals are crucial here. Actual relations with people must agree with these ideals.

- Life is a constant battle, full of vigorous action. It is vital to train your will and tone your body in order to be ready for immediate response and prevail in a crucial situation.

- The main condition for psychological equilibrium is balance, contentedness, and harmony in everything that constitutes a person's surroundings. For a normal life it is extremely important to have equally good physical health and perception of beauty, comfort, and content.

- The most interesting thing in life is to find something new, and exciting, discover a fresh, appealing opportunity, meet an interesting new person, or conceive an unusual project. The world is full of mysteries and secrets that have yet to be uncovered.

- The main value of the world is the infinite and abundant reign of personal imagination. This imagination will never grow boring because with its help new ideas, suggestions, and images appear so magically and easily. Imagination makes it possible to delve into the darkness of the past and the mist of the distant future, to grasp the world in its entirety, to capture the dynamics and tendencies of main events, and to predict the final result.


My note: following this page is an interesting scenario where one of each of these types is riding in a bus which hits a deer, crashes and breaks down. To be continued...

[Gilly]

I like this.

[tcaudilllg]

I don't. Makes no distinction between quadra forms. The eight elements are only a mechanistic feature... qualitatively they are a relic.

Socionists still have pitifully poor understanding of sensing types.

[Beautiful sky]

Take out "must" from Fi description; I agree with squark

[717495]

I guess that kind of depends, if you're the sensory or intuitive subtype than you might not agree with the "must" designation, as dominant subtypes take these functions with a crucial decisiveness, creative subtypes may instead prefer the word "does" or "should" with an added explanation: most of the time I am surely able, within my creative sphere. Creative subtypes need a more of a conditional balance between their ego functions and can't channel all their emphasis into the dominant.

[Beautiful sky]

I guess that kind of depends, if you're the sensory or intuitive subtype than you might not agree with the "must" designation, as dominant subtypes take these functions with a crucial decisiveness, where as the creative subtypes may prefer the word "does" or "should" with an added explanation: most of the time I am surely able, within my creative sphere. Creative subtypes need a more of a conditional balance between their ego functions and can't channel all their emphasis into the dominant.

Fi subtype. If, there is such a thing as "subtype"

[Mattie]

My note: following this page is an interesting scenario where one of each of these types is riding in a bus which hits a deer, crashes and breaks down. To be continued...

The example on this page is out-right laughable- I honestly LOLed when I read it. It is probably the main reason I disliked the book as a whole, because it was the only time where you say Filatova implement Socionics... and it was just ridiculous. These descriptions doesn't really describe anything, it's so introductory that they are only good for establishing an initial context, and then the person would move on from these once they have a stronger grasp on how Socionics applies to reality. The -, -, - and -leads were especially lawl-worthy.

[717495]

I thought the scenario was interesting and outlined the types in their essential maximal distinctions pretty well. Btw, these are all descriptions, hypotheticals, so technically Filatova didn't implement them, except where you can pick up on it yourself, which is pretty easy. There are other short-diologues scattered throughout the book from others.

These descriptions doesn't really describe anything,

That's rather false.

and then the person would move on from these once they have a stronger grasp on how Socionics applies to reality.

Though yes, the book isn't supposed to teach you about life--it covers a good portion of the basics so you can identify types once reading it, gain some insight about how the types operate, and base new conclusions from it. It's much better than that Spencer Stern one, especially in the sense that its actually official, or correct, and more descriptive. I felt a lot more confident grasping Socionics once finished reading it, compared to when I finished the other book. Although of course there are plenty of other online sources.

[Suz]

Yeah i dont like those descriptions either actually.

[ilikesex]

It's much better than that Spencer Stern one, especially in the sense that its actually official, or correct, and more descriptive.

how is it more official? there is no such thing as official socionics, you take whatever you accept that you can apply to your environment and forget the rest. it only shows what a smart observer knows which is that you have no way of evaluating what you read and your criticisms are random.

[Mattie]

All of those examples feel so stereotyped to the point of unrealism. I could imagine valuers identifying 100% with the description; valuing is more than just "people" or "morals", valuing is more than just "efficiency", blah blah blah etc. It feels like nobody can write a book about socionics with describing the IEs in a manner like this, and it annoys the shit out of me ughhhhh

This is basically how I feel. The counter-argument is always "Well, people just just intuitively understand that these are stereotypes and not apply them so literally," but when every source DOES do this and we see forum members (even the people who feel like they 'know better') apply Socionics in this manner, there obviously isn't a clear mention of this mentality and practice. Which is why I said in my initial critique, if this was the only book a person picked up in America (since there are no other advanced books available in official English translation; and on that note, there were a sizable amount of translation mistakes throughout the book, so I'm not even sure how much credibility to give it) they would be applying Socionics incorrectly or just disregard Socionics because of how unrealistic it is (as portrayed in this book).

how is it more official? there is no such thing as official socionics, you take whatever you accept that you can apply to your environment and forget the rest. it only shows what a smart observer knows which is that you have no way of evaluating what you read and your criticisms are random.

I completely agree, and this makes it difficult for me to discuss Socionics here. Does the point become "Do you have a strong reasoning for why you approach Socionics the way you do?" (which is what I'm starting to think) or "Everyone has an individualized manner of doing Socionics and there is no point of reaching a consensus until testing is done"?

[ilikesex]

I completely agree, and this makes it difficult for me to discuss Socionics here. Does the point become "Do you have a strong reasoning for why you approach Socionics the way you do?" (which is what I'm starting to think) or "Everyone has an individualized manner of doing Socionics and there is no point of reaching a consensus until testing is done"?

what i said was specifically for melody man.

[xerx]

I thought Filatova's book was fine. It used simplistic scenarios and was a bit redundant, but in no way is she flat out wrong about anything, except possibly a few typings. I agree with poli's assessment that she was trying to describe the maximum concentration of each type's leading function on paper, and thought it could have used more theoretical descriptions (e.g. external object statics, etc.) over practical ones.

Nevertheless, the onus should be entirely on the reader, not Filatova, to figure out exactly how and in what sense the stereotypes she was describing could occur in more realistic situations.

- The most interesting thing in life is to find something new, and exciting, discover a fresh, appealing opportunity, meet an interesting new person, or conceive an unusual project. The world is full of mysteries and secrets that have yet to be uncovered.

[MatthewZ]

If this is true, I'm IEE.

[Brilliand]

These recent element descriptions keep giving me excuses to call myself ILE.

[717495]

Maybe. However I think the main point is that these descriptions are for the dominant function placement, not the creative or other placements. So that means, you can relate to the other ones, but the one you relate to the most is your dominant, and you don't necessarily relate to your other valued functions, as shown here, until you read the lengthier descriptions of them. The book provides other basic descriptions of the "functions," being IMs. It also follows closely the dichotomies and clubs, and provides a dichotimal test that is quite insightful to helping grasp your type, imo gives me new insight into the dichotomies, however not always 100% reliable.

[Brilliand]

- Everything in the world must comply with a certain order and system. This is the core of life on which everything else relies; if it is taken out, everything else collapses. It is crucial to understand this system, to develop and improve it, and to find everyone's place in it.

Maybe it's just putting too much emphasis on what should be done with it.

[717495]

is essentially logical and analytical; dominants I know seem really into figuring out the math and logic of phenomenon or theory, into problem solving, whatever interest comes up, and a number of them are really curious to know of and have some design for life or events. I don't think it means that dominants have everything figured out, and they know what the system for all the underlying processes are, but they're the types most willing and capable to figure it out, and probably gain a lot of structural insight as they mature. They also tend to believe in that kind of thing, I know lots of people who don't even really care or think that structuredly and analytically, where as the dominants I know seem plenty interested in the logic of underlying processes and often have a lot of self-assuredness about it.

[Brilliand]

is essentially logical and analytical; dominants I know seem really into figuring out the math and logic of phenomenon or theory, into problem solving, whatever interest comes up, and a number of them are really curious to know of and have some design for life or events. I don't think it means that dominants have everything figured out, and they know what the system for all the underlying processes are, but they're the types most willing and capable to figure it out, and probably gain a lot of structural insight as they mature. They also tend to believe in that kind of thing, I know lots of people who don't even really care or think that structuredly and analytically, where as the dominants I know seem plenty interested in the logic of underlying processes and often have a lot of self-assuredness about it.

It's more the "must uphold the structure and put everyone where they belong" vibe that turned me off. I view the structure more as something inescapable to be understood.

[717495]

I think it implies "uphold" or "seek out," either being one's personal choice and depending on one's certainties, though certainly "inescapable."

[Galen]

All of those examples feel so stereotyped to the point of unrealism. I could imagine valuers identifying 100% with the description; valuing is more than just "people" or "morals", valuing is more than just "efficiency", blah blah blah etc. It feels like nobody can write a book about socionics with describing the IEs in a manner like this, and it annoys the shit out of me ughhhhh