Quote Originally Posted by ephemereality
This is an example of DA:
Imagine the concept of Yin and Yang. On the one hand you have Yin, symbolically represented by water and also represents all that which is feminine; on the other hand you have Yang, symbolically represented by fire and also represents all that is masculine. Yin and Yang are opposing forces and can thus never be be one force, never be united as one. Yet they are inextricably linked to each other, depending on each other in order to exist. Without one there is no other, just like there is no darkness without light (forget the scientific explanation, it's the symbolism I'm getting at). So they are the one and the same, yet they are diametrically opposed of each other. The way DA understands this is that there is unity in difference, it has the same source, just like man and woman was created by God. Unity occurs through the act of common intent in creation, rather than the objects being the same in having the same qualities.
This sounds a great deal like the way I think and see the world, so you're actually making me think I'm DA even more. I'm an atheist and doubt anyone created this universe, so common intent in creation does not really apply, but everything else you said is resonating with me (a special kudos goes to you for symbolism > scientific explanations). How I would say it is that there is an implied unity in the manifest lack of unity that pervades any two things. This unity is a negative existence, like the full moon implied by the quarter moon or the filled-in disk implied by an empty circle. The fact that I recognize this unity as a nonexistence, a thing that is absent, and believe that this absence is inherent to reality by definition, is part of what distinguishes me from theists.

Quote Originally Posted by ephemereality
Is it? Or is it not? It sure comes across as an emotionally expressive statement. Whether it is pathetic or not is something you judged yourself.
It is because I say it is. : P And here is why: there's a difference between how I think and how I express myself. Internally I'm basically a postmodernist--it's all a matter of perspective, nothing is set in stone, and the only escape from that is that some things impress me (all that matters is the impression) as being objective facts (postmodernism, like most or all systems of thought, contains the seed of its own destruction)--but I like to express myself in a confident and decisive fashion, so I don't say "here is how it could be," "here is how I think it is," or "this is one way of looking at it." I say, "this is how it is." That feels good to me; it's fun and sounds confident.

Ti is basically one of my nemeses. I hate how restrictive logic is. I want to believe anything I like, and break as many rules as I can while I'm at it; I'm not going to let some system tell me what to think. And I think that logic is an illusion; things are basically unjustified, absurd, irrational. I embrace that; I don't run from it or punish myself by trying to live up to the standards of logic when rigorous logic isn't natural, reasonable, or even possible.

You wrote a lot of very thorough and interesting things outside of that quote. Let's see if I can address some of them in a fashion more direct than the one so far employed in this message.

- I understand that reality is basically dynamic--stasis is an abstract nonexistence. This is a consequence of, or to put it more correctly, entailed by what I said about reality in the first paragraph. Whether this translates to me being dynamic in socionics terms, I do not know.

- I'm very much a planner, so that aspect of Ni is a good description of me. I'm a J in the MBTI. And like you said of Ni doms, I want someone who will spur me to action, someone who will give me that extra little push. I get trapped in my ruminations and hopes and dreams and don't act even when I realize it's imperative for me to act.

- There's a little bit of irony in how you're saying that you don't identify with my way of seeing the world, and yet I largely identify with the Yin and Yang example you gave.

- Stagnation is a part of the flow, but it still exists and sucks. The word is certainly not meaningless, at least not especially more so than any other word (all words are a little bit meaningless, a view which surely exemplifies a partial absence of Ti).

- No one has really asked me to describe my thought processes, and so I really haven't done so. I'm not sure, therefore, what you're referring to when you say I'm not describing Pi in the ego.

- I don't really observe the world at all. I'm basically cut off from reality. So if observing the world is a part of Ni, I must not be Ni unless "world" means something like . . . your thoughts and feelings. I mean, I watch movies sometimes, and occasionally I come across something that catches my eye, but the main thing I observe is just the things going through my head; I have a bunch of little imitations of worldly things in there.

- There's a lot of Ti in me right now, but for the larger portion of my life, there was very little that was Ti about me. Ti is something I started doing in my teen years, and which I've probably gotten rather good at (it stems from a streak of perfectionism; Ti is a way of ensuring that I'm not making mistakes in my self-expression, and it allows me to perfect the structures of various artistic projects that I do. It's also a general way of checking for errors in different claims and, by extension, determining what statements can't be true because they simply don't express anything coherent). The earliest function I remember using would be Ni, I think. I was very mystical, spiritual, and intuitive, from an early age. That isn't to say that I think I'm Ni, though; I leave that as a hanging question. I could be wrong about the IM that was responsible for that.

- Throwing options on the table and determining how true they are is something that everyone who starts a thread like this is doing on some level, usually a very direct and obvious level. So I don't see that as having anything to do with Ne. And most of my commentary really has nothing specifically to do with the logical correctness of people's suggestions. I'm not saying that the descriptions or labels are logically self-contradictory (incidentally, I'm a fan of contradiction; I view the ability to be inconsistent as something that is healthy and desirable); I'm saying that I do or don't identify with them. That could just as easily be Fi as Ti, and it could also simply be common self-awareness. So for Ne, in particular, I'm going to need something more substantial.

- I'm still not seeing the Si valuing in me. Si is basically my least favorite function, and certainly not something that I want people to provide me with. And if I were Si-valuing, it would be Delta Si, not Alpha Si.

- By novelty I don't mean anything related to Ne. What I'm trying to get at is that I spend all of my time sitting around the house doing nothing. I like to be doing things, I like to be moving my life forward and having fun and all of that wonderful stuff, and that requires me to be somewhere other than my house: i.e. a novel environment. That's the limited sense in which I crave novelty. I don't by any means like novelty as a rule, and frequently find it silly or annoying when it isn't directly to my purpose. It would be clearer, perhaps, to say that I crave activity and currently lack activity.