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To: VadeRetro
Truth is, I can hardly read this kind of BS, written as it is with very few concrete nouns. The eyes just glaze over.

Serously and uncontentiously, I'd be really interested in knowing if you've had any "personality" or "temperament" tests. I wouldn't be surprised at all if those who lean "objectivist" or "logical positivist" tend to be "left brained" and the Interneters of them, more ISTJ or INTJ in "MBTI/Meyers-Briggs" terms. The opposite for the opposite, of course. (I tend to be INFP, though I tend to splash around.)

But then again, this last paragraph might cause your eyes to glaze or at least roll, too! ;-`

45 posted on 05/23/2003 5:34:46 PM PDT by unspun ("Do everything in love.")
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To: unspun
MBTI/Meyers-Briggs" terms.

I'd be careful about internalizing that kind of label, if I were you. The results of those tests could tend to be self fulfilling prophecies.

By accepting a positive("I am stronger in language skills") we implicitly acknowledge the negative("I can't do math"), and give ourselves permission to allow those skills to atrophy. We all have the centers in our brain that correspond to any of those skills.

Likewise with "thinking" or "feeling" and "introverted" or "extroverted." Introverts care about what others think, extroverts are capable of introspection. They are false dichotomies.

56 posted on 05/23/2003 5:48:01 PM PDT by Yeti (There are two kinds of people: One is the kind who divides everyone into two groups ....)
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To: unspun
It shouldn't be just a personality thing. You read the article and it's got all this "intentional states" (is "internal" meant here?), "flowing t-states," "signs," "operating with signs," "imaging a word" (not to be confused with "using a word"), "conditions, state, relations, or properties of y ..."

All of these terms invite replacement by some big range of real-world examples. In one case--just the one, "intentional states"--the author actually gives some examples of what is meant: Henry VIII, the first auto one owned, the Pythagorean Theorem, or the Mississippi River. There are precious few other instances of the class "concrete noun" in the whole article.

I used to know a computer guy who was more of a configuration management specialist than a programmer. He liked to BS people with long speeches full of "methodology ... baseline ... configuration ..." It would sound like, "Once you establish a methodology to baseline working configurations, you never slip back. From there, it mushrooms as you go up a meta-level to configure new successful methodologies for baselining ... Blah! Blah! Blah!" The funny thing was, most of the customers would assume he was actually talking about their specific problems and knew the answer to same, when he was only hiding that he wasn't and didn't.

I used to get white-hot angry at him when he'd do that to obscure the problems. I was the system designer who absolutely needed clear understanding and agreement on what I was to design and build. Mr. BS was flat-out sabotaging me as well as wasting time and deceiving the customer.

Strunk and White, a good English style guide, says to prefer the concrete over the abstract where possible. They're right.

71 posted on 05/23/2003 6:07:02 PM PDT by VadeRetro
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To: unspun
I'm with VR on the need for concrete imagery. Abstractions are fine as long as they summarize concrete objects, events or relationships.

I took Meyers-Briggs twice. First one was INTP, the second was taken the week after 911 and I tested INFP. The F/T scales were mixed in both cases. The other three scales leaned completely in one direction.
108 posted on 05/23/2003 8:21:54 PM PDT by js1138
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