Those four preferences interact to form a fuller picture of the personality type
I don't know what this means, and to be frank, it sounds like a lot of gobbledy-gook. The whole point of categorizing is that the categories should convey some information about the thing categorized. The point I'm making here is that these personality categories don't even come close to this. The problem is that personality is an extremely complicated concept, and one that is prone to constant change. I seriously doubt that you could say something meaningful about a subject's personality with 10 axes, let alone four.
To illustrate this, ask yourself two basic questions of these test results:
1) Are the conditions and results repeatable?
2) Can you use them to make any meaningful prediction of behavior?
My contention is that the answer to each is a resounding "No", and hence the results are essentially useless.
The Wikipedia link I provided describes preference interaction in depth.
It seems you're saying that a categorization system that doesn't describe its subjects in complete, full, everlasting detail is worthless. I'd have to disagree.
Look at the poll right now, or its predecessor. INTP has a higher tally than all the other types, which is particularly interesting considering its relative rarity in the general population. You could therefore conclude that an INTP is more likely to vote in a poll on HN than, say, an ISFJ. That's information. Useless information perhaps, but information nonetheless. If MBTI didn't actually indicate anything, then the tallies would more closely fit the type distribution in the general population.
Your concerns about the test's reliability are valid, but any attempt to categorize something that we don't completely understand is going to have its inconsistencies. It's a far leap from there to useless.
It seems you're saying that a categorization system that doesn't describe its subjects in complete, full, everlasting detail is worthless.
No, what I'm saying is that a categorization system that doesn't say much of anything about its subjects is useless.
INTP has a higher tally than all the other types, which is particularly interesting considering its relative rarity in the general population. You could therefore conclude that an INTP is more likely to vote in a poll on HN than, say, an ISFJ. That's information.
You're using INTP in conjunction with a hacker news poll to draw a conclusion here; not INTP itself. The reason for this is that it's not possible to draw any meaningful conclusion from the INTP result itself. And even this conclusion is very vague: what does it tell you exactly that the incidence of scoring INTP is higher on HN than the general population? What prediction can you make from this fact?
Except that the theory suggests that a high prevalence of INTP / INTJ types on a forum dedicated to intellectual curiosity and rational discourse is exactly what you'd expect.
Couple that with the mentioned fact that the entire four set of rational types is less than ten percent of the general population and I can't see how you couldn't find that just a little indicative that perhaps they're onto something.
What it tells me is that most HN readers are introverts who like solving abstract problems, but that's news to no one.
A categorization system that could make accurate predictions about how a person may act or be or feel would be far more complete than MBTI. I think we agree on that. But I don't think that's what MBTI claims to be. What I've gotten from it is an improved vocabulary for describing my personality in general. My type didn't tell me much I didn't already know. What it did tell me was that my lack of meatspace organizational skills and my well-structured code (or meticulously organized music library) may share a source in my preference for introverted, abstract thinking. Which is to say, it highlighted an aspect of myself of which I was dimly aware and caused me to relate it to the way I behave.
Ultimately MBTI is a personal tool for limited reflection. Any larger conclusions about a population should be avoided or qualified with "generally speaking."
FWIW, when I take the tests I come out INTJ every single time and I usually "act like an INTJ" most of the time, which is to say, if the only thing you knew about me was I'm INTJ, you could meaningfully predict my sort of behavior a good percentage of the time ;P
Comments
Those four preferences interact to form a fuller picture of the personality type
I don't know what this means, and to be frank, it sounds like a lot of gobbledy-gook. The whole point of categorizing is that the categories should convey some information about the thing categorized. The point I'm making here is that these personality categories don't even come close to this. The problem is that personality is an extremely complicated concept, and one that is prone to constant change. I seriously doubt that you could say something meaningful about a subject's personality with 10 axes, let alone four.
To illustrate this, ask yourself two basic questions of these test results:
My contention is that the answer to each is a resounding "No", and hence the results are essentially useless.The Wikipedia link I provided describes preference interaction in depth.
It seems you're saying that a categorization system that doesn't describe its subjects in complete, full, everlasting detail is worthless. I'd have to disagree.
Look at the poll right now, or its predecessor. INTP has a higher tally than all the other types, which is particularly interesting considering its relative rarity in the general population. You could therefore conclude that an INTP is more likely to vote in a poll on HN than, say, an ISFJ. That's information. Useless information perhaps, but information nonetheless. If MBTI didn't actually indicate anything, then the tallies would more closely fit the type distribution in the general population.
Your concerns about the test's reliability are valid, but any attempt to categorize something that we don't completely understand is going to have its inconsistencies. It's a far leap from there to useless.
It seems you're saying that a categorization system that doesn't describe its subjects in complete, full, everlasting detail is worthless.
No, what I'm saying is that a categorization system that doesn't say much of anything about its subjects is useless.
INTP has a higher tally than all the other types, which is particularly interesting considering its relative rarity in the general population. You could therefore conclude that an INTP is more likely to vote in a poll on HN than, say, an ISFJ. That's information.
You're using INTP in conjunction with a hacker news poll to draw a conclusion here; not INTP itself. The reason for this is that it's not possible to draw any meaningful conclusion from the INTP result itself. And even this conclusion is very vague: what does it tell you exactly that the incidence of scoring INTP is higher on HN than the general population? What prediction can you make from this fact?
Except that the theory suggests that a high prevalence of INTP / INTJ types on a forum dedicated to intellectual curiosity and rational discourse is exactly what you'd expect.
Couple that with the mentioned fact that the entire four set of rational types is less than ten percent of the general population and I can't see how you couldn't find that just a little indicative that perhaps they're onto something.
What it tells me is that most HN readers are introverts who like solving abstract problems, but that's news to no one.
A categorization system that could make accurate predictions about how a person may act or be or feel would be far more complete than MBTI. I think we agree on that. But I don't think that's what MBTI claims to be. What I've gotten from it is an improved vocabulary for describing my personality in general. My type didn't tell me much I didn't already know. What it did tell me was that my lack of meatspace organizational skills and my well-structured code (or meticulously organized music library) may share a source in my preference for introverted, abstract thinking. Which is to say, it highlighted an aspect of myself of which I was dimly aware and caused me to relate it to the way I behave.
Ultimately MBTI is a personal tool for limited reflection. Any larger conclusions about a population should be avoided or qualified with "generally speaking."
FWIW, when I take the tests I come out INTJ every single time and I usually "act like an INTJ" most of the time, which is to say, if the only thing you knew about me was I'm INTJ, you could meaningfully predict my sort of behavior a good percentage of the time ;P