Dimensionality and Axial Post-Dimensionality

This post does not have examples of cases, I continue writing about thorny theoretical things that are not instructive examples. It involves the topic of dimensionality, a framework for thinking about socionics types that I resoundingly reject. This topic is only very little better than sheer nonsense. If theoretical nonsense does not interest you, feel free to ignore this post. However, the idea of dimensionality has a foothold in western socionics content from other authors, so it might be of interest to navigate.

The presence cube model

Other authors, including Jack Aaron and Ibrahim Tencer define functions as expressing different strength and value parameters. Specifically, the ego and superid blocks are considered valued, while the ego and id blocks are considered strong. This distinction also exists in Augusta's work, although in Augusta's work it seems very little emphasized; it seems to me that the emphasis on the different flavors of functions is more modern. Generally, valued functions are seen as psychologically rewarding to attend but not necessarily skillful, and strong functions are considered skillful to attend, but not necessarily rewarding. (Throughout this post, I will refer to the idea of separation of strength and value as "the presence cube", although the presence cube is a model developed by Ibrahim Tencer linked above. Other authors like Jack Aaron do not use the same terminology, but his idea similarly involves separate strength and value and I will also refer to his modeling, and other authors' that I will not name here, as the presence cube). 

Dimensional Strength, or just dimensionality was an addendum theory developed by Vladimir Ermak and Aleksandr Bukalov in the 90s. It characterizes gradations of strength within the weak and strong blocks, and also suggests that the skilled use of functions varies in generalizability; high dimensional (high strength) functions have access to more domains of reflection than lower strength functions. Almost nobody in the western community pays attention to the specifics of these domains regarding whether people have access to experience, norms, situations, and time; instead they regard dimensionality as mere gradations of strength.

It is important to recognize that dimensionality is aquadral. The creative function and ignoring function have identical dimensional strength, despite the ignoring function being out of the quadra. In the presence cube, the value dimension is called "priority" and is a simplification, but a reasonable approximate measure of which quadra blocks are emphasized in the different types within a quadra. As such, the presence cube model is a combination of quadras and aquadral dimensionality. Western Socionics in general is the idea that socionics is a theory of quadra values. The presence cube model with both quadra values and dimensional strength is thus a kind of hybrid model, that socionics is a theory of quadras but not entirely so, although Tencer, Aaron and other authors tend to regard quadras as the more important variable than dimensionality, which makes their models recognizably Western. However, the model that follows, which views socionics as entirely a theory of quadras and entirely ignores dimensionality, is more Western.

Axial Post-dimensionality model

The presence cube making use of dimensionality alongside quadra values has been heretofore the more popularized flavor of Western socionics. I wish to point out some flaws of dimensionality and the presence cube and present a different and simpler model.

What is a strong function, anyway? Socionics is a model of information metabolism, which means that it is a model of how different people differently pay attention to different sorts of information. The idea of strength and value as separate, independent parameters of functions implies more, that not only is there a hierarchical rank of some domains that are more attended and some that are less attended, in addition there is an assumption that these hierarchically ranked attentions are qualitatively different in their skillfulness and in their rewardingness. Likewise, some functions (e.g. the ignoring) are skillful but unrewarding, and hence, the theory goes, ignored and hardly ever utilized, while others (e.g. the mobilizing) are rewarding and therefore subject to frequent practice, but are inherently unskilled, and are never fully grasped as skillfully as those people who have this function as a stronger function.

The presence cube model has the following bad features:

1. It assumes that some functions are rarely used, but nonetheless skillful, which is hard to measure (i.e., in principle how do you observe someone being skillful at something that they rarely or never do?).
2. There are two parameters of function quality, value and strength. Two parameters are harder to measure, and harder to understand, than one.
3. Having additional free parameters in a model dilutes the explanatory power of that model.

In my model, there is only one parameter to measure per function, degree of attentional visibility, which I call strength. With fewer independent things to measure, it is more straightforward to measure change in function strength over time, which led me to my idea that the superid functions level up over time, and thus change their strength as people grow and work on their weaknesses.

In this model, the mobilizing function is a strong function, and the ignoring function is a weak function and blind spot, equivalently weak or weaker than the vulnerable function. The fact that dimensionality describes the mobilizing function as weaker than the ignoring function is the most glaring issue with the concept. I can not understand what property the ignoring function has that makes it stronger or more skillful than the mobilizing function in any respect whatsoever, as dimensionality predicts. It is very hard for me to understand why the ignoring function which is rarely or never used could be considered strong in any way. The classical view that the mobilizing function is weak, makes more sense, and the classical notion of the mobilizing function as "stubborn" or misguided can be seen sometimes, usually in young people that have not developed much confidence and not developed their superid functions very well. But usually, people have a lot of confidence in their mobilizing functions, and emphasize this function a lot, and make it externally visible -- and by using it frequently and leveling it up early on in their lives, they usually become skillful at it pretty quickly.

I came up with the following simple math to translate between my axial view of model A, and the parameter of function strength output:
strength = axis*balance

In other words, each of the four function axes (e.g. Ti and Te) has a overall strength level and an imbalance towards one end. The logic axis of the LSE is very strong, as it is the dominant axis, but extremely weighted towards Te, in other words extremely imbalanced. The logic axis of the EII, by contrast, is much weaker overall, and more balanced.

As an example of this model for proof of concept, with sort of ad hoc made up numbers:

LSE

Str(Te) = Str(logic) * balance(logic) ≈ 0.99*0.99 ≈ 0.99

Str(Si) = Str(sensorics) * balance(sensorics) ≈ 0.9*0.7 ≈ 0.63

Str(Ne) = Str(intuition) * balance(intuition) ≈ 0.7*0.97 ≈ 0.7

Str(Fi) = Str(ethics) * balance(ethics) ≈ 0.5*0.45 ≈ 0.23

Str(Fe) = Str(ethics) * (1-balance(ethics)) ≈ 0.5*0.55 ≈ 0.28

Str(Se) = Str(sensorics) * (1-balance(sensorics)) ≈ 0.9*0.3 ≈ 0.27

Str(Ti) = Str(logic) * (1-balance(logic)) ≈ 0.99*0.01 ≈ 0.01

Str(Ni) = Str(intuition) * (1-balance(intuition)) ≈ 0.7*0.03 ≈ 0.01

This pretty well matches the function visibility weights that we normally see in people. Note that these parameters, axis strength and axis balance, are 8 parameters, same number as if we treated each function as having independent strength (and fewer parameters than the presence cube in which each function has an independent strength and value, so 16 parameters to measure). 

The "developmental parameters" which change over time can be attributed to the balance of the suggestive functions axis, and possibly the axis strengths for the weaker axes will become better developed as people work on their weaknesses and improve them. Most of the parameters will likely be more stationary. Importantly, axial post-dimensionality allows for modeling these developmental changes as nonstationary measurements over time without introducing more parameters. We can simply model the development of people improving their weak points as increases in axis strength over time, while leaving the axis balance stationary. 

The post-dimensionality axial model is better than the presence cube model.

1. Axial post-dimensionality has fewer parameters to measure than the presence cube.
2. It explains why equivalently valued functions in the presence cube have different strengths.
3. It explains the property of the role and demonstrative function as being "half valued" -- which the presence cube also models, but with different numerical outputs. (specifically, the presence cube considers the demonstrative 4D+2P as much stronger than the role 2D+2P, which I think is dubious, and the ignoring 3D+1P as equal or roughly equal to the role 2D+2P. Tencer suggested to me a modification, where P (valuedness) is weighted more highly than D (dimensional strength, which allows for the role to be stronger than the ignoring; however, unless the coefficient for dimensionality is zero or very close to zero, the strength of the ignoring is estimated too highly for me)
4. It more clearly describes what parameters are changing than the presence cube when developmental changes occur as people improve upon their weaknesses.

Dimensional strength is a bad theory and should be discarded. The presence cube which incorporates dimensionality is a bad model and should be discarded. 

Derivation of Reinin Dichotomies

This post is theoretical and does not have any examples of cases. It involves Reinin dichotomies, a topic which is sheer nonsense. I attempt to illustrate why Reinin dichotomies are sheer nonsense. If dense theoretical nonsense does not interest you, feel free to ignore this post. 

Reinin dichotomies are defined as linear combinations of Jungian dichotomies. The Jungian dichotomies are introversion/extroversion, intuition/sensation, logic/ethics, and rationality/irrationality. To illustrate these dichotomies, I use Sergei Ganin's terminology, such that an LSE is called ESTj, which is different than the MBTI ESTJ which has the same Jungian dichotomies. 

As an example, ES+IN types are farsighted, whereas EN+IS types are carefree. To be more precise, the ESFj, INTj, ESTp, INFp, ESFp, INTp, ESTj, and INFj are farsighted, and the ENTp, ISFp, ENFj, ISTj, ENTj, ISFj, ENFp, and ISTp are carefree. The farsighted types are those that are both extroverted and sensors, or both introverted and intuitives. The carefree types are those that are both extroverted and intuitives, or both introverts and sensors.

All of the Reinin dichotomies are linear combinations of Jungian dichotomies in this way.

There are six Reinin dichotomies that are combinations of two Jungian dichotomies. I define these as second-order Reinin dichotomies.

Farsighted ES+IN, carefree EN+IS

Yielding ET+IF, obstinate EF+IT

Dynamic EJ+IP, static EP+IJ

Aristocratic ST+NF, democratic SF+NT

Tactics SJ+NP, strategy SP+NJ

Emotivist TJ+FP, constructivist TP+FJ

There are four Reinin dichotomies that are combinations of three Jungian dichotomies, or in other words, combinations of one Jungian dichotomy with one second-order Reinin dichotomy. These are defined as third-order Reinin dichotomies.

For example, the positivist/negativist dichotomy, which is the ESTX dichotomy, can be defined as E+aristocracy, S+yielding, or T+farsighted. The large group resulting from these definitions are all equivalent. 

Negativist EST+ENF+ISF+INT, positivist ESF+ENT+IST+INF

Judicious ESJ+ENP+ISP+INJ, decisive ESP+ENJ+ISJ+INP

Serious ETJ+EFP+ITP+IFJ, merry EFJ+ETP+ITJ+IFP

Process STJ+SFP+NTP+NFJ, result STP+SFJ+NTJ+NFP

The remaining Reinin dichotomy, asking/declaring is the only fourth-order Reinin dichotomy, which predictably is derived from a Jungian dichotomy and a third-order Reinin dichotomy, or by any two non-overlapping second-order Reinin dichotomies. The large group resulting from all of the combinations is the same. This proves that even though a combination of all four Jungian dichotomies is needed to make this Reinin dichotomy, even though there are 16 ways to assemble the four jungian dichotomies, there is only one way to construct a fourth-order Reinin dichotomy, which is sort of an interesting algebra result even in spite of the semantic meaninglessness of the Reinin dichotomies.

My primary purpose in describing the derivations of Reinin dichotomies is to point out that their definition assigns them no meaning. What is the significance anyway of grouping the SJ and NP types together, across from the SP and NJ? As an exercise for the skeptical reader, I challenge the reader to think of a convincing explanation for the significance of any Reinin groups. 

The biggest problem with Reinin groups is that they are totally aquadral. The Reinin groups posit some (maybe undiscovered) similarities between types of all different quadras. If you see types as expressions of their quadras, these proposed sweeping similarities between both sets of opposite quadras are hard to make sense of. The Reinin traits have nothing to do with the structure of the socion based on quadras 

Even if you completely rejected grouping by quadras and focused more on jungian dichotomy traits and dimensionality, concepts that I reject in socionics, the Reinin groupings relate some very opposite MBTI types (the Reinin dichotomies are a valid mathematical construction in MBTI whether anyone uses them in MBTI or not, since only the Jungian dichotomies are used to derive them). In mainstream MBTI (and in very much of eastern pop-classical socionics), type similarity is often seen by the number of jungian dichotomies in common which hypothetically underly some traits. Using this type of similarity as an assessment, the Reinin groups are also broken.

Reinin dichotomies are in fact so broken and incompatible with any other major ideas in socionics that the schools of socionics that focus on Reinin groupings (the ones that is most familiar to me is the school following the works of Vladimir Mironov) are essentially outcasts that regard no other major principles in socionics, such as quadras, IM elements, intertype relations as important, and their only activity is to characterize the objective observable nature of Reinin traits. I talked with a Russian guy who came to a meetup in New York City one time, perhaps around 2013 or 2014, who was primarily exposed to the Mironov school, and it became clear very quickly that we had very different views of socionics, when I explained to him that i view socionics as a theory of quadras, he said, paraphrasing, "I never heard anyone say anything like that before, I only thought people really focus on Reinin dichotomies, it's the only thing in socionics I've ever thought of as real" 

The School of Humanitarian Socionics, by Viktor Gulenko, at least trends heavily in this direction and seems to focus principally on complex dichotomies while paying little attention to the quadras and IM elements, something Gulenko has done for decades. Another notable school is the "introverted socionics" of Semyon Churyumov, who redefines intertype relations as qualities of types and develops a new intertype distance measure of Reinin dichotomies, which is very confusing.

Overall, Reinin dichotomies have no significance. They are haphazardly constructed to group all of the different types of opposite types. They are incompatible with quadras. They are also incompatible with concepts of dimensionality and jungian dichotomy similarity in mainstream MBTI. Indeed, assuming the semantic meaning of the Reinin dichotomies was described by Reinin and Augusta as something to be cautious about, even while they both assumed, for some incredible reason, that they had some highly significant, yet undiscovered meaning. Reinin treated most of his discussion about what was the significance of his dichotomies, as speculative hypotheses. The descriptions that he did come up with, that have been propagated today as semantically descriptive of the Reinin traits, are quite vague and in some cases pretty inconsistent across the very different types in the socion. For example, the positive emotionality oriented alpha quadra has in it the supposedly glass-half-empty negativist types LII and especially SEI, which is difficult to rationalize and should be seen as inconsistent with basic quadra values. 

Prior to Reinins derivation of the Reinin dichotomies, Augusta had already defined the large group of askers and declarers, and provided the semantic interpretation that askers ask more questions and declares make more declarations in their speech patterns. This interpretation is not very consistent with quadra dynamics, since it suggests for instance that the SEE, which has significant access to the independent-mindedness of the Te+Ni block of the gamma quadra, it is still considered an asker (it is difficult to understand conceptually why the harsh judgment block should be an asking block, as well). But, I guess that this hypothesis led Augusta to be more interested in the idea that the other elaborated Reinin combinations also had significant meanings too, even though she had no justification for this assumption.

Of course, the Reinin dichotomies include two quadra dichotomies. These are certainly not meaningless. (They likewise also contain a dichotomy that relates the opposite quadras, which is worse than meaningless, it is directly the reverse of quadra similarity). Besides the two quadra axis groups, the other 9 Reinin dichotomies are meaningless, including the 5 other dichotomies that can also be derived by some other properties in model A, which still equate some similarity between extremely different types. A broken clock is right 2 times out of every 11.

Lambsauce

Lambsauce was interviewed:

Before we begin, let me give a bit of context. On this blog, I strive to make content that will be accessible to a reader in the future, that has never met the subject, and doesn't need to have met the participant who we are analyzing in order to experience and understand the sort of person that the participant presents themselves to be. But, of course, I have met these paricipants, and sometimes I have extensive experience with these participants outside of the narrow window of content that I am curating for the future viewer. As in this case, where I knew the participant, who the interviewer accurately describes as infamous, long before I ever bothered to watch this interview; in fact I only watched the interview to make this post. I had already very firmly made up my mind about Lambsauce's type well before perusing the interview. And, as a word of warning, understanding the correct type certainly is possible from the interview and there are many clues available. But, it was more obvious, from interacting with Lambsauce over the internet, and observing him from a distance, for an extended time, and I will discuss later my observations from that modality.

One clue that presents itself immediately, as Lambsauce begins talking at about 00:30, already, he shows bitingly critical remarks of the opponents of his discord server, the Jungle, as though preparing for a verbal sparring match with such critics. Even though he restrains himself, his critical outlook contrasts with the interviewer's calm, welcoming disposition.

Lambsauce has a very obvious tendency to monologue freely, to rant openly and with bluster about a wide range of topics and to change the subject frequently in his stream of consciousness.

Lambsauce has a stern, focused, intense expression throughout the interview.

Lambsauce is and analytically deconstructive and verbally combative, perhaps, as though, welcoming a debate. At 3:00, but also throughout the entire interview, he at least discusses rigor of his positions on many intellectual topics, especially personality models that he mentions repeatedly (for example, around 50:00, although he slips in to speaking about this subject during his long unfocused monologues throughout).

Some use of singsong or mocking tones as voice modulation, for example at 14:30

Lambsauce has a dismissive attitude towards other people's ideas, and often as well towards other people directly. As at 31:00, where he calls other people "retards" in no unclear terms for their ideological positions about personality modeling. Lambsauce claims to be an open-minded person, and gives an interesting answer at 45:00 in response to the question of when he last changed his mind, to which he says, all the time. But, immediately, he proceeds into a digression about other people being extremely wrong a lot, and having no evidentiary basis for their ill-formed views. Overall, in spite of his repeated claims for open-mindedness, we can see that Lambsauce is a highly stubborn, ideologically charged and often ideologically uncompromising person. Although, referring to some observations not from the video, he is not lying that he does change his mind; he has done this many times for instance in his typing work, changing frameworks fastmindedly and at seemingly random times, making him look stupid and clumsy and suggesting that he obviously did not understand the model or the subject or both, to begin with. This can be understood as partially supporting his claim of changing his mind, but more fundamentally, he is not an openminded person; rather an extremely recalcitrant, discriminating person, and who appears not to be aware of his own extreme tendency towards stubbornness and opprobrium.

Lambsauce is, in my view, an SLE. He is prone to debate and to verbal conflict, and it seems the arena of intellect is the main arena where he prepares for challenge, although Lambsauce also uses language at other times emphasizing his competitiveness and his own attitude that he was lacking confidence in the past and had to, by his own bootstraps, pull himself together.

Lambsauce's style is exaggerative and confident, and makes ludicrous, exaggerative claims (for example, at 32:00 where he grossly exaggerates the ideological consensus of typists, by mainly focusing on his narrow group of followers and ignoring completely the very large number of other typists that fervently disagree with Lambsauce about many typings). Yet, while Lambsauce's confidence, and dismissiveness of other people's negative ideas can be seen readily, he claims repeatedly to have been anxious, unconfident, and in the past to have struggled with passivity and depression. Yet, he acknowledges his confidence at the present moment, as well as his stimulation seeking behavior, and inclination to (1:01:00) "scream it [the 'interesting' information he has to share] in [others'] face[s]". His emphasis on his own prior passivity and anxiousness, is, perhaps not an untrue characteristic of his experience, but certainly exaggerated in his tendency to decide what to present to us in his inner monologue at the present time.

The "meat" of ideological matters, whether other people are right or wrong in their conclusions, is something that he is willing to very freely challenge, but as an overall theme, can be construed less as understanding the evidence (which Lambsauce claims many times to do), but really as presenting a sound argument in a debate. In other words, his approach is not trying to solve the questions independently about the world by examining lots of evidence disconnectedly, it is more a process of building, and presenting persuasively, frameworks that are well justified, and ironcladly built, defending some idea positions. The persuasive, and combative disposition of Lambsauce's inner-monologue-presented-as-debate, speaks to this. This debating style, characterized by the ideological conflict of the beta quadra, is a feature of Se blocked with Ti. In Lambsauce's case, his highly analytical tendency to challenge, but also often to randomly switch frameworks, and his view of himself as a "depressive nerd" suggests a better fit in orientation to Ti in the ego block, rather than the super-id of the EIE. Likewise, he seems very little concerned (although partially he just did not focus here) on the way other people receive his tangential monologue, somewhat unlike Fe dominant types, but perfectly fitting the mold of Fe mobilizing types that are only beginning to realize the importance of not irritating other people in their way of relating -- which he seems overall to be dismissive of; again recall his defensive reaction at 0:00:40 into the interview.




I will also, for this exercize, post in full my comments about Lambsauce from another forum, in which I argued, speaking generally, that Lambsauce is the SLE, based on his behavior over a long period of time on discord. The extent of his belligerence, and tendency to argue with others without really letting them get a word in, may not be obvious from the interview, but as before, there are numerous hints.

He seems very willing to take a direct, belligerent approach towards others, and almost instinctively puts forward ideological positions in a challenging "this is the way it is" stance. Despite his more regular certitude, he also has an inherent inconsistency and flexibility, classically characteristic of the SLE in the application of ideology, which manifests occasionally in his tendency to "negotiate" with other authoritative figures to reach an ideological consensus, and which I predict would also manifest in occasional random changes to ideologies held (NB this analysis was written a year ago, I had not observed random shifts to lambsauce's ideologies at the time, but clearly this prediction has held correct) [editors note, i wrote the parenthetical edit about this protracted prediction long before writing this blog post]. His approach to socionics is clearly rather scattered in its source material and his interpretation of interview subjects is naturally (and probably somewhat incorrigbly) hurried and impatient, and his conclusions are generally based on discretized answers with chunked information. Ideological opponents are drowned out in a neverending sea of dyspeptic verbiage, which is putatively based on reason; in a deeper view, it is also a not-so-subtle form of messaging conveying expectations of ideological conformance. Despite his intellect, he is not really a very idea-oriented person to begin with, his intellect easily falls within a typical range of the SLE (which is not to say that SLEs cannot be even more intellectual). His overall public image is relatively clumsily managed, as he fails largely to recognize that other people often do not concern with his ideological games on intellectual subjects, he does a generally poor job of reading others' lack of interest in his widely ranging authoritative commentaries and does not make himself well liked beyond a relatively narrow circle of followers that don't seem to mind his bossy mentality.

Silveranstavern interview

I interviewed silveranstavern (as you can see, the video was recording the game I was playing during the interview, in which I was only doing a fishing minigame to acquire resources, which I do during interviews because this takes approximately 0% of my attention).

Some observations that I jotted down to myself while I was reviewing this interview:

Slow, contemplative cadence of speech.

Silverantsavern presents himself very quickly as an open book, a straightforward person willing to let the interviewer, and the listener, peer inside his brain pretty openly. Within the first few minutes (2:00) he discusses also his explicit principle of openness, and provides a relevant example of his upcoming ayahuasca experience. He has a relaxed, easy disposition, as if inviting the listener to be at ease in the conversation.

He is inclined to somewhat bold actions, including for example (25:00) moving to Colombia without knowing the language. This was an intentional move, perhaps not a spontaneous action, but quite a bold, life-changing one.

Silveranstavern demonstrates some spontaneous revealing of tangible, intimate details. Compared to some people that are really allergic to being specific and inclined to generalize, Silveranstavern's openness extends into telling his history in really a lot of unfiltered detail, although in many ways, maybe in more of the interview when not guided by my specific requests to discuss some examples, he often drifts into speaking abstractly, and philosophically about complicated and spiritual topics. It's easy (for me) to imagine him, in a different conversation and a different context, eliding much specificity about what he's talking about and talking abstractly himself indirectly through buddhist phenomology, without all that much slice of life to connect it to reality -- although, maybe not, that's not how our conversation went, and the interview context is an artificial context which different people approach very differently.

The section starting around 26:00 where silveranstavern discusses the circumstances of his first marriage and his exiting that situation with children that are not fully grown, is interesting for its window into silveranstwavern's emotionality and his choices in challenging emotional situations -- and also, for his selective attention to describing in laborious detail his own emotional responses, while not focusing much on how other people felt about his actions. He seems to have a disinterest in narrating other people's points of view, and maybe even a sort of flippancy about discussing other people's emotions, almost as though it's pointless to focus on or speculate about, others' inner states.

The section and its story displays a high level of adaptability and flexibility, and willingness to take life as it comes, but also a deeply resigned passivity -- an expectation that other people will do what they will do, and there is no point in ever trying to change them or fight about the circumstances of one's life (or, in this case, his childrens' lives, either -- something that some people fight vociferously over). I don't believe this passivity is only a product of buddhist self-awareness, I think this "passive, relaxed attitude" runs more deeply and has always been there (and at points in the interview, he seems to affirm this idea that he has always been chill), although maybe it's true silveranstavern's experience with mindfulness makes him more inclined to specifically ruminate about his experiences that are in his control, and not to talk about other people who aren't in his control.

There is some explicit mention at times of the principles, ethos, or "code" used to live by (28:30).

Silveranstavern gives a pretty good, detailed overview of his kids' personalities and character. He is capable of discussing in some detail the character of others (which he was clearly prompted to do).

At 1:44:00, there is a relatively open, unfiltered conversation about silveranstavern's perception that he is a "lighthearted" person, that he prefers to be lighthearted rather than serious, although he also mentions in his self-perception that he has the ability to create a degree of seriousness at appropriate moments in life, while preferring nonetheless to travel through life more lightheartedly. While this is all self-perception that he tells me rather than shows me, it is consistent with his chilled out disposition throughout the entire interview.

At 1:53:00, there is a short, but interesting conversation about nonmonogamy in which silveranstavern describes that his current relationship is founded on the principle of "relationship anarchy" -- which seems, in addition to being an unusual way of approaching relationships, very abstractly codified, and also, maybe returns to the concept above of regarding inner emotional states, (as in, in this context, other people's expectation about how relationships might develop) with some degree of flippancy.

I type Silveranstavern as an LII. Broadly, the most important themes that stand out to me as principally influential from the interview, are silveranstavern's chilled-out relaxedness, his interpersonal passivity and lightheartedness (i.e., nonseriousness) that he discusses, with which he traverses through life. This passivity is characteristic of Si-valuing introverts, and is a very separate way of being than the indifference and usually more substantial judgments of Ni valuing types. Ni dominant types are passive in their own ways, and also have capacity with Se suggestive for bold action (that is often inconsistent) -- and silveranstavern shows a capacity for bold action, but also an overall really loose, lighthearted, chilled approach to his surrounding circumstances. It took me some time in the interview to unpack the complex, abstract, and generally buddhism-influenced self-presentation, but when I understood this chilledness, it left me clearly with the idea of an Si valuing type, and in particular, of an Fi-devaluing Si-valuing type, with a more distant connection to seriousness. The LII with Fi role has a pattern, where they sometimes have a sort of almost-but-not-quite scornful attitude towards people who are too emotional, who can't seem to figure out how to "relax" to the engagement level of their surroundings. The LII type is outwardly subdued, and also, usually subduedly respectful of others' expressions of sincerity, and so this almost-scornful-but-not-quite reaction is not always outwardly obvious, but they nonetheless may find it overbearing, although also tolerable and doable, to focus on inner emotional states for too long, whether themselves or others, and they may also desire not to subject others to too much of their own inner turmoil.

I think silveranstavern might not see himself as "flippant" as I described above, with respect to understanding, navigating, and describing, other people's inner emotional states. Although he may not see himself as regarding others' emotions with flippancy, he probably would nonetheless agree that he focuses, and in this focused infinitely more, on his own inner state of mind, than speculating or describing the actual or hypothetical states of mind of others, something he did very little of in comparison to his own very lengthy and very precisely analytical description of his own motivations for his actions. Regardless of exactly the words used to describe it, in my view this flippancy or inattention to the emotions' of others, coming short of a wholesale indifference or incompetence at dealing with emotional situations, but maybe a light preference not to a lot of the time, is totally fitting with Fi role in the alpha quadra where a preference for positive emotionality is predominant. This is the primary piece of evidence that points me to a particular quadra.

It's also easy to see silveranstavern's unrestrained openness as like that of Ne ego types, and his often analytical and abstract approach to conversations, and his occasional forays into discussing important principles more readily than details, as signals of Ti values. Those signals are fuzzier, especially occasional discussion of principles -- the LII doesn't usually tend to express their principles as dogmatic ideologies that they rant about, in the way that can be seen sometimes in the spontaneous ideological ranting of LSIs and SLEs -- it's harder sometimes to see this type as ideological, because, they present themselves as more flexible than ideologically principled, and the discussions of principles and codes, however abstract, could just be explained as passing concepts in conversation that aren't very indicative of highly structured or principled thinking. Which is true, I don't view this observation as very definitive.

It doesn't seem very likely to see him as an extrovert, although sometimes the Ne dominants can have a mix of passivity in boldness; they usually are more principally bold in spite of their avoidant tendencies, while silveranstavern in my view is more principally passive, despite his boldness.