RoR: Forum

Well, Martin, you asked a question that really did not have much bearing on the topic at hand, so why should anyone have bothered to answer it at all, especially when that question was written "to get a reaction". And please, already...it is "WE THE LIVING," not "WE ARE THE LIVING."

Post 61

Monday, November 1, 2004 - 7:59pm

Jeanine writes:
"Which brings to the the Brunnhilde Principle. Oh dear, oh dear. Here I am very torn. On the one hand, I know too many innumerable varieties of exceptions to hold to any strong Principle here intellectually..."

You know, I was eagerly, impatiently waiting for you to weigh in on this topic...I almost called out for you....:)

Real quick, just wanted to say that I should have said Brunhilde metaphor, instead of Brunhilde principle. Of course there are variations, like you point out, regarding dominant women and and submissive men...(wonder how Rand would have addressed THAT, since she didn't like the idea of a woman president!).

Post 62

Thursday, November 4, 2004 - 1:03am

Joe Rowlands

The energy orientation is exactly that - doesn't refer to the physical measurable energy we get from food, but the sense of emotional or psychological exhaustion we get from making mental efforts. I am an introvert. When I get home from work (and my work involves me being with people constantly), I feel tired, but not sleepy tired. If anyone suggested I go to a party, or join a group down at the pub, I'd shy away in horror. What I want to do is sit alone with a book, some music, potter in the garden. be alone. But do I Never go out and see people, ever?
Of course not. After a quiet day at home, I'm more than happy to join a group of friends out somewhere. The "psychological energy" concept is extensively explored - the Myers-Briggs model has been used extensively for over 40 years with Millions of people all over the world. The evidence for it as a reality is pretty solid. I did say that we all have the "ability" to be either, and we all exhibit degrees of preference for when we choose which of the orientations best suits us. It is not an unrealistic dichotomy - if you want to claim it is, I think you need to attack the huge body of work the Myers-Briggs Foundation hason this subject,anddemolish the factual basis they work from. An introvert is just someone who prefers the "being alone when tired" option a lot more than the other, as an extrovert prefers to seek out other people a lot more often than not. It's a question of which side of a line down the middle you tend most often to fall, thats all.
Cass

Post 63

Thursday, November 4, 2004 - 1:51am

Cass, I could just as easily say that everyone is either a herbivore, omnivore, or carnivore. Or put it on a herbivore/carnivore scale. Guess what? I've got all the empirical data in the world to back me up.

It's a question of which side of a line down the middle you tend most often to fall, thats all.

As I said, if it's used descriptively. But lots of descriptions work, as my food scale above shows just one example. I could also pick things like "sleeps a lot vs. sleeps a little", "showers often vs. showers not often", etc. All that is fine. Of course, if you are to measure how often someone stays home or goes out in their spare time, you'll see people differ along the scale. And it works great for describing behaviors because it really is just a description of behavior. If you classify people as "readers" vs. "non-readers", I'm willing to bet that the first group reads more books than the second group. Hell, I'd go so far as to say they enjoy it more! Wow! I can do science too! Wanna bet that if I did surveys, the empirical data would conform to the theory?

Post 64

Thursday, November 4, 2004 - 2:46am

I give in Joe - all the 40+ years work and millions of people who used the concept and found it valid are wrong. And you're right. OK?
Cass

Post 65

Thursday, November 4, 2004 - 3:01am

Thanks! You're too kind. Of course, I wouldn't use the terms "right" and "wrong". If you assume the categories are descriptive, not causal explanations, the question isn't about being right or wrong. It's about being useful or not useful, or about the degree of usefulness. What do you learn from saying that someone spends their spare time alone? Not much, because the causes are varied, as my article points out. You can of course describe what the fact that they spend time alone, probably going as far as saying "they're more comfortable alone", which is a huge leap. But it doesn't really say why. It just describes it.

This whole notion that there's 40 years of evidence is just ridiculous. It's just a way of classifying, and classification is suppose to serve the purpose of understanding. If you find a better model, you go with it. There is no "proof" that this model is "right". There's no such thing. You can argue that 40 years shows that it has some merit, but that doesn't make it the best, or beyond improvement, or whatever else. And then the question is, useful for what? And by what benchmark? If people take the Rowlands graph (just named it) from my article, and apply it for 40 years, it will be as "proven" as your graph. Can't you see that that proves nothing?

But since you conceded defeat, maybe you can.

Post 66

Thursday, November 4, 2004 - 12:46pm

You know, I was eagerly, impatiently waiting for you to weigh in on this topic...I almost called out for you....:)

Real quick, just wanted to say that I should have said Brunhilde metaphor, instead of Brunhilde principle. Of course there are variations, like you point out, regarding dominant women and and submissive men...(wonder how Rand would have addressed THAT, since she didn't like the idea of a woman president!).

Oh, well, thank you, Joe;

<smooch>. Apologies if my attentions have been elsewhere. In the future please feel welcome to call out for me... you have my name.

Otherwise... oh, I know the nasty things Rand would have said about women and men who didn't behave as expected... she said lots of narrow and stupid things about sex, notwithstanding my debts to her initial conceptualist insights into the intellectuality of sexual desire which I infinite, infinitely agree with, sociobiology and common opinion be damned!

Incidentally, do you know any emotionally lead-taking women in Randian circles who'd have an open mind with a Pagan transgender escort... ~sigh~... LOL!- what's the point?

anyway, thanks, Joe,

shine on!

Jeanie Ring ))(*)((
"not all those who wander are lost"

Post 67

Thursday, November 4, 2004 - 1:44pm

Cass: “When I get home from work (and my work involves me being with people constantly), I feel tired, but not sleepy tired. If anyone suggested I go to a party, or join a group down at the pub, I'd shy away in horror. What I want to do is sit alone with a book, some music, potter in the garden. be alone.”

Hi Cass. What you describe above fits me to a “T”. On the other hand, my wife can spend all day in meetings, come home and spend all evening on the blower to friends. Go figure.

It’s years since I looked into this subject, so I did a quick google and a very helpful article confirmed the above empirical observation. And you’re right. Introversion/extraversion doesn’t describe a continuum; if any continuum exists, it’s within the categories rather than between them.

So it seems the original article rests on a straw man. As they say, a little knowledge etc.

Brendan

Post 68

Thursday, November 4, 2004 - 6:38am