the struggle

I remember when this nonsense was new and all the rage... I took a full online test, like 200 questions, about 6 different times over about 3 months.

Turns out, the test results changed a lot depending on my current mood, recent experiences and stress level.

It baffles me that still to this day even many professionals and business people think this has any merit.

People who unironically believe in astrology are worse though. Which is a shame, because seemingly nearly everyone on a dating app of any kind is basically either a religious conservative, or a weed addicted astrology believing 'leftist'.

So did you end up marrying the purple boy?

Sure, but a lot of people have also 'heard' that mbti is not scientifically valid and go around parroting that without any knowledge of what specifically science says about it.

It is entirely possible that outside of a scientific discipline, mbti works well enough for people to use.

Kind of like how we use the term "meme" and understand what it means but the concept of memes are not used in science because other models of cultural evolution have better explanatory power.

It gutted me. I was so into the typology for about six months.

From what I can tell, it wasn't until around the turn of the century that it was widely regarded as total bunk. I know it was used in professional psychological and occupational contexts in the '90s.

I always pay attention to how people feel about either the astrology or MBTI, that does give you some helpful information about them. And if they don’t agree, that also gives some information. They’re just tools to help us understand each other or ourselves, I don’t think we have to be negative about that.

Astrology can be fine as long as you don't take it too seriously. It's not much different than a favorite color or lucky numbers.

Glass house level: Psych PhD

I always wondered how this scale matches up with nerodivergent communities and even brain injuries etc. It's obviously a bit like a horoscope, but still fun to see.

As one who both tested as and very much sees the description of the INTJ in themselves, can confirm as being an obnoxiously over-analytical fool.

In some ways if you take them in a certain light the M/B, astrology, and even tarot cards play a similar role. They provide a thought prompt to explore from.

INTJ is the "Libertarian Left" of quack psychology; the test is set up to put people in that category so they feel special, and annoying people with no personality fall for it every single time because it's the closest thing they will ever have to an identity outside "video games" and "weed"

Same thing happened too me lol. Other than the retaking it part. It was kind of useful in the sense that it made me think about if I was acting that way and to make an effort not to do so.

These intentions are all well and good until an employer requires you to take a Myers Briggs test and you're turned down from a job because of it. I don't have any issue with someone reading their horoscope to try and understand their own feelings and emotions, I have a pretty massive issue with anyone trying to use pseudoscience nonsense to make serious decisions.

That’s why I like the I Ching. Instead of wrapping its abstract advice in hokey mysticism or pop-psychology quackery it comes right out and admits what it’s doing. It say, “Generate a random number between 1 and 64, then read the abstract advice that goes with your number. It may help you see a problem in a new light.”

I agree, but I think it is important to clearly communicate what is and what isn't scientific consensus and what is only pseudoscience. Because there will always be people who think that stuff like Myers Briggs tests or homeopathy are really reliable/effective. They might be a good placebo but there are also people dying because some quacks tell them that they shouldn't take their cancer medication and homeopathy instead. Myers Briggs and astrology are obviously not that dangerous as they aren't medical treatments. But I fear the atmosphere in society shifting towards pseudoscience and distrusting in actual scientific approaches.

What? ‘Bill’? Yeah that’s really insensitive to ducks.

The idea of taking a complicated system and boiling it down to an essential value (or set of values) that describe everything is high-key fascism. It's fine to simplify a system to better understand it, but the moment you start saying these abstractions have any kind of predictive capability outside their original contexts, that's when you start getting into the eugenics shit.

When I was working on my associates, I took 3 psych classes as electives thinking I would minor/double major with math. I took all 3 of them with the same professor, and she took every opportunity she could to roast the OCEAN as a knock-off of the MBTI. She was particularly critical of people who dismissed the MBTI as pseudoscience while using the OCEAN.

You have changed then, assuming it was the same test. I tested the same for decades. Eventually I recognized that my personality has changed and took the test again and yup, different result.

People who do are dumb fucks.

You really missed the joke on this one, huh