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Whenever people bang on about debunking this or that artifact of social science research (artifact of the academy to be more precise), I recall that personality

Whenever people bang on about debunking this or that artifact of social science research (artifact of the academy to be more precise), I recall that personality can’t really be established empirically by modern psychological science. People are less willing to go around debunking personality, or say debunking free will. Some people do, especially in the “rationalist community” but generally fewer. Trusting the science is easier when it doesn’t conflict with reality, but there are a minority of people who have no trouble even when it does. In psychology especially, we should heed the adage, “Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.” It’s difficult measuring the behavior of the human mind.

bloqs 3y ago
The big five are verifiable and accepted
- 2devnull 3y ago
  Traits are not personality. And factor analysis is arbitrary.
nordsieck 3y ago
> Whenever people bang on about debunking this or that artifact of social science research (artifact of the academy to be more precise), I recall that personality can’t really be established empirically by modern psychological science. Do you mean aside from this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits
- syndicatedjelly 3y ago
  How is something like that verifiable?
  - ta988 3y ago
    If you do like all those pseudo psychologists, always find one category a person they meet fits in. There you go there are only 5 traits. Same thing for horoscopes, you can always fit one description from a sign to someone so you are always right. Except when there is this "how weird i thought you were a gemini what is your ascendant" "ohh that's why." a posteriori analysis can explain anything you want.
- 2devnull 3y ago
  Not exactly, because we don’t experience people’s big five, we experience a personality. You can argue that personality isn’t a real thing, and that differences can be reduced to five traits but have you ever wondered why five? Why not one? Personality as we experience it is something closer to mbti, but that also boils down to traits and isn’t very reliable. Personality doesn’t really change, but mbti does. People who downplay personality, social psychologists, will point to numerous studies where behavior is determined by social forces or external circumstances alone. There’s not a lot of experimental evidence that people differ from one another, despite our entire legal/ethical system holding that as a fundamental truth. From an empirical perspective is looks like determinism is, if not in the lead, having a good run at the moment.
  - Jensson 3y ago
    > Personality as we experience it is something closer to mbti What, how is mbti a personality but big five isn't?
    - 2devnull 3y ago
      It’s hard to answer that concisely but one way to answer it concisely might be: mbti are often described as personality types, “The INFP tends to like x and often does y, they dislike z, …” the big five are just five arbitrary dimensions arrived at through factor analysis, they are descriptive more than predictive, they were not developed by Jung, a personality theorist. My point is that the things we can easily measure are not what we think of as personality. Your wife, daughter, dog, are not reducible to the big five. Whatever the extra stuff is, beyond those five dimensions, that’s specific to individuals and persistent, what we call a personality, is a very real thing that cannot be demonstrated empirically. That should humble us to the limits of our ability to understand the human mind, and complicated human mental processes like learning.

bloqs 3y ago

The big five are verifiable and accepted

2devnull 3y ago
Traits are not personality. And factor analysis is arbitrary.

nordsieck 3y ago

> Whenever people bang on about debunking this or that artifact of social science research (artifact of the academy to be more precise), I recall that personality can’t really be established empirically by modern psychological science. Do you mean aside from this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits

syndicatedjelly 3y ago
How is something like that verifiable?
- ta988 3y ago
  If you do like all those pseudo psychologists, always find one category a person they meet fits in. There you go there are only 5 traits. Same thing for horoscopes, you can always fit one description from a sign to someone so you are always right. Except when there is this "how weird i thought you were a gemini what is your ascendant" "ohh that's why." a posteriori analysis can explain anything you want.
2devnull 3y ago
Not exactly, because we don’t experience people’s big five, we experience a personality. You can argue that personality isn’t a real thing, and that differences can be reduced to five traits but have you ever wondered why five? Why not one? Personality as we experience it is something closer to mbti, but that also boils down to traits and isn’t very reliable. Personality doesn’t really change, but mbti does. People who downplay personality, social psychologists, will point to numerous studies where behavior is determined by social forces or external circumstances alone. There’s not a lot of experimental evidence that people differ from one another, despite our entire legal/ethical system holding that as a fundamental truth. From an empirical perspective is looks like determinism is, if not in the lead, having a good run at the moment.
- Jensson 3y ago
  > Personality as we experience it is something closer to mbti What, how is mbti a personality but big five isn't?
  - 2devnull 3y ago
    It’s hard to answer that concisely but one way to answer it concisely might be: mbti are often described as personality types, “The INFP tends to like x and often does y, they dislike z, …” the big five are just five arbitrary dimensions arrived at through factor analysis, they are descriptive more than predictive, they were not developed by Jung, a personality theorist. My point is that the things we can easily measure are not what we think of as personality. Your wife, daughter, dog, are not reducible to the big five. Whatever the extra stuff is, beyond those five dimensions, that’s specific to individuals and persistent, what we call a personality, is a very real thing that cannot be demonstrated empirically. That should humble us to the limits of our ability to understand the human mind, and complicated human mental processes like learning.