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Monday 21 March 2016

Plato (IEI): Personality Type Analysis

Plato was a Greek philosopher who founded the Academy in Athens, one of the greatest philosophical schools of antiquity in Ancient Greece. Many of Plato's works had an enormous impact on the development of Western philosophy and science for centuries to come. Plato has often been sourced as one of the founders of Western religion and spirituality, heavily influencing famous philosophers and scholars such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Saint Augustine of Hippo.

Plato was the first innovator of the dialogue and dialectic forms in philosophy, which helped solidify the foundations for Western political philosophy. In works such as the 'Republic' and 'Laws', elaborate on the treatment of political questions from a philosophical perspective. One of Plato's works reflects an interesting philosophical approach to the political world. This Socratic dialogue reflects concerning the definition of justice, the order and character of the just city-state and the just man. The formed the abstract idea of what a Republic is like, discusses the meaning of justice and examines whether or not the just man is happier than the unjust man by considering a series of different cities coming into existence in speech. Particularly, these are recurring themes of L and T.

In the 'Republic', Plato describes the soul as divided into three parts, labeled appetitive, spirited, and rational. He offers this division partly as a way of explaining our psychological complexity and partly to provide a justification for philosophy as the highest of all pursuits, because it corresponds to the highest part of the soul—the rational part. The idea of writing treatises on systems of government is an adequately expresses Plato's emphasis of creating rules and structures by which a government and its individuals can abide by. This reflects the emphasized values of L and T within Plato's work by the finding logical relationships between abstract forms and effectively organizing it to fit a proper system. I find this to be far more in line with T1 and L6, instead of L1 and T6. Furthermore, this additionally presents Plato's passionate visions of an ideal society E+T combined with how to properly implement concrete rules in government which blocks F+L. The Republic is essentially a Beta society, the fundamental idea of loyalty for the country and putting beyond one's own life is very purpose and vision based. (F/T and L/E values)

Plato was a great supporter of Socrates' work, using him as a mouthpiece to support his own collective and hierarchical ideas. Plato was also not attracted to the idea of being the center of the attention and much rather prefers to operate out of public view. I do not think this would be likely in the case of a Beta Energizer who would have no issue communicating their ideas directly and facing challenges without having much fear of being incorrect. This leaves us with LSI and IEI as two possible types. To further clarify the distinction, to better examine on of Plato's works is through the 'Theory of Forms'. Plato was heavily drawn to idealized abstractions, internalized conceptions of how reality can be interpreted. The 'Theory of Forms' for instance, differentiates the abstract world of thought from the world of the senses, where art and mythology operate. The 'Theory of Forms' maintains that two distinct levels of reality exist: the visible world of sights and sounds that we inhabit and the intelligible world of Forms that stands above the visible world and gives it meaning. This is a highly internal subject that deals with humanitarian values instead of an objective method of interpreting reality externally. (Ego T+E and Super-Id L+F)

Thus far what has been mentioned about Plato clearly points towards T1, E2, F5 and L6. In conclusion, Plato is an excellent representative of the IEI type of information metabolism.

To learn more about IEI, click here.

If you are confused by our use of Socionics shorthand, click here.

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