How do INTJs determine Right/Wrong?

[Evalind]

I find I'm the "odd man out" when it comes to ideas of right and wrong. Basically, the way I was raised, there were very strict guidelines of good/bad and right/wrong. Most INTJs seem to question these definitions early and often, but somehow I missed that part of the developmental process in my youth. Having been raised by an INTJ father in a highly religious household is the most likely cause. He "knew" already, and he was way smarter than me, so I took his word for it for a long time. I have grown since then, especially during the late years of college, but there are still some things that I'm very black/white on even though I haven't questioned them to a large extent.

Has anyone else had this type of experience? Do you know what likely causes led you not to question certain things?

Do you end up having relatively black/white views after you've questioned something, or are you always open to changing your mind?

[thegnat]

We determine right and wrong. We're Gods remember?

Ok all joking aside...

Basically I have a very gray view of right and wrong, I don't believe there is a universal right and wrong and each person has their own version of right and wrong.

I have my version, you have yours. So I accept that what you do in my opinion that is "wrong" for me - is "right" for you and accept it as a difference in opinion. I'm very accepting of people. It also depends on the degree of "wrongness" or "rightness" to me.

Say you kill a person, that's VERY wrong. You're not going to even be able to be seen as a good person. I won't look at you in a good way at all. You probably won't even talk to me.

But say you litter straw wrappers or something. I consider it "wrong" but not VERY wrong. So I'll be very willing to talk to you and probably not discriminate against you at all. I'll just accept it as a difference. I won't even look at you funny. Same with things like drug use/abuse. There are probably quite a few things on this level for me.

Then there are some things in between that I'll look at you funny (well in my mind, not literally, I'll give you a chance) and then maybe once I get to know you I'll stop that funny look. I've had that happen with a couple friends actually.

Personally I've always questioned things. I was never religious and questioned God's existence ever since I knew about God. I even questioned what happens when we die before I was even 10 years old. I still haven't found an answer to some of my questions. I'm very open minded. When you question things you don't always get an answer. Maybe you'll find one that you'll accept, but of course it's still not black and white.

[orange]

Basically, the way I was raised, there were very strict guidelines of good/bad and right/wrong. Most INTJs seem to question these definitions early and often, but somehow I missed that part of the developmental process in my youth. Having been raised by an INTJ father in a highly religious household is the most likely cause. He "knew" already, and he was way smarter than me, so I took his word for it for a long time.

I've grown up like that too, but I still basically take his word for it. He always gives me referances to why he thinks that so I can research it myself though. sometimes I do and I haven't found fault with his logic yet. Although I'm sure I (and my dad) would dissagree with most people (including those here) on sevral topics.


I wonder if having that type of relation to an INTJ dad is common with INTJ kids....

[deicruxified]

i was raised by a religious catholic mother letting me recite and memorize the rosary when i was a kid. but as an intj then came enlightenmnt so i explained to mom. then she was hesitant but she accepted that faith is something she can never control in my life. so as for the concept of right or wrong, i don't see a clear cut definition of what right or wrong is because it would still depend on the situation where judgement is called for. if i see reasons as to why a certain decision is right then i think it is right no matter how many people would oppose to it. being an intj has helped me a lot... intuition backed up by logic. determining right and wrong would be best if done scientifically.

[Tsuru]

I think I've gotten more black and white in my thinking over time because I've gotten intellectually lazy as I've gotten older. And I'm only 23, cripes! D:

While I abhor the thought of taking things unquestioningly on "faith" and shutting out openness to better solutions/perspectives on things, I definitely feel like I've moved past the stage of my life where my perspectives on life, the world, right/wrong, ect, were in a state of flux to the point that the next book or debate I encountered could seriously change the way I think in terms of the fundamentals.

In a lot of ways, I think that's good. People can't accomplish much in life if they don't trust their judgment and live in relativity. Just as long as you aren't stupid about it. :P

[blckprljinju]

Well, I think being punished for trying to become "independent in thought" is certainly a good reason for why I have some dispositions that I now am trying to change but have hard time doing so..

I am convinced that my dad is ST because to him, it's God, family, work in that order. Further, he refuses to allow dissent or any independent thought that clashed against him, and as an INTJ, we've fought many times, and because of his "authority" as the father (in an Asian family... those things are very difficult to come above), I always lost, even if my logic and explanations trumped his logic and explanations. In the end, it was always "are you rebelling/arguing/disrespecting against your FATHER!!??" or "because I am the parent, and you live under my roof." usually were the end of discussion...

and when you live in such environment for 20 years or so... it really starts to shape your view of right or wrong in some manner or another... although i'm slowly managing to change my thought process (being away from home in grad school certainly helps) to what I believe and think is true...

At this point, what's right or wrong is dependant upon whether the effects of such action or decision causes ill, good, or no effect. Besides, deeming something as Right or wrong is also rather biased under which society and culture you live in. There are some instances where it's not right or wrong, and it's very difficult to choose.. what's perfectly "right" in one culture is perfectly "wrong" in another. As such, I think looking at the effects it may cause usually help me determine whether something is more right or more wrong than the other....

[PHS Philip]

I start off with a set of values. I freely admit that they're arbitrary, but because to me they're important, I'm damn well going to defend them. I've built my entire philosophy and ideas of good and evil upon a few basic values. For instance (I'll oversimplify it, just for clarity's sake, since they're hard to put properly into words), one value is that society, in some form, is important and necessary. Because of this, I say that a society that also holds up reasonably well under my other values as the right to do what it must to defend itself. It has the right to punish those who damage it. I would never say that, objectively, it has any worth to defend, but at the same time, since I hold that it has worth, I think it has the right to lash out at those whose actions could jeopardize it. Criminals should be punished not because of some objective moral code they've violated, but because they've done something that can damage society.

[bored1]

I don't keep a list of what I consider right and what I consider wrong. I often don't feel strongly about anything unless it affects me. I don't see a murder story and think "what a horrible thing to do!" but instead I analyze it and see how it was commited and what the murderer must have been thinking, from an almost purely objective standpoint. Unless something directly affects or bothers me (or a loved one), I don't care.

Something I've noticed about INTJs is that we build our own views of the world, while other types (usually Es) take what society gives them. An example of this would be me and a friend of mine (an ESFP) walking in the store. A man walks by with a popular hairstyle. She tells me "You should put your hair like that, I'm sure all your friends would think it looks good!"

I built my own opinion of the hairstyle, and told her that it shouldn't matter what my friends think, and that the hairstyle looks terrible and would be a pain to maintain.

It's this freedom that makes me love being an INTJ. :D

[Astra]

I find I'm the "odd man out" when it comes to ideas of right and wrong. Basically, the way I was raised, there were very strict guidelines of good/bad and right/wrong. Most INTJs seem to question these definitions early and often, but somehow I missed that part of the developmental process in my youth. Having been raised by an INTJ father in a highly religious household is the most likely cause. He "knew" already, and he was way smarter than me, so I took his word for it for a long time. I have grown since then, especially during the late years of college, but there are still some things that I'm very black/white on even though I haven't questioned them to a large extent.

Has anyone else had this type of experience? Do you know what likely causes led you not to question certain things?

Do you end up having relatively black/white views after you've questioned something, or are you always open to changing your mind?

There's a big emotional dimension to questioning your own parents' most dearly-held views when you are young - I think that's what makes it hard to take an objective view in that situation.

And if you let J dominate too much, it can stop you from sifting through all the other possible explanations - it somehow seems easier to just decide "I'm a Christian, all non-Christians are just plain wrong" or whatever than to delve into your views further and face the possibility that you might have been wrong.

[Fridays Child]

I'll make it easy for you: I'm always right. You may or may not also be right but that's largely irrelevant. Except to you.

Next!

[jikin]

Normally I start with what I believe are absolute rights and wrongs, I do believe that there are black and white issues. Obviously there are grey issues also, where I can't easily see which would be "right". With that I just play a balancing act. Which decision seems to fit best, or from which will the "best" outcome follow?

[Haphazard]

Eh, the way I decide what's 'right' and what's 'wrong' is pretty simple. Things are measured by:

1) how much it hurts others (not hurt = good)
2) if it is humanly possible (humanly possible = good)
3) if it is practical (practical = good)
4) fulfills the needs of myself and those close to me (fulfills needs = good)
5) fulfills my wants (fulfills wants = good)

I guess that's the rough order. Obviously they conflict sometimes but that's when I use my better judgment. Pretty much it's searching for the best outcomes. In my basic decision-making, my religion doesn't get involved.

[eli]

As much as I am logical, I have heard of people arguing themselves out of the most horrible deeds. I believe that humans are capable of twisting words in a way to make rape, murder and a number of other horrible deeds sound like grand ideas.
I trust my intuition and my humanity when I think about right and wrong. It might be less logical, but logic can be used to mask a lack of humanity or heart.

[mattosphere]

I don't believe in right and wrong in the traditional sense. I don't believe in blame since we have no choice.

I could kill a thousand people with the push of a button, I would not consider it "wrong". Simply inefficient as there would be repercussions that would prevent me from doing other things.

I hope to align my goals with humanities goals so that a conflict of interest does not arise.

This requires more CPU cycles. I will think about it some more. Good question.

[Akkarin323]

I'm black and white.
If someone violates what I consider to be another person's rights, then they're in the wrong. Those rights are absolute to me.
I'm not really sure how this happened. I saw the pointlessness in religion early and got rid of that. Since I'm curious, I wanted to know about morality, right and wrong and the like. Did a lot of thinking and sorta formed a rough moral framework that was really basic (pretty identical to what i said about rights above).
Read The Anthem, and that was it really.
I've been right ever since... =)

[acyckowski]

I'm right, anybody who disagrees with me is obviously wrong. How hard is that?


Seriously, though, to arrive at the "correct" moral action for any given situation I'd have to go through a pretty complicated system of multiple premise values and their resultant logic streams interacting with each other, and then study my own emotions and self-interest to assess my own objectivity, and even then it might be too close to call....most of the time, it's simply more efficient to follow the damn rules and get on with things.

[Max]

Has anyone else had this type of experience? Do you know what likely causes led you not to question certain things?

I can't recall ever having that type of experience because I always question everything that's put in front of me... always have. I suppose that's what made me a 'difficult' child (or at least, that's what I hear). I will never ever just believe in something because I am told to believe in it. It doesn't matter what I'm told or who tells me, I will always look it over and see for myself if it's something worth following.

[Antares]

I was drilled into me that SJ was good. For the better part of my life, I ended up believing in everything my mother taught me. I found homosexuals disgusting. I was fanatically pro-life. I valued hierarchy more than anything. But something 'snapped' in October 2007 and I started to become more and more... How to say it? INTJ...? I've basically thrown off all my morals and started anew, resorting my standing on every relevant issue. I haven't gone through all of them yet, but I've decided to remain neutral on the ones I haven't touched. In high school, you don't get a lot of time to rethink something you've believed your entire life. I just got the more important and relevant morals reformed; the others can wait until I feel like it.

[ssrprotege]

I was drilled into me that SJ was good. For the better part of my life, I ended up believing in everything my mother taught me.

I would have to agree with this, to certain extent, because I had to spend most time with my mother, an SJ. At that time, we didn't know much; so to certain extent we had no choice but to accept what parents teach. The INTJ tendency was intensified when I moved to North America. The 'snap' intensified my N in particular, making me keep questioning stuff. For example, my parents think homosexuals are disgusting, but I don't see any point in feeling so. There was less "regimentation" in North American than I was in Korea. I guess that allowed me to be more myself.

[Uytuun]

Good question...right and wrong are definitely not set in stone for me when talking about theory, but when it comes to concrete actions, I'm good. I can't bring myself to steal and I think it's a combination of Fi - instinctively not being able to do it - and contingency thinking i.e. the possibility that I might get caught isn't worth it.

[Synamon]

It is right if it works and wrong if it doesn't.

I questioned and rejected societies views of right and wrong as hypocrisy from an early age. I'm all about the shades of grey, right for one person is wrong for someone else. My shades of grey shift along the continuum, I'm open to changing my opinion. That's why I'm always right ;)

[Mozzes]

It is right if it works and wrong if it doesn't.

I questioned and rejected societies views of right and wrong as hypocrisy from an early age.

I don't think hypocrisy has anything to do with rather a view is "right" or "wrong". A mass murderer can damn murdering and a plagiarist can speak out against plagiarism; there may be a contradiction between thoughts and actions but I don't know if that inherently makes anything right or wrong, workable or not.

I'm mostly just curious how you arrived where you did. During junior high and high school I went through a similar phase of rejecting cultural beliefs and values but it was mostly as a result of asking "why?" and rarely receiving a rational answer.

[Synamon]

That is how it manifested for me as well, the dreaded word "why?".

The disconnect of actions to thoughts was what I was referring to by my inexact use of the word hypocrisy, which you picked up on. People who didn't believe the rules of right or wrong applied to them, but went around applying them to everyone else. I was also turned off by the way people followed along with societal norms like sheep without thinking for themselves. I think way too much and question way too much to do that, so I asked "why?" or played devil's advocate enough to decide that there is no right or wrong, just what works and what doesn't.

[Mozzes]

That is how it manifested for me as well, the dreaded word "why?".

The disconnect of actions to thoughts was what I was referring to by my inexact use of the word hypocrisy, which you picked up on. People who didn't believe the rules of right or wrong applied to them, but went around applying them to everyone else.

Ahhh I understand you now and I think I can relate to that. I've always lamented that few people appear to give much thought to how they behavior or what they say and claim to believe. Virtually zero introspection I guess. My line of thought was something like "If nobody knows why this idea/belief/value is correct them maybe it isn't." Which of course lead to reflection on the object in question, consideration of alternative view points as well as all sorts of good stuff such as the opposition of authority for the sake of authority, etc.

[Synamon]

I've recently had numerous debates about how shades of grey versus black/white play out for people. One of the common denominators for people who see the world as black/white are their very strong belief systems (regardless of whether they can defend them or even know why they have them). I respect others beliefs, but I lack them, don't have a need for them, therefore I see everything as grey. I don't claim it to be a better or worse way to view the world, just a different way. So I'm with you on the "If nobody knows why it is correct then maybe it isn't" line of thought.

People who see the world as black/white need solid ground, need to have defined lines and boundaries. I function just fine on shifting sands and with lines that move. "It depends" is often my answer when someone asks me if something is wrong or right. I decide what is right for me when an issue crops up and accept the consequences of my decision and action.

[Uytuun]

Myeah, people perceive INTJs as rigid, but we're not exactly black and white.

[Homini Lupus]

Myeah, people perceive INTJs as rigid, but we're not exactly black and white.

I noticed that, if you don't wave like a banner each time the wind changes, people thinks you're rigid and unable to accept change. That's because other people can't see when you're really evaluating other point of views searching for good points.

[Seppuku Savant]

For every situation that supposedly has a clear cut definition, I can think of an out. In my personal life, I do what works for me. I try to take into acct other people if they are directly involved, but I will always do what my intuition suggests.

[foroneonly]

It depends. When I came to something I didn't understand as a kid I would question it until I came up with what I thought was a logical answer. I'm open minded on some subjects but I do believe in a certain extent in absolutes depending on the subject. I can identify with having similar beliefs as my parents. However that is simply based on the coincidence that we came to the same conclusion on a lot of issues.