Introduction to judgment, the means to an end vs. the end in of itself and why we shouldn't be able to change our desires

                                        I: INTRODUCTION TO JUDGMENT-SYSTEMS

     (1). In any system of judging information, regardless of whether it's a truth-judgment system (a system that helps you judge information as true or false) or a value-judgment system (a system that helps you judge information as ethical/evil, good/bad, like/dislike, etc.), there will always be a set of fundamental assumptions that you accept without any reason, logic, argument or evidence. These are called the axioms of the system. Other words for axioms inside Lacanian psychoanalysis are "master signifiers", "S1" or "unary signifiers".

    (2). Inside the judgment-system itself, the axioms can't be either true or false, they are simply axioms. Instead, all of the other non-axiomatic judgments of the system are judged in relation/in function of these fundamental axioms. This is why the axioms correspond to Lacan's "S1" ("unary signifiers", also known as "master signifiers"). The non-axiomatic statements (the judgments themselves) of the judgment-system correspond to Lacan's "S2" ("binary signifiers" - binary because they can take on two possible values: either true or false, good or bad, etc.).*

    (3). Inside value-judgment systems that have a practical use in making the subject make concrete decisions in their everyday life, the axioms are the objects of desire that are ends in of themselves. The "binary signifiers" (the things that can be judged as either/or in the first place: either good or bad, either like or dislike, etc.), instead, are the objects of desire that are means to an end.

    (4). The ends in of themselves are axiomatic ("unary", "S1") because they can't be judged as either/or, and they can't be judged as either/or because they're axiomatic/unary. In other words, they are like this by definition. Hence, the objects of desire that are ends in of themselves are whatever we want without any explanation, reason or argument. Hence, it is not "good" or "bad" to want them, else they wouldn't be unary. They are exactly what must be accepted in order to be able to judge other objects of desire as good or bad.

    (5). Inside the context of developing language, Lacan said that the master signifiers (S1) are that which represent the subjects for all the other signifiers, and that which allows the chain of signification to develop in the first place. We can adapt this to truth and value judgments and say that the master signifiers are those statements which are not and cannot be judged, but which allow us to judge other statements in the first place.

    (6). Practical example: Let's say that I want money. Is the money the end in of itself? No, they are useless pieces of paper in of themselves, they are actually a means to an end: a means to buy cars. Are cars the end in of itself? For many people they could be, but let's say that I don't want cars for the sake of cars, I want cars because they help me get into contact with women. Is getting into contact with women the end in of itself? For many it could be, but for me let's say it's not, let's say it's a means to an end: a means to have more sex. Is the sex the end in of itself? For many it isn't, but let's say that it is for me.

    (7). In the above example, we are presented with four objects of desire. Three of those are a means to an end (money, cars, getting into contact with women). One of those is an end in of itself (sex).

    (8). As per paragraph (4), the first three objects of desire can be judged as good or bad. The last object of desire (sex) can NOT be judged as good or bad, since it is exactly what must be accepted unconditionally in order to be able to judge the first three as good or bad in the first place. It is the "frame of reference", so to speak (in other words, the "master signifier" around which all other signifiers revolve around). Therefore, the first three objects of desire are judged as good or bad in terms of how well they are able to get me closer to the end goal (sex). Me wanting to have sex is neither good or bad inside this narrowly-focused value-judgment system, it simply is, period. For me to judge whether "it is good to want sex", I must have something else to compare it to, and that something else would have to be accepted unconditionally without reason or logic, and we would be back to where we started (to a system with unary and binary signifiers).

    (9). If someone is able to judge whether wanting sex is a good thing for them or not (ex: "It is bad to want to have sex so much because you risk STDs"), then that is sufficient evidence that in that specific moment when they said that, they placed "sex" in the position of S2, not S1. Hence, it is sufficient evidence that some other object of desire was axiomatic for them (S1, unary, end in of itself), and whether wanting sex is a good thing or not was judged in relation to how close this would get them to the axiomatic S1. For example, maybe their S1 in that moment was "health", and everything else other than health in this world is judged as good/bad depending on how it would affect their health.

    (10). A judgment-system can have more unary/master signifiers. However, a single signifier can NOT be both a unary and a binary signifier at the same time in the same philosophical system. In the particular case of value-judgment systems, a single object of desire can't be both a means to an end and an end in of itself in the same judgment system, but, a single value-judgment system can have more ends in of themselves (and obviously, more means to achieve ends).

    (11). A judgment-system is defined by which signifiers are unary and which signifiers are binary, since the status of each signifier as either unary or binary is both a sufficient and a necessary condition for a system to be a judgment-system (as per paragraph (10)). In the particular case of value-judgment systems, a value-judgment system is defined by which objects of desire are means to an end, and which objects of desire are ends in of themselves.

    (12). Since a single object of desire can be both a means to an end and an end in of itself simultaneously for one person, then the logical conclusion, following my previous definition of a judgment-system, is that a single object of desire operates in more value-judgment systems simultaneously. For example, if "having sex" is both a means to achieve another end (like having children) and an end in of itself (wanting sex for sex itself), then the human subject operates under at least two value-judgment systems: under "system 1", sex is a means to an end, and it is either good or bad depending on how well it gets the subject close to a set of other objects of desire that are ends in of themselves; and under "system 2", sex is the end in of itself, and all other objects of desire are judged in terms of how well it gets the human subject close to having sex. For example, the respective person might have one system of value-judgments where "health" is the master signifier (and everything else is either good or bad depending on how it affects their health, thus "sex" being more bad than good here) and and another system of value-judgments where "sex" is the master signifier (and everything else is either good or bad depending on how it affects their sexual life, but the sex itself being neither good or bad).

    (13). Since an end in of itself can't be either good or bad under a value-judgment system (by definition), desiring an end in of itself can't be either good or bad under a value-judgment system either. In fact, the fact that you desire it without explanation is exactly the thing which makes it an end in of itself in the first place. This is the place where we can see some real-life applications of this concept: I read a bunch of time ago about a book (the source itself doesn't matter now, my point still stands) where a psychologist explains the psychological games that humans play in romantic courtship, and how they were necessary to our evolution but are redundant now and we "should" get rid of them. What happened there? The author of the book placed courtship games and various forms of 'flirting' as an S2 inside a value-judgment system, not as an S1. In other words, they already started from the assumption that they're a means to achieve an end for humans, otherwise they wouldn't be able to judge them as "good" or "bad" in the first place. I propose an alternative interpretation: what if, for many people, the games are not a means to achieve an end (S2), but an end in of itself (S1)? If the whole purpose of some social interactions is to get enjoyment out of the games for the sake of it, then the fact that humans "play games" is neither a good or a bad thing, it simply is what it is, and in fact everything else that humans do other than those games are to be judged as good or bad depending on how well it helps them play those games (the psychological games become the S1/"master signifier", the point of reference around which everything else revolves around).

    (13). The value-judgment for experiencing the possession of an object of desire and the value-judgment for desiring an object of desire may be different under the same value-judgment system (obviously, the previous statement only applies for S2/means to achieve ends, since the S1/ends in of themselves are not judged in the first place, by definition). However, this is rarely the case. For example, Viktor Frankl developed a therapeutic method that he called "paradoxical intention", where he thinks that the more you want something, the more likely it is that the opposite might happen, and that the only way to obtain things is to not actively seek them out. For example, he proposes that people with insomnia should try to stay awake as long as possible, which will paradoxically make them fall asleep faster. Under these assumptions, an object of desire (ex: "being asleep") and the desire for that respective object of desire (ex: "wanting to fall asleep") do not have the same value: the former is good, the latter is bad. But this is the exception, it is way more common for people to place an object of desire and the desire for the respective object under the same value, since most people believe that desiring an object is more likely to make you obtain it (ex: if "sex" is good, then "wanting sex" is also good, if "sex" is bad, then "wanting sex" is just as bad, few people will make an exception to such a rule, Viktor Frankl is one of the people who made an exception).

     II: THE PARADOX OF THE SUPER-HUMAN ABILITY TO CHANGE YOUR DESIRES

    (14). SHOULD WE BE ABLE TO CHANGE OUR DESIRES? This is where we get to one of my main points in this article. I will try to argue, with the help of everything I've written until now here, that this concept is paradoxical. Suppose that a person gets the superpower of changing their desires, wishes and likes/dislikes. Everything I just listed (desires, wishes, likes, dislikes, tastes, etc.) are the "input" of any value-judgment system - in other words, we do not consciously choose to want something.

    (15). Here we can make a tangent about the popular debate of whether sexual orientation is a "choice". To ask whether sexual orientation is a choice is like asking whether you chose to like the color blue more than the color red. The answer is no, but your decisions had an effect upon your life experiences, and your life experiences had an indirect effect upon your wishes. Therefore it is plausible to imagine that, perhaps, there is a non-zero chance that your past life decisions had an indirect impact on you liking the color blue more than the color red, or liking pork more than beef, you were just unaware (unconscious) of the cause-effect relationship between your decisions and their effect on your wishes. We could make a similar argument about sexual orientation, perhaps in some people, early childhood experiences may have a partial effect upon their sexual orientation, and perhaps they made certain decisions that had an indirect and unpredictable effect upon their sexual orientation (Or not! We don't know). That does not mean that it is a choice, since it is not a conscious decision, in the worst case you may call it an "accident".

    (16). The main point to understand out of the previous paragraph is that when we say that "wishes are not a choice", we do not mean that we do not have any influence over them, we do (with the exception of the strictly inborn biological ones), we are just unaware ("unconscious") of how we influence them. When I say that I did not choose to like philosophy more than gaming as a hobby, that doesn't mean that my decisions did not have an impact on me liking philosophy more than gaming, it means that I wasn't aware of how my decisions impacted my likes and dislikes.

    (17). Hence, wishes/tastes/likes/desires are only an "input" in the superficial sense of the term, since they are both the input and the output of our actions, they are only perceived as an input by the conscious mind (the "ego"). It is here that Albert Bandura's concept of "reciprocal determinism" may come in handy to help us understand this: our environment shapes our actions just like our actions shape our environment, therefore the "determinism" of his psychological theory goes both ways. Similarly enough, our desires and tastes influence our actions just like our actions influence our desires and tastes, it is just that in the latter direction (actions -> desires/tastes) the effect is almost always uncertain and unpredictable.

    (18). We can now come back to the point of paragraph (14): since our decisions require an "input", that input being desire (what you want), the concept of changing what you want becomes stuck in an "infinite loop", a permanent state of "checkmate-ing" yourself. For those who have ever written code: it is analogous to those moments in programming where a for-loop or while-loop gets 'stuck' in an infinite loop and the program cannot continue to execute whatever is after it (and the end result is "doing nothing forever"). Similarly enough, a hypothetical super-human ability to change your desires, I argue, would get you stuck in an endless state of doing nothing. Since changing your desires now becomes a decision, this decision needs an input as well, and the input of decisions is desire. However, wasn't desire the output now? It is here that we see the dangers in becoming aware of the ways in which we influence our desire: if I get to "choose what I want", then what will determine how much I want to change what I want? Let's say that I enjoy walks in the park more than listening to music. Let's say that I "want to want" listening to music more than walks in the park. Why do I want to want listening to music more? What if I change my desire for changing my desire - what if I want to stop wanting music more than I want to want walks in the park? This can go on to infinity: what if I want to want to want to...

    (19). We see here a philosophical proof of why humans evolved to have an unconscious as well: humans need to be unaware of the ways in which their decisions shape their own desires in order to be able to live and survive in the first place, even if our desires are partially the output of our actions, they need to be perceived as an input. Otherwise, we would not have any "input" for making any decision, getting stuck in tautological infinite loops and remaining in a catatonic state forever. If humans were to be aware of how to shape their own desires and wishes, their reasoning would not be linear but circular: they'd know what decisions to make to stop wanting to live, and suddenly dying would become a "good" thing. And after they start wanting to die, they'd be able to know what decisions to make in order to start wanting to live again. But why would they want to want to live or want to want to die in the first place? If there is a reason for such a thing, why would they want to want to want to live or want to want to want to die? And so on. At one point this has to stop in order for humans to be able to survive, and that exact point is the unconscious: the gap of knowledge between cause and effect, between our actions (causes) and the effect they have on our desires.

    (20). Such an ability to change your desires is not the end of the world since we can do it anyway with psychology, especially behaviorism. For example, humans have already discovered how to condition themselves using classical or operand conditioning in order to change their desires. But at a certain level, we need to be at least partially unaware of how to shape our desires, otherwise our logic/reasoning would stop having "a beginning and end", it would stop making sense. This is why having an unconscious is a given.

    (21). As an extra note, you can see how behaviorism is the psychological school of objectifying humans and reducing their subjectivity as if they were robots/machines that could be programmed into anything. This is not only due to its determinism, as many argue, since psychoanalysis is also deterministic but it doesn't erase human subjectivity (under psychoanalysis, you can be a subject and also lack free will). This is contrasted with the humanistic school (both a subject and a free will-agent) and with the radically behavioristic school (humans as objects and without free will). Take, for example, one useful tool from behaviorism that many students use: classical conditioning. If you find yourself lacking in motivation (it's hard for you to want to do schoolwork), you can reward yourself after you complete a task in order to change what you want, such that after you do this, you will literally start wanting to do schoolwork more (since your brain now associates schoolwork with ice-cream, or chocolate, or whatever pleasant thing you rewarded yourself with). Notice what happens here: the human subject splits themselves in two - "I am two people at once" - the person changing the desire and the person receiving the changed desire. This is radically different from how we usually experience life, since we perceive our wishes/desires as an "input" that we have no control over, what we want is something that "happens" to us, as if there is some external being implanting our wishes into our head. Behaviorism, on the other hand, is the science of humans mastering themselves ("I am the cause of my desire").

    (22). We see how the behaviorist philosophy can only work partially, which is why modern psychology now embraces partial behaviorism but not strict/radical behaviorism. Radical behaviorism is a contradiction, since if you were to be able to change all of your desires (in a similar way to how the student changed their own desires about schoolwork through classical conditioning), then there would be no way to make the decision of what desires to change in the first place. In other words: in order to make the decision of whether you want to change your desires or not, you must first have to decide whether a desire is "good" or "bad", and if the desire is "bad", then you change it (through classical conditioning, or whatever tools we may discover in the future). But in order to judge whether a desire is "bad", then this implies judging how well this desire is affecting your ability to get closer to another object of desire, which must be accepted unconditionally as "input". Without at least one object of desire that you want "for no reason" (an S1, an "end in of itself"), it is impossible to judge other desires as "good" or "bad" in the first place! Hence, there must be at least one thing that you want, at any given moment, without being able to change the fact that you want it. If you do not have at least one fixed, unchangeable desire at any given moment (if you do not have a "master signifier"), then the end result is "a state of doing nothing": catatonia, nihilism, etc.

    (23). Let's apply what I said in the previous paragraph to the student using classical conditioning. The student does not like doing homework. In order for him to decide that it would be beneficial to like it more, he must have some other, more important goal in mind that is an end in of itself. Therefore, liking doing homework would be beneficial since it would make him more likely to do homework, and doing more homework would be beneficial since it would get him closer to some other goal, and that other goal is what he wants with no explanation and with no way to change it (ex: "successful career", or something like that). Therefore, we see that even in such an example, there must be at least one unchangeable desire at any given moment in time.

    (24). From the previous paragraph, (23), it naturally follows that Carl Jung was right that neurosis is caused by "a tension of opposite, conflicting forces" inside the psyche. What causes emotional struggle is inner conflict, that inner conflict is caused by our own desires and likes being in conflict with one another. For example, the student wants to be successful, but does not like to do homework. Hence, whatever decision he makes in this state (either doing homework and being successful or not doing homework and not being successful), he will have something to lose anyway. Emotional well-being is achieved when such inner tensions are as small as possible: when your own desires are in a "win-win" scenario (for example, a person liking both doing homework, as well as the consequences of doing homework). We could say, in other words, that inner conflict is when a person enjoys an activity but not its consequences, or vice-versa: when they enjoy its consequences but not the activity itself. Or, even better: inner conflict is when an object of desire is a means to an end in one value-judgment system but not an end in of itself in another, and emotional well-being is when an object is both an end in of itself and a means to an end in different value-judgment systems. For example, if the student likes doing homework, then "homework" becomes both a means to an end to achieve another pleasant goal ("successful career"), as well as an end in of itself (he likes doing homework and would do it even if it wouldn't guarantee any other return, just for the sake of it). Therefore, when an object of desire is both a means to an end and an end in of itself, it becomes a "win-win", it is good because of two reasons: it directly gives pleasure just for the sake of it, and it also indirectly gives pleasure by getting one closer to another object of desire. Thus, it removes the need for compromise-formation. Here is an example for the removal of the need to make compromises in the first place: "Find work that you enjoy, and you will never work a day in your life".

    (25). The reality principle, as described by Sigmund Freud, is the ability to desire a means to an end that is not an end in of itself in any value-judgment system of the subject. In other words, we engage in the "reality principle" whenever we try to obtain something that is not desirable in of itself in any way, but that helps us get closer to something else that we truly want for no apparent reason (an end in of itself). Terms related to the reality principle are "sacrifice", "trade-off", "work", "will-power" and "self-control". The previous five terms are five specific examples of the reality principle. For example, I do not enjoy going to work in of itself in any way, but I still do it because it gets me closer to something else that I truly enjoy in of itself (it gets me closer to money, which gets me closer to objects that I like for no reason, that are an end in of itself). The concept of dieting is another example of the reality principle: short-term gratification ("the pleasure principle") would drive me to eat a piece of cake, but the reality principle will drive me to control myself in order to lose weight and gain more pleasure on the long-term from the act of being thin. Here, I am pursuing the act of not eating, which is a means to an end but not an end in of itself in any way, it is a means of achieving a healthier and more attractive body, which is the actual end in of itself for many.

    (26). Ambivalence, as described by Freud, could be defined with my own terms introduced here as a subject's attitude towards an object which is only a means to an end and not an end in of itself. The way Freud described ambivalence is as "mixed feelings" towards something, as something that is both good and bad in certain ways. Here, an object is bad because it does not produce any pleasure in of itself, only pain, but it is good because it gets as closer to another thing that produces pleasure (ex: work, for most people, since most people don't enjoy their work, but they only enjoy their salary). Compromise formation, as described by Freud, is the sum of all mechanisms that attempt to resolve ambivalence. The reality principle is one such mechanism. Defense mechanisms like repression, reaction-formation, projective identification, etc. also work as a means of compromise-formation.

                    III: APPLICATIONS INSIDE SOCIONICS/JUNGIAN TYPOLOGY

    (27). "Information elements" ("IEs", for short), inside Socionics, are subsets of all the information in the world. Classical Socionics defines 8 information elements: Ti, Te, Fi, Fe, Si, Se, Ni, Ne. The information elements are defined by intersections of dichotomies. A dichotomy is a way to split all the information in the world into two (in this context): for example, perception vs. judgment. The 8 information elements from classical Socionics can be thus, defined, in multiple ways, as intersections of log_2 (8) = 3 dichotomies. Ti ("Introverted Thinking") can be defined as external, rational and introverted information. Ne ("Extraverted iNtuition") can be defined, for example, as internal, irrational and extraverted information, but it could also be defined as abstract, static and irrational as well.

    (28). There is no "correct" way to group information into subsets and no "correct" answer to "how many information elements are there". The specific ways in which classical Socionics splits the entirety of information into 2^3 = 8 subsets is more or less arbitrary. Viktor Gulenko, for example, splits information into 16 different information elements (16 subsets) by splitting each of the first 8 into 2 more subsets each.

    (29). I will propose alternative definitions for some of the dichotomies and IEs in Socionics, using the definitions introduced in this article.

    (30). "Judgment" or "rational information" can be defined as information about binary signifiers (S2). Binary signifiers are signifiers that are either true or false, either good or evil, either "like" or "dislike", etc. Judgment is that which helps us differentiate between what is true or false, what is good or evil, etc.

    (31). "Thinking" or "Logic" can be defined as truth-judgment: information about things that are either true or false.

    (32). Thinking can be further split into two: Introverted Thinking ("Ti", for short) or Extraverted Thinking ("Te", for short). Ti is relational or relative truth judgment, conclusions that you can arrive at without any direct observation of external reality (examples: mathematics, logic, etc.). Te is absolute truth judgment or "facts": conclusions that you can arrive at only by using direct observation of the world. This distinction was already made by David Hume hundreds of years ago, he just didn't call it "Ti" or "Te". For example, mathematical truth-judgments like "2+2=4" or the Pythagorean theorem are abstract enough that, hypothetically speaking, one could arrive at such conclusions even if they were a vegetable with all 5 of their senses cut off. You could spend your time in a sensory-deprivation tank and still come up with such statements, and those are in the domain of Ti. Te, on the other hand, is truth-judgment that requires at least some direct observation of the world: historical events, laws in chemistry, etc. Te is called "extraverted" because it requires interaction with the outside world that Ti ("introverted" thinking) does not require.

    (33). "Feeling" can be defined as value-judgment: information about things that are either good or evil, good or bad, wanted or unwanted, useful or useless, valuable or useless, like/dislike, etc. 

    (34). Feeling can be further split into two: Introverted Feeling ("Fi") or Extraverted Feeling ("Fe"). Fe is absolute value-judgment: whether something is good or not in of itself (ex: "Will this give me pleasure?"). You can see how Fe includes information about whether a signifier is unary or binary. This is a sort of meta-thinking: whether a signifier is unary or binary is a binary type of information, hence why it falls under "judgment". In other words, Fe asks: "Is this object a means to an end or an end in of itself?".

    (35). Fi is information about relative value-judgment: how to change desire. For example, information about how to change desires inside a relationship, how to make someone like you on the long-term, how to maintain a friendship (and thus change someone else's attitude towards you), etc. Fi is exactly information about the seemingly "paradoxical" turning of the input into an output. An interesting question could be posed: is the reason that I find the changing of desire paradoxical simply because I am of the NeT/ILE personality type (and Fi is my vulnerable function)?

    (36). "Work" is a subset of the reality principle and it falls under Te because it is information about how good of a means to an end is an object for another object which is an end in of itself. This requires no value-judgment, this is a truth judgment (ex: "Will doing X help me obtain Y?").

    (37). "Perception" or "irrational information" can be defined as information about unary/master signifiers (S1). Unary signifiers are signifiers that are, and that's it, they aren't this or that, either/or, they simply are.

    (38). Perception can be split into Sensing and iNtuition. Sensing is perception about the physical world ("what exists"). iNtuition is perception about the metaphysical world ("what could exist").

    (39). It must be pointed out that judging whether something exists or not falls into the domain of Te, not Se. It is only after one accepts what exists, through other IEs like Te, that "what exists" becomes an input (perception), and it falls under the domain of sensing.

    (40). I will not attempt to further split iNtuition into introverted and extraverted, and same with Sensing, since this is only the beginning of a larger project of transforming Socionics from a pseudoscientific psychology of personality, into a system of analytic philosophy where we theoretically prove everything using Ti (using my own Introverted Thinking), in a similar way that we could consider "math" a form of "doing analytic philosophy before it was considered cool" (before the term 'analytic philosophy was even invented'). More stuff coming soon, perhaps.

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*: What I describe in the first paragraphs about S1, especially in paragraph (2), has also been stated by Hegel in paragraph 81 of The Phenomenlogy of Spirit:

"Just as these preliminary and general remarks about the manner and the necessity of the progression have been made, so too it might be useful to recall something about the method of the way it is carried out. This exposition, represented as the conduct of science in relation to knowing as it appears, and represented as the investigation and testing of the reality of cognition, seems incapable of taking place without some kind of presupposition which underlies it as a standard. For the testing consists in the application of an accepted standard, and in the resulting equality or inequality between the standard and what is tested lays the decision as to whether what is tested is correct or incorrect. The standard, likewise science itself if science were to be the standard, is thereby accepted as the essence, or as the in-itself. But here, at the point where science first comes on the scene, neither science itself nor anything else has justified itself as the essence or as the in-itself, and without something like that taking place, it seems that no examination can take place at all."