Adam Smith * Abraham Lincoln * Charles Darwin * Thomas Jefferson

“Architect” is another name for this Myers-Briggs personality type that seems to be all at the same time intuitive and rational, kindly and distant, human and “alien”. The letters stand for: “I” introverted; “N” intuitive; “T” thinking; and “P” perceptive. This type is full of contradictions, rich in possibilities and, like real life professional architects, noted for left/right brain balance.

INTP Architects are intellectual concept builders. They remind me of magicians and wizards. They are metaphysicians, exploring whole universes. In fact, INTPs often say they are “from another planet”. As an INTP visitor to my website put it, “Ah, if only Earthlings could see how things are done on my home planet! (I wonder where my home planet is?)”.

INTPs know that the All is Mind. All is Mental. These Architects ponder reality, the manifest world around them, looking for unifying principles. Once discerned and tested, these principles provide the logical structure on which they build strategies. Using this process, Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln, four famous INTP personality types, built a vast part of the world we live in today. Where would we be in society without their concepts?

“Enlightened self interest” became the principle economist Adam Smith used to lay the foundations for our worldwide capitalist system. “All men are created equal” was the principle President Thomas Jefferson used to craft the American Constitution. “Survival of the fittest” was the essential principle upon which Darwin based his theory of evolution. Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address embraced a rebirth of “a government of the people, by the people, for the people”.

The ideas of these four men, the organizing principles they discerned, have shaped the world we live in today and infused it with meaning. This, I feel, is their unique greatness, to discover and inspire. These men were all superbly warm communicators and zealous truth seekers as well as cool detached scientists.

Let’s take a closer look at how the INTP mind works. According to David Keirsey, whose father originated a Jungian based personality typing system similar to the MBTI which, to me, is easier to work with, “The Architect’s distant goal is always to rearrange the environment somehow, to shape, to construct, to devise, whether it be buildings, institutions, enterprises, or theories…. They look upon the world -- natural and civil -- as little more than raw material to be reshaped according to their design, as a formless stone for their hammer and chisel.” [Visit Keirsey online at www.keirsey.com]

Howard Roark, the protagonist in Ayn Rand’s novel The Fountainhead, is perhaps the quintessential fictional INTP. Keirsey quotes this passage from The Fountainhead where Rand describes Howard Roark:

“He was looking at the granite. He did not laugh as his eyes stopped in awareness of the earth around him. His face was like a law of nature -- a thing one could not question, alter or implore. It had high cheekbones over gaunt, hollow cheeks; gray eyes, cold and steady; a contemptuous mouth, shut tight, the mouth of an executioner or a saint. He looked at the granite. To be cut, he thought, and made into walls. He looked at a tree. To be split and made into rafters. He looked at a streak of rust on the stone and thought of iron ore under the ground. To be melted and to emerge as girders against the sky. These rocks, he thought, are here for me; waiting for the drill, the dynamite and my voice; waiting to be split, ripped, pounded, reborn, waiting for the shape my hands will give to them.” [pp 15-16]

Like Rourke, real life INTPs are often described as merciless and considered arrogant. I find this quite ironic in that the conclusions three out of four of these men reached were so patently egalitarian. “All men are created equal” is a truth that would be the farthest thing from self evident to an arrogant man, not to mention freeing slaves and viewing human nature as founded on an inherent sense of morality as Smith did.

On the question of arrogance, Keirsey explains, “… Architects are likely, especially in their later years, after finding out that most others are faking an understanding of the laws of nature, to think of themselves as the prime movers who must pit themselves against nature and society in an endless struggle to define ends clearly and adopt whatever means that promise success. If this is arrogance, then at least it is not vanity, and without question it has driven the design engineers to take the lead in molding the structure of civilization.”

Let's take a look at the social behavior of these INTPs to see what gives them their reputation. "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we can expect our dinner,” said Adam Smith, “but from their regard to their own interest." And how did Smith himself, the INTP, interact with these same butchers, brewers and bakers, the everyday people in his life? Smith was noted for wandering about town mumbling to himself and has been described as the most contrary dinner guest imaginable. He did not participate in the conversations going on around him and when this was called to his attention at times, would begin to lecture loudly and often incoherently as to his current opinions (also interminably). Smith, a Scotsman who did not marry and lived his whole life with his mother, had acquaintance with the leading intellectuals of his era, David Hume in England, Voltaire and Quesnay in France, and Edmund Burke, Samuel Johnson and Edward Gibbon in England. His Wealth of Nations laid the groundwork for the emergence of modern capitalism and dramatically influenced the way our economy works, something indeed to be proud of if not arrogant.

Smith is not the only INTP to eschew marriage. As a contemporary visitor to my website puts it [a non native English speaker], “Another issue not mentioned by other INTPs here is relationship and marriage, but this is not a surprise. Until quite late in my life, I don't feel any urgent need or interest for a girlfirend, and would rather spend lots of time reading and thinking about 'unrealistic' things. These are about the only odd traits noticed by my family and friends. But once I've formed a 5 years relationship, I've discovered that actually it's a better state than being completly solitude. We brokeup envetually, but I've made up my mind to start searching for a new soulmate. Being an INTP, this seems to be extremely painful and ‘unnatural’. But I believe it worth it.”

There are some other interesting coincidences here among these INTPs. Abraham Lincoln left Mary Todd waiting at the altar and spent a full year before actually going through with the marriage. According to witnesses and later historians, this grave emotional crisis (one of many to plague him throughout life) took its toll on his physical body. He became "gaunt" from that day forward.

Lincoln and Darwin were born on the same day. Both suffered from physical issues. Lincoln’s head was deformed because he had been kicked there by a horse when he was 10. This left him with some eyesight problems as well. There is also speculation that Lincoln suffered from Marfan syndrome, a dominant genetic disorder that leads to a whole variety of complications, including early death from a ruptured heart.

Darwin’s health later in life was just awful. He picked up Chagas’ disease on his travels to South America. According to Peter Salwen in a letter to The New York Times dated May 30, 1989, “As a naturalist aboard the frigate Beagle, Darwin spent five happy, strenuous years exploring some of the wildest places on earth. But once back in England, his health declined horribly. He suffered extreme lassitude and gastrointestinal pain, nausea, vomiting, sleeplessness and, ultimately, a fatal heart disease. Forced to give up field work and social life, he lived out the rest of his 71 years as a reclusive semi-invalid.” The culprit? A South American beetle. At the time, Chagas’ disease was unknown outside of South America so. Darwin's symptoms were widely misinterpreted as psychosomatic and even as God’s retribution for his theories. In spite of all this misery, more than any other man of his time, Charles Darwin epitomized the enlightened effort of Man toward a rational world order.

Thomas Jefferson led a long and more “normal” life at one level while at another level, extra-ordinary and even iconoclastic. He was married, with children, but also may have fathered a child with one of his slaves. Jefferson was an accomplished lawyer, statesman, agronomist, scientist, musician, philosopher, writer, architect and inventor. (Notice the right/left brain balance.) He was acquainted with nearly every influential person in America at the time and later many in Europe.

Now let’s hear from the INTP visitors to my website, www.theintrovertzcoach.com. I’ve noticed that the younger ones tend to describe themselves as “aliens”, visitors from another planet, as if they were maladjusted, but usually with a sense of irony. Here’s a typical example. “My friend Wayne is a psychiatrist and analyses everyone. his profesional opinion of me is that im an alien!” (age 22) and “The discovery of ‘INTP’ was the first step in proving I was not an alien. :-)” (a young woman named Charmainne).

One 15 year old says, “Personally I would find it incredibly boring if everyone in the world was modest.” 18 year old Jason writes, “Being an INTP is both curse and blessing. On the one hand, I think that awareness of the fascination of complexity and reason is a gift. On the other hand it is quite annoying to be either enerved by everyone around me or to be called an arrogant person because of my intellectuality and my search for loneliness.” [Jason later apologizes for his English as he is not a native speaker.]

Another explains, “My favorite place is inside my head, and people (including myself, but less so than others) confuse me.” His reason? “I've … discovered (to my intense surprise) that very few people besides INTPs take it for granted that nothing in the universe is certain. Because of my tendency to answer questions with "I think." or "this person believes.." people tend to find me more uncertain than I really am.” He continues, “My personality is so layered that I couldn't describe it in 10 words or even 1000 words. I kinda stopped caring about my personality though I pay special attention to understanding every other aspect of myself. I have a different personality for every person I meet, and I think that they are all genuinely me somehow. It is not forced, nor does it come from a desire to fit in. It comes naturally and it has puzzled me for a long time. When I'm not with people or when I'm engaged in my thoughts however, which is as I prefer it most of the time, I can withdraw into myself for amazingly long periods of times. Sometimes I think I would lose all awareness of a world beyond my own mind if it weren't for the people who are constantly pulling me back to it. Everything in the world is subject to analysis. The world can't simply be sensed; one must take the world in, qualify and quantify it, model it, and play with the model . . .”

A 17 year old INTP comments, “It's really shocking to see people living their routine lives without so much as a second thought about societal flaws that you see so clearly. … Generally speaking, INTPs have more to gain and more to lose, and it is their responsibility to use their gifts for the better of mankind.”

Later in life this viewpoint seems to reverse. Now it seems like everyone else is weird and the INTP is on center. This is a result of outrage (cold rage) in discovering how much other people are faking any kind of real intellectual inquiry.

Says one INTP is his early thirties “Until today I didn't know about INTP. This explains a few things. Like why I'm cold and insensitive, hate going anywhere or doing anything that someone else planned. Why I take so many notes (like the ones in front of me now). I've collected over 15 tons of industrial machinery, even a fork lift to move it around. I'm having a hard time justifying this to others because I can't tell anyone why I have them. There are a few more pieces on my list and when I get them all I am going to build the machine that I have been testing in my mind for so long. And what do you know It just might change the way the world operates. I thought I might have lost it, but now I might have to think about that…. i mean, it took me a while to realize that most of my elementary school teachers were incompetent and didn't know how to teach to different learning styles, and that i wasnt actually an idiot (im also ADD. i think most INTPs are). … i guess the trick is that once you realize that most people don't know jack and are just faking it [italics mine], you have to learn to deal with them in a way that doesn't make them look or feel stupid.”

Another 38 year old INTP puts it this way, “I work as a Civil Engineer. The complexities of arranging all the elements of site plans for large developments defies description [emphasis mine]. Most overwhelming is the need to balance conflicting variables. Deadlines, budgets, and the overlapping regulations make the assembly of a set of plans a daunting endeavor indeed. Unfortunately, I don't have to think about it much anymore, and the task is similar to finishing drywall. One area at a time until it all works. I work for a small outfit, and my office is in the attic with no one to bother me. Ideal. Not even a telephone. I live in a cabin in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley, with an hour commute each way. I listen to books on tape from the library while driving. In my spare time I read, study quantum physics and play golf. I'm quite happy.”

This next commentator, an articulate 40 year old Phd biochemist, seems to me to be the quintessential INTP! He says, “I like [my field] because the biology aspect makes the chemistry almost mind-numbingly complex [emphasis mine]. It is a great place for people who seek to try to find patterns and logic in systems so complex they seem irrational at first glance [emphasis mine]. I am pretty extreme on all aspects of INTP. I definitely need to understand the big picture. I also don't suffer illogical fools very easily [emphasis mine], although I am trying to fit them into a general pattern of human survival. I do fall in love head-over-heels. I always wondered about that, because it seems out of character, but I recently read a description of INTP that includes that trait. [Refer back to Lincoln's "emotional crises".] It is very hard for me to find social partners because I tend to focus on flaws. I am working to improve that flaw in myself.”

How exactly does this kind of mind work? One girl who visited my website compared it to a huge diesel engine starting an uphill climb … slow, but building up to speed and power. It can look feebleminded instead (or ADD?). Here’s how a programmer explains it:

“On the subject of a slower thought process I wonder if the following might be what [is] described.