In the first post of this series, I posited two primary categories of laws—natural laws and created laws. I then proceeded to discuss Te, Ti, Fe, & Fi natural laws.
While created laws can be distinguished from natural laws, it is clearly the case that natural laws inform and shape our created laws. Specifically, the preferred Judging function (i.e., the dominant or auxiliary function), and to some extent the second preferred Judging function (i.e., the tertiary or inferior function), of each personality type can exert a strong influence on their preferred type of created laws. In this post, we will discuss the created laws of J types by exploring the nature of Extraverted Thinking (Te) and Extraverted Feeling (Fe) laws.
The Created Laws of J-Types: Outer/Collective Laws
When we first think of created laws, we naturally think of laws instituted by J-types (e.g., INFJs, INTJs). This is due to the fact that, per the Myers-Briggs, J-types direct their Judging process outwardly. J-types work to achieve a sense of order and control by making the outside world more orderly and predictable. This is especially true of EJs (e.g., ENTJs, ENFJs), who use Te or Fe as their dominant function. However, all J-types use either Fe or Te as their primary tool for creating a sense of order in the outside world.
Fe Laws
Fe emphasizes social and moral responsibility to one’s family, community, and even to humanity as a whole. Its aim is to facilitate social cohesiveness, to improve morale, and to promote shared values and mutual understanding. While some Fe laws may take the form of written law, many are implicit and learned through less formal means. Things like tact, manners, social etiquette, and other social rules are examples. The moral imperatives of organized religions might also be considered Fe laws.
Language itself is best understood as a type of Fe type of law. Language is the symbolic medium that brokers interpersonal communication and understanding. If we understand the development of the modern human mind to have heavily relied on our use and development of language, then, in many ways, Fe can be seen as a necessary precursor for the differentiation and development of the other typological functions. This is essentially the argument advanced by philosopher Jürgen Habermaas, whose critique of science (Te) suggests that science is rooted in a more primitive and foundational “life world.” Namely, science is founded on language and the human capacity to achieve consensus in both purpose and method (e.g., the scientific method).
Te Laws
Clearly Fe laws, such as language, are utilitarian in the sense that they allow us to understand and communicate with each other. But their ultimate emphasis is still one of felt value, of cultivating a sense of interpersonal connectedness and solidarity.
Te laws, by contrast, place greater emphasis on utility. Probably the best metaphor for the Te approach is it sees the world as a giant machine. Its objective is to understand this machine, such as through the tool of science, and to find ways of using it more efficiently and productively, such as through the development of new technologies.
Since Te tends to distrust the less formal methods of Fe, it prefers to spell everything out to the tee; it is exacting and precise, striving to ensure that everything is explicated in order to avoid interpretive errors. It is more comfortable with holding to what is written that it is with discussions of “the spirit of the law.”
A potential problem with an unchecked Te is that, in trying to be explicit and exacting, it ends up expanding the number of laws ad infinitum. This contributes to a rise in what many consider excessive bureaucracy and, with it, systemic inefficiency. Ultimately then, Te could feasibly end up working against itself.
In the next post of this series, we will explore the laws of P-types (Yes, P-types do create laws.).
Related Posts
The first post in this series: Te, Ti, Fe, & Fi Laws: Natural Laws