Section 6

LITVINENKO’S DIALECTICAL SOCIONICS

OR SOCIONIC CATEGORIES IN THE DISTORTING MIRROR OF A SIMPLIFIED DIALECTICS

Igor Litvinenko is a young and talented scholar. He has entered socionics thoroughly and on many questions holds his own deeply grounded opinion. Connected with him is an interesting methodological problem, which can be formulated thus: does a scholar’s worldview matter when he constructs some theory or grounds his convictions? He has written many works, but I consider that the article “THE FUNDAMENTALITY OF MODEL ‘A’ — A SYNTHESIS OF THE FORMAL AND THE SUBSTANTIVE IN THE SYSTEMS APPROACH” expresses his dialectical views most fully. To the analysis of this article I have added an analysis of his other most striking works.

Author: Keywords: socionics, informational model of the psyche, model A, psychology, methodology, dialectics, functions of informational metabolism.

Commentary: The article’s keywords point to an attempt to approach the solution of the most fundamental problems of socionics using the most fundamental methodological means — among which, of course, belongs dialectics, as a method widely used, past and present, in materialist Soviet science, which made no small contribution to European natural science. Let us see how the author manages to cope with this far from simple task, and how he disposes of a method that acquitted itself quite well in Soviet science, though it gained no currency in Western countries — which is of interest in itself.

Litvinenko: The aim of this article is to ground the fundamental character of the aspects of the informational flow (IF) and of the socionic model A.

Commentary: A good beginning… True, already here we run into a certain deformation of the basic concepts of socionics — Aušra Augustinavičiūtė proposed the term “informational aspects,” which conceptually differs somewhat from the term “aspects of the informational flow.” The second concept presupposes the existence of a flow and its partitioning, which may have a subjective character. The first concept is closer to an ontological understanding of information and its components — though either concept, depending on the scholar’s worldview premises, can be interpreted in both an objective-ontological and a subjectivist key.

Litvinenko: It is also grounded that the aspects of the IF and model A are, in the worldview plane, a consequence of dialectical philosophy, and, in the general-methodological plane, a continuation of the systems approach, which is in turn based on dialectics.

Commentary: Neither the IA nor model “A” can be a consequence of dialectical philosophy — this is an incorrect use of words and concepts. To assert such a thing would be the greatest impudence on the part of that selfsame philosophy. Though — why mince words — for 70 years it was the faithful handmaiden of the ideology of the genocide of the peoples of Eastern Europe, and in this sense one could say that this genocide was a consequence of dialectical materialism. And, of course, the systems approach has its own proper foundations, and only the unceremoniousness of Soviet philosophers can extend so far that the Party begins to teach that “gases expand when heated on the basis of materialist dialectics and the systems theory founded upon it,” and that systems theory was laid down not by, say, Bertalanffy, but by the Great Leader and Teacher of All Peoples. So let us better do without dialectical demagoguery and solve problems proceeding from concrete circumstances.

Let us also note that the author has implicitly introduced a distinction between the “worldview” and “general-methodological” planes, which requires at least some clarification. It is also obvious that the author assigns dialectical philosophy to the worldview plane and the systems approach to the general-methodological one. Such an opposition can at once be held against the author as ungrounded — simply because the author has given no corresponding definitions. Why can dialectical philosophy not be assigned to the general-methodological plane? Nothing of the sort — Soviet philosophers always considered dialectical philosophy, alongside the recognition of the world’s materiality, the foundation of their worldview. And why can the systems approach not be assigned to the worldview plane? Nothing of the sort — the systems approach is not only easy to make the foundation of a worldview; for many scholars it actually is one. It is appropriate here to ask the question: “and what else could serve as the foundation of a worldview?” Well, for example, faith in God. And there existed scholars who made significant discoveries in natural science while sincerely believing in God. Such, for example, was the outstanding French biologist Cuvier, who discovered the “antediluvian animals” and drew the conclusion that God had re-created the animal world several times — that is, performed repeated creations. Of Cuvier one may assert that the concepts of dialectics were alien to him; but to deny that in his worldview, and along with it in his methodology, there were elements of systems theory is quite impossible. Cuvier, of course, had command of Linnaeus’s systematics, and systematics was a bringing-into-system, however simplified that concept may have been at the time. Linnaeus’s systematics was the first natural-scientific classification in biology, and a classification is a variety of system. Of course, in such cases one is supposed to give a definition of a system, and although by now there exist rather many of them, the general-scientific notion of a system reduces to this: a system is an ordered set of elements. But is it not characteristic of a scholar to understand the object of his research as an ordered set of elements? It is not hard to imagine certain initial stages of the collection of empirical material where orderliness may be absent. Thus in chemistry, in the early days of the discovery of the chemical elements, their set was not perceived as ordered — yet the very discovery of elementary entities is the intellect’s first touch upon the structure of the object of research. And structure, in the general-scientific sense, is the ordered connection of the elements of the object of research. It is not hard to see the presence of common semes in the concepts of structure and system.

This small excursus into the history of science was made here in order to show the universality of the systems approach for science, it being science’s most general foundation in both the worldview and the general-methodological plane. It is not hard to understand that a scholar’s worldview, as the most general part of his notions about the world, is always the foundation of his methodological complex. Into a scholar’s methodological complex may enter some quantity of concrete intellectual and empirical instruments, but the worldview scheme is always included in it. Therefore the opposition the author has drawn between the worldview and the general-methodological, without clarification of details, is not correct — which casts doubt on the correctness of all his further reasonings as well, making them simplified, approximate, and in concrete cases erroneous and homespun. By the latter I mean the author’s own inventions, unconnected with general-scientific achievements.

Litvinenko: Being, at the level of a particular science, the socionic model, model A acquires universality not only as a worldview scheme and the foundation of a general methodology, but also as an instrument of cognition in other particular sciences.

Commentary: A somewhat elevated style of exposition for what is, on the whole, a simple truth about the effectiveness of model “A” — but it is still unclear why one should proclaim it a worldview scheme and the foundation of a general methodology. This contradicts the scope of the concept of model “A,” though it is fair with respect to socionics as a whole. And, of course, from declarations one must pass to deeds.

Litvinenko: Recently, in connection with the necessity of grounding the scientific foundations of socionics, many attempts have appeared to rethink the socionic model “A” [8].

Commentary: Well, if by “recently” one means the 25 years since socionics appeared in Kyiv — but earlier it was subjected to rethinking by Aušra’s first students — Medvedev, Reinin, and, quite radically indeed, Kalinauskas — and then by Bukalov, Gulenko, Ermak, Shulman, Savchenko, Shteinikov, Kalman, and many others; and now, here, Litvinenko.

Litvinenko: Representatives of the particular sciences, especially psychologists, are trying with all their might to find socionics’ place in the system of the sciences, so as to relieve their emotional tension at the impossibility of correlating the new with their old notions.

Commentary: Beautifully said, and I can add to it — since I communicated directly with the instructors of the psychology department of Kyiv State University — that they found this defensive formula, designating socionics as, “well, one more typology, and not the most successful one…”

Litvinenko: In this connection one can say that the methodological levels described by G. M. Andreeva in the textbook “Social Psychology” allow socionics to occupy its place on each of them. These levels, in order of decreasing generality, are: 1) worldview; 2) general-scientific methodology; 3) particular-scientific methodology; 4) the methods and procedures of a particular science.

Commentary: As a working scheme of Andreeva’s — understandable; but as a fundamental construct, without grounding and definitions, it is too approximate, and it most certainly does not follow from dialectical materialism. It is curious how Andreeva manages to oppose worldview to general-scientific methodology — without definitions? That is, in violation of general-scientific methodology… It is likewise unclear how particular-scientific methodology differs from the methods of a particular science… well, “procedures” — understandable; but “methods”? This scheme is one example of the degenerate use of dialectical materialism. It is wretched and vulgar, but quite in the spirit of the dissertation activity of the nomenklatura workers of science.

Litvinenko: One can say that any particular science correlates in some fashion with these levels — on some it is based (1–2), on others it is located (3), the rest it completes (4).

Commentary: Well, if Litvinenko discerns a deep meaning in Andreeva’s scheme and wishes to fit himself into it, that is of course his affair — only he should not drag all of science in there; that is fraught with oversimplification.

Litvinenko: The cardinal distinction of socionics is that it “does” all of this with each of these levels, and that is why it is so difficult — or, more precisely, impossible — to find its place on any one of them.

Commentary: What is important here is that Litvinenko recognizes the cardinal distinction of socionics — only he ought not to measure it by the scheme he has grown fond of. It suffices to say that socionics has fundamental status.

Litvinenko: The motley tribe of socionicists enthusiastically masters whatever each prefers: some are interested in the procedures of TIM identification, some in refinements within the edifice of socionics itself in the theoretical and practical plane, and so on. But even when occupying oneself with the problems of TIM identification in practice (level 4), it is impossible to stand apart from the most fundamental, worldview level.

Commentary: One can agree that the tribe of socionicists is motley and has no shortage of enthusiasm; but perhaps the author does not notice that with this assertion he renders Andreeva’s scheme unnecessary.

Here I quite accept the author’s position, but with the correction that if socionics completely covers the worldview of any given socionicist, then this can be called nothing other than a worldview pathology. Simply because socionics is a concrete science, and although it commands great methodological potential, it nonetheless cannot cover all aspects of a person’s understanding of and relation to the world.

Litvinenko: That is, from the outset it is as it were self-evident that at minimum there is no single norm, but rather 16 different variants of it in the informational functioning of the human psyche.

Commentary: This assertion in the text of the book follows immediately after the preceding one, and some logical connection is preserved here. In the theory of tropes this connection is called an anacoluthon, in literature an ellipsis, and in logic an enthymeme, or a syllogism with an omitted premise. The preceding text was, after all, not about any norm… and therefore the use of the connective “that is” is prepared by nothing.

And, naturally, to say that something is “from the outset as it were self-evident” is inadmissible in science — everything must be analyzed and defined.

As for the norm, there is some subtle substitution present here in Litvinenko… a norm is a conventional concept, and if it has been introduced, it is single, like a law… another matter is one’s attitude toward it — many people violate norms and laws, and this too may depend on the TIM… therefore I would say that norms and laws are the same for everyone but are perceived differently… That is how two different socionicists — Litvinenko and Churyumov — understand these assertions… As an example, an appeal to the multiplication table will serve here: regardless of your TIM and your attitude toward it, you will have to use it if you want, for example, to calculate the cost of goods in a way comprehensible to other people.

Second, as it turned out, some socionicists absolutize this myth of 16 different variants of understanding everything. And they go so far as to consider not only possible but fully certain the existence of 16 different socionics — and by 2010 there proved to be more than two and a half dozen of them. Moreover, some of them differ not in minor details but reach the point of paradigmatic differences, so that indeed different socionics result — albeit with identical or nearly identical functional aims: all of them recognize, at the least, the existence of 16 TIMs, the possibility of determining them, the typological dependence of certain elements of the behavior of specific people, and the difference of certain parameters of the relations of specific people depending on their TIMs.

Here we encounter a sophism — a rather primitive one, incidentally. As is known, a sophism is an assertion that looks plausible but is in its essence erroneous. For example, typological differences do not negate the universality of the human capacities connected with performing necessary work, and all people, after a fashion, cope with their everyday cares. Moreover, the existing rigid specialization by no means necessarily corresponds to typological recommendations. Among politicians, among housewives, among performers, and among plumbers, people of all types are encountered, although their statistical distribution in each subject area may differ. People of any type cook their own food and sew buttons onto their own clothes — but this depends not on their types but on their social position. Therefore in the dry residue there remain only recommendations about a greater or lesser correspondence between the TIM and possible professional activity. And such recommendations must be given with maximal psychological tact, and in no case imposed. The same concerns partner preferences. All the more can there be no talk of 16 socionics. The situation that has taken shape is the result of the period of socionics’ wild development, and is connected, first of all, with defects in the methodological complexes of socionicist-theoreticians. As for socionicist-practitioners, they make their choice not at all from theoretical considerations.

Litvinenko: People of various basic educations come into socionics, and all of them, thanks to its strong methodology and methodological charm, successfully solve the problems of their “native” particular sciences. Since these sciences are likewise based on definite worldview and general-methodological foundations, interest arises in how socionic methodology correlates with their paradigms.

Commentary: People of various basic educations come into socionics, and to many of them it seems so simple and accessible that many of them immediately try to improve it, without thinking much and “nothing doubting” that its accessibility and simplicity may prove deceptive. And so, as a result, we have more than two dozen paradigmatic heresies of socionics. Moreover, the authors of many of them are incapable of coming to terms with one another and arriving at a single understanding of its basic concepts. It is also doubtful that “all of them successfully solve the problems of their particular sciences…” Concrete examples would be most welcome here.

Litvinenko: At the present time it has already become a commonplace to mention the systems approach and the theory of models as foundations of socionics.

Commentary: Regarding the systems approach I disagree (see CCS [The Cheshire Cat’s Smile]) — I do not agree that systems theory was placed by Aušra Augustinavičiūtė at the foundation of socionics. Her methodology relied on Jung, on the psychological research contemporary to her, and on Marx’s economic theory, which as an economist she knew well and referred to more than once as an essential element of her understanding of both psychology and socionics. As for the theory of models, it is rather that theory itself which can be replenished at socionics’ expense, and even derived from — or at least built on the pattern of — socionics, since here, for the first time in the history of science and of model theory, the concept of a model is constructed deductively, and only the general-scientific term is borrowed…

Litvinenko: In this article an attempt is made to consider the transition from the worldview level to the level of general-scientific methodology, as well as the role and place of socionics in this transition and its influence on everything that corresponds to these methodological levels in modern science.

Commentary: What might the expression “the transition from the worldview level to the level of general-scientific methodology” mean? Does the author have in mind the connection between a scholar’s worldview and his methodological complex? Or is a theoretical scheme for the transformation of worldview into methodology hidden behind this? Or is it simply verbal carelessness?

Judging by all the further text, Litvinenko intends to use his dialectical-materialist worldview to unfold the methodological component contained in it — which, of course, could be expressed more simply by saying: “And now we will apply dialectics, as the methodology of dialectical materialism, to the grounding of socionics.” For that is precisely what he has in mind, and everything else — that is, Andreeva’s scheme — he will not use further. And indeed, that is what he intends to do — see the next paragraph.

Litvinenko: The aim of this article is to ground the fundamental character of the aspects of the informational flow (IF) and of the socionic model “A.” It is also grounded that the aspects of the IF and model “A” are, in the worldview plane, a consequence of dialectical philosophy, and, in the general-methodological plane, a continuation of the systems approach, based, in its turn, on dialectics.

Commentary: I performed the grounding of the fundamental character of the aspects of the informational flow (IF) and of the socionic model “A” in CCS, but it will be interesting to see how the author does it. Moreover, as was said above, I am against the claim that “the aspects of the IF and model ‘A’ are, in the worldview plane, a consequence of dialectical philosophy, and, in the general-methodological plane, a continuation of the systems approach, based, in its turn, on dialectics.” This is a misunderstanding founded on the incorrect use of words and concepts. Ontological elements, among which I count the IA, cannot be the consequence of any philosophy whatsoever. It is philosophy that is the consequence of one or another understanding of the world’s constitution. As for model “A,” it is the consequence of Aušra’s synthesis of the information she had accumulated, drawn from various sources — including general psychology, Jung’s psychological types, Marx’s economic theory, Kępiński’s reasonings on informational metabolism, certain data from the thermodynamics of the four-stroke internal combustion engine — but all such sources are very hard to account for: Aušra, no doubt, read many books. And model “A” itself reflects Aušra’s understanding of the structure of the psyche and the character of the informational processes in it. To describe more precisely the result of Aušra’s scientific creativity, which model “A” became, is very difficult. But to consider that Aušra built her model “on the basis of dialectical philosophy” — for this, first, there are no sufficient grounds discoverable in her works, and, second, philosophical dialectics is merely a heuristic scheme that can suggest in which direction one may seek the sources of an object’s self-movement and development, but which in no way predetermines the object’s structure.

Aušra used the term IA — informational aspects — and not aspects of the IF. Since the concepts of “IF” and “information” are not identical, the replacement of one by the other is fraught with hidden distortions and must be specially justified. The assertion that “the aspects of the IF and model ‘A’ are, in the worldview plane, a consequence of dialectical philosophy, and, in the general-methodological plane, a continuation of the systems approach, based, in its turn, on dialectics” is some sort of misunderstanding — see above.

Fig. 1. “Yin-yang” — an illustration of dialectics.

Litvinenko: The largest place in the worldview foundations both of the systems approach and of socionics is occupied by the dialectical law of the “unity and struggle of opposites.” In socionics it finds its reflection in the pairedness of all the categories used (the binary features of the IF aspects, the Reinin features and a part of them — the Jung basis, etc.).

Commentary: In the critique of dogmatically degenerate dialectics, this constant imposition of dialectical dogma in the form of concrete examples of water turning into ice or steam, etc., received the name “illustration-mongering” — when the study of the concrete cause-and-effect mechanisms of phenomena’s realization is renounced and everything is replaced by “vivid examples.” And here too the author discovers “confirmation” of dialectics in the form of vivid, ready-to-use examples — the pairedness of all the categories used… So no, it is all the other way round: from socionics one might derive some variety of dialectics — but by no means the reverse.

Litvinenko: Opposition-setting as a methodological device permeates the edifice of socionics through and through, not bypassing even that region called “symbolic socionics,” where everything is based on a distinctive interpretation of the “yin-yang” dyad. Its image (Fig. 1) is the best illustration of the dialectical worldview and thinking, and therefore all manner of theoretical constructions are successfully erected upon it. In this sense it can also be used as a convincing, reliable, and scientific grounding of such constructions.

Commentary: It has long been considered bad taste to identify, “nothing doubting,” concepts from different subject areas — the infantile disorder of hasty identification… Every system of concepts grows on its own proper basis, in its own historical and social setting, and preserves its own coefficient of irreducibility. In comparativist studies a careful analysis of the compared concepts is carried out, and only after that is a conclusion drawn about the degree of their similarity (homeomorphism). Of course, one should not forget that in Soviet times, comparing Marxist-Leninist (what a word!) dialectics with some metaphysical monad or other was tantamount to a death sentence. So — careful now…

Litvinenko: So, saying “yin-yang” while meaning “dialectics,” one can attempt to answer the fundamental question which so far is only being posed in socionics — “Why is model ‘A’ precisely as it is?”

Commentary: “…we say Party, and we mean…” — but the author is wrong to say that the question of the essence of model “A” is only being posed in socionics. The author is simply unacquainted with the works of his colleagues — I proposed a possible solution to this problem in CCS. No concrete analysis of my proposal from my theoretician colleagues followed. Such behavior by scholars in science cannot be considered normal. For the answer to the question “why socionics is precisely as it is,” see [11].

Litvinenko: The dialectical worldview gives the understanding that development proceeds in a spiral (Fig. 2).

Commentary: A meticulous mathematician, in full accordance with the rules of NLP, will here be sure to ask: “And which spiral, exactly, do you have in mind?” If, for example, it is the spiral from a spring mattress, then it has a quite concrete construction; and spirals in general do not exist — except, perhaps, in dialectics…

Litvinenko: Opposite tendencies, entering into “struggle,” “rock”…

Commentary: That is just it — one is forced to use quotation marks, whereas in reality there may be no struggle at all and no one rocking anything… these are all metaphors…

Litvinenko: …a dynamic process, like a pendulum, and its projection onto the time axis leads to the opening of the circle into a coil of a spiral. That is, returning to the starting point after a certain time (which, incidentally, is called the period of the cycle), the process finds itself at a new level. And it is precisely in this sense that the saying about the impossibility of “stepping into the same river twice” is understood.

Fig. 2. The spiral of development.

Commentary: As far as I understand, this is no dialectics at all, but quite standard mathematical images — true, not tied to initial conditions; and what the author calls a spiral turns out on inspection to be a helix, which has acquitted itself excellently in technical devices, but which smacks of a speculative metaphysical scheme as soon as someone tries to stretch it over real processes.

Litvinenko: For a more detailed understanding of how opposites create a circular cycle, one should consider a coil of the spiral of development (Fig. 3).

Commentary: Actually, I have never encountered anything of the kind about the creation of a circular cycle in textbooks on dialectics — so, apparently, this is the author’s personal contribution…

Litvinenko: The opposites “1”—“3” and “2”—“4,” which are also opposite to each other or at minimum independent, are as a rule depicted statically and schematically in the form of a Cartesian coordinate system. The ordinate and the abscissa, each having within itself a plus and a minus — such is the general template for more particular constructions. In Fig. 3.b) the coil of development is seen from above; this accentuates the “coil” in relation to “development” — the picture comes out static, abstracted from dynamics. Only the coordinate axes are absent, with the origin at the center of the circle, on which the opposites are located.

Fig. 3. A coil of the spiral of development: a) side view; b) top view.

Commentary: Mathematical concepts have their own proper foundations and are not derived from dialectics…

Litvinenko: The accent on “development” is placed in Fig. 3.a) — the side view, where the break is precisely visible: point “5” is located directly above point “1.” The development of the process itself takes place under the action of the opposite tendencies, which “switch on in turn” — “3” as it were pulls the process toward itself, but “2” also attracts it to its side. And when the process arrives at point “2,” the action of its opposite — point “4” — switches on; and when it arrives at “3” — the attraction of “1.” But since time passes, and this is reflected in the direction of the axis, the “return” occurs no longer to “1” but to “5.”

Commentary: The not very complicated mechanistic reasonings given above hardly add anything essential to the concept of development or of dialectics; but they can lead one astray, since anyone who believes what the author has said will forever be searching for the fifth point…

Litvinenko: In passing it should be noted that development itself as a philosophical category rests on the law of the “negation of the negation,” which in everyday language may sound like this: “now not as before; later not as now.”

Commentary: Within the Hegelian system all of this was secured by the specific worldview of its author, with the gradual introduction and definition of all the concepts, where the concept of negation goes back to Spinoza’s maxim — “omnis determinatio est negatio,” that is, “every limitation is a negation”; then it becomes clear what the author means… but the use of general-scientific concepts “in vain” is one variety of metaphysical speculativeness. One gets the impression that the author wants to impose on us his own notions of dialectics — and only then will he permit us to understand socionics… It comes out somewhat crooked…

Litvinenko: Dialectics also manifests itself ((there it is, “illustration-mongering” in action!)) in the fact that the spiral leading conventionally “upward” does not exist alone, without its opposite “sister,” leading, correspondingly, conventionally “downward.” To designate this there even exist paired opposite philosophical categories characterizing development — “progress” and “regress.” In this case one can say: “if something increases in one direction, then its opposite decreases, and increases in the opposite direction.”

Commentary: …one can only be touched by the all-sidedness of dialectics… one recalls “where is the beginning of that end with which this beginning ends…” of the unforgettable Kozma Prutkov.

Litvinenko: If one considers the “yin-yang” image in such dynamics, it can illustrate not only this general abstract proposition but also its concretization as regards model “A.”

Commentary: …yes, dialectics from the side, dialectics from above — very dialectical indeed: the unity and struggle of projections…

Litvinenko: Let us place the black and white parts in correspondence with the mental and vital rings. If one “disassembles” this circle and stretches the parts somewhat, seeing them as three-dimensional tapering drops, then in the result one can discern both the construction and the functioning of model “A” (Fig. 4).

Commentary: So we felt like placing them in such a correspondence, and we did — and the real object with its own proper causality no longer interests us; dialectics has replaced and flooded everything, gradually passing over into its dogmatic opposite, which in the abusive variant sounds like “dialectical gibberish.” Just let someone try presenting this before analytic philosophers… such is the dialectics of dialectics…

Litvinenko: This three-dimensional formation can be considered in two projections onto the plane (Fig. 3): 1) top view; 2) side view.

The top view correlates quite adequately with the traditional flat depiction of model “A,” where control of information processing is passed sequentially from element to element — the information as it were “crawls” from cell to cell for processing. Such a vision of the work of model “A” has been successfully grounded by V. D. Ermak [4] from the standpoint of model theory. The circulation of information around the ring, wherever it begins, again reflects the top view of a coil of the spiral of development, in which the elements of the model correspond to the opposites. The transition from “4” to “1” undergoes a break, which is reflected in the presence of “height” in that part of the drop where “1” is located, as compared with its absence at “4,” since that is a point. This “rise to a height” reflects not only the dynamics of development in connection with the passage of time, but also an energetic effect — the expenditure or reception of energy in connection with the output or reception of information.

Commentary: …a remarkable example of “explanations” with references to metaphysical abstractions…

Litvinenko: In this connection one can say that the top view leads out onto the informational approach to the functioning of anything whatsoever. And model “A” illustrates this as well as anything could. In the global sense, all processes turn out to be cyclical; and since their driving forces — two pairs of independent or antagonistic opposites — are also four-stroke. That is why the analogy with the internal combustion engine used by Aušra for the initial grounding of model “A” [1], and the law of the succession of quadras and of ethnogenesis [3], and the 4 stages of any process — from the sexual act to a volcanic eruption (S. Shteinikov, see [8]) — all fit into such a universal dialectical scheme.

Commentary: Behind the internal combustion engine stands not dialectics but the concrete science of thermodynamics… the same applies to Shteinikov… And how simple it all is: “the top view leads out onto the informational approach to the functioning of anything whatsoever.” The author did not even trouble to give a definition of information — he simply looked from above, and to his intuition the informational approach was revealed.

Fig. 4. Model “A” obtained by stretching the “yin-yang.”

Litvinenko: The concretization of the socionic model leads to informational aspects being placed in correspondence with the opposites. That is, upon lowering the generality from the general scheme of the process to its real embodiments, we arrive simply at the fact that there prove to be 16 such embodiments. This is fixed in the concept of the mode of information processing, which in socionics is precisely what is called the type of informational metabolism (TIM).

Commentary: To me, as an editor of long standing, this sentence looks exceptionally muddled. What does “The concretization of the socionic model leads to informational aspects being placed in correspondence with the opposites” mean? Fine — the socionic model is something more general, about which the author has not yet told us, though perhaps he will. But of which opposites is he speaking? Simply the dialectical ones, or what? And the IA are considered already known, since Aušra already introduced them? But what does this “lowering of generality” mean? Is it an operation or a real process? What is the mechanism of this process? Or does someone simply decree what to call what and where to place it? And where, after all, did these 16 come from? Why not, say, 32? And how is this number derived from dialectics? Mathematical combinatorics explains it easily, but how to do it with the help of dialectics I do not understand. What does “…is fixed in the concept of the mode of information processing…” mean — fixed by whom or how, and what is the concrete mechanism of such fixing?

Litvinenko: In contrast to the informational, the energetic perspective opens up through the side view. ((“Dubrovsky and Olenka communicated through the mediation of a tree hollow…”*)) The “thickening of the drop” symbolizes a distinctive equipment for the processing of informational aspects, which is conceptually fixed in the socionic term dimensionality of the functions of informational metabolism (FIM).

Commentary: So the whole point is the “thickening of the drop” — that is, the point is not even dialectics… so that, it turns out, is what the IA are processed with… I also want to draw attention to the unfortunate use of the concept of functions of informational metabolism (FIM) as applied to model “A.” All psychic functions, not only the functions of model “A,” are FIM. To eliminate the equating of the functions of model “A” with other FIM of lower order, it is reasonable to use the term “socionic function” — SF.

Litvinenko: Such equipment has an energetic character and is usually interpreted ((by whom, and since when?)) as the capacity to differentiate information by the corresponding aspect with a certain degree of success.

Commentary: “…the capacity to differentiate information by the corresponding aspect with a certain degree of success” is, as I understand it, precisely the precondition of IM, while the energetic component can be bracketed out as the constant carrier of informational processes. There would seem to be no sense in confusing the energetic and the informational. Energetic and chemical metabolism is the business of physiology, and one should not dialectically reduce the higher — in this case, the informational — to the lower, that is, the energetic.

Litvinenko: The energetic approach to the interpretation of model “A” relies precisely on the side view and gives a projection of the model in which dimensionality (as an energetic characteristic in contrast to the informational one) performs a system-forming function.

Commentary: The energetic approach cannot rely on the side view, nor on the rear or bottom view — one must give normal definitions of the energetic approach and disclose the real mechanisms without references to dialectical alchemy…

Litvinenko: One can depict model “A” three-dimensionally — each FIM in the form of a parallelepiped whose number of sections corresponds to its dimensionality. If one “spreads apart” the FIMs a little, one obtains what is depicted in Fig. 5. Incidentally, the perspective on the socionic model in which the horizontal pairs of FIMs have dimensionality increasing from bottom to top (from 1 to 4) was proposed, as is known, by M. Kalman [6].

Commentary: I do not use the concept of dimensionality, so I will not discuss it here… As for Misha Kalman — he proposed a few things there, discussed a few things, but did not carry them through to conceptual concreteness. Therefore, by way of the search for the model’s meaning, his reasonings occupy their place in the history of socionics — but no more than that…

Fig. 5. The model with three-dimensional dimensionality ((“three-dimensional dimensionality” — how beautiful!))

Litvinenko: Model “A” also establishes a quite dialectical connection between information and energy.

Commentary: Well, perhaps dialectical — though all the same, by the rules of science, one ought to disclose the content of this connection. For example, Marx, analyzing the polarity of the social classes, points to their role in the process of production and their mutual dependence. But the author does not disclose the dependence of energy and information in the structures of the psyche — whereas their real, not metaphysical, dialectical connection consists in the fact that the energetic carrier provides the medium of information’s presence, since without an energetic carrier information does not exist…

Litvinenko: The struggle of these opposites consists in the fact that for each FIM the sum of the informational and energetic dimensionality is a constant quantity and equals 5.

Commentary: And here comes the pseudo-dialectical alchemy… Will someone explain to me how one is to understand that the struggle of energy with information is determined by the number 5? Why not 6 or 7, but precisely 5? Where in the “dialectical drop” is this number encoded, and how is it to be derived rather than decreed in the manner of dialectical bureaucratism? And in general, why must energy struggle with information?

Litvinenko: Correspondingly, one may speak of the efficiency coefficient of the transformation of information into energy and vice versa — in the mental and vital rings.

Commentary: It turns out someone has already calculated the efficiency coefficient… tell me: cybernetics occupied itself thoroughly with information — is this efficiency coefficient found there? And has anyone formulated and grounded a law, or at least a principle, of the transition of information into energy and vice versa?

Litvinenko: For example, the first FIM is four-dimensional informationally and one-dimensional energetically (the minimal supplied energy is “transformed” into information almost without losses, while the information received hardly increases the energy), whereas the fifth FIM is the reverse — one-dimensional informationally and four-dimensional energetically (much energy must be applied to generate information, while minimal information significantly increases the energy) [5]. In dynamics this means that the mental ring generates information, expending energy on this; the vital ring requests information, supplying its search with energy.

Commentary: Yes, now it is clear why the academicians of the Russian Academy of Sciences assign the concept of “informational energy” to the category of pseudoscience… The metaphysical embellishments of socionic theoreticians who dialectically ground the transformation of minimal supplied energy into the four-dimensional information of the first SF can only compromise the solid ideas of socionics…

Litvinenko: On the integral “yin-yang” monad this is visible in that the black drop neighbors the white point; the transition into the black point occurs with the transition into the white drop.

Commentary: Yes, this is very deep — but dark…

Litvinenko: If one considers the monad three-dimensional, spherical, then the points usually depicted at the centers of the drops, of the opposite color, are the place of penetration and source of the black in the white and vice versa. There is even a phrase verbalizing this: “The Dragon biting its own tail.”

Commentary: Well, in terms of “dragons” everything is in order here — they are capable of even more than that…

Litvinenko: However, the fully dialectical approach will be the one that supplements this phrase: “And the tail, bitten by the Dragon.”

Commentary: Yes, when it is “fully dialectical,” it comes out even better… the only thing unclear is why the dialectically supplementing phrase cannot run “The tail biting the Dragon” — and what relation dragons have to socionics?

Litvinenko: Strangely enough, very many researchers who consider themselves dialecticians by worldview and methodology let such an opposite escape their attention.

Commentary: Yes, it is very strange that many dialecticians have still not mastered the art of “the dragon biting the tail and the tail biting the dragon” — though under Soviet power, had the Party ordered it, they could have mastered it…

Litvinenko: And yet the indicated proposition vividly demonstrates the conditionally-correlative character of the categories subject/object. The tail, as the object of the dragon’s biting, becomes in a certain perspective (from its own side) a subject.

Commentary: …indeed, it is all very simple… the tail turns from an object into a subject and begins to bite others itself. True, it is convenient here to pose the question: why on earth did the dragon suddenly start biting its own tail — it must have gone mad. But dialectically everything is clear: if you have a tail, it must be bitten, or else all the dialectics will vanish.

Litvinenko: This digression was needed also in order to supplement the established approach to the theoretical construction of intertype relations (IR). Until now the phenomenon of IR was based exclusively on the informational perspective, for which even the term “the phenomenon of informational resonance” slipped through. That is, one aspect, processed by different functions of the TIMs, makes its contribution to the picture of their IR.

Commentary: I have the impression that I must have slept through something in socionics — though for a quarter of a century I stood with everyone else at the demonstration board and took notes on nearly every speaker. And as if it were not I who grounded and constructed the model of IR, but the whole point, it turns out, lies in taking account of the term “the phenomenon of informational resonance” that “slipped through”… My preliminary material was published in SMiPL No. 5 for 1999 and No. 4 for 2001. If anyone could have voiced logical (and not dialectical) arguments, why was this not done? Probably because that material is not about dialectics. The theme of relations is worked through more fully in CCS, but the work continues… And as for whether one aspect is processed by different functions of the TIMs — to this question dialectics gives no answer, because here a concrete scientific question must be solved.

Litvinenko: It makes sense, again in the channel of the dialectical worldview and methodology, to supplement it by introducing the concept of “the phenomenon of energetic resonance”: functions of the same number in TIMs process different aspects, and this makes its contribution to the picture of their IR. From this point of view M. Kalman considers IR, using his level-based model “A.” S. I. Churyumov has also approached such an approach: he gives the pairs of aspects processed by identical FIMs in the TIMs of contact partners. However, here too one sees the “costs of the ILE-centric view” of the socion — the IR with the ILE give an understanding of all IR through the aspects of the IF.

Commentary: Of course, it would not be bad if the author gave a definition of the dialectical worldview. It is plausible that Hegel had one, since to him belongs the fullest modern philosophical elaboration of the concepts of dialectics; and Marx, since he widely used the concepts of Hegel’s dialectics; and Lenin, since he used Marx’s teaching; and Stalin, since in his famous book History of the Communist Party (VKP(b)) the second chapter is entitled “On Dialectical Materialism.” But since we know these people to be very different, and their TIMs are different too — what, then, did they have in common? But perhaps the author simply does not know that there exists a general-scientific methodology which by no means requires of the scholar a knowledge of dialectical dogmas, and that it makes sense to develop socionics in the channel of general-scientific methodology. And then it will be neither ILE-centric nor SEI-centric, but “objectively-centric.” As for the concrete expression of all relations through the relation to the ILE — evidently the author never understood that Aušra discovered not intertype but interfunctional relations. And she discovered not 16 of them, but only 14. This is written in black and white in her Intertype Relations. But if someone counts each asymmetric relation as two — which is plausible — then it would not hurt him to realize that in the so-called symmetric relations one partner gives the other not the same thing he receives from him, because different aspects are bound to their same-named functions; in that case the 14 poles must be multiplied by 2, and we obtain 28. So, count as you will, 16 does not come out. And I would like to see someone prove, using dialectics for example, that the relations are nonetheless 16. I proved it relying on the principle of the duality of TIM and IR — which a portion of the dialecticians failed to take in at all. All this is described in CCS. As for the intertype relations, they are not 16 at all. If one considers that a relation does not change under permutation of the partners — this is the simplified case (1) — then there will be (256 − 16)/2 + 16 = 136 of them. But another understanding of intertype relations is also possible — the complete case (2), when all non-identical relations are counted as two, since in that case, already at the intertype and not the interfunctional level, one partner gives the other not the same as the other gives him — for even when identical functions interact, their aspectual content differs. This is quite easy to appreciate in the case of asymmetric relations, but it applies, of course, to the symmetric ones as well. Only in the case of identity does each partner give the other the same as he receives. But this, of course, only in the typological sense — the concrete relations of concrete people are all different and all asymmetric. Taking these remarks into account, the number of intertype relations, when we count non-identical relations as two, will be (256 − 16)×2 + 16 = 496. And if we include gender differences, we will have to consider four variants: MM, FF, MF, and FM. In the last two cases even relations that are typologically identical will be asymmetric by gender. For case (2) their number will equal MM + FF + MF + FM = 496 × 4 + 32 = 2016. This is a calculation for the lovers of energetic resonance — in contrast to whom I offer concrete analysis and computation, not metaphysical misunderstandings.

Litvinenko: The author has also noted, in real life, manifestations of how, during the communication of individuals, different aspects were triggered corresponding to their identical FIMs. Then they would “exchange” information on these aspects, each by means of different — his own — FIMs in the model of his TIM. What we have is a dynamic scenario of the development of IR in a situation, possessing cyclicality and in this sense resembling a pendulum: the aspect of a certain FIM of one contact partner — another aspect, corresponding to the FIM of the same number of the other contact partner — the FIM of the first contact partner corresponding now to this aspect — the FIM of the other contact partner having the same number.

Commentary: This is an interesting observation, but it can at best be taken at the level of a hypothesis — and even then, properly drawn-up observation protocols, audio and video recordings, etc., are necessary. Without this, all such talk remains intuitive “flittings” over the flowers of chance circumstances. But if real mechanisms stand behind this observation of the author’s, then the theory of socionic relations (SR) will be still more complex — but here real proofs are needed, not fantasies.

Litvinenko: Further, speaking once more of the various levels of generality, it is worth emphasizing that model “A” as such, with numbered cells, corresponds to the level “human being.” Model “A” filled with aspects for each of the 16 TIMs corresponds to the level “individual.” This lowering of generality corresponds to the fact that model “A” as such specifies the form of the processes taking place. The filling with aspects reflects the concretization of this form when it is filled with concrete informational content. In turn, more general from the informational point of view proves to be the totality of the IF aspects as such, as a basis for the decomposition of, in principle, any information.

Commentary: Apparently the author does not distinguish two kinds of function semantics: positional and aspectual. Positional semantics is identical for all types and answers the question “what the function does with information.” Aspectual semantics is connected with the aspectual content of the functions and answers the question “what information the function processes.” Of course, at issue are the maximally generalized functions — the socionic functions (SF), which are what socionics considers. Knowing this spares one the necessity of resorting to the concepts of dialectics, inappropriate in the present case.

Litvinenko: Again, it is strange that dialecticians, systems specialists, etc., unacquainted with socionics, “have not taken the next step” from their notions. They readily accept and even use the paired features that became the basis for singling out the totality of aspects. They speak of component-structural analysis (which in socionics corresponds to the feature body/field); of the connections between the components of a system, which are not only horizontal but also vertical, hierarchical, which leads to the understanding of subsystem and supersystem (the socionic feature external/internal); of really functioning systems (the feature statics/dynamics, most adequately voiced both in philosophy and in the particular sciences).

Commentary: It is probably not strange at all — dialectics is simply not adequate here. And only certain last-of-the-Mohicans craftsmen of dialectics are capable of squeezing everything out of it — even socionics.

Litvinenko: The next and quite logical step that remained to be taken was to consider them in systemic totality — quite within the framework of the systems approach — and to obtain, as usual, a “new systemic quality”: the aspects of the informational flow (of cognition — gnoseological, methodological, or whatever else).

Commentary: One would like to see how this selfsame “new systemic quality” arises.

Litvinenko: In this connection, the following will be a dialectical remark. Earlier it was said that socionics is based in particular on the systems approach and on the theory of models. Then, that it can ground both the systems approach and the theory of models. Which, then, corresponds to the truth? It looks as though the systems approach itself and its principles are based on the properties of human perception and thinking as part of psychic reflection.

Commentary: This belongs to the already-traversed stage of psychologism in the assessment of cognitive processes, philosophy, logic, etc. The systems approach and its principles are based not on the properties of human perception and thinking as part of psychic reflection, but on the universal laws governing the world. But these universal laws are connected with different levels. For example, mathematics describes a higher level than systems theory. Socionics has as its object the socion, which possesses high mathematical status (Reinin, Dubrov, Karpenko, Gut, Eskisay, and others). It is precisely this that gives grounds for placing socionics above systems theory — which, alas, is merely a collection of empirically found recipes and observations that have acquitted themselves well in technology and have merely been advertised in the humanities in keeping with the fashion for new approaches. In particular, psychology by no means corresponds to the ideal of systems theory. For that matter, systems theory itself does not correspond to that ideal — at best it is a collection of empirical equations and tables. Socionic tables, at least, are distinguished by symmetry. And this is by no means accidental — socionic symmetries reflect fundamental properties of the human psyche.

Litvinenko: A consequence of these properties are both worldview and methodology. In this case, indeed, if socionics relies on these features of perception (and it does), then from the three binary features of the IF aspects (as characterizing the features of psychic reflection) there follow, in the main, both the systems approach and the theory of models. As for worldview, it occupies a more general level in relation to methodology; however, dialectics is such that methodology, from its side and in its turn, can shape and order worldview — which is what happens with the systems approach and dialectical philosophy.

Commentary: The description of the IA by means of three binary features is analyzed in [11]. The basic defect of these descriptions is the simplified choice of these features, without regard for their nature and level. But the author is late with his hypotheses regarding the systems approach and the theory of models — this work has been done in the preparatory articles and the book (CCS).

Litvinenko: Summing up, one can assert that the dialectical worldview generates a general methodology of cognition. In its most general form it interprets any process as a unity of opposites: the general (a single universal scheme for any process) and the particular (how a concrete process actually takes place in reality).

Commentary: Judging by Soviet history, the dialectical worldview is capable of generating anything whatsoever — from the justification of coups d’état to legal lawlessness and unending ideological lies, ending in the genocide of large communities of people. Dialectics uncontrolled by the real process of cognition turns into an emasculated scheme impoverishing the possibilities of the human intellect.

Litvinenko: For explanation, other paired categories are enlisted in multitude. Even in the preceding sentence one can discern theoretical/practical; form/content; energy/information. Moreover, of the indicated opposites, the first constitute a certain unity among themselves, as do the second.

Commentary: Even from this small list it is evident that it does not satisfy the requirements of completeness, independence, consistency, necessity, and sufficiency — and a system of dialectical categories was never created… and everything reduces to “illustration-mongering” and “enumeration-mongering.”

Litvinenko: And in socionics, model “A” specifies in its form the general, theoretical course of real processes, and upon passing to a more particular level, filling itself informationally with the aspects of the IF, it gives the practical, substantive, particular manifestation of real processes.

Commentary: Read Molière’s Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, where with the greatest pomp a charlatan-teacher communicates to a man the great secret that he speaks in prose… Is this not what dialectics does when it proposes that scholars pack their knowledge once and for all into speculative abstractions? And is it not time to leave these dialectical toys behind, just as a child, growing up, leaves behind the little words once so important to him — “goo-goo,” “boo-boo,” “yum-yum,” and the like?

Litvinenko: The universality of model “A,” thus, consists in the fact that it synthesizes these opposites within itself — and, as follows from the dialectical worldview, does so in the only possible way. The peculiarity of the last phrase is such that model “A” acquires a certain activity (subjecthood); however, it should be emphasized, the model “merely” reflects most fully, capaciously, and adequately the properties of human psychic reflection, and consequently also of the organization of cognition.

Commentary: The universality of model “A” consists in the fact that it represents not only the structure of the human psyche but the structures of informational organizedness wherever they are encountered. From which, in particular, follows the universality of the TIM-code of any subjects and objects whatsoever. And simplified dialectics has nothing to do with it.

Litvinenko: Being, thus, at the level of a particular science the socionic model, model “A” acquires universality not only as a worldview scheme and the foundation of a general methodology, but also as an instrument of cognition in other particular sciences. And socionics in this sense not only lays claim to interdisciplinary scientific status, containing within itself everything connected with cognition, but also proves its exceptionality and irreplaceability.

Commentary: Model “A” is not a worldview scheme — it is a concrete product of the highly abstract science that socionics has turned out to be, and it represents a description of the generalized structure of informational organizedness. A worldview scheme is something else. It is a set of objects of faith and of values. Socionics can be included in a worldview scheme, but it is a concrete science with high methodological potential.

Conclusions

1. Works of this kind could simply be ignored, since their theoretical contribution to socionics carries a negative sign — they create metaphysical constructions that merely mislead the unprepared reader. However, from general-methodological positions they are precisely interesting as a totality of logical misunderstandings which it is instructive to detect and analyze — for the edification of posterity.

2. Dialectics in the social teaching of Marx and Engels acquitted itself as a powerful method of generalized analysis of social-historical processes; but distorted and vulgarized, it turns into yet another means of the long-since-compromised practice of arbitrary metaphysical construction.

3. Dialectics became a terrible weapon in the hands of political adventurers, and with its revolutionary results it so frightened the bourgeois philistines that they, in the person of their scholarly adepts, endeavored to disavow it as irrational and meaningless philosophizing. Nonetheless, the experience of Soviet science showed that dialectically programmed scholars are capable of obtaining results no worse than their Western colleagues’ — but, unfortunately, the degenerate forms of the dialectical thinking of the Soviet ideologues and rulers, in a mere 70 years or so, led to the collapse of the political system, defeated in the competition with the pragmatic variants of the philosophy of Western Europe and America.

4. The basic concepts of socionics must be derived deductively from a small number of plausible assumptions — not used to justify one’s own theoretical fantasies with dialectical rhetoric inadequate to socionics’ subject area. This work has been done in CCS and awaits academic discussion by scholars capable of it.

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