This website presents a new theory of the psyche based on the proposition that the content of the psyche is generated by four psychic functions.
The content of the psyche does not come from reality that exists independently of the psyche and does not reflect the content of that reality. This reality, referred to here as independent reality, acts upon the human organism, while the psyche or, more precisely, the psychic functions generate their own content.
The psyche is one of the two poles of the dichotomy that constitutes psychic reality. Psychic reality is constituted by the dichotomy subject — psyche. In this model, the subject is atomic, while the psyche consists of three dichotomies:
- consciousness — the unconscious,
- perception of changes — perception of invariants,
- significance for the subject — significance for the non-subject.
The content of the psyche is the subject’s environment.
In terms of generation, psychic reality is the dichotomy subject — psyche; in terms of content, psychic reality is the dichotomy subject — environment. An element of the environment generated by the psyche is called an object.
Everything that happens consists of invariants and changes. The irrational psychic functions generate knowledge of what happens: the perception of invariants generates knowledge of invariants, while the perception of changes generates knowledge of changes.
What happens is in itself indifferent to the subject: significance is not a property of independent reality but is generated by the psyche. The rational psychic functions generate two kinds of significance. The function of significance for the subject generates what is significant for the subject itself. The function of significance for the non-subject generates what the subject considers significant for that which is not the subject itself.
Thus, the irrational functions generate knowledge of what happens, while the rational functions generate the significance of what happens. Both knowledge of what happens and the significance of what happens are content of the psyche, rather than content obtained from independent reality.
The two pairs of psychic functions play different roles in the interaction between psychic reality and independent reality.
The irrational functions enable independent reality to influence psychic reality. This influence does not consist in the transmission of content from one reality to another. Independent reality acts upon the organism, and as a result of this action the perceptual functions generate the content of the psyche — knowledge of changes and invariants.
The rational functions enable psychic reality to influence independent reality. The significance they generate can determine a person’s actions, and a person’s actions, in turn, act upon independent reality.
Thus, the interaction involves two processes running in opposite directions:
independent reality → organism → generation of content by the irrational functions → psychic reality;
psychic reality → significance generated by the rational functions → human action → independent reality.
The designations of Jung’s four functions — S, N, F, and T — are retained in this model, although the functions themselves are defined differently.
The S function, corresponding to Jung’s sensation, is defined as the perception of invariants, while the N function, corresponding to Jung’s intuition, is defined as the perception of changes. Everything that happens takes place over a certain period of time and consists of invariants and changes. Both functions perceive what was in the past, what is in the present, and what will probably be in the future: S perceives invariants, N perceives changes.
The designations F and T likewise derive from Jung’s functions of feeling and thinking. In the present model, F is defined as the function of significance for the subject, while T is defined as the function of significance for the non-subject. These functions correspond in many respects to Jung’s descriptions of feeling and thinking, which makes it possible to retain the traditional designations while giving the functions more general definitions.
Each of the four psychic functions is represented in the psyche in two attitudes of the subject toward the object — the extraverted and the introverted attitude. These attitudes were discovered by Carl Gustav Jung and made by him the foundation of psychological typology.
In the present model, the distinction between the two attitudes receives an additional definition in terms of the relevance of the content of the psychic functions to the subject. In the introverted attitude, the psychic functions generate content that is relevant to the subject. In the extraverted attitude, they generate content independently of its relevance to the subject — both relevant and irrelevant content.
The two functional dichotomies — “perception of changes — perception of invariants” and “significance for the subject — significance for the non-subject” — are parallel to each other. The dichotomy “consciousness — the unconscious” has a different status: it is superimposed on the system of psychic functions and determines the way in which they are organized.
Superimposing the dichotomy “consciousness — the unconscious” on the two functional dichotomies, while taking into account that each function is represented in two attitudes of the subject toward the object, makes it possible to construct a model of consciousness for each of the sixteen psychological types.
For each psychological type, the model describes two alternative ways of organizing psychic functions in consciousness — the right and the left paths of consciousness.