The Clock of the Socion: Energy Dynamics of Quadra and Benefit Rings
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This is a transcript of the report made by Victor V. Gulenko at the XXV International Conference on Socionics September 21, 2009. The report was published in the 2nd issue of the Journal of the NSO in 2010 in a slightly edited and abridged version.
To see the original article click here.
Introduction
In my previous report I was considering the lowest level in socionics - the functional level. Now I will move in the opposite direction and we will address the socion as a whole.Looking from far above, it is difficult to see the details. Thus we will conduct this investigation expeditiously, moving from global societal level down to the level of individual types and only slightly touching upon individual functions. My goal is to show the socion in light of all the complex relationships that exist between these levels, and, additionally, to do so from perspective of dynamics.
I will touch upon such major issues as life and death, because time is always associated with such things - birth, death, etc. Life and death not of socion as a whole but of a single given quadra, as this quadra emerges, comes into full force, and then dissipates. I do not mean physical death of individuals but of the products of workings of their psyche, which runs along an ordered developmental course.
We shall investigate the energy-informational progression of complex communication systems. At a cursory view, it looks chaotic: randomly, some political and activist figures emerge seemingly out of nowhere, and suddenly, as if by magic, change the course of history, new systems and methods get introduced, new social order is established, and so on. In reality, this is not quite so. This progression has its own internal logic, its own internal rhythm of the development, which in this report I shall call "the clock of the socion."
Before we proceed any further, I must tell you that socion, if it's regarded as a whole, is something rather vague. When you begin to study it in detail, it starts splitting into parts, into grouping of types and subsystems. We do not have effective methods for studying socion as a whole. Although many have attempted this before, and I have tried it as well, conducting experiments with socion in general, but these have been only the first steps.
As experience shows, the socion is very multifaceted: it can be considered from one side or the other. I think that there exist two basic views which I will tentatively call "the primary and secondary organization of the socion" which are dependent on the location of the observer. It is one thing if you are located inside the socion, then you will see what I call the primary organization. In this case you are a participant and will see neither the quadra nor the rings. You will clearly see temperaments: one person is very directed, another one is calm, one is actively debating, another doesn't engage, one is interested in passing on knowledge, and the other demands practical implementation. That is, you will see their attitudes towards some activity. These form two subsystems in the socion - temperaments, the energy qualities of a person, and attitudes, area of one's interests and realization, which have been discovered by psychologists long time ago. These are always working together. This is what I call the primary organization of the socion, which manifests at close physical and psychological distances.
There is also a view of socion from much greater distance. This is the secondary level of organization of the socion: the quadra and the rings of supervision and benefit. It's another question what kind of rings we should consider. Here there are many hidden contradictions since there are two types of rings: rings of supervision and rings of benefit. When we take Model A, which was discovered by A. Augusta, we're looking at functions from point of view of rings of supervision. We can also use a different model, one that is based on considering the rings on benefits instead, and this model is different from Model A. The word "rings" in this articles will denote benefit rings. We must give credit to A. Augusta here because she has discovered both types of rings, however, she gave priority to the informational revision chains i.e. supervision rings. However, rings of benefits are more dynamic and better reflect the development of the socion as a single unit. We shall now take a look at the socion from far distance.
In general, progress forward implies aging as an inevitable process of exhaustion of energy - as a person grows old in the course of his life, the person loses his or her energy. When a person is young and healthy, it seems that he do anything, and his main strength is not in what he knows, as he knows very little. With age a person becomes wise and skilled, or, in other words, saturated with information, but not with energy and health. This is the dynamics of time: the flow of energy and information. These processes are inverses of each other. I have previously referred to this: there are several polarities associated with this dynamic, such traits as extroversion / introversion for one. Extrovert is the energetic beginning, introvert - the informational. So, if we look at the socion dialectically, its energetic constituent is in extraversion, while informational - is in introversion. This is only one polarity. There is a second polarity which has strong influences: this is polarity of right and left (process and result). It turns out that here there are also two orientations: right ring of socio-progress is oriented at accumulation of information, left ring - at accumulation of energy.
There exists a certain rhythm within the socion which creates energy maximums or peaks and energy minimums or depressions. Energy minimum is the most incomprehensible, the most complex state. Among the types that play a key role in states of such energy minimums, a role which in chaos theory is known as bifurcation (path selection, development at critical points), there is only one type out of four types that has the most power to shift the dynamics either one or the other way. Thus, informational time (lets call it T1) - this is ILI, the intuitive logical introvert. ILI is most perceptive of the informational time flow, while LII is most perceptive of energy flow. These two types are very similar to each other in terms of their mission. For ILI intuition of time comes first, and then comes structuring of this time flow. For LII it is the other way around, that is, first structure - then timing. They are as if left and right hand images of each other. The clock of the socion, figuratively speaking, has 16 divisions instead of 12. The LII as a type, take Kant for example: it was well known that he was like a walking clock. He always knew what time it was up to the last minute. He felt the energy flow, knew when to up his pace or when to slow down to arrive at his destination in time.
The ILI's perception is quite different. He's not in a hurry anywhere. His time flow is linear, the time of a philosopher who thinks that one can never keep up with time, that it is constantly flowing, everything changes, thus while you're trying to do something the situation will no longer be the same. It is best to wait for when it will comes back, and you are already sitting prepared for it. These are two very different perceptions of flow of time. It is generally the time of ILI that predominates, because on large scale the preferred ring is the right or process one. In large groups, it is most often the right/process types that lead and set the tempo for the group. In small groups, the opposite is true: time flow is more uneven, you can speed it up or you can slow it down. Now lets examine how time flows within each quadra.
How does one quadra replace the next? To do this energy needs to be expanded, a force needs to be exerted i.e. there is a need for a type which will facilitate this shift. But no one will voluntarily become displaced, so how does this happen? I will give a few examples of the programmed life and death for each type within its quadra as well as their contributions on a social level.