INTJ, "the Mastermind" and the fictional genius

If you are anything like me you spend probably too much time online. If you do you cannot have failed to have noticed the popularity of the Myers-Briggs Personality Tests. The craze in people labeling themselves and then spending hours on forums dissecting their inner workings has not been lost on me, and I have been guilty of the same thing.

The Myers-Briggs test is based (from what I can understand) on the Jungian archetypes developed over the course Jungs work as a psychiatrist. I'm sure that people can give a more accurate description of where it comes from and what in detail it entails, but for me this is not the important point. Anyone can find the information online.

For me the interest lies in the popularity and obsession with particular archetypes, in particular the INTJ.
The INTJ stand for "introvert", "intuituve", "thinking" and "judgement". As opposed to the "extrovert", "sensory", "feeling" and "perceiving". This archetype, known as either the 'mastermind' or the 'strategist', is very popular among the forums, blogs and youtube videos.

An INTJ is a deep thinker, concerned with efficiency, plans, systems and abstract rules. Although they live in their heads, their plans are tested against the real world. They are generally anti-social, withdrawn and perceived as arrogant. Much deeper analysis of INTJ's can be found here:

http://www.cognitivestyles.com/y/book2/Book_080.htm
http://ebonstorm.wordpress.com/about-the-author/intj/

To me it's not a surprise that this type is very popular. With the general interest in the lone intelligent genius still in favour many  people consider themselves to have many of the same traits. Characters such as BBC's Sherlock, American shows; Bones, Dexter and House with the same rational unemotional figures and an academic rise in the topic of psychopathy highlight this interest. The new book "Wisdom of Psychopaths" is a recent example of this phenomenon. Everyone fancies themselves as a unique person, able to intelligently understand situations and abstract systems such as mathematics. Humans have cognitive blind spots when it comes to our image of ourselves, we will always view ourselves in a much better light than we deserve.

But it causes skewed views of reality. Scientists and mathematicians rarely stumble upon the answer in one lone eureka moment. True breakthroughs take decades of study and years of hard work with many other people, working off the input of others far more intelligent than ourselves. There is no House out there, who can break all the rules and still come up with a brilliant diagnosis in a moment of deductive clarity. Likewise the Sherlock ability to read people is not possible to the extent that he displays.

The INTJ archetype reflects the desire among many aspiring hackers, scientists and business leaders to be a solitary brooding deep personality with the knack for skilfully understanding complex systems and devising plans to get what they want. This sentiment should be replaced with the personality who is highly intelligent but able and willing to work with others to achieve their goals.