On the linguistic side Kurt Goldstein and Ernst Cassirer thought of humans as talking animals. In his Abstract and Concrete Behavior, Goldstein had some people talking more abstractly than concretely and others talking more concretely than abstractly. Abstract words can be used in slightly different but related ways — analogical, categorical, fictional, figurative, general, schematic, symbolic, and theoretical. Likewise, concrete words can be used in slightly different but related ways — detailed, factual, elemental, empirical, indicative, literal, signal, and specific.

Abstract versus Concrete Word Usage

Clearly, what sets human beings apart from the other animals are two advantages we have over them — words and tools. And what sets us apart from each other is the way we use words and tools. The great majority of us are predominantly concrete in our word usage, the rest predominantly abstract. And about half of us are utilitarian in our choice and use of tools, the other half cooperative.

The Basic Dimensions of Personality

Temperament is a configuration of inclinations, while character is a configuration of habits. Character is disposition, temperament pre-disposition.…Put another way, our brain is a sort of computer which has temperament for its hardware and character for its software.…Thus temperament is the inborn form of human nature; character, the emergent form, which develops through the interaction of temperament and environment.

What Is Temperament 

Our attempts to reshape others may produce change, but the change is distortion rather than transformation. David Keirsey

For the past twenty years Keirsey has continued to investigate personality differences, to refine his theory of the four temperaments and to define the facets of character that distinguish one from another. His findings form the basis of Please Understand Me II, an updated and greatly expanded edition of the book, far more comprehensive and coherent than the original, and yet with much of the same easy accessibility. One major addition is Keirsey's view of how the temperaments differ in the intelligent roles they are most likely to develop. Each of us, he says, has four kinds of intelligence, tactical, logistical, diplomatic, strategic, though one of the four interests us far more than the others, and thus gets far more practice than the rest. Like four suits in a hand of cards, we each have a long suit and a short suit in what interests us and what we do well, and fortunate indeed are those whose work matches their skills. As in the original book, Please Understand Me II begins with The Keirsey Temperament Sorter, the most used personality inventory in the world. But also included is The Keirsey Four-Types Sorter, a new short questionnaire that identifies one's basic temperament and then ranks one's second, third, and fourth choices. Share this new sorter with friends and family, and get set for a lively and fascinating discussion of personal styles.

What Is Temperament

Please Understand Me II

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"Focusing is about saying no" - Steve Jobs (WWDC'97)

The Four Tendencies

The one thing all people with strong self-control understand