Please Understand Me II: Temperament, Character, Intelligence

Author & Context

By david-keirsey (Prometheus Nemesis, 1998). The revised expansion of Keirsey and Bates's bestselling Please Understand Me (1978), which introduced the four-temperament reading of MBTI to a mass audience. Keirsey (1921–2013) was a clinical psychologist, lifelong "people-watcher" (his preferred self-description), and decorated WWII Marine fighter pilot. He spent four decades as a family therapist and educational psychologist, focused on the Artisan children whose temperament made conventional schooling difficult.

Keirsey's intellectual move in Please Understand Me II is consequential: he keeps Myers' four-letter type codes (ISTJ, ENFP, etc.) but rejects the function-stack metaphysics. For Keirsey, the four functions (S/N/T/F in their introverted/extraverted forms) are not the right unit of analysis. The right unit is temperament — a single integrated configuration of behavior visible to any observer, anchored in ancient temperament theory (Hippocrates' four humors, Galen's four temperaments) and revived by 20th-century European personology (Eric Adickes, Ernst Kretschmer, Eduard Spränger, Erich Fromm). Each of these four 20th-century theorists, working independently, arrived at four types — and their four types map onto each other and (Keirsey argues) onto Myers' four temperament groupings.

The book is in part a polemic against Myers' function-stack theory: Keirsey thinks Myers (and Jung) over-internalized typology, looking inward at unobservable mental functions rather than outward at observable behavior. His proposal is empiricist: trust what you can see.

Core Argument

Four temperaments, not sixteen types. The sixteen MBTI types are real but should be grouped into four temperaments based on two cross-cutting dichotomies — the S/N (sensing/intuition) preference and the J/P (judging/perceiving) preference for sensors / T/F (thinking/feeling) preference for intuitives:

• Artisans (SP) — sensing-perceiving. Concrete in word use, utilitarian in tool use. The "Hippocratic Sanguines," "Platonic Iconics," "Aristotelian Hedonics," "Adickes's Innovators," "Kretschmer's Hypomanics," "Fromm's Exploiters." Includes Promoter (ESTP), Crafter (ISTP), Performer (ESFP), Composer (ISFP). Excel in tactical intelligence — adapting in the moment, reading what works, free play with sensory-rich tools (musical instruments, scalpels, joysticks, brushes).

• Guardians (SJ) — sensing-judging. Concrete in word use, cooperative in tool use. The "Hippocratic Melancholics," "Platonic Pistic [protective]," "Aristotelian Proprietary," "Adickes's Traditionals," "Kretschmer's Depressives," "Fromm's Hoarders." Includes Supervisor (ESTJ), Inspector (ISTJ), Provider (ESFJ), Protector (ISFJ). Excel in logistical intelligence — procuring, storing, supplying, supporting, scheduling, certifying. Stewards of the established system.

• Idealists (NF) — intuitive-feeling. Abstract in word use, cooperative in tool use. The "Platonic Noetics [ethical-musers]," "Aristotelian Ethical," "Adickes's Dogmatics," "Kretschmer's Hyperaesthetics," "Fromm's Receptives." Includes Teacher (ENFJ), Counselor (INFJ), Champion (ENFP), Healer (INFP). Excel in diplomatic intelligence — clarifying, individuating, inspiring, mediating, fostering human potential.

• Rationals (NT) — intuitive-thinking. Abstract in word use, utilitarian in tool use. The "Platonic Dialectical," "Aristotelian Dialogic," "Adickes's Skeptics," "Kretschmer's Anaesthetics," "Fromm's Marketers." Includes Fieldmarshal (ENTJ), Mastermind (INTJ), Inventor (ENTP), Architect (INTP). Excel in strategic intelligence — system-design, modeling, theorizing, engineering, mastery of complex contingent fields.

Two observable behavior axes ground the typology.

• Word use — concrete (about the immediate, observable, particular) vs. abstract (about ideas, possibilities, categories, theories). This maps S vs. N.
• Tool use — utilitarian (whatever works, regardless of social norms) vs. cooperative (working within socially-sanctioned methods and norms). This cross-cuts but is not identical to T/F. Artisans and Rationals are utilitarian; Guardians and Idealists are cooperative.

A trained observer can identify temperament from a few minutes of someone's speech and behavior. The cognitive-function machinery, Keirsey holds, is unnecessary.

Temperament is constitutional, character is its expression, personality is the whole. Keirsey is careful to distinguish: temperament is the inborn configuration; character is the patterned expression of temperament shaped by environment; personality is the entire phenotype. Temperament does not change; character and personality elaborate.

Each temperament has a distinct form of intelligence. Keirsey explicitly rejects the unitary-IQ view. Artisans have tactical intelligence; Guardians have logistical intelligence; Idealists have diplomatic intelligence; Rationals have strategic intelligence. Cross-temperament demands tax everyone — the brilliant Rational is often poor at logistics; the gifted Guardian is often poor at strategy; not because of low IQ but because their intelligence lives in a different domain.

Sixteen role variants. Within each temperament, the four MBTI subtypes correspond to four "social roles" — combinations of role-directiveness (E vs. I) and role-expressiveness or "informativeness" (T-utilitarian-directive vs. F-cooperative-informative, etc.). These produce Keirsey's sixteen named roles: Promoter, Crafter, Performer, Composer; Supervisor, Inspector, Provider, Protector; Teacher, Counselor, Champion, Healer; Fieldmarshal, Mastermind, Inventor, Architect.

Key Concepts (lifted to wiki)

• temperament — the constitutional, inborn configuration of behavior.
• concrete-abstract-language — the first observable axis (S vs. N).
• utilitarian-cooperative-tools — the second observable axis (cross-cutting T/F).
• four-intelligences — tactical, logistical, diplomatic, strategic — Keirsey's domain-specific account of intelligence.

Frameworks / Models

• keirsey-temperaments — the four-temperament framework.
• mbti — the underlying four-letter type code, used but reinterpreted.

Notable Quotes

"The point of this book is that people differ from each other, and that no amount of getting after them is going to change them." — Stephen Montgomery, foreword.

"Different temperaments naturally show us different patterns of intelligent behavior." — Foreword.

"There is much to be gained by appreciating differences, and much to be lost by ignoring them or condemning them." — Chapter 1.

"Artisans and Rationals have something very important in common: they are both fitters, the Artisans having a practical and technique-oriented way of fitting things together, the Rationals a pragmatic and technology-oriented way." — Chapter 3.

"We of the artistic world are...the little gray foxes and all the rest are the hounds." — Tennessee Williams, quoted by Keirsey on Artisans.

Practical Applications

• Career decisions. Keirsey's career advice is temperament-anchored. Match the intelligence-type to the work: Artisans to tactical fields (athletics, performance, surgery, sales, crisis management, the arts); Guardians to logistical fields (administration, management, traditional education, accounting, civil service, traditional medicine); Idealists to diplomatic fields (counseling, teaching, ministry, advocacy, writing for human change); Rationals to strategic fields (engineering, research, systems design, executive strategy, theoretical work). Cross-temperament careers (a Rational in customer support, a Guardian in pure research, an Artisan in HR) impose chronic load.

• Identity transitions. Keirsey treats temperament as fixed. The transition question is not "what temperament am I becoming?" but "what role variant of my temperament does this new life-stage call for?" An ESFJ Provider in the first half of life may become an INFJ-like contemplative Protector in the second — but the temperament (Guardian, cooperative) remains.

• Relationships. Chapter 7 (Mating) lays out predictable temperament-pair dynamics. Idealists and Rationals are the most common cross-temperament pair (both N) — the "Pygmalion project" pattern of trying to improve each other. Artisans and Guardians are the most common other cross-pair (both S) — the "complementary" pairing where the Artisan brings spontaneity and the Guardian brings reliability, with predictable conflict over impulse vs. stability.

• Daily practice. Keirsey's most useful daily heuristic: do not expect from yourself or others the intelligence that lives in a different temperament. The Rational should not chastise themselves for being poor at logistics; the Guardian should not chastise themselves for being unable to do open-ended strategy. Build the life around the native intelligence.

How This Book Connects

• Builds on: isabel-briggs-myers' gifts-differing (Keirsey uses MBTI letter codes), carl-jung's psychological-types (acknowledged source), and the European personology tradition (Adickes, Spränger, Kretschmer, Fromm). Behind these: Hippocrates, Galen, Plato, Aristotle.

• Contradicts / tensions with: Myers' function-stack theory (Keirsey rejects it as un-empirical). Trait-dimensional psychology — Keirsey insists on categorical temperaments. The unitary-IQ tradition (Spearman, Wechsler) — Keirsey claims four domain-specific intelligences. The Freudian/Adlerian single-motive views.

• Extends to: Subsequent temperament-based work in vocational counseling, educational psychology (especially the Artisan-child literature), and team development. Reframes mbti for those who find the function-stack opaque. Anticipates the contemporary "behavioral profiling" school (disc, etc.) in its emphasis on observable behavior over inner mental functions.

SWOT for the Author's Worldview

• Strengths. Empirically grounded — the two observable behaviors (word use, tool use) are testable and inter-rater reliable in a way function-stack analysis is not. The four-temperament structure has 2400 years of cross-cultural validation. The four-intelligences claim is humane: it stops people from condemning themselves for not having intelligences they were not built for. The book is unusually readable for a personality-theory text — Keirsey writes with the voice of a clinician who has watched thousands of cases.

• Weaknesses. Keirsey's rejection of the function-stack throws out genuine insight along with the opacity — particularly the inferior-function compensation dynamic that explains stress behavior. The "four intelligences" claim is theoretically suggestive but lacks the empirical scaffolding of Gardner's multiple intelligences. Some of the temperament descriptions are dated and gendered. The bimodal-categorical claim shares Big Five's quarrel with MBTI.

• Opportunities. Hybridizing Keirsey's behavior-anchored diagnosis with Quenk's inferior-function clinical work could yield a more complete framework — Keirsey for typing, Quenk for understanding stress. The four-intelligences claim could be tested empirically against domain-specific performance data.

• Threats. Academic psychology has not embraced the four-temperament framework any more than it has MBTI. The popular tech/HR press is increasingly skeptical of all categorical typologies. The behavior-axes claim (concrete/abstract, utilitarian/cooperative) is open to "I'm sometimes both" objections that erode the framework's clean structure.

"What Would Keirsey Say About Career Repurposing / Human–AI Collaboration / Identity Transitions?"

• Career repurposing: Identify your temperament; identify its native intelligence; choose work where that intelligence is the work, not a tolerated side effect. The expensive mistake is staying in a cross-temperament role for stability or status — the cost compounds over decades. Mid-life repurposing is often the late discovery that one's first career was a cross-temperament error.

• Human–AI collaboration (extrapolated): AI's current strengths are in logistical intelligence (scheduling, sorting, supplying information) and aspects of strategic intelligence (system-modeling). AI is weak in tactical intelligence (the moment-to-moment read of a live human situation) and diplomatic intelligence (individuating attention, the mediation of value-laden human conflict). Keirsey would advise organizations to map work by intelligence type and assign AI the logistical-strategic load, keeping humans on tactical-diplomatic work. The labor risk is highest for Guardians (logistical) — whose intelligence is most replaceable.

• Identity transitions: Identity in Keirsey is temperament + role variant + life-stage. Transitions are role-variant shifts within a stable temperament. The signature of a healthy transition is that the temperament's native intelligence finds a new role to express itself in. The signature of pathology is the attempt to become a different temperament — predictably exhausting and predictably failing.

Open Questions

• Does the four-temperament structure cross-culturally validate? Most evidence is Western.
• How do Keirsey's four intelligences map onto contemporary cognitive science (executive function, fluid vs. crystallized intelligence)?
• Can the function-stack framework (Myers) and the temperament framework (Keirsey) be unified, or are they competing ontologies?
• How does temperament interact with the inferior-function-under-stress phenomenon (naomi-quenk)? Keirsey says little about stress; Quenk says much.
• What does the AI displacement landscape look like when mapped by temperament-intelligence? Guardians at greatest risk; Artisans (tactical, physical) most insulated?

Citation

Keirsey, David. Please Understand Me II: Temperament, Character, Intelligence. Prometheus Nemesis Book Company, 1998. Revised and substantially expanded from Keirsey and Marilyn Bates, Please Understand Me: Character & Temperament Types (1978).