The mess on my desk.

**Mike Dura** · 04-16-2006, 10:03 PM

I take a look at my desk and I observe a mess. I can find anything quick enough - I have a loose order in what appears to be chaos. I'm very tolerant of mess. I feel comfortable in my messy office. I come home and I rest with ease in my messy apartment. In my messy room, one finds porn tapes in stacks on the top of my tv. Dirty clothes lie in a pile at the side of my bed. A dish and glass from two days ago lie on my dresser - I still have to get that to the kitchen. In the kitchen I find more dishes that need to be put into the dishwasher. At the foot of my bed, there's a large stack of papers that I'll eventually get back to refiling into folders that go into a filing cabinet. I rarely have a problem finding anything dispite appearing to be disorganized. A little lift here, a little lift there...oh, "woops, there it is"

Are you like this (an "Oscar") or are you like (a felix) who has everything super neat at all times? Did you know that there tends to be a systematic difference between people like Oscar and Felix (from the odd couple?). Among other things, they tend to process information in a fundamentally differently way. Messy people (like Oscar) tend tolerate ambiguity (uncertainty) better. Oscars tend to be fluid thinkers who need not "set and idea into stone." For "Oscars," conclusions are drawn tentatively and readily changed or modified with new information. "Oscars" may even enjoy endeavers that involve continuous re-visioning or changing their perspective. They may have a "need for cognition."

"Felixs," by contrast, are motivated to impulsively draw a conclusion and set it in stone - to have a firm answer. They may jump to conclusions and than process information in a biased way to fit the conclusion they already have. In so doing, their view never changes dispite information at variance that goes unnoticed and is unaccounted for. "Felixs" are more likely to use ready made "knowledge constructs" such as stereotypes, heuristics (rules of thumb), and hackneyed language and cliche. Furthermore, "Felixs" tend to be politically conservative whereas "Oscars" tend to be more liberal in their political leanings. "Felixs" tend to live in a more "black and white" world. "Oscars" tend to see the world in distinctions of many shades. All of this comes from a social scientist named Arie Kruglanski who developed a hypothetical construct called "need for closure." In addition to a personality difference, sometimes a situation may make one more like Oscar (a situation, for example, when accuracy is the motive) or more like Felix (a situation, where an impending deadline is looming large).

Something to think about the next time you observe the mess on your (or someone elses) desk.

**Ih8urdsm** · 04-16-2006, 10:07 PM

I read about 1 sentence of that...

**pepperoni** · 04-16-2006, 10:53 PM

Jeez that was like reading a damn novel

**soccer#3** · 04-16-2006, 11:54 PM

Originally Posted by Ih8urdsm

I read about 1 sentence of that...

haha

i read 2 sentences

**locutus** · 04-17-2006, 12:02 AM

Man I am constantly learning sh!t on this board.

**firmechicano831** · 04-17-2006, 12:09 AM

good shit

**SwoleCat** · 04-17-2006, 09:07 AM

I read the second response about reading one sentence then closed the thread realizing that no one else read it, so it must not be worth reading.

~SC~

**chest6** · 04-17-2006, 10:38 AM

Originally Posted by pepperoni

Jeez that was like reading a damn novel

please change your avatar before I go order an 18" pepperoni pizza and gain 10lbs

**Mike Dura** · 04-17-2006, 11:41 AM

Pretty ironic. This may very well be a "Felix." Felixs tend to jump to conclusions (as opposed to suspending judgement). Ih8urdsm saw an early sequence of information and rapidly jump to conclusion about the piece as a whole. So perhaps he concluded something like..."this guy is talking about being a slob."

Originally Posted by Ih8urdsm

I read about 1 sentence of that...

**Mike Dura** · 04-17-2006, 11:43 AM

OMG! Please do change that avatar. I'm on a stringent precontest diet and you're killing me!

Originally Posted by pepperoni

Jeez that was like reading a damn novel

**Mike Dura** · 04-17-2006, 12:10 PM

Here's another way of looking at it. I like anthropology so I'll draw upon our hunter vs. gatherer analogy. You may know that hunters preceded gatherers (agricultural advances) in early human history. Oscar is to hunter as Felix is to gatherer.

In today's world the hunter would be better suited for synthesis, lateral (or divergent) thinking. That is, hunters tend to be creative. Gatherers, by contrast, tend to be more detail oriented and systematic.

So a hunter may be able to create an inovative idea (or a new system) whereas the more detail oriented gatherer may be better suited to running the system. So called "ailments" such as ADHD/ADD, incidentally, is linked to "the hunter" or creativity in general. So when you see that a person is different than you maybe you can challenge yourself to see how what seems at first glance to be a flaw has it's strengths.