I honestly don’t think anyone in their right minds is asking this question. However, when we live in a world where an alleged science and tech writer for a major publication gets more caught up in a guy’s shirt than a major historic event, one can’t assume that they’re dealing with a sane populace. And, given how deeply SJWs have penetrated print and film, it’s probably safer to just assume arguendo that you’re dealing with complete morons who barely register as sapient, let alone sane, from the beginning.
So, can the subjects of math and science be changed to make them more readily graspable by non-NT minds? Short answer: no. Longer answer: sure. Just as soon as theorycrafting various sci-fi shows/movies becomes an Olympic event.
And the Golden Pikachu goes to Sam for winning the “Kirk vs Picard” debate
Science and math are abstract disciplines. Science, at least, has some concrete applications and studies that people without the NT temperament can grasp. People who are Sensors and Thinkers (XSTP, XSTJ) can more easily get into those fields. There are also fields were feelings are important (mostly in medicine) so NFs and XSFXs can participate there. Still, on average, even in these less abstract fields, non-NTs are going to have a harder time grasping the fundamental structures and patterns because their minds aren’t geared to it naturally the way that an NT mind will generally be. Science is a bit more accessible because it has many concrete and inductive aspects, unlike math.
For math — advanced and theoretical math — anyone without a “Thinking” in their temperament can pretty much just not bother. XSTXs can probably hack it if they really are interested but XSFXs and NFs probably won’t want to have much to do with abstract and theoretical mathematics. They might be happy in applied mathematics like finance, banking, accounting, and the like but they are probably not going to be found amongst the Nobel Prize crowd or solving the ultimate core model problem in set theory. Math is completely deductive, artificial, and abstract. Math, unlike science, cannot be “observed in nature.” You’re not going to see two numbers mating and be able to figure out what their product would be.
Or rather, if you do see such a thing, you are probably under the influence of some really fun stuff and you might want to check into a psychiatric hospital just to be safe.
I’m going to factor your brains out, baby.
The big problem comes in with math being applied in science. See, math can produce models that scientists can use to demonstrate, predict, or disprove hypotheses. Math is also a way of measuring distances, times, and references precisely. That’s why to advance high in science, you generally need to understand the mathematical statements that prove (or disprove) the theorems. Most anyone who paid attention to the teacher (instead of what the teacher was wearing — Chris Plante, I’m looking at you and Ms. Eveleth over there) in science knows that Newton’s first Law of Motion can be summarized as “an object in motion tends to stay in motion while an object at rest tends to stay at rest unless an external force acts on them.” That’s good enough if you’re just wanting to understand what the law is and how it might apply to simple real-world things (like how to get water to flow through an irrigation ditch) but if you’re going to try to figure out how to predict the path of an asteroid to see whether or not it’s going to hit Earth, you need to really know Newton’s law which is properly stated as:
ΣF = 0 ⇔ dv⁄dt = 0
Plugging that in with the data you have on positioning, spin, velocity, etc is part of how an objects’ path through space might be known. There probably are cleaner ways to figure it out but they’ll involve math that I can’t find let alone get the HTML code for, so we’re just going to stick with something simple.
Now, if you have a mind/temperament that doesn’t like to deal with abstractions easily and that doesn’t play well with being creative, you’re going to have a bad time trying to be a scientist. It’d be like sticking someone like me (an INTJ) into a counseling office and expecting us to be able to help some overwrought couple make an emotional connection.
In other words, it’s a bad idea all around.
And, while science and math are great — they’re what power the world right now — being good at them is not the only way to be smart. Sure, they’re probably the best way to be smart and do things that will have centuries’ of significance where your name will be remembered by generations untold, but they’re not the only way to be smart. There are ways for NFs (diplomats) to shine — just look at Mother Teresa or Tom Hiddleston. There are ways for SJs to shine — many American presidents have been SJs, after all. Even SPs have their place — most actors and artists are SPs. And these temperaments are not unimportant. They’re necessary. As much as it might seem that the world would be a great place with only NTs, it’d actually get a bit boring and argumentative. Sure, there probably wouldn’t be any wars because NTs are great at finding ways to get what they want even if the other side doesn’t want to cooperate. But, arguing would practically be a spectator sport. There’s also the added minus of the human population undergoing a massive contraction since INTJs and INTPs rarely bother with social interaction beyond our vague (and usually accidental) plans for world domination — which would make getting married and having kids a bit tricky — and the ENTJs and ENTPs would be too busy building their own empires and engaging in spirited debate. Maybe a few of us might engage in sexual intercourse (probably by accident or under the influence of alcohol and hormones) but probably not enough to keep the population booming.
On top of that, our kids would be miserable unless they were Thinkers because NTs are pretty crap at the whole “emotional connection and support” aspect of parenting (we’re also crap at it from the “being the kid” aspect — just ask my mother).
So, you’d have a world with loads of female scientists, yeah, and probably with all kinds of neat gadgets, interstellar flight, off-world colonies, etc…but it wouldn’t have things like Christmas, random barbeques, bars with pool tables, all kinds of different music, romantic comedies, or (and this is probably of supreme importance to Chris Plante and Rose Eveleth) fashion shows with models wearing a plastic Harley-Davidson motorbike front-end for a shirt (yeah, fellow NTs, I’m stumped on why such a thing exists outside of someone really wanting to be a motorcycle for Halloween).
That this actually exists is a bit frightening
Though, on the plus side: in a purely NT world, there would be no SJWs. So, maybe…hmph. I’ll schedule that for next Saturday’s Global Domination Summit meeting with my minions.
— G.K.
