Analysis and Synthesis

It appears that all people can be assigned a position on a scale ranging from extreme analytical to extreme synthetical. At one extreme, the analytical person perceives objects and their properties well, but perceives the relationships between objects poorly. At the other extreme, the synthetical person perceives relationships and interrelationships between objects well, but perceives the objects poorly. It is my perception that all humans can be placed on a discrete position on such a scale.

To the analytical person, relationships are ephemeral things that only exist because they are created by objects, are relative not absolute to the individual perceiver, and therefore have no real existence except in the temporal consciousness of each individual per se. Thus "above" is a relationship that only exists in the mind of the beholder, and has no existence beyond the instance of perception. Relationships have low importance to an extremely analytical person. Thus George is a person with certain properties. His relationship to me and others is unimportant; it is his characteristics as a person that are of interest and that are important. The fact that George lives at 456 Main Street is an important fact about him.

To the synthetical person, objects are shells connected by relationships. It is not the nature of the object that contains significance; objects only have significance through their relationships. Thus the key significance of a perception or memory is that a certain object has a relationship to another object; thus "above" is the supreme significance of the perception. Objects have meaning only to support the relationship and properties have no significance if they have no bearing on the relationship. Thus the importance of my relationship to George is the highest significance. He may be my friend, my acquaintance, my uncle, or whatever. It is the relationship that defines George's importance to me. The fact that George lives at 456 Main Street is of little or no importance; what is important is that he is my uncle.

Most persons are not at either extreme, but exist somewhere on the continuum between the extreme ends. However only analytical persons would be aware of this.