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Quasi-identity
疑似同一 · Квазитождественные
Same words, different view.
疑似同一 ／ one of the sixteen relations
You are in the same field and use the same words. Only, what those words point to differs a little. Just checking the premises makes you understood surprisingly fast.
QUASI-IDENTITY
01 When you first meet
Taken for a colleague
The material you handle is the same. The vocabulary overlaps too. So at first you take this for someone you can talk to. Reading the same books, thinking about the same problems.
But as the conversation goes on, it gradually stops meshing. Because the same words point to different things. You feel the other person's usage is subtly off, and they feel the same.
It is because you are close that the slip is visible. With someone from an entirely different field this would not happen.
02 After a while
Pointing at the same thing, facing different ways
Rephrase carefully and it still does not quite arrive. The other says they understood, but what comes back differs from what you expected. Explain again and it slips a little again.
The cause is neither knowledge nor ability. You assemble the same object in a different order. Looking only at the conclusion you are close, yet the route there differs from start to finish.
The other person's work can look as if it misses the point. But that is because you are looking in your own order. In the other order, their construction holds.
03 If it is to last
Check, and it gets fast
What works best in this relation is aligning the premises first. The very premise that you are using the same terms does not, in fact, hold. Once you line up what you each mean, the amount of misunderstanding drops sharply.
Speaking as if explaining to someone from an entirely different field gets through better, if anything. The omission of "this must be shared" is what causes the crossed wires.
People standing close to you are not many. Once the premises align, the range these two can talk over is quite wide.
Telling it from other relations
There are several relations that fail to mesh with someone alike. Where the slip is differs.
- The difference from identity
- Identity agrees in words and in order. Quasi-identity agrees only in words and differs in order. Leave it to them thinking you are the same, and something other than expected comes back.
- The difference from mirror
- In mirror, the clash becomes an argument. Because you can see both have a point. Quasi-identity hardly even becomes an argument. The weight of the other's claim is hard to feel.
- The difference from kindred
- Kindred looks at the same thing with different steps. In quasi-identity the thing looked at is itself slightly off, covered by the same words.
Where this relation is useful
Doubting the premises moves faster than trying to understand each other.
- Check the definitions of words first
- Confirm explicitly what is being pointed at and the amount of misunderstanding drops at once. This one move can change the relation.
- Do not treat them as a colleague
- Speaking as if explaining to someone from another field gets through better. Omission is the cause of accidents.
- Keep the deliverables separate
- Make one thing jointly and both intentions are diluted. Making separately and placing side by side keeps the character of each.
PROne thing for this relation
A relation that sees different views in the same words, so tools to set the views side by side.
- Two copies of the same bookFor two who talk as if they read different books.
- Tickets to a place with an audienceIn public, a good pair.
- Podcast equipmentThe conversation of these two comes alive when others listen.
Works that draw this relation
Chosen from works where the relationship between the two is itself the centre of the story.
- In a GroveRyūnosuke Akutagawa · 1922 · short story
Telling the same event, and the lines of each never mesh at all. A short story that gives exact shape to what happens when the same words point to different things.
This is not a typing of the characters. They are listed as examples where the shape of this relation is drawn clearly.
Songs this relation runs through
Chosen from songs whose subject is exactly what happens between the two.
- Losing My ReligionR.E.M. · 1991
The harder you try to convey it, the less it arrives. A song about the state where the words are the same but what they point to has slipped.
- Kotoba ni DekinaiKazumasa Oda · 1981
Holding the same vocabulary, yet what you want to load onto it will not go. It deals with the same problem as the core of quasi-identity.
No lyrics are quoted. The songs are listed for the shape of relation they deal with.
Quasi-identity in Model A: what talks to what
Example: INTJ and INTP. Every pair in this relation connects the same positions in the same way; only the elements inside change.
Lines connect the same element in the other person's structure. 1–2 (strong) 3 (role) 4 (vulnerable) 5–6 (wanted) 7–8 (capable, indifferent)
The 8 pairs in this relation
Quasi-identity is symmetric: it looks the same from either side.