Project Hail Mary: Ryland Grace (ENTP 6w7 694 sp/sx)
MBTI
Dominant Ne
Grace is a person who is always full of innovative ideas. His research is about how life without water is possible outside earth. He always sees the possibilities of how things can be more than what it is right now. He approached his research in a non-traditional way, using a plywood box (and hence seeing the possibility of how to use the plywood box more than what people usually use it for) with devices inside of it to simulate the conditions on Venus and he found a breakthrough doing so, even though a fellow scientist called his method reckless.
He also sees relationship between objects that seems to be unrelated, he associates his earth beanbag with lava (and still uses that association even with Stratt). Sometimes he quips something that is unrelated to the conversation, for example when he mentioned the fact that they used centrifuge to make butter during the civil war when they're discussing about using centrifuge to create artificial gravity. There are also a few times when he uses word play in conversations.
He doesn't seem to narrow down the possibilities that he explores, even if it pretty much contradicts with reality. When he was on the Hail Mary and saw a mysterious object thrown to his ship he responded by asking the ship to shield up and doubled down asking the ship computer why they don't have a shield (well of course they don't, Ryland cause shields like that only exist in fiction). His disconnection to reality was even mentioned by his ex-girlfriend who claimed that he has his head in the clouds.
Auxiliary Ti
He uses his own impersonal logical framework to explain how things work and to support his dominant Ne. He argues that life without water is possible because the planets outside earth have different living conditions.
Once he got enough information, he builds his own impersonal framework. When he saw that the astrophage went off the slide and looking for the CO2 and then they multiplied, he concluded that the astrophage goes to Venus to breed.
He saw that Rocky responded to him when he tapped the clock and he saw that he lives in a dark environment and he concluded that he uses echolocation to see.
After he collected samples from the petrova line near Tau Ceti E and saw that there are microorganisms there, he logically thought that these microorganisms are also on Tau Ceti E, and he concluded that there's life on Tau Ceti E.
During the leak he investigated the ship and found that the taumoeba could escape the xenonite breeder tanks. He remembered that Rocky's ship is made of xenonite and thus concluded that he wouldn't be able to find the leak because the leak is the ship itself and the taumoeba will eat all his fuel and he will be stranded.
Tertiary Fe
Grace always stands by what he thinks logically make sense using his own framework but he's still often influenced by what others think of him to the point of him sometimes backing off. He has this ambivalence about how he sees himself especially in the beginning. At first he backed off when Stratt offered him to be a part of the project because in the past he was scorned for standing up for what he wrote and he thought that there are lots of other people more qualified than him and then he wanted to be a part of that project when Stratt was about to look for someone else because he said no earlier. He argued that he was just being modest about his ability earlier. He seems to build his sense of self based on how people react to him, especially in the past. He thinks that he's not good enough in his abilities (both as a scientist and a teacher to the crew), he backed off from presenting his findings, etc.
During his younger years however, he had a harder time to maintain social harmony. Since his Fe is in tertiary (and hence a less preferred function than his auxiliary Ti), he focuses more on what makes sense to him based on his own impersonal framework. This made him kept arguing that water is not required for life to evolve, so much so that in frustration he called the leading scholar in his field 'A staggering waste of carbon' which ended up with him being fired from his old job.
Inferior Si
Having inferior Si makes him not paying attention to little details, procedures, his own physical needs, and well-being than the possibilities that he sees. He once took a pill from a stranger without knowing what it was. He did his research on the astrophage with his own way, using a plywood box to simulate the conditions of Venus, not following the standard procedure and hence other scientist called his method reckless. He opened a foreign canister in space without wafting it and he just straight up sniffed it, which is against the standard procedure.
Shadow Functions
Opposing Ni
No data.
Critical Parent Te
When the science officers on the project got killed because of an accident in the lab, Stratt and the others insisted to keep launching because if they delay the launch, they will miss the perfect window, it will set them back months, and it will lead to more casualties. Grace criticized if there is no one trained to do the mission it won't matter.
Trickster Fi
No data.
Demon Se
No data.
Enneagram
6w7 694 sp/sx
As someone with 6 core, Grace somewhat orients himself to an authority. He was unsure of himself and his own abilities when Stratt said that she needed him on her team ("If you think I can help, then I wanna help the world?"). He is someone who thinks about the worst case scenario. He had suspicion that Stratt and the whole team don't care if he dies, he thought Rocky's canister is a bomb, he chickened out during his first space walk. He's even confused why other people are partying even though they know that they'll die. He never thinks himself as a brave person until the situation forces him to be brave. He finally started to go to his virtue (Courage) after Rocky gave him a glimpse of hope that he could go home. He finally started to take action by collecting samples on Tau Ceti. He knew that the situation is dangerous but he kept on doing his mission, trying to push the fear away, took risks that he usually wouldn't take and after all the danger that he went through he still doubted his own bravery. He finally really reached his virtue when he finally decided to be brave for Rocky, sacrificing his chance to go home to save him, even though there's no certainty that Rocky is still alive.
His 7 wing makes him seek fun activities to distract himself from the negative emotions that he feels. He tried to distract his class from asking questions about the dying sun, so he suggested to play a game with the class. After he was on the Hail Mary he tried to distract himself from the weight of the mission and the certainty that he wouldn't go home by doing something fun with Rocky.
He has a 9 on his tritype. He typically tries to keep his own peace. Even though Stratt has taken away his autonomy, he wasn't even angry at her, he framed his decision for not going back as at least he doesn't have to hear that she was right all along.
His 4 tritype makes him show his own shame to other people. He feels that he is a failure and he showed that to other people.
His sp/sx instinctual variants makes him care about his own survival first (self preservation/sp) without really depending on other people first. This with his 6 core makes him a phobic 6 who srhinks away from fear. His secondary sx instinctual variant makes him care about someone that he's close with on one on one basis and in this case it's mostly Rocky. He was willing to sacrifice himself after Rocky also saved him from a dangerous situation. He was even willing to stay on Erid afterwards because he got to be with him there while he got no one else on earth. Since he prioritizes sp and sx, that makes him blind to his social instinctual variant (so). He doesn't really care whether he belongs to a group or not. He even said something that made the science community fired him. He doesn't depend on the community at large for his own survival. Even after he was willing to be on the project, he didn't spend a lot of his time with the people on the project (except Carl and Stratt). He even called the party weird and didn't even spend his time with the crew at the party. He spended his time alone at the party and just observing the people there and tried to have a conversation with Stratt instead.
