Rational

## 1. Etymology

**Rational** names what **accords with reason**—thoughts, feelings, and actions based on objective values established by practical experience. Compare [irrational](/index/irrational/). Related: [thinking](/index/thinking/); [feeling](/index/feeling/); [adaptation](/index/adaptation/); [typology](/index/typology/).

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## 2. Plain summary

In Jung’s typology, **rational** does not mean “cold” or “only intellectual.” It marks the judging pair—[thinking](/index/thinking/) and [feeling](/index/feeling/)—because both are decisively shaped by reflection. Reason’s laws name the average, adapted attitude handed down through human history; what accords with those laws is rational, what contravenes them is [irrational](/index/irrational/).

A rational [attitude](/index/attitude/) declares objective values valid—not as a private invention, but as a historically organized complex of ideas. Related to [adaptation](/index/adaptation/) and to one-sidedness when reflection dominates perception.

**Examples (exhaustive house list for this Index lemma — common rational motifs named across Jung’s essays and standard Jungian lexica; not a claim that Jung’s CW contains only these):**

accords with reason; objective values from practical experience; thinking + feeling as rational functions; reflection-shaped judgment; historical complexes of ideas; average adapted attitude; vs [irrational](/index/irrational/) perception pair; [typology](/index/typology/) rational class; [adaptation](/index/adaptation/) kinship; one-sidedness risk when perception starved.

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## 3. Academic elucidation

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## 4. Lexicon

**Sharp (1991)**

> Rational. Descriptive of thoughts, feelings and actions that accord with reason, an attitude based on objective values established by practical experience. (Compare irrational.) … Jung described the psychological functions of thinking and feeling as rational because they are decisively influenced by reflection.

(Sharp, 1991, p. [provisional — unverified])

> typology … four functions divide into two pairs — a rational pair (thinking and feeling) and an irrational pair (sensation and intuition).

(Samuels, Shorter, & Plaut, 1986, pp. **153–155**)

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## 5. CW concordance — sample, not exhaustive

> The rational is the reasonable, that which accords with reason. I conceive reason as an attitude whose principle it is to conform thought, feeling, and action to objective values. … The rational attitude which permits us to declare objective values as valid at all is not the work of the individual subject, but the product of human history.

(Jung, 1921/1971, CW 6, pp. 633–634, ¶785)

> Most objective values—and reason itself—are firmly established complexes of ideas handed down through the ages. … Human reason, accordingly, is nothing other than the expression of man’s adaptability to average occurrences…

(Jung, 1921/1971, CW 6, p. 634, ¶786)

> Thinking and feeling are rational functions in so far as they are decisively influenced by reflection. They function most perfectly when they are in the fullest possible accord with the laws of reason. The irrational functions, sensation and intuition, are those whose aim is pure perception…

(Jung, 1921/1971, CW 6, pp. 634–635, ¶787)

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**See also:** [irrational](/index/irrational/); [function](/index/function/); [thinking](/index/thinking/); [feeling](/index/feeling/); [typology](/index/typology/); [attitude](/index/attitude/); [adaptation](/index/adaptation/).

## References

Jung, C. G. (1971). Psychological types [Definitions]. In H. Read, M. Fordham, G. Adler, & W. McGuire (Eds.), *The collected works of C. G. Jung* (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.) (Vol. 6, pp. 633–635, ¶¶785–787). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1921)

Samuels, A., Shorter, B., & Plaut, F. (1986). *A critical dictionary of Jungian analysis*. Routledge.

Sharp, D. (1991). *Jung lexicon: A primer of terms & concepts*. Inner City Books.

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