I had started with the simplified statement, that I am looking for someone, whose rationality is stronger than gullibility and instinctivity. But this needs a more elaborate explanation.
First of all, I am not referring to those instincts, that serve the survival of the individual. The needs for a minimum of food, water, air etc. is not something irrational that could be overridden by rationality.
Such instincts as also are most basic emotions are facts to handle rationally. Survival needs and emotions of well being are both in need of homeostasis. For both, rationality cannot remove them or avoid them, rationality is needed to create homeostasis. Rationality can help to be aware of needs and emotions, to know, what triggers and causes them, to know, what is best to reach homeostasis.
When I am looking at the relative predominance of rationality over instinctivity and gullibility, then this is restricted to all urges, that are detrimental to the well being of the individual.
Instinctivity and Rationality
Instinctivity and rationality can be two independent traits. There are different variations of the level and predominance of these traits. The choice of examples is from my perspective of a woman, there could be many other examples.
1. Low instinctivity and low rationality. People are just not driven by instinct to do anything but they are most probably not even aware of this. They may not have any part in their value system in favor or in rejection of that instinctive behavior. The may not have conscious reasons not to do, what they are not inclined to do.
Example. A man, who is himself not attracted to pornography, but who has no objections to other men consuming pornography.
2. Low instinctivity and high rationality. With high rationality, they have a value system and attitudes in congruence. They are not only aware of the absence of instinctive urges, but they have an attitude about that instinct in general.
Example: A man, who is not only not attracted to pornography himself, but holds strong values in respecting women as equal humans, who should never be degraded in any way.
3. High instinctivity and low rationality. Such men are more animals than human, they act by instinct without reflection, and they either get into trouble or do not succeed in the pursuit of their urges.
Example: Rapists, who end in jail, because they did not think before being overwhelmed by their urges. They are dangerous, since they are also stronger than women, they should never be released again to protect women.
4. High instinctivity and rationality just a bit weaker. They are those, who are ultimately driven by their instincts, but have enough rationality to serve as a tool to enhance their success.
Example: Casanovas of any kind, who lie, manipulate and lure women into consent, and after having succeeded in fulfilling their urges, they dump the women.
5. High instinctivity and even higher rationality. They are those, who are fully aware of having instinctive urges, but have a value system, that enables them to control their urges in favor of the wish to preserve their self-respect or to avoid cognitive dissonance. Their value system is not in contradiction to having the instincts or to those instincts in general, but only in contradiction to some consequences of the instincts.
Example: Men, who do feel the wish to procreate, but refrain, because of reasons like the overpopulation of the earth or circumstances that they consider not good enough for their progeny.
6. Instinctivity higher than rationality, but lack of opportunity. They are dangerous, because they may appear, as if their rationality were higher. When there is an unforeseen opportunity, they show their real self.
Example: A man cheats after years of fidelity, because until then cheating was never triggered, while his wife wrongly assumed, that fidelity was a part of his value system.
Based on this, I would feel most comfortable with men of variety 2. Absence of instinctive urges in combination with a conscious value system in opposition of those urges creates the probability, that a relationship based on the ERCP is possible.
Men of variety 5 are an option with a hazard. There is always the luring danger, that under some circumstances they would force consequences of their acceptance of their instincts upon me.
The others are not suitable.
Gullibility and Rationality
Rationality is conscious cognition and acting by logical reasoning using evidence. Irrationality is the absence of rationality, where conclusions and the motivation to act are derived by any influence except logic.
Gullibility is a sub form of irrationality, where a need to get or avoid something causes to believe claims without evidence. The belief fulfils a need or supplies the hope to fulfill a need. Praying to a deity, buying homeopathic water as if it were medicine, avoiding risks on Friday the 13th are all behaviors to reduce anxiety and insecurity or are a form of wishful, magical thinking.
Therefore it seems that rationality excludes gullibility, and gullibility indicates the lack of rationality. Except that delusions are not explained with this simple approach.
Rationality excludes delusions as much as any other variety of irrationality, and that is, what I am looking for in a man. I will look at delusions later.
