@Craig Weller
I get what you're saying about there being perceived similiarities between schizotypal behaviour and some aspects I, an INFJ, recognize in myself. I can't help but wonder though... Other than when I was younger and much more shy I don't have social issues, and most of my beliefs are shared by a large number of people who are not considered nutty. I've had some silly moments of credulity when I'm investigating something I'm interested in that may result in momentary silliness, but I regain my composure (and critical faculties)fairly fast.
I read a description of the disorder by the Mayo clinic and can't personally subscribe to being schizotypal.
Symptoms
By Mayo Clinic staff
People with classic schizotypal personalities are apt to be loners. They feel extremely anxious in social situations, but they're likely to blame their social failings on others. They view themselves as alien or outcast, and this isolation causes pain as they avoid relationships and the outside world.
People with schizotypal personalities may ramble oddly and endlessly during a conversation. They may dress in peculiar ways and have very strange ways of viewing the world around them. Often they believe in unusual ideas, such as the powers of ESP or a sixth sense. At times, they believe they can magically influence people's thoughts, actions and emotions.
In adolescence, signs of a schizotypal personality may begin as an increased interest in solitary activities or a high level of social anxiety. The child may be an underperformer in school or appear socially out-of-step with peers, and as a result often becomes the subject of bullying or teasing.
Schizotypal personality disorder symptoms include:
Incorrect interpretation of events, including feeling that external events have personal meaning
Peculiar thinking, beliefs or behavior
Belief in special powers, such as telepathy
Perceptual alterations, in some cases bodily illusions, including phantom pains or other distortions in the sense of touch
Idiosyncratic speech, such as loose or vague patterns of speaking or tendency to go off on tangents
Suspicious or paranoid ideas
Flat emotions or inappropriate emotional responses
Lack of close friends outside of the immediate family
Persistent and excessive social anxiety that doesn't abate with time
Schizotypal personality disorder can easily be confused with schizophrenia, a severe mental illness in which affected people lose all contact with reality (psychosis). While people with schizotypal personalities may experience brief psychotic episodes with delusions or hallucinations, they are not as frequent or intense as in schizophrenia.
Another key distinction between schizotypal personality disorder and schizophrenia is that people with the personality disorder usually can be made aware of the difference between their distorted ideas and reality. Those with schizophrenia generally can't be swayed from their delusions.
Both disorders, along with schizoid personality disorder, belong to what's generally referred to as the schizophrenic spectrum. Schizotypal personality falls in the middle of the spectrum, with schizoid personality disorder on the milder end and schizophrenia on the more severe end.
When to see a doctor
Because personality tends to become entrenched as people age, it's best to seek treatment for a personality disorder as early as possible.
People with schizotypal personality are likely to seek help only at the urging of friends or relatives. If you suspect a friend or family member may have the disorder, be on the lookout for certain signs. You might gently suggest that the person seek medical attention, starting with a primary care physician or mental health provider.
I'm open to believe in some "supernatural" phenomena and like most spiritual people may interpret some events as "signs from God", but I'd be careful not to call that a symptom of a disorder, no matter what Dawkins might say about it...
...and I get a little rambly sometimes but not RAMBLY as in very incoherent-whatthehellisthispersontalkingabout-thisisjustallovertheplace-helpmeouthere-rambly
I might sometimes be a bit of a space cadette, but I don't personally think it would qualify as a mental disorder, slight eccentricity yes, disorder no.
EDIT: I think if tou think of it as a kind of a sliding scale with someone super soberminded and decidedly unspacey (like an ISTJ maybe) on the "normal" end, schitzotypal in the middle and schizofrenic at the other end this is what it would look in my mind:
soberminded, rational, traditional--->most people----->artists, innovative thinkers----->(INFJs would go around here in my mind)----spiritual visionaries---harmless eccentrics---schitzotypals--->>> untill we arrive at schitzofrenics
on a personal level, in my life I use my own scale which is like this:
someone soberminded who sees reality as it is (buddha, Jesus)---->artists, innovative thinkers---->most people---->people whose sense of reality is compromised and cannot relate to others
and I'm thinking in certain types of phenomena being interpreted a certain way magnifying at each level in a way...
Though that said I may be biased in my ideas of how a schizophrenic would be, I.e. couldn't function. I do actually know a schizophrenic, though I had no idea for years they suffered from this condition, who manages to function fine in society apart from when they have an episode from what I've heard....heard, not seen. So I don't know.