This is the title of a very influential book that was written before the end of WWII. I think it has influenced neo-liberal and conservative economists. It is a critique of Plato's sociology, but also an eloquent defense of democracy and individualism.
Popper casts a few concepts in a different light than what I see them as:
1. Empire
2. Trade
3. Tribe
4. Social engineering.
According to Popper, the greek empire (and neo-liberals can extrapolate to the american empire) did not arise in order to exploit and oppress other tribes, but in order to facilitate trade of material goods and ideas.
Trade is not a means of exploitation either, but a means of improving the material well being of everyone, of learning (by coming into contact with other cultures) that one's ways of doing things are not unique and thus becoming less bound by one's tribe or social group. Tribe is seen as an oppressive institution, limiting individual freedom, an infantile stage of human development that we must grow up from. Social engineering, if it is to improve matters, is only to be done in small increments (piecemeal engineering), as opposed to wiping the slate clean and starting over with sweeping changes (utopian engineering).
I will start my critique with common ground. Both Popper and I agree on the ethical point that the goal of any "good" social arrangement is to maximize the freedom and potential for happiness of individuals, in an equalitian way. This is to be contrased with fascist (or communist) views that stress the stability of the state and the superiority of a master race (or class), or familial views that stress the cohesion of the family or tribalist views that stress the cohesion of the tribe.
All such collectivist ideologies, when implemented lead to what Popper calls "closed societies", in which individuals are not free to choose how they live, but must adhere to predetermined social norms or laws. Social norms exist in "open societies" too, but they do not totally hamper the freedom and creativity of individuals. Another lynchpin of some closed societies is the theory (dubbed historicism) that history operates according to certain laws and/or certain ends which are beyond human intervention, similar to natural laws or god-given will.
I think Popper is aware of collectivism as a political and social arrangement or ideology, which leads to closed societies that are detrimental to individual liberty and happiness. The other meaning of collectivism is a psycho-spiritual need of individual humans. Popper is aware of this need, but underestimates its imoportance. Collectivism in this sense is a need to transcend one's individuality/ego and either merge with or commune with a larger life (e.g. God, Spirit, Nature, family, tribe, mate, mob, nation-state, tribe). Similarly, individualism(differentiation) is not only an ideology and a resulting social arrangement, but a psycho-spiritual need. Looked at this way, it is not wise to choose either collectivism or individualism, as Popper seems to think is necessary. Both must be acknowledged and different individuals may make different choices (depending on how strong the respective need is in them) to optimize their happiness. Indeed, the psycho-spiritual need preceeds ideology and influences it. Suppression of benign, readily available means for satisfying the need for collectivism will only lead to its eruption in the (sports, or political) mob or narcotic use and an increase in ideological fascism, communism, cultism, and (lately) anti-civilizationism and neo-primitivism. Suppression of readily available means to individuate will lead to creative anemia, lack of innovation and ideologies which over-emphasize individualism, such as objectivism. Popper made an important distinction between individualism and selfishness and between collectivism and altruism, whereas most of these ideologies confuse these and allow only two possibilities: 1. individualist and selfish or 2. collectivist and altruist. Popper allowed for two more possibilites: 3. individualist and altruist or 4. selfish and collectivist (as in I only care about my tribe or my class or my nation-state). But if we view these as psycho-spiritual needs of individuals, then there are two more possibilities: 5. selfish and altruistic and 6. individualistic and collectivist.
A good social arrangement would encourage 2, 3 and 6, or equivalently all 3 of individualism, collectivism and altruism. This means that tribes and families would be encouraged, not just individuals. Possibility 4 is also known as parochialism, but tribes or families need not be parochial.
From the point of view of psycho-spiritual needs, empire does not usually increase the possibility for individuation but has the opposite effect. The needs of individuals are best decided by the individuals themselves and their family and local community, not by a global empire (whether it be ruled by tyrants, special interests or corporations). Empire may start with good intentions (or perhaps only selfish economic interest), to promote trade, which would edify people materially and culturally, but it seems to always end up oppressive.
Trade in goods and ideas can decrease parochialism and promote open societies, but when global it can also destroy families, local communities and tribes, which is precisely what has happened with global trade when 1. most people only have their labor to trade in a global market (as opposed to also guaranteed access to basic needs and a democratic participation in their production) and 2. Nasty environmental and human rights abuses can be hidden far away from those who pay for them unwittingly. Ultimately, global trade is also destroying individual liberty, because one can be controlled by the most economically powerful. There are more stringent limits to economic power when production (at least of basic needs) and consumption are local and democratic. Though the intention of global trade starts as one of freeing people from tribal customs and natural and social dependencies, it ends up making people into over-specialized idiots who do not know hot to provide for their basic needs without a dependence on global corporations, lots of capital which is only under the control of the few, and national governments. It ends up destroying communities and nature and by so doing it deprives people of the basic need for communion and ego-transcendence. I think there is a way to remedy this situation by enabling local economies at least for basic needs, but that is the subject of a different post (and has been mentioned in at least one previous post).
Last, I wish to discuss Popper's idea of social engineering. The distinction between piecemeal and utopian engineering is a very useful one and I agree with him based on history that piecemeal engineering is more effective in bringing about desireable change. However, it will be useful here to look not only at the evolution of technology but also at the evolution of biological species for a fruitful analogy, in order to learn what works. Analogies are dangerous because people often forget their limitations, but they can also be useful. Social Darwinism was an analogy that was not that useful, but only because the people making it did not understand the biology of altruism and speciation. They only focused on competition and micro-evolution (as opposed to macro-evolution, aka speciation). Analogies are useful because many interacting systems have similar dynamics, a fact that is exploited in systems theory (physics) and category theory (mathematics).
In order to understand the following, it helps to have a visual picture of a "fitness landscape". Moving in an east-west and north south direction corresponds to changes in genes and geographical location (in reality there are alot more dimensions than 2, but for the purposes of visualization pretend like there are only 2 dimensions to move in). The topography corresponds to negative fitness. Negative fitness instead of positive fitness only so that we can conceive of the highest fitness (lowest negative fitness) at the bottom of a valley. A species can move around this landscape by mutating its genes (or moving geographically), and the fitness landscape itself is dynamic by virtue of other species changing their genes and location too, and non-biological changes (meteor hits, climate change, mountain erosion, sea level rising, etc). A species which has achieved equilibrium in this landscape is in a valley surrounded by mountains. It has maximized its fitness (minimized its negative fitness). The question now is how does a species evolve to something else?
While small random changes can lead to large changes over time (on the time scale of changes in the landscape which is the sum total of all other species in one's ecology and abiological changes) and to one mode of speciation (called chronospeciation), there are other ways that species arise due to relatively quick changes in particular genes that can regulate many other genes (called master genes or regulatory genes). Changes in most genes do not make much difference because of redundancy, or only affect small changes because most genes only influence a few other genes. Master genes, on the other hand influence tens or hundreds of other genes and mutations in master genes can have large effects. Even when chronospeciation is the mechanism whereby a species evolves into another species, master genes are probably involved. Besides the timescale, the main difference between chronospeciation and a species bifurcation into two species is the fact that in a species bifurcation reproductive isolation (which might result from the original mutation or from a different mutation) is needed between the incipient new species and the mother species. I think this is because a bifurcation can occur by 3 means (after the mutation in the master gene has occured).
1. The mountainpass scenario. The next negative fitness valley can only be reached through a mountainpass, which while crossed implies lower fitness, which implies a quick transition is needed, before everyone dies. While going up to the pass, there are two forces acting against the incipient species:A. The decreased fitness. B the genetic drift partially coming from mating with the old species. If B can be eliminated by reproductive isolation, the incipient species has a better chance of overcoming A.
2. The entropic barrier scenario. There is one or a few downhill paths to the next valley, but they are very hard to find with a genetic algorithm. There are many more paths leading to higher (or equal) negative fitness (lower or equal fitness). Reproductive isolation is necessary in order for the incipient species to acquire enough distance in fitness space from the mother species. Without isolation, the incipient species is constantly coming back to the old valley through random genetic drift. Though it has acquired a beneficial mutation, the mutation can be lost by breeding with the mother species. In this scenario, there are two timescales: the time for the incipient species to get far enough away going downshill so that reproductive isolation happens automatically. The other timescale is how quickly the beneficial mutation can be eliminated by drift. Chances are increased for the new species to form with a steep downshill direction and a relatively small reproductively accessible population in the mother species.
3. The tunneling scenario. The mutation is silent for a while, offering no selective advantage or disadvantage. If the reproductive isolation does not happen quickly the mutation will be lost before the incipeient species has a chance to tunnel through to the new valley, where the mutation is now beneficial.
In these 3 scenarios a small population (the incipient species) is involved in finding the new (negative) fitness valley. This population will be genetically swamped by the larger mother species before it makes it into the new valley unless in can reduce or eliminate exchange of genes with the mother species. The mother species (unless it has small numbers due to some catastrophe) cannot make any of these 3 transitions en masse, quickly. It has inertia. Only a small population can be "lean and mean" enough to make it quickly into the new valley. The mother species can make it into a new valley only over large timescales, timescales over which the whole fitness landscape changes (due mostly to other species changing and perhaps climatic and geologic changes) and allows a constant downshill path that is easy to find.
The analogy I wish to make is with new cultures evolving similarly to new species. Instead of genes, we have memes. Instead of reproductive isolation, we have cultural isolation. Cultural isolation is not the same as starting with a clean slate, anymore than a new species has to start with a new genome. Engineering can speed up the natural process of culture formation and direct it in desireable, less random ways. In order for social engineering to be effective, one must respect these three laws of social engineering:
1. Cultural isolation is necessary unless one waits for an uphill direction to become a downhill direction, which could take eons, or an environmental/economic catastrophe.
One has to make memetic changes with a small, somewhat isolated group. The resulting culture is not closed in Popper's sense (since an isolated culture can allow for critique and individual liberty to question norms), nor does it need to stay isolated forever. Only until it is stable enough to resist being swamped by the mainstream culture from which it arose.
2. Any change proposed must be in a master meme if one of the three scenarios of culture bifurcation happens. If the change is not in a master meme, then many other changes will be required to be implemented "by hand" instead of automatically and this would take too long to figure out, even if the change is not random but engineered. All the bifurcation scenarios require a quick timescale. A mutated non-master meme will usually lead to going uphill and then coming back to the original valley, either a case of micro instead of macro-evolution (this is the case when a proposed change leads to the same old problems) or no change at all.
3. Mechanisms for mutation must be ample--by analogy with biological speciation mostly through imperfect reproduction of memes. This is exactly the open society where democratic critique and non-totalitarian education are encouraged.
Unless one respects these laws, then any changes will be short-lived and/or superficial.
Here is an example of the first law. I am struggling with this here in Atlanta. While my housemates agree that we want to change the meme of dependency on the global economy to one of local production of goods, they find it hard to not be influenced by the memes of cheap or free food which requires little or no processing (unlike garden food which at least requires washing). By contrast, the Possibility Alliance in rural Missouri has no cell phones, TV (actually no electricity at all) cars or internet, only lets in a few guests at a time and have a buffer of amish farmers around them. They are not prone to memetic infections from the mainstream culture, but actually can infect visitors with their mutated memes. They have already bifurcated.
An example of paying attention to the second law of social engineering is if one wants to change the carnivorous diet meme to a vegan meme, it won't work. Carnivorous diet is regulated by many other memes, hence it is not a master meme. One such meme is the need for more protein in a blue collar (physically demanding) job than a white collar job. Another is the meme of religious and cultural associations with meat (e.g. dominion over animals with no souls). A third is the supposed unsustainability of current alternatives to meat in industrial agriculture (their production and transport). A fourth is the reduced labor per calory of food possible with meat and animal products in areas where vegetable farming is difficult or impossible. A fifth is the supposed need for animals even for sustainable vegetable production (e.g. need for animal manure).
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
update from Arkwright
Infrastructure: We are off the electrical grid, and our solar panels and batteries (all donated) are serving us well. We are off the heating grid, using two rocket stoves that heat (relatively cleanly) with wood. We are also off the water grid. We have running hot water from the rocket stove, which so far we have used for dishes, but now that it is getting warm, we probably won't fire the stove up anymore. We also have running hot water from solar panels and a heating element which we use for indoor showers and dishes. We also have hot water from the passive solar outdoor (in the greenhouse) shower now that it is above freezing. We are taking showers and I am doing laundry with that water. We are still cooking mostly with propane from tanks, though occasionally I use my little rocket stove and a solar cooker. We are planning more cooking rocket stoves for an outdoor kitchen so we could get off the propane grid. Our greenhouse is working great--we have many starts and some have been transplanted into the garden already. We are digging many beds and should have about 1500 sq feet planted (which is not that much considering it would take about 4000 sq feet to feed a person needing 2500 calories for a year (maybe half that much with two successive plantings and 1/4 with excellent yields). Our greenhouse also kept the water from freezing. We have a shallow well pump plus 750 gallon cisterns (made out of wood and pond liner) that gives us running water, and an outdoor 300 gallon tank system plus diaphragm pump plus filters for our drinking water. Our fruit trees have many buds, so I am hoping for many plums and peaches. Our chickens were laying great until I thought to experiment and see if they really need that unsustainable commercial feed so I took them off it for a week, and sure enough, they stopped laying. After two weeks on feed they are laying 5-6 eggs/day again. We are experimenting with growing worms for them and are considering using the neighbors 2000 sq foot yard for growing them some food. We are debating whether to use roundup or not to remove the Kudzu. Jenell just built a chicken tractor and we should be putting the chickens there to help us tear up the kudzu. The chickens seem happy, they have a big area to roam in (and supplement their diet with bugs), encircled by both an electric fence and chicken wire (not counting the chicken tractor). I also hope to supplement their diet with nuts from our black walnut trees which last year did not produce good nuts, but which we might be able to revitalize. I gathered some nuts from another place and am trying to grow maggots in them before I feed them to the chickens, and then crack them once the other husk is off and feed them again to the chickens. Our batteries and solar panels plus electronics are a temporary measure to buy us time. We either need to figure out how to make them locally or get off them eventually.
Social/spiritual: We are currently 3 people living in a house and two people helping with bread labor who are not living there. A few people have not been a good fit for what I (I'd like to say "we", but can't at this point) am trying to create. The urban intellectuals who have a million ideas (mostly from UTube) but can't implement any of them or only want to work on the "sexy" ones which do not address our immediate needs (e.g. someone wants to work on a DYI mass spec!). The opportunists who just want a free place to live. The anarchists who believe that they should only do what they love doing (which might be feasible after a critical mass is reached, but not at this stage of our project). The individualists who cannot take helpful suggestions for improvement without having their egos hurt. Without getting too personal, I would say that this is the most challenging area. I would like to encourage deep connection with people, nature and the divine, creativity, scholarship, critical thinking and joy. Unfortunately the internet is still prevalent in our house and I believe does not foster most of these qualities but in some cases actually works against them. It is maybe better than television, so I should be grateful for the fact that we have no television. I decided not to use internet at home and just go to the library for my brief internet needs and we will see if we can achieve consensus on that (it also costs money). We do show movies once a month, which is OK, but I would like more active activities. We did have intelligent discussions the first few movies, but not lately.
I am trying to institute activities which would promote the above qualities, but so far people have not been able to participate in those activities. The mainstream culture is too strong and I sometimes feel like I need to start with a clean slate and people who have less of the mainstream within them.
Economy: No luck with any of the people I wrote to personally (James Cameron, Greg Mortenson and Kim Stanley Robertson). Will investigate George Soros, Ursula LeGuin and Michael Moore. We are selling Kombucha as a separate coop (for legal reasons), but in order to make significant money we will need someone to take on the business/legal side of it. We are investigating making drinking glasses out of bottles. We started bartering with a neighbor who is a blacksmith. We give him and his wife eggs and veggies (she makes her own Kombucha so doesn't need ours) in return for gardening tools and barrels for rocket stoves. We do get much food and materials from the urban waste stream.
Legal: I met with a lawyer to get advice on getting 501c(3) status and tax questions. He thinks we do not need to file taxes until we make some significant money. Jenell and I attended a workshop about fiscal sponshorship from existing tax-exempt non-profits. It would be good to find a fiscal sponsor.
Transportation: we are mostly off the car grid, using bikes and public transportation and a bike trailer to haul stuff.
Social/spiritual: We are currently 3 people living in a house and two people helping with bread labor who are not living there. A few people have not been a good fit for what I (I'd like to say "we", but can't at this point) am trying to create. The urban intellectuals who have a million ideas (mostly from UTube) but can't implement any of them or only want to work on the "sexy" ones which do not address our immediate needs (e.g. someone wants to work on a DYI mass spec!). The opportunists who just want a free place to live. The anarchists who believe that they should only do what they love doing (which might be feasible after a critical mass is reached, but not at this stage of our project). The individualists who cannot take helpful suggestions for improvement without having their egos hurt. Without getting too personal, I would say that this is the most challenging area. I would like to encourage deep connection with people, nature and the divine, creativity, scholarship, critical thinking and joy. Unfortunately the internet is still prevalent in our house and I believe does not foster most of these qualities but in some cases actually works against them. It is maybe better than television, so I should be grateful for the fact that we have no television. I decided not to use internet at home and just go to the library for my brief internet needs and we will see if we can achieve consensus on that (it also costs money). We do show movies once a month, which is OK, but I would like more active activities. We did have intelligent discussions the first few movies, but not lately.
I am trying to institute activities which would promote the above qualities, but so far people have not been able to participate in those activities. The mainstream culture is too strong and I sometimes feel like I need to start with a clean slate and people who have less of the mainstream within them.
Economy: No luck with any of the people I wrote to personally (James Cameron, Greg Mortenson and Kim Stanley Robertson). Will investigate George Soros, Ursula LeGuin and Michael Moore. We are selling Kombucha as a separate coop (for legal reasons), but in order to make significant money we will need someone to take on the business/legal side of it. We are investigating making drinking glasses out of bottles. We started bartering with a neighbor who is a blacksmith. We give him and his wife eggs and veggies (she makes her own Kombucha so doesn't need ours) in return for gardening tools and barrels for rocket stoves. We do get much food and materials from the urban waste stream.
Legal: I met with a lawyer to get advice on getting 501c(3) status and tax questions. He thinks we do not need to file taxes until we make some significant money. Jenell and I attended a workshop about fiscal sponshorship from existing tax-exempt non-profits. It would be good to find a fiscal sponsor.
Transportation: we are mostly off the car grid, using bikes and public transportation and a bike trailer to haul stuff.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
the hundredth monkey
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundredth_Monkey for background. The story is apocryphal, a myth. But maybe something like that effect happens sometimes in evolution of species or of cultures. If it does happen, it could either be a speciation event or just a fixation of a mutant gene/meme within a species/culture. The part that is controversial is a proposed wholistic, global effect that does not involve local transfer of memes from monkey to monkey (or person to person). Something like collapse of a wave function or morphic fields. There is no data from evolutionary biology to support such a scenario, as far as I know, and I won't be discussing this scenario, as interesting as it might be. I will however discuss a way that critical population size could play a role in speciation or fixation of a meme/gene. Before we discuss how something like a critical mass could be essential for speciation (or for the fixation of a mutated gene/meme), we need to review 3 possible speciation scenarios.
1. The mountain pass scenario, when a reproductively isolated population needs to overcome a fitness barrier (mountain pass and think of negative fitness for the analogy to work) in order to then descend into a new valley where it can optimize its fitness and become a new species (splitting off from the parent species).
2. The tunneling scenario, when a reproductively isolated population has a hidden phenotype due to a genetic/memetic mutation and emerges into the other valley when it has traveled far enough in geographical and/or genetic/memetic space, without a fitness penalty (splitting off from the parent species).
3. The chronospeciation/entropic barrier scenario, when the whole population makes the shift (no reproductive isolation), going "downhill" (in negative fitness) all the way, finding a rare downhill path among mostly uphill paths. The downhill path may have been there for a while but was not found, or just emerged to to changing environment.
Keeping these speciation scenarios in mind, there are three posssible ways that a hundredth monkey scenario could operate:
1. When there is no speciation, but only fixation of a gene/meme, the mutated sub-population has reached a critical mass where the probability of being swamped out by genetic drift from the unmutated population is very small, and so the gene/meme almost certainly gets fixated in the population at large.
2. When there is reproductive isolation, a mutation in a master/regulatory meme, and a mountain pass or tunneling scenario, the small new species becomes large enough to be stable and not die out. This is once they have gone over the mountain pass or tunnelled through the mountain. In a mountain pass scenario, there is the possibility of a critical mass being necessary even while going up to the pass, because more people who are already manifesting some of the new culture might actually be able to lower the barrier or be able to handle and thwart the old culture manifesting in new people. I feel like this is the situation with my project (Open Space Church or Arkwright).
3. Perhaps a critical mass could be important in a chronospeciation event (no splitting into two species) without reproductive isolation in a scenario with entropic barriers. A few individuals go down the new path and thrive, but no one follows until a critical mass is reached because people (or monkeys) from the old species/culture are not going to notice the thriving people/monkeys in the new species or perhaps they notice and persecute or make it hard for those monkeys/people, being conservative in nature and apt to believe that the old ways are better. I think this might be the situation for the Possibility Alliance.
1. The mountain pass scenario, when a reproductively isolated population needs to overcome a fitness barrier (mountain pass and think of negative fitness for the analogy to work) in order to then descend into a new valley where it can optimize its fitness and become a new species (splitting off from the parent species).
2. The tunneling scenario, when a reproductively isolated population has a hidden phenotype due to a genetic/memetic mutation and emerges into the other valley when it has traveled far enough in geographical and/or genetic/memetic space, without a fitness penalty (splitting off from the parent species).
3. The chronospeciation/entropic barrier scenario, when the whole population makes the shift (no reproductive isolation), going "downhill" (in negative fitness) all the way, finding a rare downhill path among mostly uphill paths. The downhill path may have been there for a while but was not found, or just emerged to to changing environment.
Keeping these speciation scenarios in mind, there are three posssible ways that a hundredth monkey scenario could operate:
1. When there is no speciation, but only fixation of a gene/meme, the mutated sub-population has reached a critical mass where the probability of being swamped out by genetic drift from the unmutated population is very small, and so the gene/meme almost certainly gets fixated in the population at large.
2. When there is reproductive isolation, a mutation in a master/regulatory meme, and a mountain pass or tunneling scenario, the small new species becomes large enough to be stable and not die out. This is once they have gone over the mountain pass or tunnelled through the mountain. In a mountain pass scenario, there is the possibility of a critical mass being necessary even while going up to the pass, because more people who are already manifesting some of the new culture might actually be able to lower the barrier or be able to handle and thwart the old culture manifesting in new people. I feel like this is the situation with my project (Open Space Church or Arkwright).
3. Perhaps a critical mass could be important in a chronospeciation event (no splitting into two species) without reproductive isolation in a scenario with entropic barriers. A few individuals go down the new path and thrive, but no one follows until a critical mass is reached because people (or monkeys) from the old species/culture are not going to notice the thriving people/monkeys in the new species or perhaps they notice and persecute or make it hard for those monkeys/people, being conservative in nature and apt to believe that the old ways are better. I think this might be the situation for the Possibility Alliance.
Friday, July 9, 2010
Stiffed-
A charge often leveled at molecular biologists is that they are too focused on cells to understand organs, organisms, species and ecosystems. Particle physicists are similarly accused by condensed matter physicists or system theorists of failing to see emergent phenomena by focusing too narrowly. In the affairs of humans, new age psychologists could benefit from a sociological and historical viewpoint. Movements such as The Forum, or The Work seem to focus too much on individual psychology, without the benefit of the larger view. I am not a great scholar of psychology, and so I am only aware of two psychologists who had this larger viewpoint--Erich Fromm and Paul Goodman, and both were much more than psychologists. There were and are many feminist sociologists who also made forays into psychology.
I just read one of these, Susan Faludi's "Stiffed-The Betrayal of the American Man". Faludi is a journalist, but also a sociologist, as she goes beyond reporting to making hypotheses about her reporting. I found the book engaging and insightful, an example of how feminism is still vibrant. There are several hypotheses, skillfully hammered home by a plethora of supporting evidence, akin to molecular biology papers that support their hypotheses through multiple experiments until there are no objections (did you think of this possibility--yes, and here is the experiment) remaining.
The first hypothesis is that the economy in the US shifted from primarily producing things to primarily producing images.
The second hypothesis is that masculinity used to be defined, pre-WWII by being of use (of service) to one's community, by teamwork and loyalty to one's society and that as the economy shifted away from production towards image, it also shifted from teamwork and loyalty to individualism and competition with one's fellow workers.
Why is service so important? We seem to be deeply social animals who find serving others deeply gratifying. And what kind of service? Service to a family, to the state, to a community, to a planet? Or service to one's highest calling? These can sometimes be antagonistic. A community may not want to support a mathematician or artist when there are food shortages or enemies on the border. What the state demands may be antagonistic to what the best interest of one's offspring are. And there is a difference between voluntary service and socially or state- imposed service. The peasants in Russia would probably have loved to share if they hadn't been forced to. Similarly, if society expects a man to be a provider for his family just because he's a man, it may be counterproductive. Or when one is forced to have sex from economic necessity, it is not usually as pleasurable as when done out of love. Men naturally want to be useful, of service, but they have to figure out to whom and how by themselves, without social expectations.
The third hypothesis is that sons need fathers to teach them useful skills and a relationship with their fathers that this passing on of skills entails, and that barring such a relationship (brought about by consumer culture) they experience a lack of meaning and abandonment issues.
I pondered how all this fits into my personal life. My father was never a silent or unemotive man. Luckily I did not get that kind of gender curse. I don't feel betrayed by him, I don't feel betrayed by the culture (like it owes me a job or a community). I have been trying to create my own work, so I am not dependent on the culture, and my own community. But I do feel like the culture is messed up in many ways and that is not on the side of joy, peace and justice.
My son probably feels somewhat betrayed and abandoned by me, and the feeling is mutual. I would love to get him back from the Eye of ornamental consumer culture. I would love to leave him a world of life, instead of what I perceive to be a world of death. I would have loved to teach him physics or biology or even a craft, but I am not a craftsman. I would have loved to pass on to him the values of service and a community that he could be part of.
The fourth hypothesis is that masculinity changed into what feminists used to complain about: becoming not of use but used by commercial interests (or by other interests), as in on display. I am guessing that being used as a baby making machine or a sex object feels about the same as being used as an ATM--horrible.
In my own life, I feel used by the culture (with my ex-wife being but a pawn expressing the prevailing view) to provide money that my son does not need. I am reduced to an image of an ATM instead of being able to focus my energy on being of true use to my son, the planet and the larger community.
These hypotheses are nested like layers of an onion, which Faludi calls layers of masculine betrayal. Each deeper layer psychologically affects the shallower one above it. Men's economic privilege going down is the outer layer of betrayal. The useful, productive jobs are mostly gone, replaced by slaves abroad, machines or service jobs (but not so much service to people as service to corporations). Underneath this layer is the layer of loyalty to something bigger than oneself (community or corporation) and integrity. Underneath the betrayal of loyalty and integrity to and from the community or corporation is the layer of betrayal by fathers who are absent or silent, who did not pass on a patrimony. And underneath that layer is a layer of the Eye of Sauron (my analogy, not Faludi's), media culture, always observing, always objectifying, commodifying both men and women.
I think there is at least another layer of betrayal, underneath the eye of Sauron. Why is it that people buy into consumer culture and are so mesmerized by images? I think at the root is the need for comfort and security, of which I've written before. Consumer culture loses its power when one no longer seeks what it offers, or can find it in other ways.
Faludi's concluding fifth hypothesis is that instead of trying to fit social expectations of what it means to be a man, it is more gratifying (for a man) to seek to be useful to a community of men and women and to seek one's bliss, and that this is also the task of women that feminists have been pointing out for a long time.
Why is being an image so bad? It is because the image is two dimensional, it has no depth, and it does not come from a place of creativity and goodness. It comes from trying to make money or manipulation. It does not contribute to real wealth, but only fictitious money. It is not concerned with what is really happening to produce basic needs, if it hurts other creatures or people, it is selfish. Imaging might be something that happens naturally in conscious systems, but this culture has carried it to hellish extremes.
I just read one of these, Susan Faludi's "Stiffed-The Betrayal of the American Man". Faludi is a journalist, but also a sociologist, as she goes beyond reporting to making hypotheses about her reporting. I found the book engaging and insightful, an example of how feminism is still vibrant. There are several hypotheses, skillfully hammered home by a plethora of supporting evidence, akin to molecular biology papers that support their hypotheses through multiple experiments until there are no objections (did you think of this possibility--yes, and here is the experiment) remaining.
The first hypothesis is that the economy in the US shifted from primarily producing things to primarily producing images.
The second hypothesis is that masculinity used to be defined, pre-WWII by being of use (of service) to one's community, by teamwork and loyalty to one's society and that as the economy shifted away from production towards image, it also shifted from teamwork and loyalty to individualism and competition with one's fellow workers.
Why is service so important? We seem to be deeply social animals who find serving others deeply gratifying. And what kind of service? Service to a family, to the state, to a community, to a planet? Or service to one's highest calling? These can sometimes be antagonistic. A community may not want to support a mathematician or artist when there are food shortages or enemies on the border. What the state demands may be antagonistic to what the best interest of one's offspring are. And there is a difference between voluntary service and socially or state- imposed service. The peasants in Russia would probably have loved to share if they hadn't been forced to. Similarly, if society expects a man to be a provider for his family just because he's a man, it may be counterproductive. Or when one is forced to have sex from economic necessity, it is not usually as pleasurable as when done out of love. Men naturally want to be useful, of service, but they have to figure out to whom and how by themselves, without social expectations.
The third hypothesis is that sons need fathers to teach them useful skills and a relationship with their fathers that this passing on of skills entails, and that barring such a relationship (brought about by consumer culture) they experience a lack of meaning and abandonment issues.
I pondered how all this fits into my personal life. My father was never a silent or unemotive man. Luckily I did not get that kind of gender curse. I don't feel betrayed by him, I don't feel betrayed by the culture (like it owes me a job or a community). I have been trying to create my own work, so I am not dependent on the culture, and my own community. But I do feel like the culture is messed up in many ways and that is not on the side of joy, peace and justice.
My son probably feels somewhat betrayed and abandoned by me, and the feeling is mutual. I would love to get him back from the Eye of ornamental consumer culture. I would love to leave him a world of life, instead of what I perceive to be a world of death. I would have loved to teach him physics or biology or even a craft, but I am not a craftsman. I would have loved to pass on to him the values of service and a community that he could be part of.
The fourth hypothesis is that masculinity changed into what feminists used to complain about: becoming not of use but used by commercial interests (or by other interests), as in on display. I am guessing that being used as a baby making machine or a sex object feels about the same as being used as an ATM--horrible.
In my own life, I feel used by the culture (with my ex-wife being but a pawn expressing the prevailing view) to provide money that my son does not need. I am reduced to an image of an ATM instead of being able to focus my energy on being of true use to my son, the planet and the larger community.
These hypotheses are nested like layers of an onion, which Faludi calls layers of masculine betrayal. Each deeper layer psychologically affects the shallower one above it. Men's economic privilege going down is the outer layer of betrayal. The useful, productive jobs are mostly gone, replaced by slaves abroad, machines or service jobs (but not so much service to people as service to corporations). Underneath this layer is the layer of loyalty to something bigger than oneself (community or corporation) and integrity. Underneath the betrayal of loyalty and integrity to and from the community or corporation is the layer of betrayal by fathers who are absent or silent, who did not pass on a patrimony. And underneath that layer is a layer of the Eye of Sauron (my analogy, not Faludi's), media culture, always observing, always objectifying, commodifying both men and women.
I think there is at least another layer of betrayal, underneath the eye of Sauron. Why is it that people buy into consumer culture and are so mesmerized by images? I think at the root is the need for comfort and security, of which I've written before. Consumer culture loses its power when one no longer seeks what it offers, or can find it in other ways.
Faludi's concluding fifth hypothesis is that instead of trying to fit social expectations of what it means to be a man, it is more gratifying (for a man) to seek to be useful to a community of men and women and to seek one's bliss, and that this is also the task of women that feminists have been pointing out for a long time.
Why is being an image so bad? It is because the image is two dimensional, it has no depth, and it does not come from a place of creativity and goodness. It comes from trying to make money or manipulation. It does not contribute to real wealth, but only fictitious money. It is not concerned with what is really happening to produce basic needs, if it hurts other creatures or people, it is selfish. Imaging might be something that happens naturally in conscious systems, but this culture has carried it to hellish extremes.
Sunday, July 4, 2010
mathematics of speciation
In standard evolutionary theory, every species is trying to optimize its fitness function, within a certain environment. But in reality, most of the environment is determined biotically by other species. Let's assume that for simplicity, for now. The situation is each species is trying to optimize its multivariate fitness function, where it only has control over a few variables (geographic location, DNA, etc) and the other species control the rest of the variables (food availability, CO2 concentration, predation, etc). It seems to me that there is only one fitness function since when two species diverge they have the same fitness function and so there is no reason to speculate more than one function with different domains. But one can consider a function of only the variables under a particular species' control, call it the reduced fitness function. These functions can be different for each species, and they are time dependent. The definition of a species is a domain around a local maximum of the reduced fitness function, separated from other maxima by mountain passes. This avoids all the problems encountered when one defines species only by reproductive isolation.Speciation can occur in two different ways.
In the first, there is a temporary reduction in fitness as an emergent species goes downhill for a while, through a mountainpass to another peak.
In the second, two populations which have the same value of the fitness function but are separated a bit by one or a few of the control variables have their reduced fitness function change in different ways due to other species attempted optimization of their reduced fitness function. They both go uphill at all times, with no need to reduce their fitness, unlike in the first case.
It would be neat to come up with actual numerical examples of how this could happen. Perhaps there are topological constraints making certain things impossible. Perhaps it is necessary to introduce an abiotic element (meteors, solar flares, etc) in order for the second situation to be possible.
In the first, there is a temporary reduction in fitness as an emergent species goes downhill for a while, through a mountainpass to another peak.
In the second, two populations which have the same value of the fitness function but are separated a bit by one or a few of the control variables have their reduced fitness function change in different ways due to other species attempted optimization of their reduced fitness function. They both go uphill at all times, with no need to reduce their fitness, unlike in the first case.
It would be neat to come up with actual numerical examples of how this could happen. Perhaps there are topological constraints making certain things impossible. Perhaps it is necessary to introduce an abiotic element (meteors, solar flares, etc) in order for the second situation to be possible.
Monday, May 17, 2010
Does happiness come from within?
In keeping with the last topic, I will talk about a different kind of foundation. The psychologist Abraham Maslow thought that happiness can't be achieved unless a hierarchy of needs are met(physical needs are the foundation, then psychological needs of various levels). The psychologist Victor Frankl, on the other hand thought that people can choose to be happy even if other more basic needs are not satisfied, as was often the case in concentration camps (basic needs not being satisfied). If one believes Maslow, then one is compelled to improve the physical, ecological and social conditions of the world, as happiness, one's own and others' depends on these external conditions. If one believes Frankl, then one may want to improve the world, but because it makes one's own life more meaningful, not because it will make anyone happier. I think they are both right. Frankl is right because we humans are adaptable and have some choice with regards to our states of consciousness. Maslow is right because certain conditions are more conducive to happiness, though it isn't a deterministic system. There is always a choice to be happy or not, even under stressful circumstances. If there is a choice, then sometimes it may be better (in a sense which we yet have to define) to choose unhappiness. It depends what one is trying to optimize. If one is trying to optimize one's happiness, then of course it is tautologically best to choose to be happy. If one is trying to optimize the world's happiness, or any other parameters, then sometimes it makes sense to choose to be unhappy.
Is happiness or communion internally generated? What does internally mean? We are living in a world, we are part of a system. Our neural system can generate experience, but we live in a culture and in a physical environment and we are constantly influenced by it. People who think they could choose to be happy or loving no matter what, usually break down when they encounter a life-threatening situation.
Franklites can choose their worldview in order to hide from things that would make most humans upset. I bet there are more Franklites than Maslowites in places where basic needs are met, such as middle class cultures across the world. Franklites might be happier in such places- they might have a selective advantage in a memetic pool--people might spread memes from happy, confident people more than from gloomy, self-doubting people. They might also have a selective advantage in places where basic needs are not met, such as a concentration camp, Frankl's original example. It is thus surprising that they haven't taken over the human population. Maybe this is because the human species as a whole is dependent on Maslowites to improve the human condition. Maslowites are altruistic.
Dav believes that the only problem in this world is that we are destroying it. He is a Franklite. I am a Maslowite, and believe that there are other problems, having to do with psychology, economics and spirituality all related to each other and related to ecology. Psychology: alienation from the means of production, alienation from other people, alienation from nature. Economics: A non-local economy/technology promotes corruption, environmental destruction, concentration of power in the hands of a few, minimal freedom of expression for most, and opacity (lack of transparency). Capitalism promotes exploitation by those having capital of those that don't (so most landlords get much more than what they put in just for having capital). Spirituality: Instead of communion with other people and nature, people are usually stuck in their ego. The basic need to transcend one's ego is minimally met through drugs/alcohol/addictive sex. It is not true that people could just change if they chose to. The economic, psychological and spiritual system of which they are a part gives them constant reinforcement to maintain homeostasis. Even people who have been radicalized and woken up, still have trouble changing because it is real hard to make a real, sustainable change by oneself. The infrastructure needs to be rebuilt, and this can only be done by a community (many communities), not a lone individual or family. The concentration camps were not ended by happy Franklites, but by many factors, including defection of Nazi soldiers upon seeing atrocities committed against human beings (Maslowites?) who refused to be dehumanized, and the allies war effort.
Capitalism (and probably any complex and powerful enough system), as Herbert Marcuse
pointed out, tends to coopt and engulf any opposition. The opposition coming from the environmental movement is an example which has begun to show signs of being coopted, though the story has not been finished. I don't think any psychological maneuvering which is allied with capitalism can really solve the systemic destruction of out planet, because it is too tied in to economics, psychology, sociology and spirituality in ways that are contradictory to capitalism.
Even if it were possible to separate the environmental problem from everything else, and solve it, I wonder if Dav would really feel like everything is OK with the world if we did things sustainably but had slaves, or Jim Crow laws, or if we lived in a sustainable fascist state. What if we (or most people) merely live a living death, working at stupid jobs that do not use our highest potential and disconnect us from nature and each other, not being able to commune with people (but able to have superficial connection) because everyone is too stressed out or dumbed down or living too far apart and commuting to work and competing with everyone? We got alot of work to do to mend things and it's much more than fixing the environment and taking the Forum.
Is happiness or communion internally generated? What does internally mean? We are living in a world, we are part of a system. Our neural system can generate experience, but we live in a culture and in a physical environment and we are constantly influenced by it. People who think they could choose to be happy or loving no matter what, usually break down when they encounter a life-threatening situation.
Franklites can choose their worldview in order to hide from things that would make most humans upset. I bet there are more Franklites than Maslowites in places where basic needs are met, such as middle class cultures across the world. Franklites might be happier in such places- they might have a selective advantage in a memetic pool--people might spread memes from happy, confident people more than from gloomy, self-doubting people. They might also have a selective advantage in places where basic needs are not met, such as a concentration camp, Frankl's original example. It is thus surprising that they haven't taken over the human population. Maybe this is because the human species as a whole is dependent on Maslowites to improve the human condition. Maslowites are altruistic.
Dav believes that the only problem in this world is that we are destroying it. He is a Franklite. I am a Maslowite, and believe that there are other problems, having to do with psychology, economics and spirituality all related to each other and related to ecology. Psychology: alienation from the means of production, alienation from other people, alienation from nature. Economics: A non-local economy/technology promotes corruption, environmental destruction, concentration of power in the hands of a few, minimal freedom of expression for most, and opacity (lack of transparency). Capitalism promotes exploitation by those having capital of those that don't (so most landlords get much more than what they put in just for having capital). Spirituality: Instead of communion with other people and nature, people are usually stuck in their ego. The basic need to transcend one's ego is minimally met through drugs/alcohol/addictive sex. It is not true that people could just change if they chose to. The economic, psychological and spiritual system of which they are a part gives them constant reinforcement to maintain homeostasis. Even people who have been radicalized and woken up, still have trouble changing because it is real hard to make a real, sustainable change by oneself. The infrastructure needs to be rebuilt, and this can only be done by a community (many communities), not a lone individual or family. The concentration camps were not ended by happy Franklites, but by many factors, including defection of Nazi soldiers upon seeing atrocities committed against human beings (Maslowites?) who refused to be dehumanized, and the allies war effort.
Capitalism (and probably any complex and powerful enough system), as Herbert Marcuse
pointed out, tends to coopt and engulf any opposition. The opposition coming from the environmental movement is an example which has begun to show signs of being coopted, though the story has not been finished. I don't think any psychological maneuvering which is allied with capitalism can really solve the systemic destruction of out planet, because it is too tied in to economics, psychology, sociology and spirituality in ways that are contradictory to capitalism.
Even if it were possible to separate the environmental problem from everything else, and solve it, I wonder if Dav would really feel like everything is OK with the world if we did things sustainably but had slaves, or Jim Crow laws, or if we lived in a sustainable fascist state. What if we (or most people) merely live a living death, working at stupid jobs that do not use our highest potential and disconnect us from nature and each other, not being able to commune with people (but able to have superficial connection) because everyone is too stressed out or dumbed down or living too far apart and commuting to work and competing with everyone? We got alot of work to do to mend things and it's much more than fixing the environment and taking the Forum.
Friday, April 16, 2010
abundance on a firm vs rotten foundation
We are working hard to create abundance. We dig the soil with a shovel and fork, we water with rain water and a solar-powered pump, we plant lots of vegetables. We are thinking about raising fish, we will definitely raise some chickens. Dav built some raised beds with lumber, galvanized sheet metal and soil from Lowe's and pond liner from an online source. We are building a solar shower with scrap PVC and black plastic hose. We have built two rocket stoves, with both scrap and bought stove pipe, bricks, perlite and barrels and local sand and mud for cob. We gather sticks and split wood that someone cut with a chainsaw. Also we split some scrap oak flooring. We have a room hooked up to the batteries, running LEDs and outlets. The rest of the house is just waiting for GA power to release their tentacles so I could safely go in through the main panel and hook up the inverter to the rest of the house. I am thinking about joining the local goat coop so we can get goat milk and make goat cheese. Maybe we could get some goats on the neighbors yard if we build a Kelvin Generator electric fence. We have many projects, all designed to create an abundance of food, water, energy, heat, shelter. I'd also like to have an abundance of ideas, love, discussions, workshops, skills, trade, dance, music. We have started a dance and a meditation.
Yet we have not forgotten that the foundation is still rotten. Almost all the materials come from environmentally destructive, people exploitive, war promoting sources. The money to buy those materials that we don't scavenge comes from companies (that have employed us in the past) that have questionable practices. The economic system (capitalism) is based on selfishness, greed, and making people into wage slaves, rent slaves, and dependents on whatever product or service the corporations are peddling to the masses. We are committed to fixing the foundation.
If one does not mind the foundation and builds or renovates a house on rotten sills, it matters not how wonderful the house is, it will still crumble. In the case of a culture, even if the culture survives a long time on a rotten foundation, the rot affects the souls of the people of that culture.
I am thinking of Ilse Koch, practicing abundance at Buchenwald. She had a horse-riding arena built, she rode horses, she had lots of fancy stuff in her home, like lampshades and soap, she had a zoo she had many lovers. The arena cost the lives of about 30 prisoners. The fancy stuff was paid for by stealing from the inmates. The lampshades were made from prisoner's skin. The soap was made from prisoner's fat. The zoo had a bear who would tear apart prisoners and an eagle who would pick the bones. Ilse's lovers murdered people routinely. Ilse committed suicide in the late 60s.
I am thinking of the Roman empire. I am thinking of antebellum Southern US. I am thinking of the Green sky novels. I am thinking of us.
It is one thing to continue to build on a rotten foundation, while trying to fix the foundation and doing everything so that one has the energy and resources to fix the foundation. It is another thing to pretend like the foundation is not rotten and to fill one's time with fancy stuff. One can be loving and spiritual, but if one's material foundation is rotten, the love will not be quite right. The material and spiritual are intricately linked, as in any complex living system. Perhaps a house is not the best analogy for such a system, not complex enough. An organism or ecosystem would be a better analogy for a culture. Instead of foundation, we can think of roots, or of photosynthesizers and fungi. On the other hand, if one's material foundation is sound but there is no love or freedom of thought and deed, that's not a good place to be either. We need to build a beautiful house on a firm foundation.
Yet we have not forgotten that the foundation is still rotten. Almost all the materials come from environmentally destructive, people exploitive, war promoting sources. The money to buy those materials that we don't scavenge comes from companies (that have employed us in the past) that have questionable practices. The economic system (capitalism) is based on selfishness, greed, and making people into wage slaves, rent slaves, and dependents on whatever product or service the corporations are peddling to the masses. We are committed to fixing the foundation.
If one does not mind the foundation and builds or renovates a house on rotten sills, it matters not how wonderful the house is, it will still crumble. In the case of a culture, even if the culture survives a long time on a rotten foundation, the rot affects the souls of the people of that culture.
I am thinking of Ilse Koch, practicing abundance at Buchenwald. She had a horse-riding arena built, she rode horses, she had lots of fancy stuff in her home, like lampshades and soap, she had a zoo she had many lovers. The arena cost the lives of about 30 prisoners. The fancy stuff was paid for by stealing from the inmates. The lampshades were made from prisoner's skin. The soap was made from prisoner's fat. The zoo had a bear who would tear apart prisoners and an eagle who would pick the bones. Ilse's lovers murdered people routinely. Ilse committed suicide in the late 60s.
I am thinking of the Roman empire. I am thinking of antebellum Southern US. I am thinking of the Green sky novels. I am thinking of us.
It is one thing to continue to build on a rotten foundation, while trying to fix the foundation and doing everything so that one has the energy and resources to fix the foundation. It is another thing to pretend like the foundation is not rotten and to fill one's time with fancy stuff. One can be loving and spiritual, but if one's material foundation is rotten, the love will not be quite right. The material and spiritual are intricately linked, as in any complex living system. Perhaps a house is not the best analogy for such a system, not complex enough. An organism or ecosystem would be a better analogy for a culture. Instead of foundation, we can think of roots, or of photosynthesizers and fungi. On the other hand, if one's material foundation is sound but there is no love or freedom of thought and deed, that's not a good place to be either. We need to build a beautiful house on a firm foundation.
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