Jamie,

Thank you for your well-written reflections on The Red Queen and The Social
Leap.  I validate the stress of having these evolutionary frames as part of
one's "walking around knowledge."  While this knowledge offers some
satisfaction in the pursuit of truth, the enhanced awarenesses seems to add
a sense of responsibility to our social interactions, and loneliness to
bear because we feel we cannot discuss the perceptions and intellectual
material that is important to us personally in a given moment. Even worse,
our significant efforts can feel as if we are "rewarded" with rejection and
alienation.

Joseph Campbell's "The Hero of a Thousand Faces" may be good compensatory
intellectual material, as the language he uses to describe these archetypal
mechanisms is more universally ecouraging, warm, and relatable than the
language of evolutionary theory.  The Evo frame and Joseph Campbell's frame
together suggested that many of us are in a confused interruption of our
attempts to master our environments, achieve something heroic, and bring
wisdom or the treasure back to our tribe.  We seem to be stuck with this
situation.

Part of the urgency on the part of Gregg with regards to the Unified Theory
is that, without a shared language system we can use to describe these
dynamics, we are doomed to be willing and unwilling participants in a
violent struggle between confused apes attempting to repair the
discrepancies in their worldviews by eliminating evidence and reminders
that their worldview is false, and by justifying personal and faulty
worldviews through the accumulation of force.  Yes, that situation is very
real.

I will continue to dream of a shift in our zeitgeist in which we activate
and align with our Bonobo (rather than chimpanzee) templates and
lifestyles.  Whereby we achieve a mass cultural recognition that our
intellectual, cultural, and physical adornments are provisional for the
purposes of something playful in spirit.  In the meantime,

You said:

*appearing happy and self-satisfied in a contagious way, while being just
competent enough at whatever your actual job is - that seems more like
it.... Unless you make a breakthrough that humbles everyone in your
presence.*

Thank you for delivering that piece of treasure to this group :-)

-Chance



On Mon, Feb 17, 2020 at 8:22 AM Henriques, Gregg - henriqgx <
[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Hi Jamie,
>
>   Thanks for sharing this. I am not sure I understand what your thoughts
> are regarding how either the Red Queen or the Social Leap offers a
> narrative that is not consistent with the Justification
> Hypothesis/Justification Systems Theory. Can you say more of your thinking
> here?
>
>
>
>   Also, to most clearly see the (basic) theory of self-esteem provided by
> the Unified Framework, you would want to familiarize yourself with the
> Influence Matrix. Here is a slide show on it.
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.gregghenriques.com_influence-2Dmatrix.html&d=DwIBaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=v_U3XK3luYodZA5TQtHS2q3njeZ9sKrF9Hsl9XY2zLM&s=zofrgiOB1Tb9tFKrN2Ewkq8-w7apKnYpOJ_jJ6RiVMk&e=> Happy to offer
> more resources if you would like. Also, I should note that to fully
> understand JUST in terms of how it frames our everyday interaction, it
> needs to be paired and contextualized with BIT and the Matrix. Here is a brief
> blog on how to use investment, influence and justification
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.psychologytoday.com_us_blog_theory-2Dknowledge_201901_3-2Dways-2Dexplain-2Dhuman-2Dbehavior&d=DwIBaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=v_U3XK3luYodZA5TQtHS2q3njeZ9sKrF9Hsl9XY2zLM&s=D55VBAcs_GZ2u9HbPI5CMOy4P8SV-yQfn7jG6IUym_c&e=>
> as a basic frame for every day interaction.
>
>
>
> Best,
> Gregg
>
>
>
> *From:* tree of knowledge system discussion <
> [log in to unmask]> *On Behalf Of *Jamie D
> *Sent:* Monday, February 17, 2020 1:40 AM
> *To:* [log in to unmask]
> *Subject:* The Red Queen and The Justification Hypothesis
>
>
>
> Hey all,
>
>
>
> I just finished reading The Red Queen, which seems to be an important
> recent book on the evolution of human sexuality. Another book with
> similarly candid conclusions is The Social Leap.
>
>
>
> Near the end of the Red Queen, the author describes some experiments that
> support the idea that human intelligence evolved largely because of the
> endless treadmill of competition with other humans - that we are all
> natural Psychologists, and whether we like it or not, status is important
> to one's health and wellbeing.
>
>
>
> "It's not how good at chess you are overall, but how much better you are
> than your competitors that matters"
>
>
>
> The author also mentioned a theory for the 'invention' of the subconscious
> - that in order to better deceive others (and I'll add, simply to
> cooperate), we must become good at deceiving ourselves in useful ways.
>
>
>
> The reason I add that we *might* need to deceive ourselves to cooperate
> is that certain existential truths set us against each other, and most of
> us would rather deny them than acknowledge them. But I'm more inclined to
> think we should be *publicly* conscious of our incentives and responsible
> for them rather than tuck them away. The schism between the realities of
> our individual incentives and the widespread cultural ontology seems to me
> to be main difference between the "real world" and the matrix. (You know,
> all this blue, red, black pill stuff)
>
>
>
> The author also mentions roughly that "Human communication is less for the
> honest exchange of information [and truth seeking] than for advertising
> value and status."  It seems the latter comes first, in order of priority
> to the individual, and the former is a consequence of competitive
> cooperation.
>
>
>
> This last part is a big deal for me personally, because it explains a lot
> of my frustrations. While I'm seeking people with whom to learn, explore,
> create and grow, I've constantly felt most people I come across to see the
> conversation I'm trying to have as status-aggrandizing, and to retaliate by
> misrepresenting or belittling the topic in order to stay above some "zone
> of humility".
>
>
>
> I could certainly be wrong, but it also seems to create a problem for the
> justification hypothesis.
>
>
>
> Personally, I absolutely love the idea that the refinement of rationality
> and science is the recent pinnacle and trajectory of cultural evolution.
> And pressures of competence in real-world challenges would seem to keep
> this trajectory going if our future is to explore the hidden realms of
> truth and technological-creative possibility. But great swaths of humanity
> are busy maintaining lies (usually implicit lies, it seems to me) to
> themselves and each other in the struggle to appear (and be treated) like
> they matter... and to belong, for its allegiance to the group that we are
> most willing to sacrifice truth. (this connects to the recent post about
> the American life being unhealthy. I agree with the thesis, but I don't
> think the author diagnosed the root problem nor a solution. I might write a
> post on that.)
>
>
>
> We all need to matter to important people around us, which means we need
> some measure of what does and doesn't matter - scarcity of some kind, to
> keep the hedonic treadmill going. Perhaps there must always be losers for
> others to experience liberation, and being perfectly reasonable isn't
> enough. Jordan Peterson's idea that "True Speech" is what empowers people
> doesn't jive with my experience. Rather, appearing happy and self-satisfied
> in a contagious way, while being just competent enough at whatever your
> actual job is - that seems more like it.... Unless you make a breakthrough
> that humbles everyone in your presence.
>
>
>
> I'll stop there to keep this reasonably short.
>
>
>
> - Jamie
>
>
>
> P.S. An existential bummer isn't something I went looking for, nor have
> any desire to propagate in itself, but is simply where my intellectual
> journey has thus far landed. To be honest I rather often feel unsafe even
> being conscious of such findings, because I might inadvertently trigger a
> reaction that could utterly destroy my social value. It's happened before.
> There are some milieu's where if even someone *thinks* you know or
> believe some fact that's inconvenient for dominant norms, you could get in
> serious trouble.
>
>
>
> P.S.S. Self esteem seems connected to behavioral investment theory, in
> that high self esteem activates behavior (or liberates one from chronic
> behavioral inhibition). And I suspect that self esteem is literally
> governed by the dominant norms that govern what memes are allowed to
> spread. There is an evolving 'moral filter', part of the moral arc, that
> protects previously justified memes (based on utility I presume). An
> unfortunate effect is that certain truths have to be packaged extremely
> precisely as to avoid alienating other memes/people. Therefore, many people
> throughout history could have been perfectly reasonable and right about
> whatever they care about, but didn't evolve enough politically to 'make it
> through the filter' to have their memes contribute to the cultural
> memesphere, and their person recognized as someone who matters.
>
>
>
> P.S.S. I'm having a chuckle at wondering if my signals of low status might
> make Gregg uncomfortable. Is that a source of connection or alienation?
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --
>
> -Jamie
>
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