My favorite cult to read about is Rajneeshism. It’s very recent, the head guy was almost supernaturally charismatic by all accounts, and the story is hilarious! From the collection of 93 Rolls-Royces to a bioterror attack by poisoning salad bars in an Oregon town with salmonella (yes).
BTW, Scott of slatestarcodex has also chimed in against the OP’s proposal:
On third thought, everyone else is right and I am wrong. The Dragon Army group house is a very bad idea, enough so that it’s okay to be forceful in encouraging Duncan to modify it or other people not to join it. This is true even if the required modifications are so hard that they end up sinking the project.
Slatestar: “Also, Duncan’s taking the wrong strategy by denying it’s a cult. His pitch should be “Hey, cults seem pretty good at controlling their members, let’s get together a bunch of people who are interested in using cult techniques to become the best people they can be by their own values, and see if we can make it work.””
I agree with Scott on this. When proposing that we should return to well-explored territory found to be dangerous (which is what I claim cults are), we should at least be honest about the fact that we’re returning to old territory, and perhaps argue that it was in fact not as well-explored as we thought and there might be good things to be found there.
But instead, Duncan appears to be arguing that, according to the Pendulum model, we have moved so far past the “old way of doing things” that we skipped over the optimum and are now in another poor solution. He suggests his proposal is a gentle nudge towards the optimum, but this doesn’t seem to square with the fact that the “cult” model is the “old way of doing things” that we we’re previously stuck in. So to me it seems more like “swing even harder in the opposite direction!” when the pendulum should actually be slowing down, moving towards the optimum with less momentum than it had previously.
I agree that “cult” is a loaded and derogatory word and probably should be abandoned in favor of more information-carrying terminology. It might be better described as the centralized authority model. I stand by my claim that the centralized authority model is a return to old territory, though, and this meshes well with Scott’s model of the formation of the bi-modal distribution of peoples’ priors about this (marginalized groups have probably been exposed more to the centralized authority model than privileged Westerners).
“cult” … might be better described as the centralized authority model.
I don’t know about that. There are a lot of organizations with highly centralized authority which are not cults (by any definition). For example, the military.
I would probably define “cult” as an entity which, when faced with the question “Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes?” strongly encourages the answer “You, of course you!” In more abstract terms, a cult depends on controlling the information flow to its members, both through isolation and through inculating high trust for “internal” claims and low trust for all “external” claims.
Cults are not good at getting members to fulfill their own values. Consider the amount of cults that valued sexual purity and ended up with a whole lot of rape and child molestation.
BTW, Scott of slatestarcodex has updated his post with an “on fourth thought” (in addition to his excellent theory on the dynamic motivating disagreement) that states he’s moving away from concern (though not necessarily all the way to “unconcerned”). I’m hoping you would’ve posted this yourself—having sort of implicitly committed to using Scott’s opinion as an advisory authority—if I hadn’t done so myself first. Not just trusting him when he’s on your side, and so forth.
I’m encouraged by this both because they seem like good ideas and because they sound like he’s thought this through more fully than I originally thought.
Also, if we are going to keep bringing in questionable outside blogging as source material, there’s this, which I feel fairly treated by and comes from an author with actual relevant life experience.
Also, if we are going to keep bringing in questionable outside blogging as source material, there’s this, which I feel fairly treated by and includes people with actual life experience rather than those talking out of their butts.
EDIT: Scott of slatestarcodex has updated his post with an “on fourth thought” that states he’s moving away from concern (though not necessarily all the way to “unconcerned”).
My favorite cult to read about is Rajneeshism. It’s very recent, the head guy was almost supernaturally charismatic by all accounts, and the story is hilarious! From the collection of 93 Rolls-Royces to a bioterror attack by poisoning salad bars in an Oregon town with salmonella (yes).
BTW, Scott of slatestarcodex has also chimed in against the OP’s proposal:
Slatestar: “Also, Duncan’s taking the wrong strategy by denying it’s a cult. His pitch should be “Hey, cults seem pretty good at controlling their members, let’s get together a bunch of people who are interested in using cult techniques to become the best people they can be by their own values, and see if we can make it work.””
And the circle is complete.
I agree with Scott on this. When proposing that we should return to well-explored territory found to be dangerous (which is what I claim cults are), we should at least be honest about the fact that we’re returning to old territory, and perhaps argue that it was in fact not as well-explored as we thought and there might be good things to be found there.
But instead, Duncan appears to be arguing that, according to the Pendulum model, we have moved so far past the “old way of doing things” that we skipped over the optimum and are now in another poor solution. He suggests his proposal is a gentle nudge towards the optimum, but this doesn’t seem to square with the fact that the “cult” model is the “old way of doing things” that we we’re previously stuck in. So to me it seems more like “swing even harder in the opposite direction!” when the pendulum should actually be slowing down, moving towards the optimum with less momentum than it had previously.
I disagree with Scott that this qualifies as a cult. Outside post that I think sums up the relevant difference.
I’m also opposed to calling it a cult just because a lot of people took one glance at it and leapt to the most uncharitable stereotype possible.
I agree that “cult” is a loaded and derogatory word and probably should be abandoned in favor of more information-carrying terminology. It might be better described as the centralized authority model. I stand by my claim that the centralized authority model is a return to old territory, though, and this meshes well with Scott’s model of the formation of the bi-modal distribution of peoples’ priors about this (marginalized groups have probably been exposed more to the centralized authority model than privileged Westerners).
I don’t know about that. There are a lot of organizations with highly centralized authority which are not cults (by any definition). For example, the military.
I would probably define “cult” as an entity which, when faced with the question “Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes?” strongly encourages the answer “You, of course you!” In more abstract terms, a cult depends on controlling the information flow to its members, both through isolation and through inculating high trust for “internal” claims and low trust for all “external” claims.
Cults are not good at getting members to fulfill their own values. Consider the amount of cults that valued sexual purity and ended up with a whole lot of rape and child molestation.
BTW, Scott of slatestarcodex has updated his post with an “on fourth thought” (in addition to his excellent theory on the dynamic motivating disagreement) that states he’s moving away from concern (though not necessarily all the way to “unconcerned”). I’m hoping you would’ve posted this yourself—having sort of implicitly committed to using Scott’s opinion as an advisory authority—if I hadn’t done so myself first. Not just trusting him when he’s on your side, and so forth.
Also, if we are going to keep bringing in questionable outside blogging as source material, there’s this, which I feel fairly treated by and comes from an author with actual relevant life experience.
Also, if we are going to keep bringing in questionable outside blogging as source material, there’s this, which I feel fairly treated by and includes people with actual life experience rather than those talking out of their butts.
EDIT: Scott of slatestarcodex has updated his post with an “on fourth thought” that states he’s moving away from concern (though not necessarily all the way to “unconcerned”).
Note: I’ve also reached out to Scott directly myself.