You’re getting at something that feels half-right, but only half.
the comfort that we experience (in the developed world) due to our modern technology is very much a product of the analytic-rational paradigm, that comfort is given roughly equally to everyone
Generalizing from too small a sample? I have argued previously that the analytic-rational paradigm mostly has an impact on societies, but societies are not homogenous collections of individuals: large numbers of individuals in “comfortable” societies are in fact quite miserable, the few who are exposed enough to the analytic-rational paradigm to become conversant with it are typically among a small fraction of the most comfortable.
Is Maslow’s hierarchy itself an accurate belief, btw? How did you judge its accuracy?
Is Maslow’s hierarchy itself an accurate belief, btw? How did you judge its accuracy?
This is a good point, but for now I will note that I have some personal empirical evidence in favor of it, it seems to make sense from an evolutionary point of view (e.g. food before status, because if you run out of calories you die right there) and it is widely accepted, so I will consider it true until evidence is brought against it.
it seems to make sense from an evolutionary point of view (e.g. food before status, because if you run out of calories you die right there)
That’s not necessarily true—there are instances where people starve themselves (though rarely to death) as part of a status-seeking effort.
In the modern developed world, food is dirt-cheap as long as you don’t engage in luxurious extravagance, so that even if you could stop eating altogether, you wouldn’t save a significant amount of money. However, in the past, when even the cheapest subsistence diet was a very large expense relative to income, many people would cut down on eating well beyond the point of discomfort to be able to afford various status-seeking goods to show off. Some other examples of status-seeking behavior that comes at the cost of starvation are religious fasting and dieting to improve one’s looks. Hunger strikes are a peculiar extreme example.
Overall, Maslow’s model is a useful first approximation, but nowhere near fully accurate.
I come into contact (of some sort) on nearly a daily basis with folks who lack one or several of the above: of these I do mean miserable at one of these levels. Not just the homeless, but a growing number of people struggling to make ends meet.
What I’m getting at is that your generalization that “once you find yourself in a more economically developed country, your individual decisions in improving the quality of your own life will (mostly) aim to climb from level two of Maslow upwards” requires some strong qualifications.
As a case in point consider a friend of mine who hasn’t been paid by her employer for a few months, who has been enjoined by the court to keep showing up for work because failing to do so would be cause for termination of any benefits, and who therefore has to keep spending large amounts on oil to drive to work because in her employment-poor rural region most jobs are found at least one hour’s drive away. This is someone I met over ten years ago, who was then comfortably middle class.
This person’s situation isn’t unusual or atypical, but it seems to me that it fits very poorly into your scheme whereby you describe her as a “free rider”.
Conversely, quite a few people who benefit from the most visible trappings of the analytic-rational paradigm, by which I mean schools and universities, go on to occupy position in society which contribute little to the pool of knowledge, to the well-being of the majority, or in general to anything but their own narrow interest. Surely these folks, who presumably have the capacity to be rational, though they don’t exploit it on an everyday basis, also deserve the “free rider” label?
Yet another category your black-and-white scheme seems to ignore is people who are typically asked to sacrifice their lives in defense of the institutions without which the efforts of “scientists, engineers and great thinkers” would have no discernible impact. Among these, I would bet that “irrationalists” are disproportionately represented.
You are, I think, considerably underestimating the difficulty of describing “our modern technology” in terms that would allow identification of “the kind of person who most contributed causally to it happening”. The causal pathways are insanely long, intricately interwoven with the rest of the fabric of society, such that it is far from clear that the notion of “free riders” can apply at all.
Shorter: your post conveys an oversimplified conception of both science and society. (This is a common failing around these parts, possibly needing more posts like the one on the mangle, but this is a topic where the inferential distances appear to be substantial.)
This person’s situation isn’t unusual or atypical, but it seems to me that it fits very poorly into your scheme whereby you describe her as a “free rider”.
Do you honestly think that this friend lives a worse life than a medieval peasant? Yes, people end up in financial trouble, but even in the USA they don’t starve.
Your point about soldiers is taken, but note that in the west, very few soldiers die. The casualty count for Iraq is a few hundred for the UK, out of an army of 100,000. Those are much better odds than a paleolithic or bronze age soldie. Would have faced.
Do you honestly think that this friend lives a worse life than a medieval peasant?
The question at issue didn’t seem to be better vs. worse, but rather “motivated by what”. My friend is spending money on oil which she would prefer to spend on groceries or shelter, neither of which she has quite enough of, and spending it to keep a job which is currently paying her a salary of zero.
It’s not clear to me that this decision is a matter of being “motivated by” this or that category of primary social goods (“things it is rational to want whatever else one wants”), even once you drop (as you have) the idea of a linear ranking of these goods. She doesn’t feel like she is making a decision.
The title of your post suggests that its major point is (still, after your revisions) the italicized phrase “irrationalists free-ride on the [...] achievements of rationalists”. It’s not clear that rationality is a “commons” in the original sense of a scare resource that could be depleted by over-exploitation. It’s not clear what you suggest someone in my friend’s position could be doing to contribute closer to her fair share to the maintenance of “the analytic-rational paradigm”.
Despite a lower than minimum-wage revenue she is actually paying taxes this year, the apparent consequence of the latest tax reform. Would you argue taxes don’t count as contributing back to the commons? These taxes pay in part for universities and research institutions. Why does your post fail to mention taxes altogether?
Your final points I can agree with, in line with Gregory Bateson’s observations that sometimes going crazy can be a sane response to an insane situation. It’s a tragedy all right, but I’m not sure it can be called a tragedy of the commons.
My description of the situation would be more along the following lines. Particular epistemologies (practiced by few individuals) have had huge effect on human societies, transforming them in ways that resulted in much greater numbers of people, interacting in very different ways than in the past, and in particular having greater environmental effects.
One consequence of these changes has been to amplify the impacts of both kinds of epistemologies: whereas it didn’t particularly matter what the medieval peasant believed, in terms of impact on the medieval peasan’ts comfort, how the 21st century citizen in a developed country thinks does matter to his or her medium-term comfort (e.g. through party politics), and epistemological failures of 21st century elites may have a drastic impact on the citizen’s medium-term comfort.
We all need to learn how to think better, and soon, or we are all shouldering more risk than we’d be comfortable with if we did know better; but the consequences of our predecessors’ own improved thinking are playing a large part in distracting us from that objective. Our past successes at thinking better have made the world a more intellectually challenging place, which is hindering further success at thinking better.
You’re getting at something that feels half-right, but only half.
Generalizing from too small a sample? I have argued previously that the analytic-rational paradigm mostly has an impact on societies, but societies are not homogenous collections of individuals: large numbers of individuals in “comfortable” societies are in fact quite miserable, the few who are exposed enough to the analytic-rational paradigm to become conversant with it are typically among a small fraction of the most comfortable.
Is Maslow’s hierarchy itself an accurate belief, btw? How did you judge its accuracy?
This is a good point, but for now I will note that I have some personal empirical evidence in favor of it, it seems to make sense from an evolutionary point of view (e.g. food before status, because if you run out of calories you die right there) and it is widely accepted, so I will consider it true until evidence is brought against it.
Roko:
That’s not necessarily true—there are instances where people starve themselves (though rarely to death) as part of a status-seeking effort.
In the modern developed world, food is dirt-cheap as long as you don’t engage in luxurious extravagance, so that even if you could stop eating altogether, you wouldn’t save a significant amount of money. However, in the past, when even the cheapest subsistence diet was a very large expense relative to income, many people would cut down on eating well beyond the point of discomfort to be able to afford various status-seeking goods to show off. Some other examples of status-seeking behavior that comes at the cost of starvation are religious fasting and dieting to improve one’s looks. Hunger strikes are a peculiar extreme example.
Overall, Maslow’s model is a useful first approximation, but nowhere near fully accurate.
I think “useful first approximation” is all I need here.
Re: it seems to make sense from an evolutionary point of view
This makes more sense—from an evolutionary point of view:
“Rebuilding Maslow’s pyramid on an evolutionary foundation”
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/sex-murder-and-the-meaning-life/201005/rebuilding-maslow-s-pyramid-evolutionary-foundation
The key point is that they are not miserable due to lack of food, shelter, sanitation or warmth. They don’t lack Maslow 1 and 2.
I come into contact (of some sort) on nearly a daily basis with folks who lack one or several of the above: of these I do mean miserable at one of these levels. Not just the homeless, but a growing number of people struggling to make ends meet.
What I’m getting at is that your generalization that “once you find yourself in a more economically developed country, your individual decisions in improving the quality of your own life will (mostly) aim to climb from level two of Maslow upwards” requires some strong qualifications.
As a case in point consider a friend of mine who hasn’t been paid by her employer for a few months, who has been enjoined by the court to keep showing up for work because failing to do so would be cause for termination of any benefits, and who therefore has to keep spending large amounts on oil to drive to work because in her employment-poor rural region most jobs are found at least one hour’s drive away. This is someone I met over ten years ago, who was then comfortably middle class.
This person’s situation isn’t unusual or atypical, but it seems to me that it fits very poorly into your scheme whereby you describe her as a “free rider”.
Conversely, quite a few people who benefit from the most visible trappings of the analytic-rational paradigm, by which I mean schools and universities, go on to occupy position in society which contribute little to the pool of knowledge, to the well-being of the majority, or in general to anything but their own narrow interest. Surely these folks, who presumably have the capacity to be rational, though they don’t exploit it on an everyday basis, also deserve the “free rider” label?
Yet another category your black-and-white scheme seems to ignore is people who are typically asked to sacrifice their lives in defense of the institutions without which the efforts of “scientists, engineers and great thinkers” would have no discernible impact. Among these, I would bet that “irrationalists” are disproportionately represented.
You are, I think, considerably underestimating the difficulty of describing “our modern technology” in terms that would allow identification of “the kind of person who most contributed causally to it happening”. The causal pathways are insanely long, intricately interwoven with the rest of the fabric of society, such that it is far from clear that the notion of “free riders” can apply at all.
Shorter: your post conveys an oversimplified conception of both science and society. (This is a common failing around these parts, possibly needing more posts like the one on the mangle, but this is a topic where the inferential distances appear to be substantial.)
Do you honestly think that this friend lives a worse life than a medieval peasant? Yes, people end up in financial trouble, but even in the USA they don’t starve.
Your point about soldiers is taken, but note that in the west, very few soldiers die. The casualty count for Iraq is a few hundred for the UK, out of an army of 100,000. Those are much better odds than a paleolithic or bronze age soldie. Would have faced.
The question at issue didn’t seem to be better vs. worse, but rather “motivated by what”. My friend is spending money on oil which she would prefer to spend on groceries or shelter, neither of which she has quite enough of, and spending it to keep a job which is currently paying her a salary of zero.
It’s not clear to me that this decision is a matter of being “motivated by” this or that category of primary social goods (“things it is rational to want whatever else one wants”), even once you drop (as you have) the idea of a linear ranking of these goods. She doesn’t feel like she is making a decision.
The title of your post suggests that its major point is (still, after your revisions) the italicized phrase “irrationalists free-ride on the [...] achievements of rationalists”. It’s not clear that rationality is a “commons” in the original sense of a scare resource that could be depleted by over-exploitation. It’s not clear what you suggest someone in my friend’s position could be doing to contribute closer to her fair share to the maintenance of “the analytic-rational paradigm”.
Despite a lower than minimum-wage revenue she is actually paying taxes this year, the apparent consequence of the latest tax reform. Would you argue taxes don’t count as contributing back to the commons? These taxes pay in part for universities and research institutions. Why does your post fail to mention taxes altogether?
Your final points I can agree with, in line with Gregory Bateson’s observations that sometimes going crazy can be a sane response to an insane situation. It’s a tragedy all right, but I’m not sure it can be called a tragedy of the commons.
My description of the situation would be more along the following lines. Particular epistemologies (practiced by few individuals) have had huge effect on human societies, transforming them in ways that resulted in much greater numbers of people, interacting in very different ways than in the past, and in particular having greater environmental effects.
One consequence of these changes has been to amplify the impacts of both kinds of epistemologies: whereas it didn’t particularly matter what the medieval peasant believed, in terms of impact on the medieval peasan’ts comfort, how the 21st century citizen in a developed country thinks does matter to his or her medium-term comfort (e.g. through party politics), and epistemological failures of 21st century elites may have a drastic impact on the citizen’s medium-term comfort.
We all need to learn how to think better, and soon, or we are all shouldering more risk than we’d be comfortable with if we did know better; but the consequences of our predecessors’ own improved thinking are playing a large part in distracting us from that objective. Our past successes at thinking better have made the world a more intellectually challenging place, which is hindering further success at thinking better.
Well, they don’t starve, usually, buuuuut...