An overlooked cognitive function?

[karff]

Hey,
I registered an account to share something of possible interest to the ERE2 subforum.


Searching for causality is computationally more expensive for the brain than normal correlation, and it can not be allowed to go on indefinitely. The search for more causes backward, and more effects forward has to be cut off for efficiency and functioning. If not, all our mental resources would be devoted to searching for “why? why? why?” and we would get nothing else done.

This “causal cutoff function” must necessarily be calibrated for usefulness. If we cut off our search for causality too short, we might miss valuable understandings of our environment necessary for survival. If allowed to run too long, we would spend all our time asking “Why?”

Logically, the brain would at first allow the search for causality to go too long - The stage of childhood where extreme curiosity is outwardly evident. The brain then pares down the chains to a useful length - Just useful enough for understanding the causes and effects of the immediate physical and social environment, but no more. Outwardly, this appears to be the growing incuriosity of most humans as they pass through adolescence and into adulthood.

For the average human in society, the search for causation tends to end when the causal chain is followed back to a human mind. Searching further back for causes and influences on the human agent takes up time and mental resources, and has diminished utility for immediate survival purposes. The search for causation also ends when tracing the chain of causation back to one’s self. Influences and causes of one’s own actions are rarely searched for.

Unaware of the influences on itself, the mind is assumed to be directly perceiving reality, contributing to low self-awareness* and naive realism.

The attributes of other human agents are assumed to be static properties with no cause - “Those people are just like that”. With no understanding of the causes of attributes and actions of others, perspective-taking is very poor**.

The nature of reality is causal, so any model of reality, such as those used to interpret society-wide human interactions, must also be causal. To be realistic, chains of cause and effect must go through agents, forming long causal chains, combining to form causal webs. With cognitive machinery normally calibrated to cut off causality at a human agent, these realistic causal maps are not understandable to the average human, and they have no existing cognitive framework to place them.

Effects of this function are widespread in societal interactions, yet no accounting for it seems to take place in analyses of those interactions.

*Differentiation of the self is most easily done across time, as elements of the self occupy the same space.

** Advancing a stage in the various human development models usually is the result of adding another link in a mental causal chain, on one end or the other (It’s not a side effect, it’s a prerequisite.)


I don't lurk around these parts often, so I may take some time in responding to queries.

[karff]

I am not an arguing troll. I'm curious to know your thoughts on the idea.
Even if you pick it apart, I won't argue with you to prove a point. I'll ask questions to understand your perspective on the particular subjects.
So, your thoughts? (I'd appreciate if you would point out perceived flaws)

[basuragomi]

Sounds like you've rediscovered Kegan levels.

[jacob]

That was also my first thought.

The OP's model reveals more of the potential innards (also see https://openresearch.surrey.ac.uk/esplo ... 346#file-0 ).

Two questions:
1) How can this be tested?
2) How can this be used?

[7Wannabe5]

The other characteristic that is more evident in toddlers than adults is motivational energy. An adult with toddler level curiousity and motivational energy would likely almost immediately be diagnosed and hospitalized as suffering from manic phase of bi-polar disease. This is also why bi-polar disease is very well-correlated with IQ and creativity and sugar-addiction (the brain is energetically expensive, the higher the IQ of a mammalian species,the sweeter the milk.) This is also why some highly ambitious college students ingest Ritalin-like substances to achieve hyper-focus.

Most humans enter into a highly conformist mindset at around age 6 to 8. It's not just that schooling tends to create conformity. It's recognized that young humans are not able to conform until they achieve this developmental level. Some 6 year olds are ready for 1st grade or a job in the pickle factory, others are not.

[karff]

1) How can this be tested?
2) How can this be used?

Tested.
The prevalence of what I call the “uncaused agent model” could be tested for in individuals.
It’s a subconscious mental model where actions and attributes of agents are just spontaneously generated with no prior cause. I’ve done quite a bit of thought experiments gaming out its effects in society. You could see if the use of that mental model correlates with the larger effects predicted by the thought experiments (things like conspiracy thinking, political tribalism, etc.)

You could also test for recalibration of the causal cutoff function. The function would necessarily be situation dependent. If an extra link in the causal chain was shown to be meaningful or useful to the individual (in a specific situation), it would recalibrate for all similar situations.

Use.
It narrows the target area if you’re trying to ameliorate its effects. For its effects in society, you would know the goal is specifically to recalibrate the cutoff function to cut off one link (or more) behind a human agent. Carrot vectors would be almost inherent, as understanding human intent is beneficial to the individual in many endeavors.

[daylen]

The nature of reality is causal, so any model of reality, such as those used to interpret society-wide human interactions, must also be causal.

*Differentiation of the self is most easily done across time, as elements of the self occupy the same space.

I'm not so sure that nature of reality or ultimate reality needs time. Time from the perspective of a finite being may just be a transition from one self or structure to another. Perhaps ultimate reality just sorta exists as the medium for of all possible perspectives or interactions. Anything that can happen all happens in no time / infinite time. Taking on a God's eye view may close causation into a loop with no definite boundaries. No start or end. Snake eating it's own tail sorta thing.

Though, a finite being exists along side such boundaries and the potential to explore across them. Hence our obsession with infinite processes that cannot ever halt for us (e.g. curvature, irrational constants).

[7Wannabe5]

Differentiation of the self is "caused" by homeostasis. The elements of your self are constantly being replicated and replaced at many levels. In fact, your sense of self is just a recent addition to the bundle of homeostatic processes. Really, you are just a worm with a slick coating of bacteria and a number of interesting sensory appendages.

[daylen]

That is quite an interesting story of continuity we like to tell ourselves.

[karff]

These concepts do not correspond exactly to similar concepts in human development models, so I’ll not use their terms.

Concept A
Having an Effect Link
At first, if I do not think causally of human agents, I only notice Different Effects of their actions. Those Different Effects are correlated spatially, into somewhat undifferentiated groups.

Concept B
Adding a Cause Link
I start thinking about human agents causally. Two people may be exposed to the same cause, and have different effects, reacting differently. Or vice versa. I develop a rudimentary understanding of the Differences of agents.

Concept C
Adding an Effect Link
As I continue thinking causally about human agents, they form long chains of cause and effect. The chains intersect, forming a web. Complexity increases as some effects have many causes, and vice versa. Feedback loops are integrated. I realize that the Differences have an overweighted effect on the web. The different Differences interacting are a big part of the causal flow. A System of Differences is now part of the web.

Concept D
Adding a Cause Link
Looking at the interior of the agents, I begin to realize they also have entire webs (or lack thereof) inside their minds. Looking at these other webs, putting myself in the agent’s position from inside their own web, I develop a Theory of Differences - how the webs create the differences.

Concept E
Adding another Cause Link
Looking at various webs even more, I develop insight into how they form, integrating it with the previous concepts into a Theory of Webs. (Not what I’m doing here, painstakingly thinking through a mechanistic analogy of cognition, but a smoother, more granular intuition of human thought and behavior. I’m using the first person for illustrative purposes. I’m not claiming to be anywhere near Concept E.)

As for the “Add another Effects Link” between Concepts D and E - I couldn’t really think what that would look like. Maybe someone else can describe that?

[karff]

Conspiracy thinking vs a causal web

As “model” might have the wrong connotations, I’ll use “assumption”.
Uncaused agent assumption - Subconsciously assuming attributes and actions of agents spontaneously generate with no prior cause.
Caused agent assumption - Subconsciously assuming all actions and attributes of an agent have a prior cause.
The assumptions are situation dependent, as sometimes it’s quite useful to know why someone did something, other times not.
The ratio of use is on a continuum, some minds hardly ever assuming cause, and other minds usually assuming cause.

If an individual is on the cause-assuming end of the continuum, their mental map of the larger society can be described as a causal web. Causes of some agents are the effects of others, forming chains. The chains intersect.
A key benefit of having a causal web is resistance to misinformation. For information to seem true, it has to fit into the cause and effect pattern of the web. With a dense web, most nodes have multiple causes and effects. For a piece of information to be deemed true, it must fit those multiple causes and effects. Collections of misinformation, like conspiracy theories, seem completely false because each piece of different information must fit into the web in a different place. Also, these collections of misinformation must make sense causally as a system by itself. They rarely do, and an individual used to placing agents in the middle of a cause-effect chain immediately recognizes the conspiracy theory makes little sense, even on its own.

If someone is on the uncaused-assuming end of the spectrum, agents in society rarely have a cause extending back from an effect. Few causal chains exist in their mental map of the larger society, and they have no causal web. They have no way to tell if information is true or not, as they have no nodes of multiple causes and effects to check them against. An entire collection of misinformation, making no sense at all in a causal web, can be easily accommodated with no cognitive dissonance.
Someone who usually assumes agents are uncaused also believe themselves to be uncaused.
Thus, they have no insight into the influences and causes of their own perceptions. Their thoughts and feelings are direct perceptions of reality. When they feel an emotion, they are feeling the truth about reality.

When observing an action in society, they believe their feeling of the action is the truth about it. And, they need no other information to confirm it. If they search for more information, they are simply providing evidence for others, or to differentiate a concept they already know to be true.
A conspiracy theory consists of
The core truth the uncaused thinker has felt about reality. They themselves need no more evidence than this.
A list of evidence making no causal sense, as it was produced by noncausal thinking.


A few kinds of conspiracy theories.

“They are deceiving me”
Most all of us have a sense of when we are being “oversold” something. Ever since some well-meaning adult tried to convince us brussel sprouts were tasty, we associate a large amount of information coming from one source about a particular subject with likely falsehood. A causal thinker with a causal web can discern likely falsehood from likely truth through various causal means. The “They” of corporations, government, and media are differentiated by occupying different areas of a causal web. The intent of many of these actors is more known. The denser the web, the finer grained the understanding of how the information was generated.

A noncausal thinker perceives corporations, the media, and government as an undifferentiated “They”, as most of their differentiation is a result of placing them in a causal web. The noncausal thinker cannot distinguish between a corporate advertising campaign and a public health awareness campaign. It’s just “Them” trying to convince him of something.
The more news and information there is about a current event, the more the noncausal thinker feels deceived. He’s felt the truth of reality, and that’s that. Be it moon landing, major terrorist attack, public health crisis, or major environmental issue, the sudden surfeit of information feels like deception, so it is. The various “facts” of the conspiracy theory are more like a list of evidence.

“Those people are evil”
The noncausal thinker feels like a particular group of people are bad, and that’s that. The rest is just evidence. Think of the very worst things someone can do, and those people are likely doing that. Thus, most groups of people have been the target of a “blood drinking, child molesting, Satan worshiping” conspiracy theory.


“They are controlling me”
If the government comes up with any new law or regulation, or a well-meaning group is advising changing individual behavior, the noncausal thinker feels controlled, and that’s that. That’s the truth of reality.


“They are trying to harm me”
The world of the noncausal thinker is more full of unknowns, as cause and effect offers greater understanding of anything’s place in the world. We are most all afraid of the unknown, and fear is the emotion of possible harm. If the noncausal thinker encounters anything unusual or unknown, like cell phone towers or airplane contrails (seriously), they feel fear, and that’s the truth about those things. They are meant to harm.

When a causal web thinker encounters a conspiracy theory, they try to interpret it through a causal web, not realizing it was produced by a different mental model. “Wow, they must have a very elaborate but very wrong causal web!” They believe if just a few of the elements of the conspiracy are debunked, the whole thing will fall apart, as would normally happen to collections of facts attached by cause and effect.

But, the “facts” of a conspiracy are really just a list. Disprove one, or several, and it has no effect on the rest of the list. Disprove them all, and the noncausal thinker is still not moved, as the real core of the conspiracy theory is the truth he felt about reality.


I can clarify anything if my clunky writing makes things unclear.

[daylen]

Couple questions. Is the way you are defining "cause" consistent with Aristotle's notion of an "efficient cause"?

Where an efficient cause is "the source of the objects principle of change or stability" according to https://www.uvm.edu/~jbailly/courses/Ar ... Notes.html

Also, I am curious if you have any insight into how conspiratorial thinking can be reversed? Is this just a matter of finding better causes or explanations that debunk the conspiratorial web?

I suppose I tend to see causation as being tightly linked with explanation and effects as tightly linked with goals. Do you draw distinctions between these? Like in some sense, a biological explanation hints at a casual structure/web at some level of granularity, and a physical explanation hints at a casual structure/web at a different level. So both biology and physics can explain or reveal the causal structure of say a human, though the exact language/logic may be radically different by virtue of looking at the human in terms of different components (i.e. a different level of coarse graining).

Seems like the general perception is of goals being inherently good and effects being neutral. One way of looking at it may be that "good" goals are homeotelic towards some greater purpose and "bad" goals are heterotelic towards some greater purpose, but effects are devoid of moral judgement?

[karff]

Couple questions. Is the way you are defining "cause" consistent with Aristotle's notion of an "efficient cause"?

Ah, yes. I’m guilty of not defining terms. In my hypothesis, “causal thinking” is the mental process that asks “why?”. And, it could be in the context of any of Aristotle’s 4 different kinds of causes. Generally, thinking like this will result in a more accurate picture of the world than not, even if it’s as imprecise as a small child asking why the sky is blue.

For instance, if you ask “Why do journalists do what they do?”, looking for any form of Aristotle’s four causes would be better than just “feeling the truth” about journalists.

And, most any answer to the question would connect journalists to some other part of society, in your own mental model of society.

An “effect” is just looking at a cause from a different direction.

How I’m using “cause” - it’s a mental link between one element of society and another, and it could be any of Aristotle’s four causes.

“Uncaused thinking”, or “noncausal thinking” is the habit of not looking for any links between elements of society. Like assuming journalists do what they do “just because” - they just spontaneously decided to do what they do with no influence from the wider society. When someone thinks like this, their mental map of the wider society is not elements linked into a “web”, but just poorly differentiated groups correlated by their effect on the observers mind. There’s the “bad people”, the “good people”, the “stupid people”. They are not differentiated by possible causes of why they are like that, and they are not linked to other elements of society.

Is this just a matter of finding better causes or explanations that debunk the conspiratorial web?

I’m not picking on you, but the question illustrates a point. You seem to have what I’m calling a “causal web” (most anyone on the ERE forums does), where elements of society are linked by causes (any of Aristotle’s four will do) in the mind. This gives you a much more accurate picture of society than a conspiracy thinker. When you encounter a conspiracy, the first reaction is “But, why?”. The causes don’t make sense. Subconsciously, you’re comparing the “facts” of the conspiracy to the cause links between elements in society (in your mental model of society). The “facts” do not fit the causes.
Also, subconsciously, you assume everyone thinks similarly - fitting facts into a linked web model of society. You assume the conspiracy thinker must have a similar subconscious web, it just must be very wrong. We use terms like “elaborate” conspiracy or “conspiratorial web” in reference to how the “facts” of a conspiracy would need to fit into a linked web model of society.
But, the conspiracy thinker does not have a linked web model. The “elaborate web” of conspiracy is just a list of evidence, without needing to have any links to each other - many of the elements of a conspiracy are directly contradictory - if you analyze them as if they should be linked together. The conspiracy thinker doesn’t normally link things together in his mind, so these contradictions do not bother him. (When we assume the conspiracy thinker is making all sorts of links, we’re projecting our own mental processes onto him - the links appear “crazy” because they are not really links).

Also, I am curious if you have any insight into how conspiratorial thinking can be reversed?

My idea is more prevention than cure. Try to teach people in such a way that the elements of society are linked together in a complex web in their mental map of society. Conspiracy theories and misinformation don’t make sense when compared against the links of a web mental model of society. Teach them a way of thinking about society where facts can be hung on a framework of causal links, rather than a list of facts to regurgitate and forget. If this was the specific target, I think anyone of average intelligence could develop a linked web mental model of society.