Damn it Feels Good to be a Gangsta

[AxelHeyst]

The fondness is one of the objects of inquiry, not the lens with which the inquiry is taking place.

This is how I see these conversations go:
A: "It is interesting that many people think about pre-modern societies with fondness."
B: "Pre-modern societies were pretty shite actually."
A: "Yes, so why do so many of us moderns pine for an imagined simpler time?"
B: "Those "simpler" times were awful!"
A: "Ahem, yes, heard, but more people nevertheless pine for them than is easily explainable by ignorance of the essential facts. What can be learned about this fondness and applied to the decisions we make in our personal lives and our thoughts for the future of our own modern societies?"
B: "The fond feelings are a foul fount of fabricated fantasies!!"
(I'm caricaturizing to try to make the point clear, not to dunk on anyone.)

And then we're talking about if it'd be better or worse to live in such and such non-modern society, which isn't really anyone's point, and people leave the thread with the sense that it's about if hunter gatherers had shittier or less shitty lives than we do, and wind up not engaging with the actual ideas the OP is trying to drop.

[suomalainen]

I read the post differently.

A: ‘It is interesting that many people think about pre-modern societies with fondness. That means that modernity is incompatible with the human condition.”
B: “The fondness is a cognitive bias.”
A: “Yes, but it’s still interesting.”
B: “Yes, fiction is interesting, I guess.”

[AxelHeyst]

I read the post differently.

A: ‘It is interesting that many people think about pre-modern societies with fondness. That means that modernity is incompatible with the human condition.”
B: “The fondness is a cognitive bias.”
A: “Yes, but it’s still interesting.”
B: “Yes, fiction is interesting, I guess.”

The bold part is what I'm not seeing in JnGs posts. I think you're inferring a statement that isn't there, at least not at the strength you're imputing. I see him saying things like:

Socially and emotionally we live in a confusing society.

and

Prior to the past few decades most believed that emotions and sensations were unimportant, something best muted or ignored. It has recently become popular to over-identify with emotions, holding others accountable for our emotional state and learning to exist in a state of emotional helplessness. This helplessness is used to justify not holding oneself accountable or one's life or actions. Still, we fail to ask the difficult questions about where these sensations and emotions come from, what they might be telling us, how to regulate them and how to take responsibility and exhibit some amount of control or predictability over our own sensations, emotions and impulses.

He's not saying: "Ah, modernity: bin it, reject it, forget it." He's saying (or at least, his posts are causing me to think): "Oof, modernity: what are we to do with it? How are we to cope with it? How can we modify our relationship with it to live less confusing, less anxious, more fulfilling lives? How can we adapt to the world we find ourselves in, and also intentionally shape the world in beneficial ways?"

[suomalainen]

It’s pretty clearly stated.

I believe modernity creates an environment our fear system is not calibrated to handle. People are adaptable, they can and do adapt to physiologically survive; however, they don't emotionally or cognitively thrive.

I think this is why we look back to simpler societies with fondness.

And then he goes on to state multiple times as fact things along the lines of: In simple society we know things. In modern society we don’t. Those are just assumptions. He’s using assumptions to build an argument. The argument being “I believe modernity creates an environment our fear system is not calibrated to handle.“ I do not at all get the sense that he is merely musing about why people look back in time.

If I’m misreading him, as it appears others may have as well, then he, as a writer, can take the feedback from the reader that he isn’t conveying his point clearly.

Edit: I’m only quoting / responding to the latest post because it’s the only one I read closely. I don’t know the build-up of the prior posts.

[philipreal]

Fear getting kicked out is wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy fucking worse than fear of some stranger silently judging you. The former includes a massive roll of the dice. Chief is an asshole, you’re raped every day. Chief isn’t an asshole, you may be happy. Stranger is an asshole? Turn around and walk away. Those prior-life frictions had massive costs, which ALL inured to the benefit of the leadership.

Modernity creates an environment my fear system is not calibrated to handle, Premodernity creates an environment my asshole is not calibrated to handle. I think while it's clear modernity has fixed so many problems (better lube), it's also pretty clear that there are a lot of problems people have today that they would not have had in premodern times, and it's plausible to me that there could be solutions to some of them if we integrated good things about the past that are less common now. There are a lotta places where I'd like if he could bring in some sources for some of the claims and/or express things more clearly, and I agree it is important to be accurate regarding premodern societies, but also I think if you had read some of the previous posts you would have seen what he was getting at more. Your criticisms of premodern society generally seemed to be related to safety needs, which J+G acknowledged earlier upthread that modernism was really good at providing.

[Jean]

I think it's obvious that premodern societies filled sone of our needs better, because our cravings are calibrated toward survival in premodern society.
It doesnt mean that life was better at that time. But i think that looking at how life was at the time to guess what the unknown unfullfilled need is, is a good strategy.

[7Wannabe5]

Well, one of the problems with attempting to follow primitive pattern as a guide is that many/most men achieve a certain form of peak happiness if/when they have acquired three wives. Seriously, I have rarely seen men as jolly as those who have achieved something approaching this with some level of stability. And the genetic record clearly indicates that polyandry was the rule of thumb in primitive times. And the only way to equitably approach this level of happiness in modern times is to engage in the practice of polyamory, which could theoretically provide 3 part-time wives for each man, without having to kill off or subjugate half or more of the men as in the primitive model.

IOW, the clear purpose of life is reproduction, so only a model that approximates achievement of maximum reproductive capability (inclusive of some "fulfilling" level of active engagement in support of child-rearing (or sublimated simulation), so "wives" not one-night-stands) is likely to serve. All evidence, including the fact that porn is still #1 internet activity, supports this model.

[Jean]

We also will never experience the joy of killibg a mamoth with all our childhood friend
It's not because some aspect are impossible to reproduce without destroying everything that the answer we get from this approach are wrong

[7Wannabe5]

It's not because some aspect are impossible to reproduce without destroying everything that the answer we get from this approach are wrong

I didn't mean to imply that the approach was wrong. I think it is correct and is very important to the psychological design of our environments as is made clear in many books on garden design or architectural design, as in "A Pattern Language." For example, one of the "patterns" is that small children need places to hide in their environment. One of the reasons I enjoy working with small children is that they haven't yet been socialized out of primitive mode; they will crouch in a circle eating fruit out of a shared bowl with their fingers unless you make them sit at a table and attempt to consume a more varied diet making use of utensils and individual plates.

In terms of my previous only somewhat meant to be humorous post, it is possible to abstract the concepts of "reproduction", "child", and "wife." For example, if you write a book, that process can be abstracted as creating a "meme child", and if somebody significantly assists you with that project, that human might be considered to be your "book wife", regardless of your/their sexual identity. Similarly, a man might be my "permaculture project husband" or my "permaculture project wife" and whether I was currently or formerly sexually engaged with him might be somewhat irrelevant. The "husband/house-bond" partner generally being the one with somewhat more ownership of the project and/or the one who offers contract, the "wife/with" partner being the one who is somewhat more "joining in" or "with" the creative "reproductive" endeavor. Therefore, at this level of abstraction, it is possible to recreate the model without "destroying everything." A human with enough competence, vigor, and leadership ability to have several creative projects of their own primary initiation (perhaps inclusive of conventional family formation) ongoing will almost certainly accumulate several "wives."

[Lemur]

And that explains my nephew, who decided after he got off the bus this afternoon to just whip it out and pee right there lol. The dad was shocked and angry and I had a good laugh. The child naturally asked me "why" when told that he has to make a beeline home or last resort run into the woods if he can't make it.

[Jin+Guice]

@7: I found that shame thing about modernity quite interesting as well.

How well does this jive with the fact during the sustained Nazi bombings of UK cities known as the Blitz, asylum admissions went down significantly and many long-term patients actually improved?

Bombing is a direct threat which our bodies are set up to respond to. When we experience a visceral threat our sensory, emotional and cognitive systems are aligned. If I'm not mistaken, WWII also caused people to rely more interdependently on their neighbors. It also united the English against a common enemy and provided people with a sense of purpose.

I expect a constant but rarely realized threat of bombing would induce more psychological diseases.

I think direct fear will reduce anxiety and malaise, but I don't think this is the answer to the crisis of meaning.

After most wars there is a huge uptick in PTSD related symptoms as people's fear response systems have been trained for wartime threats and exhibit responses that no longer make sense in times of peace.

@ertyu: I hear you that these types of relationships are hard. I think people crave in-person reciprocal interdependent relationships with a community of people we know. In our current environment, we rely on transactional impersonal relationships to get most of our needs met. I think this causes alienation.

I think the breakdown of familial relationships is in large part because we still have the expectation of interdependent relationships with our families, but no information on how to build interdependent relationships. In the modern environment, this greatly increases the chances that relying on our families will be painful.

One of the advantages of modernity is we have the opportunity to find and build relationships with people we feel are more like us. We are no longer limited by family or geography (and there are vastly more options for how to be). I think one of the problems with rural localities in modernity is the awareness of these options but lack of opportunity to realize them.

Someone with green hair and piercings is strongly signaling their group allegiances.

When someone in modernity says "I don't care what people think" what I believe they usually mean is they aren't subscribing to what they view as the dominant cultural paradigm. This usually means they are subscribing to an alternate paradigm and they usually care what the people who are in that paradigm think. Additionally I think they sill feel embarrassed for a moment when they trip over a small piece of uneven pavement.


@jacob: I agree that the hierarchy can be misleading and that it's actually several feedback loops where the practice of satisfying your need for food can actually satisfy every single need level. As you pointed out, the hierarchy exists on a moment to moment basis where someone who's extremely hungry is going to be both cognitively compromised and deploying all of their remaining cognitive energy to try to get food. This is the only place where there is a hierarchy.

Same here. Is society losing actualization potential because it has convinced a large fraction of humanity that a/the most worthwhile focus is to drive an expensive car or---for those who are not into cars---compete on who can afford the exotic vacations? Or are we missing something that otherwise could have been if that focus had been more nuanced? Or on the flip side, is allowing people to buy any expensive car they want but at the same time creating more expensive cars for others to be jealous about creating status anxiety that doesn't need to be there?

Yes and yes, this is pretty much where I am going...

Implies ancient peoples knew of and taught these things widely. Why assume that ancient peoples not gonna people?

And then he goes on to state multiple times as fact things along the lines of: In simple society we know things. In modern society we don’t. Those are just assumptions.

I'm not assuming they were taught these things. I'm assuming they knew these things because there was no option not to.

If the three largest problems of modernity are inequality, environmental degradation and alienation:

I think that the simplest societies have difficulty causing environmental degradation because they lack the ability to do large scale environmental degradation. As societies become more complex, they appear to have inflicted increasing amounts of environmental degradation (relying on Diamond/ Tainter for this info), though pre-modern societies were unable to inflict the amount of destruction that today's modern society can.

I think the simplest societies have difficult achieving inequality because they lack the material resources for much inequality. They are also believed to be nomadic, so material possession beyond what one could carry would be a burden.

I think the simplest societies lacked alienation because they were forced to interdependently rely on each other for survival. They didn't have to search for their tribe or find community.

I think the simplest societies existed in an environment that made more sense to human sensory, emotional and cognitive systems because that was the environment they were born into. They didn't need to learn to control when they went to the bathroom because they could go when they pleased. They didn't need to learn how to not get heart disease because heart disease was difficult to achieve. I'm theorizing that this extends to emotions and cognition as well (I realize there is no way to know this). I don't think people were taught emotional or cognitive skills, I think the emotions and not-formally-taught cognitive skills that every person is born with made more sense in the environment simpler societies lived in.

It's not that simpler societies are "better" (or "worse") but that the problems of complex society are an unintended consequences of using complexity to solve problems and so simpler societies do not suffer from them (they suffer from other problems).

My overall question is "why do wealthy modernists continue to pursue economic growth when increasing economic growth seems not to satisfy any needs and causes additional problems?" or "why are consumers so resistant to ERE, when we can show them that the work/ consume praxis is providing very little benefit and causing most of their stated problems?" In examining the past, I seek to examine people who didn't suffer from the problems of modernity to see if I can get some information for why we are presently so very dedicated to the collective delusion of the consumer praxis.

[Jean]

I mentionned it before, but i think Vivian dittmar's book about relationships provides many analisys on exactly those questions, along with guidance to do relationships in a way that fullfils those needs.

[7Wannabe5]

When someone in modernity says "I don't care what people think" what I believe they usually mean is they aren't subscribing to what they view as the dominant cultural paradigm. This usually means they are subscribing to an alternate paradigm and they usually care what the people who are in that paradigm think. Additionally I think they sill feel embarrassed for a moment when they trip over a small piece of uneven pavement.

I somewhat disagree on the basis that both old people and adolescents often "don't care what people think", but only the first group really means it. IOW, "When I am 13, I will wear purple." is rather different than "When I am 83, I will wear purple." For example, Maude in the movie "Harold and Maude" loved life and other humans, but really didn't care about what people thought, whereas Harold hated life and other humans, but still did care about what people thought. Also, at it's most generalized best, "ERE" can be read as a means by which to design your own uniquely alternative personal paradigm.

[Saltation]

I think the simplest societies lacked alienation because they were forced to interdependently rely on each other for survival. They didn't have to search for their tribe or find community.

This, in my day-to-day living, appears to hold true. Encountering people daily in the workplace that say and do many of the meanest things they can to others because of no recourse is very alienating. The basic idea of not being an asshole no longer holds (maybe it never did). When the only interconnectedness is the sharing of TikTok videos for a laugh at another's expense followed up with gossip the moment someone leaves the room begets hopelessness. The idea that working together towards any commonly held goal would be helpful. Solidarity in mind and action that did not involve the derailment of human dignity would be appreciated. When the tribe/community is #Kanye, #insertpresident, #politicalopinion ad infinitum I'd rather work on being a tribe of one for most of my day.

Unfortunately, in order to find community, I drown out the related workplace noise with an earbud and podcasts like the Great Simplification or something else that is equally disheartening but not disingenuous.

The simple times were not so simple but the current times of complexity are much the same as the old aside from the accountability/responsibility that no longer applies. An endless game of plunder what you can and kick the can down the road sort of situation.

[suomalainen]

I'm assuming they knew these things because there was no option not to.

Still an assumption.

I think that the simplest societies have difficulty causing environmental degradation because they lack the ability to do large scale environmental degradation.

What does scale have to do with it? Degradation of an ant hill by taking a shit on it is still degradation. Just because we’re more efficient at it now doesn’t mean it wasn’t a (local) problem then. Note I’m not taking a position on whether degradation happened at all or some times or all the time. Just noting the insertion of “large scale” into the acquittal of “simple societies”.

I think the simplest societies have difficult achieving inequality because they lack the material resources for much inequality. They are also believed to be nomadic, so material possession beyond what one could carry would be a burden.

Who says inequality has anything to do with material possessions? Waving away inequalities is an assumption. Note I’m not taking a position on whether all “chiefs” (whatever their titles) were “equal” in completely flat societies or whether there existed hierarchical societies. Just noting the assumption.

I think the simplest societies lacked alienation because they were forced to interdependently rely on each other for survival. They didn't have to search for their tribe or find community.

Another assumption. I love this totally equal egalitarian society with no strife or personal jealousies or anything that you’re imagining. Where can I sign up?

They didn't need to learn to control when they went to the bathroom because they could go when they pleased.

They didn’t? Shitting in the middle of the village was acceptable universally? During the such-and-such ceremony?

In examining the past, I seek to examine people who didn't suffer from the problems of modernity to see if I can get some information for why we are presently so very dedicated to the collective delusion of the consumer praxis.

Examining and imagining are two very different things. I surmise I’ve stepped into a communal storytelling exercise, and while there’s nothing wrong with using fiction to examine an idea - many wonderful novels are exactly this, the authors don’t fool themselves into thinking they are historians.

Alas, as I clearly do not get what is happening here, I will exit and cease shitting on your rug.

[Ego]

After most wars there is a huge uptick in PTSD related symptoms as people's fear response systems have been trained for wartime threats and exhibit responses that no longer make sense in times of peace.

One of my favorite quotes on this is from Theodore Dalrymple, the former prison physician and psychiatrist who said, "Misery increases to meet the means available for its alleviation", and much more, some of which I mentioned in this post in my journal.

ETA, we've now been back in the supposed first-world for roughly 30 hours and I've seem about ten meth zombies so far.

[Lemur]

It it tough to be certain about what social and political life was like for primitive societies since there wasn't exactly written records in most places; however, I can suggest a book where an anthropologist David Graeber and an archaeologist David Wengrow team up do just that and challenge ongoing narratives.

Should be a good read for anyone involved in these discussions in the past couple of pages...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dawn_of_Everything

The authors open the book by suggesting that current popular views on the progress of western civilization, as presented by Francis Fukuyama, Jared Diamond, Yuval Noah Harari, Charles C. Mann, Steven Pinker, and Ian Morris, are not supported by anthropological or archaeological evidence, but owe more to philosophical dogmas inherited unthinkingly from the Age of Enlightenment. The authors refute the Hobbesian and Rousseauian view on the origin of the social contract, stating that there is no single original form of human society. Moreover, they argue that the transition from foraging to agriculture was not a civilization trap that laid the ground for social inequality, and that throughout history, large-scale societies have often developed in the absence of ruling elites and top-down systems of management.

Looking into the past to speculate on modernity can certainly be useful but not all primitive societies were created equal. Even amongst Native Americans there was huge variations betweens some that were very top-down, patriarchal, and war-like while some were very egalitarian to a point where even the Chiefs had laughable amounts of power and influence.

[ertyu]

JnG, imo you're missing the mark by making up historically inaccurate noble savage narratives. I don't think you need them to acheve your goal -- which, iirc, is to figure out what your values and needs truly are so the appropriate values and needs can serve as nodes to your wog. Not that making up historically inaccurate noble savage stories isn't a thing people have done in social philosophy, they have, but their thinking is good *despite* having done so, not *because.* If those stories are inaccurate and made up, what do you actually really gain? The noble savage, "how people used to be," is up there with "how (wo)men really are" on Dunning Kruger hill. Imo, it's much more useful to question why you feel such deep need to make up stories about the good old times when we didn't have modernity and everyone was psychologically healthy.

Why postulate the noble savage in the first place? My best guess would be that it's an escapist fantasy. So: what is it, not about "modernity" (another made-up postulation), but about the demands YOUR real life places on you, that you find chafes? You're postulating the noble savage so you can argue that something isn't how it "should" be. So, find out what's not like it "should" be, journal a bit about how you would like it to be in your life, and go make it that way. This entire noble savage/"modernity" hill you seem to want to die on is a massive derail imo.

[Lemur]

@suomalainen

No rug pooping here imo. I like that when I see discussions here, we are able to challenge each another's assumptions, question our established beliefs, and to JnGs credit, he doesn't seem to takes criticisms as an offense. Keeping ourselves intellectually honest while remaining civil is a massive strength of this forum and personally keeps me coming back.

[7Wannabe5]

Primitive humans did degrade the environment on a large scale. For example, the evidence points to early humans being responsible for the extinction of many other large-sized mammal species on both the American and Australian continents. Also, one of the problems with the primitive egalitarian model is that it only applies to men. In fact, it has been argued that the entire concept of division of labor in capitalist societies is based upon the "natural" first division of labor between men and women. Even into the late 19th century, very liberal minded futurists rarely imagined a world in which the majority of women worked outside of the home and wore trousers. Feminism at the level of the masses is dependent upon technology at the level of the factory-made rifle and chain-saw. When more women behave like men at Level Orange/Modern, society gains more "power" (adult masculine energy) and "freedom" (juvenile masculine energy), but also becomes more cold, cruel, and alienating. Not to be political, but Kristi Noem posing for photo in front of prison is almost a perfect example of somebody with artificial feminine surface, but little internal feminine virtue or beauty.

The struggle for men at Level Green, of whom the Romantics were early examples, is to bring forward their own aspects of feminine virtue. The appeal of the primitive is also the appeal of Nature, which is also often associated with feminine energy. It can also be a harkening back to the phase of life in which we don't have to work for food, because the mammalian maternal provides. The maternal or adult feminine energy is linked to the hearth, and as Graeber noted in his book on debt, an early human word for "freedom" was literally translated as "return to mother" , because released from slavery. So, it is almost as though the concept of attachment theory is inherent in our related concepts of "freedom", "independence", "liberty." We grow and gain independence as we venture away from "mother", but lacking or losing that initial central hearth, we may become completely untethered and our liberty degrades into alienation, our narrative of adventure becomes incoherent when there is no longer anybody left at home to hear our tale upon return.

IOW, psychologically, the desire to return to the primitive can often be overcome by caring for one's own internal juvenile masculine "freedom-seeking" energy with one's own internal adult feminine "home/hearth-making" energy vs. just creating/maintaining the domain in which one can be 'free" with one's own adult masculine "power." Or in simpler terms, if/when you don't actively love yourself, freedom -> alienation. I recommend making yourself a nice pot of soup as first exercise. Then take a walk in the woods until you almost find yourself lost. Then, at long last, make your way home to have a nice bowl of the soup you were so kind as to make for yourself previously.