[FRIAM] the Skeptical Meme

Wed Aug 16 20:05:47 EDT 2017

Steve, I trust strongly the neuroscience that insists that our brains have
not totally evolved past the point of reptilian behavior emerging from what
I call the left-over parts of the brain. We seem to remain wired for kin
and tribe, and perhaps our survival still depends to some extent on all the
parts of our brain, old and new.  We teach, however, that some form of
contemplative practice holds the key to leaping over the barriers that keep
us from loving one another.

On Wed, Aug 16, 2017 at 4:30 PM, Steven A Smith <sasmyth at swcp.com> wrote:

> Merle -
>
> Thanks for offering this up.   My own maunderings about "what is in human
> nature" having me trust that we are still *mostly* the animals who gathered
> in groups of order Dunbar number (150?) who *mostly* loved one another and
> treated one another with respect and generosity (up to a myriad quirks of
> personality and a shared fate).
>
> On the other hand, while members of said community/group/tribe/pack/herd
> might extend some of that goodwill toward others they recognized as
> same/thePeople, they had good reason to be less generous/trusting toward
> others who were not so familiar, who spoke unrecognizeable languages, whose
> skin/hair/eye color or features were significantly different.   I think
> these are very real evolutionarily adaptive roots of what we see as
> Xenophobia today.
>
> I don't describe this as a way of trying to normalize racist/ethnic
> bigotry, but rather to acknowledge that it has some instinctual roots that
> focus the "hateful/fearful teachings" that become institutionalized in
> subcultures and perhaps entire cultures.   And it is this wholesale
> adoption by a group which ends up not only teaching, but maintaining the
> fear (and therefore hate?).
>
> I know your work is IN "peacebuilding".   Does your model include an
> acceptance of these somewhat instinctual responses to "the Other" ?
>
> I was very pleased to see the speech by Heather's mother today which I
> thought held a very positive message in what must be a very tragic moment
> for her.
>
> - Steve
>
> On 8/16/17 4:16 PM, Merle Lefkoff wrote:
>
> Obama's tweet about the events in Charlottesville got the most "likes" of
> any tweet in twitter history.  It is a quote from Nelson Mandela:  "No
> one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his
> background or his religion … People must learn to hate, and if they can
> learn to hate, they can be taught to love … For love comes more naturally
> to the human heart than its opposite,”
>
> On Wed, Aug 16, 2017 at 12:50 PM, Steven A Smith <sasmyth at swcp.com> wrote:
>
>> Marcus/Eric -
>>
>>
>> Great observations, both.   I think this cuts to (part of) the heart of
>> the matter.
>>
>>
>> I just recently watched "Glass Castle" (current run at Violet Crown) with
>> Woody Harrelson playing the role of a fairly intelligent (his daughter, the
>> memoirist characterizes him as brilliant) but highly dysfunctional father
>> of 4 who himself has (mostly/almost) escaped the small Appalachian
>> coal-mining town he was raised in by an acutely abusive mother and an
>> apathetic/dysfunctional father and greater community.   The family lives a
>> vagabond life with Harrelson's character (Rex) leading them on an
>> alternatingly merry and curiosity-driven chase through skipping out on bill
>> collectors and trying to find the "next big opportunity" and "escape the
>> forces out to repress us!".    It is (IMO) a great story of a nearly
>> effective attempt (by the parents) to escape/transcend their own
>> dysfunctional roots and the mostly effective experience of the children
>> escaping their own (passed down a generation) from that half-functional
>> platform.
>>
>>
>> I also picked up (at a "tiny library" in a neighborhood) a copy JD
>> Vance's "Hillbilly Legacy", a memoir written by a 31 year old Harvard
>> educated lawyer, now living happily (and presumably functionally) in San
>> Francisco with his wife and child(ren?), but still quite attached
>> emotionally/romantically to his own roots in Appalachia (a small KY coal
>> mining town) and the Rustbelt (Middletown OH, aka MiddleTucky) where all of
>> his family and most of his childhood friends still live and vote for and
>> continue to support Trump.
>>
>>
>> The common thread is the abject hopelessness that surrounded the people
>> locked into those environments by circumstance, including lack of
>> perspective to "just leave".   Vance credits his Grandparents who raised
>> him most of his life for having had enough perspective to shield him from
>> the worst of that and to encourage/help him "just leave".   His chronicle
>> (I also listened to an NPR book interview when it came out maybe a year
>> ago) includes feeling that he had "done everything in his power to waste
>> his life up until about 18 years old" and looking at his cohort and family,
>> might use the term "but for the grace of God, there go I".
>>
>>
>> My Pollyanna (a fairly significant player in my personal Pantheon of
>> Personalities which helps me cope with the kinds of Cosmic Ennui and
>> Existential Angst that comes with trying to be a thinking/caring person in
>> these hyper-connected, seemingly chaotic times) has me looking for a
>> "bright side" of all of this.
>>
>> I particularly want to call out the following quote from Marcus:
>>
>> *A healthy society is one where individuals can mature to the point they
>> can begin to doubt the meaning in their own anxiety (whether by themselves,
>> with their shrink or their spiritual authority) and make it to the next
>> day.    *
>>
>> and offer a rewording (my words are *underlined*) or expansion:
>>
>>     "*whether with themselves, their shrink, their spiritual authority,* *or
>> their community of emergently self-enlightened people*"
>>
>>     and
>>
>>     "*and make it **beyond** the next day* *and into a new era of
>> contagious enlightened self-interest*"
>>
>> I hope that if we can ever get through this acutely dark/inverted time
>> that we can follow some of the example of Nelson Mandela in his perspective
>> and leadership out of the centuries long oppression of his people that was
>> most recently exhibited as Apartheid.   Obviously that moment was only a
>> partial antidote, as too many of the original problems linger or arise
>> again.   But I *think* it was a better solution than to the similarly
>> genocidal/punative response many of his people were calling for when the
>> descendents of their Colonial Overlords finally fell.
>>
>> I heard recently a quote from Barbara Boxer as she left the political
>> stage after many decades:
>>     "No victory is final"
>>
>> This underscores why we are dealing with the rise of
>> white-supremacy/nazi/confederate/kkk, gender oppression,  and many other
>> battles presumed to have been won.   This moment (in most places) is
>> nothing like the conditions of the antebellum South, nor the era of
>> Nazi/Fascist power in Europe, but there are clearly strong echoes.   Such
>> things *might* be suppressed temporarily by force, but ultimately those
>> kinds of behaviours/activities dissipate through healing and enlightenment
>> much more than regulation/punishment/suppression.
>>
>> my $.02,
>>  - Steve
>>
>> On 8/16/17 9:10 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
>>
>> Eric writes:
>>
>>
>> < It is not so far from Nietzche’s notion that “God is dead” creates a
>> problem for people, and they will face a fork in the road in how they try
>> to deal with it. >
>>
>>
>> Yeah, it is probably nothing new that is happening nor a new
>> interpretation.   Institutions of various kinds can give individuals a
>> role to play and guidelines for conduct, but a highly interconnected
>> population with a complex economy will stress these institutions and reveal
>> their limitations.   Meanwhile, only exceptional and delusional individuals
>> can really make a convincing case (esp. to themselves) about their unique
>> value either coupled-to or uncoupled-from from institutions.   However, I
>> fear the stakes are pretty high now -- the contagion of people going
>> bonkers could be fast with social media.   A healthy society is one where
>> individuals can mature to the point they can begin to doubt the meaning in
>> their own anxiety (whether by themselves, with their shrink or their
>> spiritual authority) and make it to the next day.
>>
>>
>> Marcus
>> ------------------------------
>> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> <friam-bounces at redfish.com> on
>> behalf of Eric Smith <desmith at santafe.edu> <desmith at santafe.edu>
>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 16, 2017 6:56:23 AM
>> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
>> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] the Skeptical Meme
>>
>>
>> > Their desperation and rage just comes from a feeling that they can't
>> confront, that they just don't have much to offer.
>> >
>> > Marcus
>>
>> Reading this, I feel like you could found a new generation of something
>> that is like existentialist philosophy but equally-well political theory.
>>
>> It is not so far from Nietzche’s notion that “God is dead” creates a
>> problem for people, and they will face a fork in the road in how they try
>> to deal with it.  Maybe even, considering the currents running through
>> European and particularly German society at the time he was writing (and
>> that he specifically wrote about), driven by concerns based on similar
>> observations.
>>
>> It strikes me that this is an available point of view for almost any
>> person.  Granted, the distribution of rewards and frustrations differs from
>> person to person and also from region to region, and that matters.  But the
>> black box (black hole?) of how minds form characters and orientations in
>> response to streams of these things draws from an immense and to me-obscure
>> range of inputs.
>>
>> Makes me wonder,
>>
>> Eric
>>
>>
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>
> --
> Merle Lefkoff, Ph.D. President, Center for Emergent Diplomacy
> emergentdiplomacy.org
> Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
> Visiting Professor in Integrative Peacebuilding
> Saint Paul University
> Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
> merlelefkoff at gmail.com <merlelefoff at gmail.com> mobile:  (303) 859-5609
> skype:  merle.lelfkoff2
> twitter: @Merle_Lefkoff
>
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> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
>
>
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> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
>

-- 
Merle Lefkoff, Ph.D.
President, Center for Emergent Diplomacy
emergentdiplomacy.org
Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA

Visiting Professor in Integrative Peacebuilding
Saint Paul University
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

merlelefkoff at gmail.com <merlelefoff at gmail.com>
mobile:  (303) 859-5609
skype:  merle.lelfkoff2
twitter: @Merle_Lefkoff
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