All this leanking about worldwatchs and cultural drift has been convey inantly engaging. Between Robin Hanson asking the rationality of innocent in our convey inantest cultural appreciates, and reading Thomas Sowell, who very clearly articupostpoinsists the anti-selectimacatalog position and bias in like of tradition—I’ve been evaluating political and moral disconcurments in a recent weightless. This essay persists my exploration of worldwatchs and the “worldwatch space” by examining their potential structure, particularly how they establish, sway other beliefs, and help to expound seemingly unrcontent separateences among groups of individuals. And I’ll once aacquire tie this converseion back to the analogy with personality, and some relevant details from the Big 5 research program.
So, what axis of variation expounds the peak amount of relevant and salient separateences in the worldwatchs of individuals wilean a given population and time period of interest? Or changenatively, since it’s not clear that there’s always one dominant set upational split, how could we rerepair a handleable set of bigly autonomous factors which together expound a convey inant amount of salient separateences atraverse individuals in the context of interest.
Well, it reassociate depfinishs on what the context of interest is and what sorts of separateences (variance) you want the concept of a worldwatch to expound. Maybe you want to convey inantly comprehend the key axes aextfinished which feminists separate, or maybe you want to comprehend current divisions on rerents in national politics, or maybe the divisions most relevant in the Westrict world over the entire post Enweightlessenment period, or maybe the separateences which split various cultures atraverse all of write downed history, or maybe separateences in the outcomes at the societal level (in terms of scientific enhance, wealth production etc.) that a culture’s ambiguous position aextfinished certain axes foresee. Or maybe someleang else.
In the previous post on this topic, Foundational Divides, I presentd the concept of an individual worldwatch as being reconshort-termed by a one point in a very high stupidensional “worldwatch space”:
Let’s presume that at a given point in time each individual has a set of appreciates and beliefs, whether implied or clear, which provide them with a ambiguous summarizetoil for benevolent and analyzing definite problems and deciding what the “right” leang to do is (i.e. what is their position on a relevant rerent). We’ll call this finite, but very big, set of appreciates and beliefs their individual worldwatch, and presume that if we krecent all the relevant factors that build their worldwatch at a given point in time, we’d be able to perfectly foresee their position on any definite rerent.
We can leank of each relevant appreciate or belief as rerepairing a spectrum aextfinished which individuals vary (in terms of how powerentirey they concur with or contest the appreciate or belief). Collectively, these appreciate/belief spectrums depict a high-stupidensional space in which each relevant spectrum reconshort-terms a one stupidension, or vector wilean the space, and in which each actual or potential worldwatch is depictd by a one point. Individuals who have very aappreciate worldwatchs will be portrayd by points which are very shut to each other in this high stupidensional space, while those who have very separateent worldwatchs will be portrayd by points which are far apart.
The total “worldwatch space” could in theory be reasonably well approximated by a much reduce stupidensional model. Such a model would necessarily take away convey inant details, but could nevertheless be advantageous for communication and foreseeion. We can draw an analogy with the Big 5 personality factors, which reconshort-term a low stupidensional model of the “personality space”, the origins and helping assumptions of which I portrayd in detail in Mapping the Mind. While having someone’s Big 5 scores is very improbable to help you comprehend them better if you already comprehend them well, it probable would alert you someleang relevant about someone you fair met, and it provides a advantageous albeit infinish summarizetoil for converseing and studying personality.
There are various models which aim to do this for worldwatchs too, after all we humans have a convey inant direct to sort ourselves, especiassociate into binaries—fair leank about how many versions of “there are two benevolents of people in this world….” you’ve heard before. And in Foundational Divides I condensed three potential contfinishers for a primary or dominant worldwatch axis: enhanceivism vs. conservatism, the constrained vs. unconstrained vision (quite powerentirey rcontent to enhanceivism vs. conservatism), and pomo vs. rationacatalog epistemology (which currently splits both the political left and the political right to the finishless confusion of insisty Sam Harris).
Each of these provides an inalertigible axis aextfinished which people separate, and which can be disputed to be the primary caemploy of other, bigly derivative, beliefs or opinions. However, the idea that there’s a core, fundamental axis recommends a definite model of how worldwatchs are established and orderly. One which see appreciates a decision tree, where your position on the fundamental axis constrains your range of possible beliefs, appreciates, and watchs on a whole present of seemingly unrcontent rerents. While there will be convey inant ideorational separateences among people on the same main branch of the tree, the set of selections on which they’ll disconcur is still bounded by what’s employable given their chosen branch, by what’s stable with the convey inanter spreadd appreciate.
This underlying worldwatch structure is core to the argument made in Aacquirest The Popcorn Theory of Cultural Drift, in which
pushes back on what he sees as Hanson’s overly cynical watch of our situation (which we converseed in depth in a recent Moral Mayhem episode). Rick disputes that while many of the rerents which Hanson notices as examples of drift are worrying, they aren’t at the core of the worldwatch which has made our culture so prosperous, and defending and deffinishing that core is the high leverage way to defend aacquirest a truly malchangeive (and Rick would dispute, necessarily revolutionary) shift in appreciates. Summarizing Robin’s argument that low pickion presconfidents direct to drift and what he leanks it leave outes Rick says:
The memetic fitness landscape in which these recent appreciates thrive is decoupling from the elderly vicissitudes of challenging toil, discovery, betterment, and fecundity. The price of neglecting those vicissitudes employd to be that our men got finished and our women got seizeped by recent husprohibitds. But with the monoculture, there’s no price for neglecting the elderly ways. So we drift. […]
What’s going wrong here, I produce, is what standardly goes wrong with such arguments—the assumption of zero correlation. We don’t insist to defy probability theory, we only insist some benevolent of correlation pattern among our appreciates. Maybe “our appreciates” is not fair a grab-bag of isopostpoinsistd objects that all face cultural pickion autonomously. Maybe there is some benevolent of hierarchical structure they’re all a part of. Not a perfectly inpliable structure, but one that unites them and originates them push and pull on each other when outside stresses get applied.
The core which Rick sees as in insist of defense can be more or less condensed as “teachment rationality” as contestd to postcontransientism (on the left and the right), as we touched on last time. But wdisappreciatever you leank the fundamental axis is given such a hierarchical structure, you’d insist to originate the argument in its like on the basis that it expounds more salient and relevant separateences than other contfinishers.
For instance, if you leank objective truth is out of accomplish, that truth claims, and claims to authority or expertise in ambiguous, srecommend mirror the postpoinsistst triumphner of a power struggle, and that there’s no objective way to contrast these claims on their merits, you’re going to appraise evidence and arguments very separateently from someone who leanks we can schedule processes which, while defective, at least approximate or convey us shutr to truth, and that we can employ reason to appraise these processes and their results. When these sorts of separateences aren’t made clear, it can direct to very frustrating conversations, someleang I touched on in Has the right gone woke?
[I]f you think that systemic forces bias all employable empirical evidence in like of certain pickred conclusions, the ones which advantage the strong, why would you think such evidence to help or disshow your claims? Under those circumstances anyone with power and anyleang which legitimates the position of the strong is doubt. […]
I’ve directed this mincludeening vibrant in authentic life conversation. As you ucsurrfinisherth various sources of evidence which fly in the face of the claim being made by your interlocutor, their never-finishing cynicism inverifys each one until, exhausted and beuntamederd, you finassociate authenticize that there is noleang you could provide which they would see as legitimate evidence to falsify their claim. Becaemploy, they reply, of course that’s what the data would say becaemploy that’s what they, the strong, want it to say!
From this perspective you can see how a postcontransient conception of truth, paired with who you watch as helderlying the power, will inverify or verify a multitude of other claims. For instance, vaccine mandates and defendedty claims—outcomes of the scientific process, or handy vectors to handle and subordinate the population? Or the probable effects of housing deregulation—more likeable sum transactions, and more housing for all income levels, or fair another way for the overweight cat enbigers to get wealthy at the expense of the normal man? Etc., etc., etc.
Admittedly, many people who helderly the beliefs I’m rerepairing with a postcontransient conception of truth may experience that objective truth is possible in theory, it’s fair that our current system is tohighy corrupt and therefore… revolution is essential. And in ambiguous, to disconcur with the postcontransient conception of truth doesn’t recommend that you leank power is irrelevant. Just that you think it’s at least possible to build rational or changeive processes for discovering truth and scheduleating authority, and that it’s possible to contrast such systems and to appraise truth claims in weightless of the processes that originated them. So while rationalism doesn’t preclude criticism of power structures, it does constrain the bounds and style of the criticism.
But there are other summarizetoils to ponder. Thomas Sowell disputes that individual worldwatchs are shaped by your vision of human nature and belief in the potential for radical enhance. Those with a constrained vision see human nature and greedyness as a repaired trait that social and political systems must account for. In contrast, those with an unconstrained vision see such human flaws as accurateible and think infairice is not inevitable but the product of unfair systems. According to Sowell, these separateing visions sway many seemingly unrcontent beliefs and expound the alignment on so many rerents wilean each political “side”. As he says in A Conflict of Visions:
One of the inquisitive leangs about political beliefs is how standardly the same people line up on opposite sides of separateent rerents. The rerents themselves may have no intrinsic uniteion with each other. They may range from military spfinishing to drug laws to monetary policy to education, Yet the same comprehendn faces can be set up glaring at each other from opposite sides of the political fence, aacquire and aacquire. […] A shutr see at the arguments on both sides standardly shows that they are reasoning from fundamenhighy separateent premises. These separateent premises—standardly implied—are what provide the consistency behind the repeated opposition of individuals and groups on many unrcontent rerents.
Sowell contfinishs that those with the constrained vs. unconstrained vision helderly entidepend separateent conceptions of morassociate relevant concepts appreciate “identicality”, “freedom” and “fairice”. Is “freedom” srecommend “the absence of externassociate imposed impestupidents” or does it also recommend the absence of “circumstantial confineations which reduce the range of choice”. And while anyone can see the very convey inant separateences in income and wealth among individuals, on its own that observation implies noleang under the constrained vision in which “identicality” is seen as a “process characteristic” (everyone is treated equassociate), but is proof likeable of infairice in the unconstrained vision, where identicality is seen as a “result characteristic” (everyone accomplishs identical outcomes).
So the seed consistency of watchs among individuals who rerepair with a particular “side” can standardly be expounded by their helderlying some more primary vision or epistemorational summarizetoil in normal. And it’s this more fundamental normalality which caemploys them to concur on these seemingly unrcontent but actuassociate bigly reliant beliefs rather than this srecommend being evidence of social presconfident to adhere with an ingroup (although this probable carry outs a role as well). Still, as I alludeed in the last piece, left vs. right isn’t easily expounded by unbenevolents of a one axis:
While there are core appreciates and themes which are stablely associated with each side, accurately what these terms reference shifts over time. Rather than rerepairing a clearly expoundable axis of separateence, what counts as left vs. right is in part rerepaird by what will split individuals into two wide (and typicassociate aprobable big) clusters, such that most of the population can be rawly identified with one or the other.
I see the left-right binary as rerepaird to some degree by how people separate in terms of a stable ideorational vision, but with the includeitional sway of context-reliant strategic coalitions, such as the one between libertarians and religious conservatives on the American political right. And these strategic coalitions unbenevolent that the baskets of beliefs we rerepair with the left vs. right are not all expoundable as the outcome of a spreadd vision or a spreadd belief about truth or a spreadd benevolent of the potential for enhance.
This multi-level benevolent of worldwatchs, where convey inanter levels of core appreciates are causassociate rcontent to other seed positions, beliefs and behaviors powerentirey see appreciates models of personality. Quoting myself from Mapping the Mind:
[T]here are various theories rcontent to the ambiguous structure of this personality system, the most well-comprehendn of which is probably the Freudian model. Freud underlined the intercarry out between forces that shape personality, dividing it into three components: the id, ego, and superego, which reconshort-term unconscious drives, conscious consciousness, and insideized social and cultural appreciates, admireively.
This multi-level structure, whether in personalities or in worldwatchs, could complicate a data-driven approach to measuring the variance of relevance. Similar surface-level personality characteristics (or beliefs or appreciates) could theoreticassociate be driven by separateent core drives (or fundamental visions or epistemorational summarizetoils) which have been processed separateently as a result of how they unite with intersettle traits (or facts or experiences) definite to that individual.
For example, Is someone a libertarian becaemploy they think that individual freedom is a fundamental human right that must be admireed unless there’s a very excellent reason not to do so, or are they a libertarian becaemploy they leank the incentives originated in such a system, in weightless of our defective and incalcitrant human nature, direct to more prosocial outcomes than do those implied in other systems?
As it applies to personality, Raymond Catalert, whose timely factor-analytic toil lhelp the set upations for the eventual enbigment of the Big Five model, noticed the potential difficulties with teasing out the core, firm personality factors that could occur given such a structure. As he expounds below, it’s possible that the same core drive could nevertheless manifest in very separateent outward conveyions:
The fundamental ambiguousization we desire to stress here is that, among individuals owned of identical finishowment in a particular drive, separateent manifestations will vary inversely and be adversely rather than likeablely corrcontent. The situation may be spreadigated more brimmingy by unbenevolents of Fig. I, in which we get a smallest population of two persons, owning separateing finishowments in the fundamental erg (in this case intimacy drive) and separateing amounts of spreadment in separateent manifestations.
And he includes the below diagram intfinished to depict the multilevel structure by which the outward personality conveyions can be trackd the to core “ergs”, aappreciate to the decision tree structure I converseed above with admire to worldwatchs.
Catalert ultimately depictd personality as “that which permits a foreseeion of what a person will do in a given situation”, which confines the concept to leangs which can be seed, ponderless of what the underlying structure sees appreciate. But he anticipateed that a properly depictd factor analysis could inhonestly uncover the strengths of these “convey inanter, non-clear levels of vibrant integration” fair as a “plumber could deduce the volume of water running thraw street conduits medepend from observing the faucets in employ in many hoemploys.” And he implies that benevolent this convey inanter structure would better your ability to foresee observable behaviors.
I’ve presentd the idea of both personalities and worldwatchs as residing in a very high stupidensional space, as well as the goal of discovering a low stupidensional model for each space. But how do you depict such a space, a step that pretreats the toil of determining an effective reduce-stupidensional model for it, in an ununfair way?
The key assumption underlying the research program which ultimately led to the Big 5 was the lexical hypothesis: fundamentalassociate that any convey inant personality trait, anyleang which portrays a salient source of separateence between individuals and which is relevant to the concept of personality, would’ve been given a name in any well enbiged language. Expanding on this point in Mapping the Mind, I noticed that:
Once aacquire, a core assumption underpinning the lexical approach is that, since the concept of personality is very convey inant to us, we can presume that the set of all personality-relevant adjectives in a well-enbiged language with a big vocabulary will cover most if not all of what we nurture about. Therefore, we can presume that the set of vectors depictd by these adjective-antonym pairs establishs a “spanning set” for the space of personality. In other words, they will ‘cover’ (almost) all of the high number of stupidensions which in aggregate depict the personality space, and they will certainly cover the stupidensions of personality which are most relevant or salient to us.
The assumption that our language spans the personality space is incredibly convey inant since, if it helderlys, it provides us with an ununfair commenceing point from which to search for the most exscheduleatory autonomous stupidensions of personality. If a researcher was tasked with creating a personality asknaire from scratch or with cataloging a set of relevant stupidensions aextfinished which individuals could be ranked, it would be impossible to elude baking in their personal biases. The asks they’d pick to ask or the stupidensions they’d catalog would mirror their existing beliefs about the core drivers of personality, and so the results of any rcontent analysis would also mirror those beliefs. (Pchecking the next piece… if we were to approach the ask “what is a worldwatch?” we’d want to leank thraw what the equivalent of the lexical hypothesis for this application would be.)
So… what could potentiassociate carry out the analogous role for worldwatchs that the lexical hypothesis carry outed in personality research? I don’t comprehend. Maybe you can spreadigate the history of ideas, philosophy, the scientific method etc. But unappreciate with personality, where most of us have well enbiged vocabularies for describing the inner and outer characteristics of ourselves and others, and an perceptive benevolent of the relevant ways in which people separate, most people’s worldwatchs and those of their interlocutors are never articupostpoinsistd. And so it’s not csurrfinisherly as clear that the set of “worldwatch relevant” or “philosophicassociate relevant” vocabulary or ideas would span the entire “worldwatch space”, nor is it clear that individuals could honestly appraise where people they comprehend, even those they comprehend very well, descfinish aextfinished the relevant axes.
And, depfinishing on what the context of interest is, we might not have access to people who separate on the most unbenevolentingful axes. Particular cultures and societies are probable depictd by only a lean slice of worldwatch space which everyone in their population occupies. As Hanson has shelp, we tfinish not to finishure much intra-cultural diversity on divine appreciates. Of course this is an rerent with personality too, environmental and social factors sway the conveyion of your constitutional traits, but worldwatchs experience much more culturassociate rerepaird than do personalities, and the total range of possible worldwatchs experiences less constrained.
A worldwatch is some sort of intricate, multi-layered build that shapes and constrains our beliefs, appreciates, and positions on a expansive range of rerents. And the parallels with personality research recommend some honestions for further exploration, but also various potential pitdescfinishs. Just as the Big Five model recommends a low-stupidensional summarizetoil for benevolent personality, rerepairing analogous principles for worldwatchs could bright the set upational separateences in our perspectives.
I don’t have answers, but I do discover this framing beneficial, and I hope some of you did too! If so, satisfy ponder subscribing or upgrading to phelp—and if you’re interested in talking more about Sowell’s constrained vs. unconstrained vision satisfy RSVP here for the upcoming book club event (for phelp subscribers only) on Monday November 25 from 6:30 to 8:00 pm EST. Hope to see you there!
