Kill the Culture and Burn the Pulpit Part 2: Cultural Change

[Adios]

I thought we were talking about individuals.

We are. How many individuals would be required to effectively change things?

Depends.  In the civil rights movement, it took about 200 leaders.  Out of 280,000,000 people.  So 1 in 1,400,000.

Don't forget to count all the non leaders in the street who were getting beaten and firehosed.

[Adios]

"Individuals are more likely to do the right/smart thing than is the vast majority of humans taken as a whole."

That's pretty much what I believe. On and individual basis, more often than not, people are more or less okay. But when they get into groups, they get stupid and mean.

I believe that humanity as a whole has a lot of potential, but needs to grow up to achieve it. Right now, as a whole we're stupid and self destructive. I want to try and change that, if I can. It may be that there is little we can do to try and change humanity, but as long as I can try and still enjoy it, I'll keep going.

I admire your efforts.

[Cramulus]

I think there is hope in trying to teach people how to operate their brains.

we have a lizard, an early mammal, and a rational human inside each of us, wrestling for control.

It took millions of years for us to develop this great brain. For most of our evolutionary history, we were stuck in the lower brains, our actions predestined by the laws of survival, territory, aggression, sexual reproduction. Now we have a cerebral cortex, and we can ignore or sublimate our reptilian urges. We're just not very good at it.

People like Tim Leary and Carl Sagan thought that there was a lot of hope contained there! We spent millions of years living like savages, killing each other with sticks and rocks, and then suddenly we have cities, writing, and the average person is not spending all day struggling for survival. The individual can be taught to orient himself on something bigger and cooler than the immediate tribe. The individual can learn to examine his own intelligence and refine it. If there is hope for our race, it comes with the idea that we can stop acting like lizards.

Is that possible (or desirable) to totally turn off the lower brains? fuck no! But you can learn to recognize when the lizard and monkey are sitting in the driver's seat and toss them out if they're driving recklessly. Maybe if we can get the economy and government to stop sending DANGER messages, people will be able to shake it off.

ah, wishful thinking

[Doktor Howl]

I thought we were talking about individuals.

We are. How many individuals would be required to effectively change things?

Depends.  In the civil rights movement, it took about 200 leaders.  Out of 280,000,000 people.  So 1 in 1,400,000.

Don't forget to count all the non leaders in the street who were getting beaten and firehosed.

Okay, I give up, yeah all those people would have spontaneously shown up with no leadership, because that's how humans operate.  It's all hopelessness and failure, and we should both go clean our pee-stained dentures.

[Doktor Howl]

Fucking done here.  Carry on.

[The Wizard]

The psychology is pretty well known.  Primate behavior changes as you add monkeys, and the big changes happen (for whatever reason) in multiples of 8.

I read that somewhere, can't remember where though. Came to the same conclusion anyway. High school is a great place to observe such behavior.

I admire your efforts.

Thanks.  

[Adios]

I thought we were talking about individuals.

We are. How many individuals would be required to effectively change things?

Depends.  In the civil rights movement, it took about 200 leaders.  Out of 280,000,000 people.  So 1 in 1,400,000.

Don't forget to count all the non leaders in the street who were getting beaten and firehosed.

Okay, I give up, yeah all those people would have spontaneously shown up with no leadership, because that's how humans operate.  It's all hopelessness and failure, and we should both go clean our pee-stained dentures.

Why are you upset? Isn't banging ideas around they way they come to life?

[The Wizard]

Don't forget to count all the non leaders in the street who were getting beaten and firehosed.

Okay, I give up, yeah all those people would have spontaneously shown up with no leadership, because that's how humans operate.  It's all hopelessness and failure, and we should both go clean our pee-stained dentures.

It's a two way deal. A leader needs people to help him get what needs done done, while the people need a leader to get them organized and motivated.

[Adios]

I think there is hope in trying to teach people how to operate their brains.

we have a lizard, an early mammal, and a rational human inside each of us, wrestling for control.

It took millions of years for us to develop this great brain. For most of our evolutionary history, we were stuck in the lower brains, our actions predestined by the laws of survival, territory, aggression, sexual reproduction. Now we have a cerebral cortex, and we can ignore or sublimate our reptilian urges. We're just not very good at it.

People like Tim Leary and Carl Sagan thought that there was a lot of hope contained there! We spent millions of years living like savages, killing each other with sticks and rocks, and then suddenly we have cities, writing, and the average person is not spending all day struggling for survival. The individual can be taught to orient himself on something bigger and cooler than the immediate tribe. The individual can learn to examine his own intelligence and refine it. If there is hope for our race, it comes with the idea that we can stop acting like lizards.

Is that possible (or desirable) to totally turn off the lower brains? fuck no! But you can learn to recognize when the lizard and monkey are sitting in the driver's seat and toss them out if they're driving recklessly. Maybe if we can get the economy and government to stop sending DANGER messages, people will be able to shake it off.

ah, wishful thinking

Excellent post. Sent my brain spinning that maybe the arts is a great tool for this idea.

[Doktor Howl]

Don't forget to count all the non leaders in the street who were getting beaten and firehosed.

Okay, I give up, yeah all those people would have spontaneously shown up with no leadership, because that's how humans operate.  It's all hopelessness and failure, and we should both go clean our pee-stained dentures.

It's a two way deal. A leader needs people to help him get what needs done done, while the people need a leader to get them organized and motivated.

WHICH CATAGORY OF PERSON IS OPERATING AS AN INDIVIDUAL?

OH, FOR CHRIST'S SAKE. 

BUT BOTH OF YOU KNEW THAT ALREADY.

Dok,
Off to take a pill, and forget that this fucking conversation ever took place.  Goddammit.

[Adios]

Don't forget to count all the non leaders in the street who were getting beaten and firehosed.

Okay, I give up, yeah all those people would have spontaneously shown up with no leadership, because that's how humans operate.  It's all hopelessness and failure, and we should both go clean our pee-stained dentures.

It's a two way deal. A leader needs people to help him get what needs done done, while the people need a leader to get them organized and motivated.

WHICH CATAGORY OF PERSON IS OPERATING AS AN INDIVIDUAL?

OH, FOR CHRIST'S SAKE. 

BUT BOTH OF YOU KNEW THAT ALREADY.

Dok,
Off to take a pill, and forget that this fucking conversation ever took place.  Goddammit.

Both. The leaders who had a direction and the non leaders who used their brain to recognize a worthwhile idea and cause and to follow the leaders.

[The Wizard]

WHICH CATAGORY OF PERSON IS OPERATING AS AN INDIVIDUAL?

OH, FOR CHRIST'S SAKE.

BUT BOTH OF YOU KNEW THAT ALREADY.

Dok,
Off to take a pill, and forget that this fucking conversation ever took place.  Goddammit.

Okay. Sorry to have pissed you off. No need to give up the conversation though.

Both. The leaders who had a direction and the non leaders who used their brain to recognize a worthwhile idea and cause and to follow the leaders.

This.

[Doktor Howl]

Right.  Individualism is a meaningless concept, then.

[The Wizard]

Right.  Individualism is a meaningless concept, then.

No it isn't. You said it yourself that people probably wouldn't band together and risk getting the hell kicked out them without a leader to inspire them to. The cause become an important enough goal for them to risk themselves for it, because the leader gave them a reason. They still chose to join up, and they chose to put themselves in harms way. Without the leader, they probably wouldn't have a united front or goal.

As for the leader, well if he tried to change things in an obvious manner by himself, he'd probably be murdered as soon as he started making waves.

[Doktor Howl]

Right.  Individualism is a meaningless concept, then.

No it isn't. You said it yourself that people probably wouldn't band together and risk getting the hell kicked out them without a leader to inspire them to.

And I was told that the gestalt that formed around him was actually individualism.  If that's the case, than any activity from anyone, ever is "individualism", even in groups.

I concede.  The individual is powerless, because the term is a meaningless word for a grab-bag of different behaviors that have nothing to do with it, and therefore we just spin as little tiny cogs in a great big machine, until we break and are replaced.

It's all so clear, now.  We've been wasting time here for 8 years, when we could have been more productive at work.