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Do pecking orders trump rational thought in humans?

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Wed, 2010-08-11 13:32

#1

Brian White

Do pecking orders trump rational thought in humans?

Once upon a time humans were social animals who lived in small groups maybe 15 to 50 individuals. Like lions, wolves, hyenas, or baboons.

And just like the lions, baboons, etc, they must have had an alpha male who got a lot of action, alpha females who tried to keep the alfa genes just in her family and some hopeful no hopers males, eyeing all the females, especially the alphas and waiting for the alpha male to hurt itself or fall off a cliff. Then inteligence evolved and the tribes swelled in size to 100 strong, then 200, then 2000 and 2 million . But did things really change in the hard wired pecking order stuff? I mean, it evolved over something like 30 million years. It is not suddenly going to disappear. And the pecking order, itself, is still only going to be 5 or 6 pecks long because thats what it was hard wired to be.

I see a clash occuring between the pecking order stuff and rational thought. One big irrational pecking order is monarchy. The heredetary king and his loyal followers. Stupid idea. just irrational. But there are millions of loyal followers in countries all over the world and many would still die for "king and country" The king might have a bunch of kids with willing hopeful cortesans and these kids will not become king. And why not? And why should any of his kids have special right to be king anyway? Probably a better new king is somewhere among his 4 million subjects. Another is the caste system. Thousands of years of regimented drudgery for some based on a pecking order. Pecking order power explains bill and monica, tiger and quite a few, and perhaps it also explains politicians and ceo's and movie and pop stars and how some of us follow their every move. And the introductory question "what do you do?". This question is asked purely to find out if the person is higher or lower on the pecking tree than you are. To "put them in their place".

Anyway, I think the pecking order thing is bad. I think the human brain slices up his or her social network into multiple pecking orders. And if you are below them in the order, your thoughts and words and actions are ignored unless they threaten his or her position in their preceved order. (People have actually researched this) Bosses! I have had a few where I had more training that they had as certain stuff, but they vetoed no brainer improvements that would have made them more money.

I think that sometimes you can be below a person in one order and above them in another of thesse multiple pecking orders.

I think politicians know all about these pecking orders. Harper has defunded climate science and the scientists (who are basically losing their jobs) hardly even whimper. It is because in their mind, he is the alpha and they must take whatever shit he gives them.

I used to look up to scientists, but now I see them as no better than lab rats. If harper puts funding into carbon storage underground, they will run for that funding as fast as their little legs will carry them.

Someone did an experiment a few years ago where he had actors taking fake electric shocks. The shocks were administered by "lab techs" who did not realize that they were the subjects of the experiment. Their boss insisted that the techs give the actors higher and higher shocks. Even with the actors pleading for their lives and faking their own death throes, many of the "lab techs' continued to "electrocute" them. I suggest there is much to learn about rational thought and how easily it can be turned off by a pecking order.

Any thoughts on pecking orders versus rational thought?

Wed, 2010-08-11 03:59

#2

Cueball

Cueball's picture

Rational thought by its defintion trumps instinct.

Wed, 2010-08-11 09:18

#3

KenS

Post-enlightenment human beings are severely hampered in their understanding of what really plays into what we call 'rational thought'.

We feteshize our notion of what it should be into what it is. And the left is even more a victim of that.

A prequisite to understanding cognitive processes that are central to what we call'rational thought' is a dynamite charge to our ossified dualism of rational/irrational.

Wed, 2010-08-11 09:19

#4

KenS

Rational thought is only an aspiration.

Wed, 2010-08-11 09:24

#5

Caissa

I often doubt it is even an aspiration for some, KenS.

Wed, 2010-08-11 09:54

#6

Tommy_Paine

I think it's more complicated-- in fact infinately more complicated than pecking order. Here's an overview on "Tit for Tat" at wiki. Doubtless there's more in depth articles available on line.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tit_for_tat

I think tit for tat, or reciprical altruism is a kind of algorythm that runs in the background of every social animals brain.

And, there's little doubt in my mind that our brains have hundreds of these "instinctive" algorythms runing all the time, and that we are born with them. However, each individual has different "presets". Just because we all have a pecking order algorythm running in our brain, doesn't mean that I percieve or act on it with the exact same strength as you do, or anyone else.

Are we prisoners of our born instinctive behaviors? Is rational thought merely a conceit?

Hardly, in my view.

Perhaps the best anology to all this is the commercial aircraft. A commercial jetliner can take off, fly and land now without a cabin crew. It can be totally automated.

But you wouldn't fly on such a jet.

That's because a computer cannot be programmed to account for every conceivable contingency a commercial jet may face during take off, flight and landing. That's what the cabin crew is for.

Our frontal lobes are like the cabin crew. Nature could not pre-program instinctive behaviors so that they could account for every contingency that the environment would throw our way. So, there's another algorythm that allows our instinctive predispositions to be modified by our environment (or, another way of saying it, our experience) but even more valuable is the ability to over ride them.

I think this over ride option is rational thought. We're rational when we let facts and evidence over ride inappropriate instinctive behaviors.

We should do this more often.

Wed, 2010-08-11 10:22

#7

KenS

Tommy_Paine wrote:

Are we prisoners of our born instinctive behaviors? Is rational thought merely a conceit?

Hardly, in my view.

Of course if you are going to set the question up that way, the answer is no.

That false dualism

Wed, 2010-08-11 10:28

#8

Pants-of-dog

Cueball wrote:

Rational thought by its defintion trumps instinct.

It is probably more correct to say that it should trump instinct, but it does not.

Primate dominance tactics are a part of our instinctual heritage. There is little point in denying that. However, many people, such as myself and probably most babblers, feel more comfortable in a non-hieracrchical environment. It is therefore possible that people can either be socialised to ignore this part of our instincts or that these instincts do not inevitably lead us into pecking order dynamics. Most likely, the truth is that there is some complicated relationship between all these factors.

Wed, 2010-08-11 10:31

#9

KenS

Dont get me wrong, rational thought is a very powerful tool. And generally far better than the alternatives.

But at bottom its just another tool. We are limited beings, and it doesnt magically transform us.

"Of course" people will say. But our discourse shows that we beleive it does or will magically transform us.

For a simple and near at hand example: the expectation that scientists, people with tons of those rational tools, will act more 'rationally'.

Wed, 2010-08-11 10:38

Tommy_Paine

Of course if you are going to set the question up that way, the answer is no.

That false dualism

Would it be different if I would have said, "Do we have to be prisoners of our instinctive behaviors?".

I set the question up this way, anticipating one of the arguments that is often brought up, which is a rejection that we have instinctive behaviors at all, because a lot of people fear that it gives an excuse for those behaviors when they are inapropriate, so they want to deny them.

Wed, 2010-08-11 10:57

Tommy_Paine

"Of course" people will say. But our discourse shows that we beleive it does or will magically transform us.

For a simple and near at hand example: the expectation that scientists, people with tons of those rational tools, will act more 'rationally'.

My own view is that we have instinctive behaviors for a good reason. They are the product of millions of years of evolution, and we should listen to them attentively.

Where we get into trouble is when we allow them to dictate to us, act on them despite facts and evidence that would indicate that they are situationally inapropriate.

Your example I think isn't an example of rational thought at all, but of unquestioning-- instinctive-- reverence for authority, of ceeding to the alpha male or female. Of course scientists are not rational all the time on all subjects. We might listen to them in their field of expertise-- and in doing so we should account for whatever possible bias they might have.

But it is irrational to suppose that because Stephen Hawking knows so much about physics, we should vote the way he tells us.

Wed, 2010-08-11 11:09

KenS

Removal of straw person set-ups is always better.

But its still the dualism of placing rational thought as if it is not INTEGRALY suffused with "lesser" forms of cognition.

Which leaves us with a magical belief in the powers of a form of cognition that also suffers from a lot of limits.

The limits of rational thought is not a problem. But the blindness to the limits is very much a problem.

Wed, 2010-08-11 11:21

KenS

The very idea of calling all sorts of things 'instinctive' is shot through with that problematic dualism.

Clearly, the 'instinctive' appeal to authority is both probematic, AND something we can overcome.

But most of the impediments to [superstitiously elevated ]'rational thought' are both more pervasive and more subtle.

Getting back to the example of the scientists... to me that isnt rocket science: smarter people are no less prone to rationalizations (pun), they just do better ones.

Wed, 2010-08-11 11:31

Tommy_Paine

Other than you, who has claimed otherwise?

Wed, 2010-08-11 11:59

Catchfire

Catchfire's picture

Cueball wrote:
Rational thought by its defintion trumps instinct.

Of course that's true, but rational thought vs desire and drive in humans is much more complcated than this a>b equation (as I know you know, Cueball).

Jacques Lacan was talking about the enlightenment and Emmanuel Kant and so-called rational thought. Kant said, Lacan explained, that if man [sic] was faced with his greatest desire, say, sex with a beautiful woman, and told that he could have it but that he would immiediately die post-coitus, there is no way that "rational man" would accept this deal. It is not a rational exchange, and rational man would therefore turn it down. That's true, Lacan agreed, but he would think about it.

Then he goes on, in typical Lacanian fashion (and in a way that would surely appeal to Tommy Paine, bagkitty and Maysie) about how, in fact, the threat of death might actually increase the force of desire and subsequent pleasure, and make it irresistible--as if rationality actually makes irrationality, or raw, animalistic desire more attractive simply because we know the difference.

I've never been much a fan of rationality anyway. Like Rodents of Unusual Size (RUS), I don't believe they exist.

Wed, 2010-08-11 13:25

KenS

I like that better than what I wrote- especially "but hed think about it."

But I'll pass on what I wrote before my dial-up became so crippled.

Brian White wrote:
I suggest there is much to learn about rational thought and how easily it can be turned off by a pecking order.

Paramount on the list of things to learn:

Rational thought is not all its cracked up to be.

Corollary: the scope and reach of non-evaluative lived experience cognition is much more powerful than we realize.

There are processes of our brain that are truly instinctive.

But in practice we use 'instinctive' and 'hard wired' as catch alls for that which doesnt fit into what we call 'rational'. And that rational thought is a fiction.

Truth is that rational thought is richer and less under our control than we are accustomed to think.

Wed, 2010-08-11 13:29

KenS

"Getting back to the example of the scientists... to me that isnt rocket science: smarter people are no less prone to rationalizations (pun), they just do better ones."

Tommy_Paine wrote:

Other than you, who has claimed otherwise?

I was addressing the opening post. And the belief is pretty strong there- just for starters.

Wed, 2010-08-11 13:31

oldgoat

Rational thought suggests to me that Brian meant to say "trump", and not "thrump" in the thread title. My position in the pecking order, at least around here, gives me the ability to change it, which I will. If you really did mean "thrump" Brian, (a kind of a cool word really), I'll change it back.

Wed, 2010-08-11 14:26

Pants-of-dog

Thrump: the sound a winning hand of cards makes when one lays it on the table.

Wed, 2010-08-11 18:23

Cueball

Cueball's picture

Pants-of-dog wrote:

Cueball wrote:

Rational thought by its defintion trumps instinct.

It is probably more correct to say that it should trump instinct, but it does not.

Try not thinking that, and maybe you will see what I am saying. If it doesn't 'trump' instinct, then it is not rational thought.

Wed, 2010-08-11 18:54

Tommy_Paine

I was addressing the opening post. And the belief is pretty strong there- just for starters.

Forgive me, I thought you were fishing for an argument that isn't there.

Wed, 2010-08-11 21:42

Yiwah

Cueball wrote:

Pants-of-dog wrote:

Cueball wrote:

Rational thought by its defintion trumps instinct.

It is probably more correct to say that it should trump instinct, but it does not.

Try not thinking that, and maybe you will see what I am saying. If it doesn't 'trump' instinct, then it is not rational thought.

No, thank you. I'll just wait for you to actually explain it. I think that it is impossible to truly separate rational thought from instinct. Therefore, instinct and rationality often go hand in hand, making it impossible for reason to trump instinct as they never were in conflict.

Wed, 2010-08-11 23:50

Unionist

oldgoat wrote:

My position in the pecking order, at least around here, gives me the ability to change it, which I will.

You mean I've been wasting my time all these years, staunchly defending you against that charge of "peckerhead"!?

On a related note, point of information: Are the "pecking orders" recognized by the Vatican?

Thu, 2010-08-12 08:22

Caissa

Now I'm feeling peckish; thanks Unionist.

Fri, 2010-08-13 21:22

Brian White

Thanks, and thanks for the link, Tommy. I guess what I am saying. (I do not even know how to put it in words) is that the pecking order IS the override lots and lots and lots of times. It is like obsessive compulsive behaviour. You got to go back and check that %^&#* door is locked even though you know the %^&#* door IS locked AND you WILL miss your !#@%& Buss IF you do it! BUT you still go back anyway!

(And the door is locked and the bus is gone.)

Or the voter who votes for Harpers glove puppet shitty candidate even though he KNOWS Harper is a scary hitler in waiting monster type politician. HE does it because of the pecking order disorder thing. AND because the tribe his ancestor belonged to back 60,000 years ago HAD a scary Harper kind of hitler and it wiped out another tribe in genocidal savagery. Thats instinctive voting and it aint good.

I have met it with my low tech solar stuff lots. I went to an ideawave meeting recently and showed my model of a new solar accumulator design and they all got it! (Because they are all smarter than me and they are into looking at new ideas as puzzles). And I am being quite honest about that. It is intimidating just how smart some of those guys are. (More pecking order stuff affecting me in my head and keeping me in my place, I guess)

But lots of times I meet people one to one and it is *&^%$ annoying because the pecking order thing comes into play and it turns their brains OFF. I am trying to explain stuff (that is not really that hard) and the IQ of the other person drops 100 points in that moment!

And I am being honest about that too. People who are way smarter than me but incapable of thought in that crucial moment.

Brian

Tommy_Paine wrote:

Are we prisoners of our born instinctive behaviors? Is rational thought merely a conceit?

Hardly, in my view.

Perhaps the best anology to all this is the commercial aircraft.   A commercial jetliner can take off, fly and land now without a cabin crew. It can be totally automated.

But you wouldn't fly on such a jet.

That's because a computer cannot be programmed to account for every conceivable contingency a commercial jet may face during take off, flight and landing. That's what the cabin crew is for.

Our frontal lobes are like the cabin crew.   Nature could not pre-program instinctive behaviors so that they could account for every contingency that the environment would throw our way.   So, there's another algorythm that allows our instinctive predispositions to be modified by our environment (or, another way of saying it, our experience) but even more valuable is the ability to over ride them.

I think this over ride option is rational thought.    We're rational when we let facts and evidence over ride inappropriate instinctive behaviors.

We should do this more often.

Sun, 2010-08-15 11:53

contrarianna

KenS wrote:
....Getting back to the example of the scientists... to me that isnt rocket science: smarter people are no less prone to rationalizations (pun), they just do better ones.

True.
Though there is a considerable range of dimensions and definitions of rationality,
rationality is largely the handmaiden of the irrational and atavistic
--a sad reality which both isn't, and yet most explosively IS-- rocket science.

Sun, 2010-08-15 17:08

Brian White

I have a few ted talk links about similar stuff(It is gratifying that scientists are looking at this stuff)

The first one is about a mathematicial mistake that humans make. "Incredibly dumb" mistakes that humans make. And wonderful stuff about monkey economics.

http://www.ted.com/talks/laurie_santos.html?utm_source=newsletter_weekly...

In my view one of our other dumb mistakes is the whole endless growth economics thing that society worldwide is based on. It is totally irrational and easily disproved but so many really "smart people" are able to turn off logic and subscribe to it. (Endless growth is imposible in our physical world and the laws of physics apply to secondary sciences like "economics" too. It does not happen in reverse. A law of economics CANNOT beat a law of physics.

But try telling that to an "economist" like Harper! The peck you would get would sting you for a month.

The second link about cultural differences in our decisions.

http://www.ted.com/talks/sheena_iyengar_on_the_art_of_choosing.html?utm_...

Sun, 2010-08-15 17:34

Protrucio

Protrucio's picture

hey check these links out.

1.)http://socyberty.com/psychology/determining-dominance-in-a-group-of-huma...

2.)http://anthro.palomar.edu/behavior/behave_2.htm

3.)Conflict Theory

Conflict Theory. Elite Theory. Traditional Contemporary Conflict Theory ... C. Wright Mills (radical sociology); Marxist and neo-Marxist theory
publish.uwo.ca/~pakvis/Conflict%20Theory.ppt -

Thu, 2010-09-02 02:48

Brian White

Not exactly pecking order stuff

http://www.world-science.net/othernews/100701_freewill.htm

Scientists are finding out that we have less free will than we thought. (Means we are not necessarly thinking rationally) A whole lot of our decisions are subconsious.

More Pecking order versus rational thought stuff right here on Babble!

another 911 thread, started by a higher up.

Validation!

Thu, 2010-09-02 05:08

Fidel

For some reason I had the strangest nightmare about a new invisible enemy, "beeQa'eda."

Brian I think I have a new theory about what's causing colony collapse disorder.

Tue, 2010-09-07 01:33

Brian White

Fidel wrote:

For some reason I had the strangest nightmare about a new invisible enemy, "beeQa'eda."

Brian I think I have a new theory about what's causing colony collapse disorder.

It does not surprise me. A vacuum gets filled with imaginary stuff. Even in physics virtual particles appear and disappear in a vacuum (acording to the quantum mechanics).

Might your endless attempts to disrupt threads be due to your idea that you are higher in the babble pecking order than you actually are?

One point is worth making. A good social scientist could design an experiment to test the pecking order versus rational thought theory.

Basically, it is not what people say that counts, it is who does the saying. That should be easy to test. As long as you can find people who can lie with ease.

Even today on tv (I forget the name of the program) neuroscientists are saying that emotions affect a persons ability to reason and they are finding out how it happens at the neuron to neuron level.

We all know cliches like herd animal and herd instinct, and mob rule. These are basically acknowlegment that groups of humans act like crazy animals. And the stuff that people BELIEVE! God would be laughing at us. (If it exists).

They are just getting around to questioning (and then testing) assumptions that people have made for decades about human behaviour being rational.

This will eventually blow the whole voodu of economics apart. We will be able to explain why Harper believes in endless growth, (or maybe he is just a king chicken who gets a kick from lieing to his loyal peckers).

I watched George Bush talking to the americans a couple of times and trying to have a serious look about him. I am sure it is pre recorded and it must have been take 20. It looked like the #$%@!* was going to burst out laughing at any second! But the americans could not detect that. They revered him! Even those who didn't were stuck in the pecking order and couldn't break out.

The whole idea of opening a 9 11 conspiracy thread in a humanitys and science forum undermines both respect for science and humanities.

(At least for most people).

I am not one who generally goes with the flow either.

I enjoy the movie conspiracy theory but I am able to recognise entertainment for entertainment sake.

Reality is quite different.

Sun, 2011-01-23 17:24

Brian White

I posted elsewhere and I got the quoted reply, aparently this lady has found evidence of pecking orders,

"Deborah Tannen http://www9.georgetown.edu/faculty/tannend/ has documented a fair amount of pecking order proof in male conversational relationships. Females are more egalitarian in conversation. All kinds of interesting results from this observation - see any of her books - this one I remember from "Talking From 9 to 5""

So it seems the evidence points to men having pecking orders moreso then women.

(I forgot that I posted about glen beck issuing the orders to assasinate someone, and someone trying to follow through), so now with pecking order theory, there is a smoking gun user and beck issuing the orders to kill, puts beck a whole lot closer to the scene of the crime.

If the theory can be tested, and proved, maybe we can get beck locked up for inciting hatred?

I reeled off the theory to an american lady who asked why her fellow americans follow such crazy leaders about 3 months ago. She is a sociologist.

But she will not be testing the idea because she finds it unpleasant or distasteful. (Which is a shame)

Mon, 2011-01-24 12:02

Protrucio

Protrucio's picture

Yes. This reminds me of the research focused on female bullying in schools and in the workplace. Apparently feminist theory or is it ideology, pretends that females are more egalitarian; yet research demonstrates that females typically establish their own pecking orders, sometimes resulting in female socio-psychic demolition ie. suicide. I have the refereneces.

Mon, 2011-01-24 13:14

Brian White

I think you are way too harsh on females. It was a Belgian guy on the radio who greatly increased the speed and breadth of the genocide in Rwanda. I see him as an African Glen Beck. (Maybe Becks role model?) That is males down the pecking order doing the unspeakable because evil dg (higher up their pecking order) tells them to.

And why did trained soldiers back off from saving people from being murdered? Because the diplomats told them.

I know the German army has a "soldiers code" about it being ok to disobey orders when they are that wrong.

Probably other armies do too.

And there IS the tides story where a guy set off on Becks radio orders to murder the guy. I posted it somewhere.

And I had a boss who I knew was lieing to me (profit share) but I stayed on for an extra year working for him on the basis of that lie.

He was and is a habitual liar, it can never change. And I knew it but stayed on anyway.

I can only explain my stupid actions on the basis of pecking orders. I think males are influenced every day in making wrong decisions on the basis of pecking orders.

Maybe if we make a decision and then write down the reasons, the pecking order will often appear as the invisible elephant on the page?

I bet there is an experiment based on questions and answers just waiting to be done on this.

Brian

Protrucio wrote:

Yes. This reminds me of the research focused on female bullying in schools and in the workplace. Apparently feminist theory or is it ideology, pretends that females are more egalitarian; yet research demonstrates that females typically establish their own pecking orders, sometimes resulting in female socio-psychic demolition ie. suicide. I have the refereneces.