Humergence®

Globalization and Cultural Shifting

The Mathematical Structure of Terrorism from PhysOrg.com  makes reference to a paper titled Universal patterns underlying ongoing wars and terrorism. From the paper's abstract:

"We report a remarkable universality in the patterns of violence arising in three high-profile ongoing wars, and in global terrorism. Our results suggest that these quite different conflict arenas currently feature a common type of enemy, i.e. the various insurgent forces are beginning to operate in a similar way regardless of their underlying ideologies, motivations and the terrain in which they operate. We provide a microscopic theory to explain our main observations. This theory treats the insurgent force as a generic, self-organizing system which is dynamically evolving through the continual coalescence and fragmentation of its constituent groups."

 

Collective Action vs. Collectivism

The P2P Foundation Blog has an excellent blog posting by Michel Bauwens on Jaron Lanier's new essay for Edge. 

The basic ideas of Lanier's essay are (quoted from CommunityWiki):

• There is a resurgance of the idea that the collective is all-wise, and that this is bad.

• There is an attempt to erase the individual, and this is dumb.
• AI is dumb. The Internet is dumb. Only people are smart.
  

The P2P foundation blog posting by bauwens borrows from his own P2P Manifesto, which looks at human collective action through the lens of Clare W Graves's theory of human nature. Clare W. Graves's theory shows that the fundamental nature of communist "collectivism" is different from the collective action of people voluntarily cooperating, as discussed by author Howard Rheingold here.

I also talk about this in the discussion section of this CommunityWiki page. I talk about how we are lacking a general "literacy of human nature", and how I believe that this lack of understanding is what is driving people to place labels where they do not belong. The reasons "why" people voluntarily collaborate are different than the reasons "why" people go along with state-imposed "collectivism" rules.

Study: Groups outperform the best individuals at problem solving

[via Cooperation Commons Thanks Madtom]

A study by Patrick R. Laughlin, Erin C. Hatch, Jonathan S. Silver, and Lee Boh of the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, published in the APA Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, finds that group problem solving is more effective than problem solving by even the best individual expert.

[via Cooperation Commons Thanks Madtom]

A study by Patrick R. Laughlin, Erin C. Hatch, Jonathan S. Silver, and Lee Boh of the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, published in the APA Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, finds that group problem solving is more effective than problem solving by even the best individual expert.

P2P (Peer to Peer) and E-C Theory

[via Social Synergy Weblog]

The P2P Foundation blog has posted a little quote from both myself and Spiraldynamics author Chris Cowan. This was partially from a discussion about the Cooperation Commons project, and how the theories of Clare W. Graves might give another lens onto the concepts of peer to peer dynamics and cooperation.

Chris' response is very interesting. Here's a small quote:

The presupposition of many P2P discussions at your level seems to be collaborative, open minds with a shared goal of building better systems capable of adaptation and knowledge gain with individual ambitions attenuated while individual rights increase. The pitfall is that open systems nearly guarantee a mix of minds with multiple agendas - a hard fact often unacknowledged. Some motives are overt while others are cloaked. Thus, the motive field is a complicated one, and it is part of the whole when the system is open to all and the distribution of systemsis ‘normal.’ Motive recognition and management is a challenge in the P2P arena quite as much as the knowledge spread.

Our own small adventures with the Wiki world have demonstrated for us how the psychology and motivations of contributors can sway ‘truth’ and their approach to its promotion. If there is a culture of open inquiry and sharing, things have a chance to work. If there are fanatics with agendas - either ideological or financial - or fixated minds stuck on particular ideas, then the outcomes turn into products of endurance, competitiveness, and alliance-building. If you’ve got a couple of folks who believe themselves without peer, it’s a problem. And for those who find such things unpleasant or not worth the effort, truth inevitably suffers. It doesn’t take but a couple of rotten apples to spoil an egalitarian barrel. There has to be a mechanism for rotating the fruits and monitoring process, as well as content.

Read the rest at P2P Foundation Blog

The Cooperation Commons project is at least partially about creating an open literacy of cooperation. This is a sorely needed resource in our world right now. Chris Cowan's statements above reflect the value of also having literacy of epistemology/human psychology/human nature, in my opinion.

Social vs Environmental Tipping Points

[via Social Synergy Weblog]
Over at TerraBlog, there is a story about a race between two "Tipping points" in regards to the issue of global warming:

On the one hand we have the argument that awareness of the issue will soon reach a critical mass that pushes us past the current political stalemate. On the other hand, we have handwringing over a coming environmental catastrophe from which there will be no return.

So, one of these two "tipping points" will come first. Either it will be that lots of people will start to realize that there is a real problem with the global climate and do something about it, or it will be that lots of people cause the environment to reach a tipping point due to our human activity actions causing global climate reactions.

[via Social Synergy Weblog]
Over at TerraBlog, there is a story about a race between two "Tipping points" in regards to the issue of global warming:

On the one hand we have the argument that awareness of the issue will soon reach a critical mass that pushes us past the current political stalemate. On the other hand, we have handwringing over a coming environmental catastrophe from which there will be no return.

So, one of these two "tipping points" will come first. Either it will be that lots of people will start to realize that there is a real problem with the global climate and do something about it, or it will be that lots of people cause the environment to reach a tipping point due to our human activity actions causing global climate reactions.

Did Cooperation Give Early Humans A Competitive Edge?

                [via Cooperation Commons and  New Scientist] Augustin Fuentes at the University of Notre Dame hypothesizes that Paranthropus went extinct because early Homo(human ancestor) species were more adept at cooperating:

...Paranthropus suffered from increased predation because Homo, and other early humans even more closely related to modern humans, learned to use cooperation to avoid being eaten. He says all would have feared the same predators, such as big cats. To test the hypothesis, Fuentes's team designed a computer program based on classic ecology models to simulate how teamwork could have tipped the scales in favour of Homo. They found that just a moderate amount of teamwork gave Homo a dramatic advantage over its close competitors, causing the extinction of Paranthropus. The computer simulations add to real world evidence of co-operation in early humans. For example, the common use of stone tools by early humans suggests they shared information on the location of suitable stone. These sites are sometimes 30 kilometres away from where the tools are found and would not have been easy for individuals to find on their own. "This implies some sort of information transfer that's not language yet, but is much more extensive than that available to other organisms," Fuentes says.

Indeed, it seems that this primitive form of cooperation is now a central part of human existence world wide. Simple, narrow objective Human cooperation of the type Fuentes describes has been so successful, that it is now driving a huge portion of other species to extinction. It is cooperation based around physiological satisfaction. Cooperating to meet the very basic survival needs of existence.

DRAWING LINES ON PAPER AND SAND: ANATOMY OF A CARTOON CLASH

Lines get drawn in many ways. Some are pen strokes sketched by artists; others are concrete forms laid out by architects. Many are abstract - dearly held values and unwritten social norms sketched indelibly in our minds, not with our hands. These days, cartoon drawings are crossing a lot of lines and pointing to divisions between worldviews in conflict.

A recent case of this in the U.S. involved actor and Scientology spokesman Tom Cruise who reportedly threw his star power around to persuade Viacom/Comedy Central to suspend rerunning an episode of the animated South Park satire that skewered the beliefs of Scientology. Fellow Scientologist Isaac Hayes left his voice-over role on the show in protest, as well. The event entertained many Americans, enraged loyal South Park fans, and got lots of attention for both the Scientologists and the show. The affair discredited Cruise in the eyes of some fans who see the church based on sci-fi writer L. Ron Hubbard’s Dianetics as a self-important mega-cult, while fellow Scientologists viewed his stand as a heroic defense of their religion. This fusion of animated characters with matters of faith made perfectly good sense on Hollywood terms.

In contrast, many people scratched their heads in utter confusion and dismay when the publication of a set of pen-and-ink newspaper cartoons in Denmark caused outrage because quite a few Muslims believed they had crossed the line. For many non-Muslim observers, the intensity of the reaction made no sense at all. Subsequent reproductions of these inflammatory drawings fanned anger since they were taken as extreme insults and deliberate, in-your-face defamation. Protests and riots ensued as Islamic true believers took to the streets in righteous anger to demand respect for their beliefs. They were countered by calls for freedom of expression and an equally self-righteous refusal to buckle under to threats and intimidation.

What does ‘emergent’ mean in context of Graves/SD?

(This article was originally posted to the Spiraldynamics FAQ)

This question has caused lots of head scratching among  scholars of chaos and complexity theories, as well as Gravesians  and serious students of Spiral Dynamics (SD). The lack of a clear  answer leads to protracted discussions and considerable  frustration. In the SD world, that's especially true for the analytical sorts who want - even demand – a single 'true  meaning' and would like to impose one on Dr. Graves post mortem.

Rather than that, we will look at how he employed the word  and its relatives. While that will not satisfy those searching for  a definitive answer, a brief discussion with some examples drawn  from his writings might better clarify the usages of the  term in a Gravesian context – at least some operational definitions for those prepared to accept a bit of semantic  relativism.

Book Review: The Wisdom of Crowds

The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki. This book discusses the theory that  a larger group of diverse people can make better decisions, and display more intelligence than any smaller collection of experts. Surowiecki's central concept is that the insights of a diverse group of individuals working independently can be aggregated together. He contrasts this with the group dynamics/social psychology studies done by Stanley Milgram in previous decades, which looked at how large groups of people can be influenced by the actions of a few, causing information cascades, and "Tipping Point" effects. Suroweicki's concept avoids the "tipping point", and information cascade effects by employing a diverse group of individuals who work largely independently of one another.

Graves and Maslow: Levels of Existence and Hierarchy of Needs Compared

(originally published in this newsletter)

We are often asked about the relationship between Clare W. Graves's Levels of Existence theory and Abraham Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs framework . Well, there are some similarities, but there are more differences.

Maslow's theorizing is often reduced to the familiar pyramid with physiological needs at the base, then safety, belonging and love, esteem from others then self, and self-actualization, sometimes with 'to know' and 'to understand' or transcendence at the tip, sometimes stopping with self-actualization. Yet calling that Maslow's theory is like saying a spiral with eight colors is Graves. Both SD and the pyramid are simplified models derived from theory. Just as the eight levels described by Graves as his nodal states (color coded in SD) represent only artifacts, the needs hierarchy is only a small chunk of Maslow's overall philosophy.

There are definite similarities because Graves began his research trying to rationalize Maslow's findings. They were contemporaries in psychology. At the surface, the needs in Maslow appear to relate with Gravesian levels; but they appear in different forms and in an order Graves eventually could not accept, based on his own data.