Is it time to be afraid? The Intersection of Human Behavioral Biology and Politics...

[renie408]

As already mentioned in several threads, I homeschool my daughter. This semester one of the educational tools we are using are a series of Stanford University lectures on Human Behavioral Biology given by Dr. Robert Sapolsky. They are highly informative, extremely interesting and can be found on YouTube. Yesterday Dr. Sapolsky talked about a 'founder' mechanism by which certain traits, in that case cooperation, can be introduced to a larger population. He described a scenario where a large population of a social species becomes separated by a cataclysmic event and a small group of the species is isolated away from the main body. Over the course of time, the smaller group develops a higher degree of kinship selection due to inbreeding and, therefore, the trait of cooperation becomes highly ingrained and dominant within that group. He suggests that if the splinter group becomes reintroduced to the larger group, then the spread of the cooperation trait would be swift. Dr. Saplosky explains much better than I could the reproductive advantages of cooperation and how the founder mechanism works.

We watched and studied that yesterday.

This morning I read the article from Truthout about the Right Wing Id referenced in William Pitt's post here in General Discussion. Two excerpts from the book quoted in the article really struck me:

"They are highly submissive to established authority, aggressive in the name of that authority and conventional to the point of insisting everyone should behave as their authorities decide. They are fearful and self-righteous and have a lot of hostility in them that they readily direct toward various out-groups. They are easily incited, easily led, rather un-inclined to think for themselves, largely impervious to facts and reason and rely instead on social support to maintain their beliefs. They bring strong loyalty to their in-groups, have thick-walled, highly compartmentalized minds, use a lot of double standards in their judgments, are surprisingly unprincipled at times and are often hypocrites."

"Probably about 20 to 25 percent of the adult American population is so right-wing authoritarian, so scared, so self-righteous, so ill-informed and so dogmatic that nothing you can say or do will change their minds. They would march America into a dictatorship and probably feel that things had improved as a result.... And they are so submissive to their leaders that they will believe and do virtually anything they are told. They are not going to let up and they are not going away."

And it struck me; could there be a founder population that has been developing in this country for quite awhile now? The initial separation for this smaller group caused not by some cataclysmic natural event; but by their own religious and political beliefs? We have all heard of the study which showed that conservatives and liberals have fundamental personality differences attributed to their level of fear reaction. It makes me wonder if by this point in time, many conservatives have genetically mutated to the point where they are incapable of seeing logic. That would explain SO many of the conversations I have had with them.

And if they have, could they, over time, 'infect' the rest of the population?

[WingDinger]

1. As I stated in the other thread, The hypervigilence, and fearfullness is subsiding.

throught the mechanism of extinguishment. Thus, one Ron Paul is able to speak to a segment of rethugs about ending the kneejerk fearfactor. They have overplayed the fear card.

Now, they will have to wait till we settle into a groove. That may be a while, if our economy improves. Particularly with Obama offing the bad guys. and countries showing higher levels of trust and respect for American prerogatives.

[cthulu2016]

2. There is no recent genetic development in play

The conservative mindset you describe is human nature. Cooperation is also human nature.

Evolutionary psychology is big, big, big but it doesn't result one one human nature. I results in a mix of human natures within a population.

For instance, there is an optimal number of liars in a human population -- if everyone believes everything (which we tend toward) then lying is a powerful innovation. As the population of liars increases, however, lying becomes less and less useful and trustworthiness more valuable.

I think 25% of any population are ready to become nazis at the drop of a hat. I also suspect that human groups without a core of would be nazis were all anihilated because there are rare circumstances where being authoritarian stooges pays off in survival and those circumstances only need to be mishandled one time to eliminate the whole genetic group.

On the other hand, too many nazis leads to belligerance tantamount to mass suicide.

Over time the optimal mix of nazis will change due to a changing environment.

Human beings today are probably less pathological than we were 50,000 years ago. Certainly less violent and less inclined to rape.

But we are domesticated animals. Self domesticated, but domesticated all the same. If you lacked the nessecary make-up to remain in civilization then your genes didn't go far.

And part of that domestication is that we are probably more obedient to authority than previously. Once he had civilization, everyone who couldn't hack taking orders was a (relative) dead end.

[renie408]

3. I don't think it would result in 'one human nature'...

but in an increased tendency within human beings towards a certain trait. And I was thinking more along the lines of Americans, not human beings a whole. But if it were a successful trait, it would eventually generate out to the human population as a whole, huh?

I wonder if we could be like Golden Retrievers and breed ourselves to the point that cooperation becomes submissiveness?

[applegrove]

4. The genetic change does not need to happen biologically. Trust me, a very smart

psychopath can change the thinking, loyalties and morals of anyone they come into contact with. They truly can teach all the behaviours described to a previously fairly normal adult. An educated adult. A good person.