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muffy 11:43 pm on July 18, 2009 Permalink |
As a neuroscience student, I’ve encounter lots of stuff by Pinker before. I never know whether to laugh or bang my head in frustration at the ridiculousness of his theories.
Shams al-Nahar 8:49 am on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
I don’t think this is a riddickulous theory, that we are seeing a modern fractal decline of violence. He backs it with stats. His question, first asked in the Edge forum is….”why is there peace?”
He admits not knowing the answer.
My gamer theory is that warfighting games like World of Warcraft bleed off some of the inbred aggro in modern populations. Also increasing global SES and news coverage of atrocity. Possibly the cartharsis of popular gorno films. I dunno.
As a neuroscience student, you don’t believe in aggro as a neuro-hormonal component of homo sapiens sapiens bloodstream or you don’t believe aggro was a selective fitness enhancer in the EEA?
And….kk, ALL theory of consciousness is pretty much outre specualtion at his point.
I mean, dig Stu Hamerhoff and his “platonic substrate” hypoth in the Penrose/Hamerhoff orchestrated objective reduction model of quantum consciousness.
we gotz no hard data.
Eventually we will be able to reverse engineer thought with nanotech.
But not yet.
I personally dig fractals. I think a fractal model of the decline of warfighting is cool….but it is a visualization as a tool used to understand data. I have to think more about whether it is accurate.
denny 3:52 pm on August 21, 2009 Permalink |
hi how many eggs do turdles have
BuzzK 1:07 am on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
Oh come on – Pinker doesn’t deserve that! He is a soft scientist. Cognitive and Neuro scientists try to earn cred by throwing some rigid stats and hard medical measurements in their BS stew. They know they don’t know sh!t.
I interviewed another Harvard Psychology professor, Stephen Kosslyn, a few years ago and asked him if cognitive neuroscience could potentially solve the mystery of consciousness.
His answer was succinct: “Nope.”
He then looked around and quietly whispered he was interested in ESP. He told me it was off the record and if I said anything, he would deny it.
I wonder how those guys fill out their days….
Muffy 2:30 am on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
I had a textbook that stated something along the lines of “neural activity within our brain triggers consciousness.” The sad fact is that we haven’t even proven THAT much about consciousness.
Oh, and I think any neuro researcher who states that he/she isn’t at least remotely interested in ESP or the paranormal is probably lying. Ditto with astronomers and ufos.
BuzzK 1:18 am on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
Ha! I am remembering I also interviewed Fred Alan Wolfe. He was more of a Quantum Physicist who, for some ill-considered reason, decided to follow Gary Zukav types into the New Age movement with Quantum Physics theories.
That was the broad spectrum of the 1980’s. Santa Fe Institute to the New Age. Anyone ever been to a Whole Life Expo? They are terrifying!
BuzzK 1:36 am on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
Forgot to mention. You have to give this passage from the Pinker article some credit. I think it is insightful:
Muffy 2:22 am on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
Well, you see, that’s exactly what bothers me about Pinker and other evolutionary psychology types: they use perfectly reasonable observations about modern humans to expand on some overarching theory about behavioral evolution from 150,000 BC to the present. Too bad that behavior leaves behind a much sketchier fossil record than biology.
BuzzK 3:03 am on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
That may or may not be. I remark only about the passage itself. How warped are human beings that we are more moved and motivated by dreadful things that normal or positive ones?
Fear and dread are powerful factors to exploit and it is somewhat obvious but still remarkable that politics and even social welfare and philanthropy should be disproportionately driven by such factors.
Humans are really warped.
Muffy 3:13 am on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
The more I think about it, the more it makes sense. If something is going well, there’s no need to change your actions. Just stay with the status quo. We don’t need to be alerted to this fact because we don’t need to change our ways. However, if things are going badly, then we need to do something, and hence we need a warning.
I’d rather live in a world where we think the world is getting more violent when it’s not than one where we think it’s getting more peaceful (or staying the same) when in fact it’s getting more violent. At least we’re motivated to do good in the former.
Then again, I suppose I can think of plenty of instances where negative sensationalism has caused harm, too. Ideally, we should be motivated by truth, not negativity/positivity. But then, to quote Pontius Pilate, “What is truth?”
BuzzK 3:32 am on July 19, 2009 Permalink
I am thinking about the opportunity cost of major benefit due to the slight possibility of violence or harm.
Think about this dent in human nature when brought to bear on foreign policy. We can spend our $15 Billion on building schools and repairing infrastructure and doing positive things or we can spend it on weapons and killing people.
Even when the case is clear that our own interest would be best served by doing good things, we choose to kill.
muffy 3:11 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
Of course, pro-war types would accuse the anti-war types of being too afraid of the costs of war. Isn’t everyone acting on fear and suffering?
Shams al-Nahar 3:12 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
well….things like Warcraft prove we fight because we enjoy it, not because we have to.
Right Muffy?
muffy 3:38 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
“things like Warcfat prove we fight because we enjoy it, not because we have to”
Of course not. WOW is nothing like real world war. WOW is fun; real war involves pain, starvation, and suffering. You can fight and “kill” someone all you want to in WOW, and he’ll suffer no physical harm. In fact, he can reincarnate himself in his original state. People play WOW exactly because it’s a fantasy world that has no real-life equivalent. It’s a escape from the ugly truth of reality. If WOW was anything like real world war, nobody would play.
BTW I posted a longer comment earlier, and I don’t see it appearing, for some reason.
Shams al-Nahar 3:47 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
Wow IS like the real world, and that is why 11 million people play.
People labor, buy and sell, improve their toon so they can fight better and get more stuff.
We play games in real life too. Game Theory runs the markets and runs the world.
EGT drives our genetics and memetics.
And we fight.
Gladiators, boxers, gamers, we are wired for it.
Shams al-Nahar 3:56 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
n/e ways, Muffy, Pinkers question is why is there a decline in warfighting, ie why is there peace at all ever?
If we are wired for warfare, competition for resources, survival, etc.
Why shouldn’t war be a stable global rate?
If you believe his stats death by war is declining.
Real violence is decling, while virtual violence is on the rise….is there a correlation? Is there causal relationship?
Muffy 3:59 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
But WOW is not the real world when it comes to the accuracy of its so-called “violence.” Do you honesty think that WOW would be popular if people felt physical pain every time his character was mauled by a quilboar in the game? Would people be so inclined to slash other characters in the game if it meant physically harming the person behind the screen?
Shams al-Nahar 4:07 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
WoW is a model of the real world. Death results in game-harm, which an approximation of physical harm. The loss of gold and honor is how it is modelled. Virtual world, virtual death, virtual pain modelled as loss.
My point is homosapiens sapiens enjoys warfighting. Or we wouldn’t do it.
We would play different sorts of game in different virtual environments.
Look at Second Life. There is a virtual life environment without the warfighting. It is roughly a tenth as popular as WoW.
Muffy 4:15 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
“If we are wired for warfare, competition for resources, survival, etc.
Why shouldn’t war be a stable global rate?”
The fact that the level of warfare isn’t stable is entirely consistent with the hypothesis that humans are NOT wired for warfare. Since you (and Pinker) assume that humans are wired for warfare, you think that something weird is going on when the level of violence isn’t constant.
Shams al-Nahar 4:24 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
So, okthen.
Pinker is just saying, Why peace?
And he advocates finding the causes for peace and encouraging them.
He is saying, we are asking the wrong question.
Who cares why warfare?
Mebbe you are right, and there is no hardwiring for war.
So we should stop asking why is there war, and ask instead, why is there peace?
Muffy 4:25 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
“WoW is a model of the real world. Death results in game-harm, which an approximation of physical harm. The loss of gold and honor is how it is modelled. Virtual world, virtual death, virtual pain modelled as loss.”
Oh, come on — you don’t honestly think that WOW “virtual pain” is like physical pain, do you? Nobody would play if it were.
Yes, popular MMORPGs tend to have virtual violence. Popular MMORPGs (like WOW) also are likely to take place in middle ages, D&D-inspired fantasy settings. Are humans wired to enjoy middle ages, D&D-inspired fantasy worlds?
I really have no desire to belabor this point any more.
Shams al-Nahar 4:31 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
Strawman!
If there is no hardwiring for violence why are violence mmorpgs more popular than non-violent mmorpgs by orders of magnitude?
You are the neuroscientist, Muffy.
Muffy 4:59 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
“Strawman!
If there is no hardwiring for violence why are violence mmorpgs more popular than non-violent mmorpgs by orders of magnitude?
You are the neuroscientist, Muffy. ”
What I’m saying is not a straw man. What you seem to be saying is that the fact that violent mmorpgs are more popular than non-violent ones is evidence that humans are wired to be violent. I’m saying that this is not necessarily so. I then gave the counterexample of how popular mmorpgs also tend to take place in a middle ages d&d type world, and yet I have yet to hear anyone argue that humans are hardwired to like middle ages d&d settings. Why accept the prevalence of violence in games as evidence of biological wiring and not other common features of popular games?
Furthermore, even if humans play violent games because they are violent, it does not mean that humans are naturally violent. Humans may be culturally programmed to be violent, for instance. Video games are a product of late -20th and 21st century civilization, and take most influence from Western and Japanese cultures of these times.
I’m just saying that I don’t see any reason to believe that popular features of games are evidence of “hardwiring” of humanity.
I think we’re going to have to agree to disagree at this point. Fun debate, though =)
Shams al-Nahar 5:33 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink
Muffy, cher, it is total strawman. Popular violent, mmorpgs are also set in the future, in outerspace, or in non-medieval settings.
But we can disagree.
It was a good discussion.
aziz 8:53 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
sorry, i dont buy this at all. He doesn’t “back” his argument with statistics, he quotes a comparison by someone of murder rates in Europe vs modern Europe. Thats not teh sum total of violence in Europe, let alone globally.
its simple fact that the world is at least as violent as italways has been. violence in society may have decreased in the western countries, which coincidentally? happen to rule the world. Lok at Africa and its far, far more dysfunctional now than it was in past centuries.
plus we have more people, globally. violence scales with population. resources scale inversely. thats your basic recipie for more violence right there.
pinker is doing selective analysis and extrapolating from it. hes just deluded.
Shams al-Nahar 9:29 pm on July 19, 2009 Permalink |
O my habbibi, bot not the Pinker.
As a percentage of world population, death by warfare has declined.
And we don’t burn cats alive for yukks n/e more.
Why?
aziz 6:51 am on July 20, 2009 Permalink |
its entirely probable that relative death has declined, since population has increased so wildly (exponential curve). Plot y1 = e^x and y2 = 0.25*x on the same curve and compare | y1 – y2 | over time. its meaningless to argue that “violence has decreased” just y relying on the relative numbers.
obviously fewer people per capita die nowadays, because of advances in health, longevity, food etc. In India you have a BILLION people now. None of this means that Pinkers thesis is corrcet, it just obfuscates.
step back and look at the trend. do the experiment above in excel and see what i mean for yourself.
Shams al-Nahar 8:23 am on July 20, 2009 Permalink |
Well, if you look at the books Pinker cites, he separating out warfare deaths.
Still, we don’t burn cats to to death on cable.
Why?