Occupy Movements of Mutual Knowledge
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John Vachon Watchers October 1938 Cincinnati, Ohio. "Watching the sesquicentennial parade go by" In the fields of economics an
[See the full post at: Occupy Movements of Mutual Knowledge]A very excellent post, Ash, and thank you for the links to the Santa Fe Institute–those will be very useful for my current chunk of work.
But I am struck, as I always am when this pattern repeats itself, by how you started the post with the frank acknowledgment–with citations–of the strength and importance of flocking behaviour*, but went on to say the work at TAE is “also rooted in both increasing factual knowledge and mutual knowledge.”
Flocks do not respond to factual knowledge. Flocks respond to actions. Now, the bright side is the lead bird may respond to facts and knowledge, but until we are making clear and public displays of our behaviour, the flock will never wheel away from a predator.
Now, we can shop at a farmer’s market and ride our bicycle, but it is harder to demonstrate we are renters, or that we are 99%ers, or that we have downscaled our work in order to do more urban homesteading. Yet that public display is critical to changing the flock’s direction.
Even I–an analytical and intellectual person–find myself unable to take certain actions that I know and believe in. The momentum of the herd is too great for me to overcome. I need a few signs of others changing direction before I will. In other ways I have changed, but we are all complex and nuanced–very few choices are made on facts, and many are based on the flock, and on emotions.
Thanks again.
Ruben.
I disagree on the point that the mass protests of even OWS laid down “the necessary and mutual foundation for systemic change”. I don’t think, in fact, that they reached a level of mutual definition and identification of the problems – in Egypt or within the cronny-capitalist western powers. In Egypt, for example, you had the real power base of an entrenched elite in bed with the military that, in effect was raping the country. But the ‘Facebook revolution’ focused on sweeping aside a figurehead, doing nothing more that paving the way for a worse situation and an impending tragedy on economic, religious, and social levels.
In OWS, you had a decentralized protest that failed to even finger the real problem – that the political systems in western countries are in bed with financial interests, and that their policies such as ZIRP, militarism, destructive embrace of globalization, and vote pandering are the real issue. They got stuck on the fact that some people are rich. Violence is only one of OWS problems. Lack of identifying the true issues is far more fundamental in my view.
A site like TAE with its clearly well thought information and thinkers like Raul, Nicole, and you is a great resource that should somehow be distilled down to something a real protest movement can latch onto. I’m afraid it hasn’t happened just yet.
*I prefer flocking over herding. Birds are cute and pretty, cows look vacant and dumb, and sheep don’t have good connotations. Let’s help people feel fast and powerful, not like they are chewing their cud.
p.s. Ash,
I have referenced the book Herd, by Mark Earls, in our conversations on behaviour and flocking. Bentley and Earl have worked together in the past, and wrote the more recent book together–‘I’ll Have What She’s Having’.
Herd is actually where I saw the reference to the computer simulation Boids, which I referenced in recent posts.
ex VRWC post=121 wrote: I disagree on the point that the mass protests of even OWS laid down “the necessary and mutual foundation for systemic change”. I don’t think, in fact, that they reached a level of mutual definition and identification of the problems – in Egypt or within the cronny-capitalist western powers.
Well, I’m sure you would agree that it is a “necessary” foundation, as in it’s a first series of steps that must be taken.
In Egypt, for example, you had the real power base of an entrenched elite in bed with the military that, in effect was raping the country. But the ‘Facebook revolution’ focused on sweeping aside a figurehead, doing nothing more that paving the way for a worse situation and an impending tragedy on economic, religious, and social levels.
True, as noted, Mubarak’s departure didn’t accomplish much. It’s not easy revolutionizing a nation when it is part of a much larger global system of coercion and inequality. Yet, they are still out there protesting a year later and many more around the world have joined them. These things adapt and evolve, but there is never guarantee of “success”.
In OWS, you had a decentralized protest that failed to even finger the real problem – that the political systems in western countries are in bed with financial interests, and that their policies such as ZIRP, militarism, destructive embrace of globalization, and vote pandering are the real issue. They got stuck on the fact that some people are rich. Violence is only one of OWS problems. Lack of identifying the true issues is far more fundamental in my view.
I don’t think we can a) say that it has failed while it is still occurring and spreading, b) say that everyone in it fails to understand the “real” problems or c) only say that it is productive when everyone agrees on what the problems are. The point for me is that people can build off of mutual knowledge of each others’ action/inaction even if they don’t agree on exactly how they and the planet are being destroyed by the system. And violence is not a problem for OWS yet.
Porkpie post=120 wrote: But I am struck, as I always am when this pattern repeats itself, by how you started the post with the frank acknowledgment–with citations–of the strength and importance of flocking behaviour*, but went on to say the work at TAE is “also rooted in both increasing factual knowledge and mutual knowledge.”
Flocks do not respond to factual knowledge. Flocks respond to actions. Now, the bright side is the lead bird may respond to facts and knowledge, but until we are making clear and public displays of our behaviour, the flock will never wheel away from a predator.
OK, but where do we draw the line for “public displays” of action? In the modern world, I believe what we are doing right now can be quite public and effective at increasing mutual knowledge of the possibilities for change. Whether that’s changing the system, one’s community or oneself, or all three. And factual knowledge is simply a more specific component of that change, i.e. how to change, what to change, where to change, etc, although I agree it may not drive the “flock” as much.
Yeah, my beef is that these kinds of phenomena are shallow. I listened to a lot of OWS protestors get their 5 minutes of fame when they had wide media attention, and they pretty much didn’t make the easy, convincing case they could have when they had the chance. But, as you say, maybe it has to evolve. Or, maybe the current organization methods are too shallow? Maybe Facebook is not a good mechanism for building the foundation we are hoping for?
Wow, you asked a mouthful.
***edit*** I am sorry Ash, this is very rambling. I have been researching this for several years, and am trying to write a clear summation of my research. Your reference this morning opened a whole chunk of new ways to think about behaviour.
OK, but where do we draw the line for “public displays” of action?
I think this is effectively not public. I am alone in my office, using a screen name with someone I will never meet. Few people know I read TAE, and nobody knows when I am reading it, or what I am doing about it (the count of viewers online tries to change that, though plenty of studies show that will be largely irrelevant from a change perspective).
Here is what I want to stress–even if my behaviour were public, the behaviour is that of reading the computer. If what we want to do is increase the social pressure for people to get out of debt, reading the computer is not helpful. What is helpful is to increase the visibility of people “getting out of debt” (quotations to indicate that may involve lots of steps, all of which may need to be visible at times).
In the modern world, I believe what we are doing right now can be quite public and effective at increasing mutual knowledge of the possibilities for change. Whether that’s changing the system, one’s community or oneself, or all three.
I agree this can be quite effective at increasing knowledge of possibilities for change.
What I do not agree is that knowledge is necessary for change.
Bentley’s work, Daniel Kahneman’s work, and the brain research all show we make very few decisions based on facts. We simply do not have the brain capacity, nor the fuel to feed the brain to make all our decisions rationally, based on facts. This is the core of socionomics and herd behaviour that is a foundation of TAE.
So facts are used for very few decisions, some more are made through rules of thumb, or based on emotional factors (embodied or peristaltic cognition). Bentley’s talk is about the mass of decisions that are made through direct copying.
There is very little connection between knowledge of possibilities and action. We do lots of things we know are bad for us, some are even life and death.
Furthermore, because of the screen barrier, you have no idea whether I make my own sauerkraut or not. Even if you saw me eating sauerkraut, you would have no idea if it was homemade, or was a globalized product of Poland.
Aspects of the new site, like the forums, are designed to allow for more transparency on specific behaviours–we chat with people who are doing, and ask them questions as we start to do.
And factual knowledge is simply a more specific component of that change, i.e. how to change, what to change, where to change, etc, although I agree it may not drive the “flock” as much.
Bentley’s work provides a method to reverse-engineer how decisions are made. The sharp jump and gradual decline are conscious, informed, knowledgeable decisions, whereas the bell-curve are copied decisions.
So knowledge is not necessarily a specific component of a change, it may be entirely absent. Knowledge is certainly a specific component of some changes, but at this time, it is very difficult to figure out which ones.
For myself, I have gained very little new and useful knowledge from TAE in many years–since the How To Build a Lifeboat primer. So once I had the core knowledge, why do I keep coming back?
Because knowledge is not a big barrier to action. I am here for the social proof, the copying, the reinforcement that other people feel the same way I do and do not seem to be raving lunatics. I need to see people doing things, not just read that things need to be done.
I think it was you that had a spat in the comments section about whether you should have more manual skills, so maybe the question of what influenced you to engage in certain behaviours and not others will ring true.
Anyhow, thanks for the links and the conversation. Sadly, this has added several more books to my reading list, which doesn’t help me get my writing done.
The question, “How much are we governed by our mutual agreements?” is important and valid. The question, “What is actually happening when we agree?” could also be helpful.
Culture is built from mutual agreements. Dynamic, interacting, interlocking systems of mutually held ideas. Most of the time we’re not even aware when we are making these agreements between each other. We’re signalling that we agree with subtle gestures or speech derived from unconscious, mostly reactive thought. And these unconscious thoughts are themselves derived, to a large degree, by the culture.
When we start getting aware of this dynamic and begin to move against it, we realise how powerful the momentum of the system is. To stand against it can be painful, psychologically, and sometimes physically. But that is what the Occupy Movement is an expression of, in my opinion. And that is why it should be celebrated.Mutual knowledge of economic values is also supposed to be gained by the process of price discovery, but this isn’t working so well lately, common realisation of the exact worthlessness of housing bubbles, sovereign debt and banking institutions is being prevented and leveraged away.
OWS seems to not have acknowledged that free markets of exchange dont exist under these conditions of rampant criminality and corporate control. Most of their voiced concerns over economic disparities make the assumption that a free market is unfair, and naturally produces these exact conditions.I’ve seen the anti-capitalist sentiments there turn towards an appeal to state socialism to enable forced redistribution of wealth, and I’ve heard rumors of incitement to harass bankers by OWS people, but there’s no pronounced violent tendency yet. Even so, [OWS] protestors are already being broadly classified as ‘low level terrorists’ by some agencies, not for any violence but for peacefully protesting as political activism, which does present a dilemma in that if the opportunity for peaceful mass protests to consolidate this social movement is taken away, it may be left only with random or organised violence to express itself, or self-defence against open persecution.
Of course violence cannot be used to fight violence of a greater magnitude, but some might not know this.
I agree with the good elements of the movement mentioned, its better than apathy, if it carries the promise of democratic process, it may function almost as a political party is supposed to, for disseminating mutual knowledge of desirable social change.Ignorance > Denial > Awareness > Knowledge > Resonance > Sense of the Possible > Intention > Action….
A continuum of awakening. To anything, really. What furthers this movement at every step? Can we generalize?
Congrats on the new site guys. Thanks for keeping me sane…I think…
As to the OWS, I think it’s too early still to say what it’s affect will be here in the states. It did seem to change the media narrative this fall. But that only made the media slightly less worthless. I do think for good or ill that OWS (Thanks Glenda) will be out in force this spring, summer and fall.
I for one may not be out in the streets, but I don’t hesitate to share my opinion (which is broadly similar to TAE’s) and for sure that doesn’t make me popular at times. But it’s clear to me where the road we are currently on is going. I just don’t know when we will get to our final destination. If I’m wrong, well then life will be good, just less profitable from a monetary perspective. I can live with that. B)
Hm. Let’s see how the reply function works….
Sadly, B’sC, that is not how behaviour works. Just looking at the last link in your proposed causative chain, studies find we don’t have Free Will, but rather Free Won’t. That is, the order to make our muscles move is made before the decision to move is made. The decision is, effectively, to cancel the order to move. We get a chance to stop what we never decided to start. Let the metaphors rain down….
There are infinite examples, as well, of change made without awareness or knowledge. The video Ash linked to is largely about this.
I don’t have precise numbers yet, but it seems like we make around 35,000 decisions each day, of which only about 2,000 are conscious.
So the generalization I would suggest is that we focus on how to influence the 33,000 unconscious choices rather than trying to get brain space to fight for one of the 2,000.
Ash, there you go again being overly generous, this time associating “the fields of economics and logic”. 😉
SteveB post=167 wrote: Ash, there you go again being overly generous, this time associating “the fields of economics and logic”. 😉
Hey, even moneyless societies would have some field of economics!
Speaking of Knowledge and social behavior, I recommend reading CHS today.
Ash, I was commenting on the juxtaposition of logic and economics (i.e., non-logic). Why would a moneyless society have a field of economics? Logistics I could see. At least in no-money, no-value-balancing world that I think would be possible and preferable, I don’t see a need or role for what we currently call economics. (By the way, I’m currently reading Dr. Steve Keen’s Debunking Economics—Revised and Expanded Edition: The Naked Emperor Dethroned? Have you read it or the original edition?)
On a related topic, and for lack of a better place to comment on it, the use of “expansion” and “contraction” without “financial” as a modifier raises the question of whether the psychology being discussed in the Lifeboat/Psychology area intro is one that applies only to a world that uses money. As such it’s not as “big picture” as it might be. When describing the past or current reality, that would be valid. But for projections of future events, a truly big picture would consider (or at least acknowledge) possibilities not bounded by history or the status quo.
I wonder whether the behaviors described (e.g., human herding) would likely hold true (and/or to the same degree) in a world that didn’t use money. And perhaps most importantly, how would trust be different?
SteveB post=253 wrote: Ash, I was commenting on the juxtaposition of logic and economics (i.e., non-logic). Why would a moneyless society have a field of economics?
I know, why wouldn’t it? The very idea of large-scale moneyless societies was borne out of theories about how economic activity occurs in the first place.
I wonder whether the behaviors described (e.g., human herding) would likely hold true (and/or to the same degree) in a world that didn’t use money. And perhaps most importantly, how would trust be different?
That’s an unequivocal yes. These are behaviors that are exhibited throughout many different social species, and humans cannot circumvent nature by ridding themselves of money. Mutual knowledge, specifically, is simply the existence of a certain state of awareness about what other individuals are aware of.
ashvin post=254 wrote: The very idea of large-scale moneyless societies was borne out of theories about how economic activity occurs in the first place.
Are you referring to something in particular? In my case, the idea came to me from nowhere in particular, at least not any economic theory source.
SteveB post=255 wrote: [quote=ashvin post=254]The very idea of large-scale moneyless societies was borne out of theories about how economic activity occurs in the first place.
Are you referring to something in particular? In my case, the idea came to me from nowhere in particular, at least not any economic theory source.
I would recommend checking out the writing/ideas of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, who was referenced in the article (because he believed in peaceful revolution), and is considered the original “anarchist”. He has written some of the most scathing critiques of private property ever, which is essentially a critique of money.There’s really no need to re-invent the wheel, SteveB. We have examples of moneyless societies that have existed and still do exist, as well as intellectual foundations for how they can work, and people who have fought hard and risked their lives to make them work. When you strive to make the idea of moneyless society your own vision of a global utopia, you devalue the entire concept, IMO.
ashvin post=254 wrote:
That’s an unequivocal yes. These are behaviors that are exhibited throughout many different social species, and humans cannot circumvent nature by ridding themselves of money. Mutual knowledge, specifically, is simply the existence of a certain state of awareness about what other individuals are aware of.So is it behavior or psychology? It seems you’re mixing them.
Ash, I’d appreciate any references to modern moneyless societies and their intellectual foundations. Thanks.
Or maybe I was the one mixing behavior and psychology in my question—or we both did it.
In any case, I think that not being explicit about the financial aspect of the scenario painted in the intro to this area will likely limit consideration of ways to achieve your professed objective of preserving the fabric of society (to the extent that doing so is popularly desirable.)
SteveB post=266 wrote: Ash, I’d appreciate any references to modern moneyless societies and their intellectual foundations. Thanks.
The best example at a relatively large scale is the revolution in Spain after the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War.
Gaston Leval wrote: In Spain during almost three years, despite a civil war that took a million lives, despite the opposition of the political parties (republicans, left and right Catalan separatists, socialists, Communists, Basque and Valencian regionalists, petty bourgeoisie, etc.), this idea of libertarian communism was put into effect. Very quickly more than 60% of the land was collectively cultivated by the peasants themselves, without landlords, without bosses, and without instituting capitalist competition to spur production. In almost all the industries, factories, mills, workshops, transportation services, public services, and utilities, the rank and file workers, their revolutionary committees, and their syndicates reorganized and administered production, distribution, and public services without capitalists, high salaried managers, or the authority of the state.
Even more: the various agrarian and industrial collectives immediately instituted economic equality in accordance with the essential principle of communism, ‘From each according to his ability and to each according to his needs.’ They coordinated their efforts through free association in whole regions, created new wealth, increased production (especially in agriculture), built more schools, and bettered public services. They instituted not bourgeois formal democracy but genuine grass roots functional libertarian democracy, where each individual participated directly in the revolutionary reorganization of social life. They replaced the war between men, ‘survival of the fittest,’ by the universal practice of mutual aid, and replaced rivalry by the principle of solidarity….
This experience, in which about eight million people directly or indirectly participated, opened a new way of life to those who sought an alternative to anti-social capitalism on the one hand, and totalitarian state bogus socialism on the other.
When I say “existing today”, I mean within local communities, villages, tribes, etc, like the indigenous tribes of Papua New Guinea.
Ash, it’s not clear from that account or the rest of the Wikipedia entry that they didn’t use money during that time. Do you know for sure whether they did?
That also reminds me that I disagree with your earlier comment that a critique of private property is essentially a critique of money (nor do I think the reverse is necessarily true.) Not explicitly examining the influences of money use would overlook a big part of the picture.
SteveB,
I would say an anarchist critique of property usually amounts to a critique of money. What is the definition of “money” you are working from?
Ash,
In systems terms, property is more like a stock (sits there), while money is more like a flow (comes and goes). As such, they have different qualities. Without explicitly critiquing those qualities, focusing on property would only tangentially address money, and vice versa. One of the more important and relevant qualities is the purposes for which they’re respectively used, which are quite different. The fact that they can be exchanged for each other might give the impression that they’re interchangeable in even more ways. They’re not.
One thing that money does through our use of it is influence how we think about various things, including the future. To whatever extent the use of property does likewise it’s not as frequent, pervasive, or extensive.
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