05/30/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 2 of 16)

0007 Okay, if the word, “niche” labels the possibility of ‘something’₁, then what is this so-called ‘something’?

Now, I turn to A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction (by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues).

‘Something’ is a content-level actuality_2a that is independent of the adapting species.

Consequently, the niche_1b is the situation-level potential_1b that virtually emerges from (and situates) a content-level actuality_2a that is independent of the adapting species.

0008 The most notable feature of this sensible construction is that the content-level actuality_2a has no apparent normal context_3a or potential_1a. In order to understand this actuality_2a, one must ascertain its normal context_3a and potential_1a, which is a very difficult assignment.

Perhaps, this difficulty is why modern biologists say that the actuality_2a reflects environmental or ecological conditions. Well, “conditions” also has the advantage of implying a specific material ‘something’ that a species adapts to. Such specificity implies that all niches are proximate.

0009 When the authors use the term, “niche switching”, they are saying that humans are adapted to flourishing in a wide-variety of ecologies and environments.

How do humans accomplish this flourishing?

Well, the generalist within us solves problems. The specialist within us modifies a skill set. Consciousness (or, is it culture?) is adaptive because it draws out an understanding that a content-level actuality_3a has a normal-context_3a and a potential_1a that the person (along with others) can adapt_2b to. In other words, the content-level independent actuality_2a is meaningful.

0010 There is another advantage of a category-based depiction of Darwinian evolution. It explains the idea of niche construction.

Niche construction occurs when a situation-level adaptation_2b alters the content-level actuality_2a by introducing a content-level normal context_2a and potential_1a. To a beaver, a rapidly moving stream surrounded by woods_2a has the normal context_3a of a place to settle_3a and the potential_1a of damming the creek to make a home_1a. Once this happens, once beavers down enough trees to block the water’s free flow, the independent actuality_2a becomes a slow moving creek and glen_2a.

Humans are even more sophisticated, since the independent actuality_2a becomes meaningful. Our lineage adapts to a niche_1b, where the potential of understanding comes from converting an actuality_2a into a sign, a mediation, a category-based nested form or some other triadic relation. The sign-relation has three elements: sign-vehicle, sign-object and sign-interpretant. The mediation has three elements: matter, form and mediator. The category-based nested form has three elements: normal context₃, actuality₂ and potential₁. The subscripts refer to the three categories detailed by American philosopher, Charles Peirce: thirdness, secondness and firstness, respectively.

0011 Triadic relations are real (although immaterial) beings (that entangle the material world). Until recently, no biologist imagines that these ephemeral beings could compose an actuality independent of an adapting species_2a. Yet, many biologists suggest that the human niche consists of niche construction, or, as with these authors, “niche switching”.

The hypothesis that the ultimate human niche is the potential of triadic relations appears in Razie Mah’s e-book, The Human Niche. The hypothesis is tested in four commentaries.

Comments on Steven Mithen’s Book (1996) The Prehistory of Mind

Comments on Derek Bickerton’s Book (2014) More that Nature Needs

Comments on Clive Gamble, John Gowlett and Robin Dunbar’s Book (2014) Thinking Big

Comments on Robert Berwick and Noam Chomsky’s Book (2016) Why Only Us?

All are available at smashwords and other e-book venues. They are listed in the series: A Course on the Human Niche.

0012 Here is a diagram of Darwinian evolution for the Homo genus.

05/26/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 3 of 16)

0013 Chapter one of Heying and Weinstein’s book is titled “The Human Niche”.

The hypothesis that the ultimate human niche_1b is the potential_1b of triadic relations_2a accounts for the authors’ claim that humans adapt to “switching” among proximate niches. A proximate niche roughly corresponds to an ecology or an environment. The switch entails finding opportunities through understanding. Understanding is the act of adding a normal context_3a and potential_1a to an independent actuality_2a. Understanding is an adaptation_2b to the potential_1b of triadic relations_2a.

0014 Say what?

The ultimate human niche (of the potential of triadic relations) allows humans to rapidly “switch” from one proximate niche (defined as an ecology or an environment) to another.

In Darwin’s paradigm, a niche is the potential that underlies an adaptation. For most species, one finds that a creature’s adaptation solves problems (or finds opportunities) in the so-called “environment of evolutionary adaptation”. By labeling the niche as “the environment of evolutionary adaptation”, modern biologists put on cognitive blinders. “The environment of evolutionary adaptation” implies material beings, not relational beings.

Material conditions goes with proximate niches.

Relational conditions goes with ultimate niches.

The label “environment of evolutionary adaptation” fixes the gaze of modern biologists onto proximate niches.

No modern biologist has come up with a simpler or a more productive hypothesis of an ultimate niche for the Homogenus that the one proposed in Razie Mah’s e-book, The Human Niche.

0015 Once evolutionary biologists (and psychologists) come to terms with the proposition that the ultimate human nicheis the potential of triadic relations (which are purely immaterial beings), they will come face to face with the mystery of human (and all biological) evolution.

0016 Say what?

Mystery of evolution?

At this juncture, I recapitulate a portrait developed in Razie Mah’s masterwork, How To Define the Word “Religion”. The presence underlying the word, “religion”, corresponds to a particular arrangement of category-based nested forms.

Already, the reader of this blog has encountered the two-level interscope. There is another way to combine two category-based nested forms. The intersection is already applied to evolution in Comments on Dennis Venema and Scot McKnight’s Book (2017) Adam and the Genome, along with other commentaries in the series, A Course on Evolution and Thomism, by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.

So, for me, this is familiar territory.

0017 Here is the two-level interscope for Darwinian evolution.

0018 This figure is only half the picture of modern evolutionary biology.

Contemporary biologists are more than mere Darwinists. They call themselves, “NeoDarwinists”. The “Neo-” of NeoDarwinism points to genetics. Each lineage carries DNA, which is foundationally distinct from the actuality that is independent of the adapting species_2a. I could say that DNA is foundationally dependent on the actuality_2a of the species. But, DNA is not responsible for the adaptations of the species, even when it serves as an internal foundation to the lineage. DNA is responsible for the phenotypes of the species.

In other words, in the normal context of body development_3b, the phenotype_2b emerges from (and situates) the genome_1b. Plus, the situation-level genome_1b is the potential_1b of the species’ DNA_2a. DNA_2a is an actuality on the content level.

The following figure is the other half of the picture of modern evolutionary biology.

0019 What about epigenetics?

Ah, epigenetics (as it is currently formulated) has the same character as niche construction. Epigenetics alters the expression of DNA_2a by altering its normal context_3a and potential_1a.

0020 The authors are natural historians, rather than geneticists. Natural selection comes to the fore in their book. Nevertheless they pay tribute to genetics with a concept, called “the omega principle”, where culture is an adaptation and culture evolves to serve our genes (that is, our lineage). This principle is confusing, because it confounds adaptation_2band phenotype_2b in a world where biology has specialized into natural historians and geneticists.

I ask, “Is there another way to formulate the mysterious omega principle”?

05/25/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 4 of 16)

0021 The authors formulate an “omega principle” that confounds adaptation_2b and phenotypes_2b and mixes natural history and genetics. The omega principle states that long-lived cultural traits are likely to be adaptive.

Long-lived cultural traits are epigenetic features that guide human development. As such, long-lived cultural traits are genomic. Even though they do not directly influence the transcription (or lack of transcription) of DNA_2a, they do so indirectly. As an example, the authors discuss an optical illusion that applies in Western civilization, but not to indigenous cultures in the Americas.

0022 Another way to say this?

Long-lived cultural traits influence phenotypic expression. After all, contemporary Western civilization has traits that allows writing, programming, race-car driving, ballet dancing and so on. These arise from the Western “cultural DNA”.

And, according to the omega principle, these cultural traits are likely to be adaptations.

So, adaptation_2b and phenotype_2b are linked. One does not situate the other. So, they intersect. They both contribute to a single actuality. I label the single actuality, “species”, in the widest sense of the term. A species ranges from the biological definition of a type of living being to cultural definitions of types of specializations.

0023 For biology, NeoDarwinism entails the intersection of adaptation_2b and phenotype_2b.

Here is a picture.

0024 Of course, there is a more aesthetic way to depict an intersection.

0025 This intersection applies to biological evolution.

However, the omega principle suggests that this intersection somehow… maybe, metaphorically… applies to cultural evolution, as well.

05/24/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 5 of 16)

0026 How to theorize the nature of the author’s portrayal of an omega principle?

Humans adapt to the potential of triadic relations. Triadic relations are indifferent to nature and culture. Nature is perfused with triadic relations. So is culture.

0027 How does the intersection change when passing from the biological to the cultural?

Here is my guess.

The niche_1H situates ‘something’ external to the species. Adaptations_2H exploit that ‘something’ in the normal context of cultural selection_3H.

The genome_1V situates ‘something’ internal to the species. DNA resides in lineages. So, this ‘something’ is foundational to a cultural lineage_1V and gives rise to the form of the cultural being_2V in the normal context of institutional development_3V.

0028 So, here is the resulting intersection.

0029 How about an application?

Here, I will develop a narrative… a theoretical expression… applying the omega principle to the authors’ professional trauma.

This theoretical expression does not capture the nightmare that these professors endured. Rather, it is a speculation about the evolutionary changes within their narrative. In particular, the intersection for biological evolution somehow applies to a contemporary shift occurring within cultural selection_3H and institutional development_3V. Figuratively, the intersection applies to a cultural episode of punctuated equilibrium.

0030 I start with the institution that these two professors labored in for fifteen years. Evergreen State College (pre-2017) is an institution that evolved in American civilization.

Here is a picture of the intersection for Evergreen State College (before 2017) at the beginning of the authors’ journey.

That is a start.

Further specification is required.

05/23/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 6 of 16)

0031 How should I specify the elements in the prior diagram?

A little history may assist.

State colleges spring up to train returning soldiers after the Hot War Among Fraternal Ideologies (1938-1945 AD). The authors are employed by one of these colleges, located in the State of Washington. Then, the institution changes in 2017

0032 Let me consider Evergreen State College prior to 2017.

The adaptations_2V?

Obviously, the term goes with the faculty. Professors_2b(2H) are selected for by the college_3b(3H) for their disciplinary expertise_1b(1H). Disciplinary expertise_1b expresses the potential of empirio-schematic inquiry_2a, characteristic of such fields as physics, chemistry, biology, quantitative sociology, cognitive and evolutionary psychology, and so on. Empirio-schematic inquiry_2a is a style of rational thought_2a.

Diagrams for empirio-schematic inquiry are developed in Comments on Jacques Maritain’s Book (1935) Natural History. The empirio-schematic judgment is rational thought. However, it is not rational in the same way as Aristotelian or scholastic thought. Empirio-schematics characterize the modern Age of Ideas, which starts around 1600 AD. Scholastics characterize the Latin Age, stretching from around 300 to around 1600 AD.

0033 Here is the two-level interscope for the axis corresponding to Darwinism, for Evergreen State College, before 2017.

0034 Heying and Weinstein are selected as professors_2b and serve well, for one and one-half decades, until a shift in both cultural selection_3b and the actuality_2a virtually underlying their positions_2b.

0035 What happens leading to 2017 and beyond?

On the content level, an imitation empirio-schematics_2a fashions itself as a style of rational thought_2a. Consider the blog for April at www.raziemah.com, titled Looking at Gad Saad’s Book (2021) “Parasitic Mind”. Like all fashions, inquiries pursuing social construction, critical theory and social justice take on the appearance of ‘something’ beautiful in order to adorn the one who wears the fashion.

Something beautiful?

Think of an adornment that signals one’s virtue, while sparkling with the certitude that accompanies empirio-schematic research.

On the situation level, the ones who fashion themselves as “righteous, in addition to rational” are instructors_1b. Why? Instructors are defined by the potential of the faux empirio-schematics of social construction, critical theory and social justice_2a. Their reward is in a fascination of their own varieties of righteousness.

In contrast, administrators_2b exploit instructors_1b, just as adaptations_2a exploit a niche_1b, in the normal context of cultural selection_3b.

Here is a picture of the horizontal axis after 2017.

0036 In 2017, Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein resign their professorships at Evergreen State College.

05/22/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 7 of 16)

0037 What about the vertical axis?

0039 The vertical axis of biological evolution goes with body development_3b, the phenotype_2b and the genome_1b. The genome_1b is the potential_1b of DNA_2a, an internal actuality that is defines the lineage. DNA_2a manifests descent with modification.

0040 How that translates into a metaphor for cultural development depends on the species… er… I meant to say… the institution.

An institution_2b is like the phenotype_2b. Traditionally, an institution_2b virtually situates a traditional mission_2a. So, a mission statement_1b manifests the potential_1b of a traditional mission_2a and supports the institution_2b.

Here is the corresponding two-level interscope.

0041 All this changes, leading to the trauma of 2017 at Evergreen State College.

Rather than a mission_2a, whose normal context_3a and potential_1a should be protected by long-standing tradition, the content-level actuality_2a changes to advocacy.

What is advocacy_2a?

I could say advocacy_2a is a type of mission_2a. However, it is the type of mission where the normal context_3a and potential_1a are generated by another institution (safely hidden offstage, so to speak). Advocacy_2a is like modified DNA_2a. Advocacy_2a supports indoctrination under the name of “education”. Advocacy statements_1b manifest the potential_1b of advocacy_2a.

Here is a picture of the two-level interscope.

0042 Now, I combine the above situation-level nested forms to visualize interscopes for pre-2017 and post-2017 higher education.

The following diagram presents the system that selected for Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein as professors_2H.

After the resignation of these professors, Evergreen State College may be portrayed by the following intersection.

0043 Higher education is a single actuality.

Before 2017, faculty_2H are selected on the basis of their expertise_1H.

After 2017, administrators_2H are selected for on the basis of their ability to manage instructors_1H (as well as other abilities).

The metaphorical niche_1H changes and so does the metaphorical genome_1V.

05/19/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 8 of 16)

0044 Where did I leave off?

After 2017, Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein find that they no longer have jobs. But, surely, they remain professors.

0045 So what happens next?

The culture of podcasting on the internet_3H values (selects for) people_2H with disciplinary expertise_1H.

Yes, the podcasting “culture” is looking for pre-2017 types of professors_2H.

0046 Bret Weinstein launches the Darkhorse podcast, a very attractive production in the internet arena. He remains a professor. Now, he also professes more than biology.

And, that brings me to the book, which applies lessons from evolutionary theory to life in the 21^stcentury.

Podcasting and book-writing are very similar to higher ed. Each podcast has its own mission statement. Each podcast format displays a certain expertise. Advertisers support well-subscribed podcasts. Patrons support the podcast directly.

0047 Here is a picture of what (I suppose) podcasting looks like, in terms of an intersection that appropriates the relationality of biological evolution for cultural evolution.

0048 What label applies to the single actuality that is the union of professor_2H and podcaster_2V?

How about the term, “guidance”?

One watches podcasts for guidance.

0049 On that note, allow me to recall the full title of Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s book, A Hunter-Gatherer’s Guide to the 21^st Century: Evolution and The Challenges of Modern Life.

If the single actuality is “guidance”, then I ask the reader how phrases in the title associate to elements in the above intersection.

05/12/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 9 of 16)

0050 In the normal context of cultural selection_3H, the actuality of the authors_2H emerges from (and situates) the potential of expertise in biological evolution_1H. That expertise_1H covers the natural history of the Homo genus.

The normal context of institutional development_3V brings the actuality of podcasting_2V into relation with the possibility of addressing people who would otherwise be hunter-gatherers and who are now facing the novel Lebenswelt of the 21^stcentury_1V.

0051 Here is a picture of the intersection for the cultural evolution that Heying and Weinstein now enter.

0052 The mission statement intimates that we are adapted to survive as hunter-gatherers. Figuratively, we have “ancient bodies”. Hunting and gathering describe team endeavors in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. Team endeavors? Surely, no one hunted or gathered on his or her own.

According to Clive Gamble, John Gowlett and Robin Dunbar (in their 2014 book, Thinking Big), hominins evolve in social circles, including family (5), intimates (5), team (15), bands (50) and communities (150). These social circles play big roles in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. Indeed, the German word, “Lebenswelt”, means “living world”. The German language is ideal for synthesizing words through concatenation.

What does that imply?

Heying and Weinstein are on your team. So read their book. Plus, tune into the Darkhorse podcast!

0053 After dealing with theory in chapter one (titled, “The Human Niche”), the authors provide a broad view of all of evolution (chapter two, “A Brief History of the Human Lineage”). In chapter three (titled, “Ancient Bodies, Modern World”), the authors present the mission of their book. Our bodies are innate expressions of our DNA. Yet, our Lebenswelt has radically changed. It is no longer the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. Rather, our current Lebensweltincludes a hypernovel postmodern civilization filled with hazards, such as colleges_2V that switch from traditional mission statements_1H to statements of advocacy_1V.

0054 Yes, the postmodern world of the 21^st century is a dangerous place.

It is especially hazardous because administrators_2H are selected for, rather than faculty_2H.

Plus, instructors_1H manifest the potential of the appearance of expertise_2a, because certification triumphs over… well… dealing with observations and measurements of natural phenomena. What certification do instructors_1H obtain? Instructors_1H are certified to promulgate knowledge about models that are endowed with certitude and supported by certain observations and measurements of social phenomena. State bureaucracies provide certitude. Selective observations provide proof that the models are… um… beyond question.

0055 How does instruction work?

Well, it starts with a sales pitch, sort of like that serpent in the garden of Eden telling Eve, who is obviously not aware that the serpent is instructing her, how the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is beautiful and should be tasty. Oh, did I mention that it will also make Eve wise and, even better, if she eats the fruit right now, if she buys into the narrative, she can be even more powerful than that patriarchal, know-it-all, busy-body, who thinks that He can tell Her what is or is not forbidden?

Talk about hyper-novelty befuddling innate adaptive tendencies.

0056 Our current Lebenswelt is clearly not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

05/11/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 10 of 16)

0057 What is the concept of punctuated equilibrium?

Steven J. Gould came up with the idea that natural history contains long periods of stasis followed by sudden unravelings of the stasis… or should I say?… changes. So, the pattern is long period of one configuration, change, then long period with a different configuration. Punctuated equilibrium is not a theory. It is an observation that makes sense of the fossil record.

0058 Now, I would like to consider the author’s creation of the omega principle, as a principle where apparently distinct concepts get muddled.

0059 For example, consider this claim. A cultural adaptation may be in the service of the genes of a particular human lineage. In other words, there is a crossover from adaptation_2H to phenotype_2V, even though their nested forms are distinct.

How could this happen?

They belong to a single actuality!

0060 Another example is the way that the intersection for biological evolution (unexpectedly) applies to cultural evolution. The cultural trauma endured by the authors fits a cultural evolution version of punctuated equilibrium. Higher ed₂, as a cultural species, foundationally changes between the pre-2017 and post-2017 intersections. The unraveling of the pre-2017 stasis presumably will end in a post-2017 stasis. At least, administrators_2H hope so. But, the instructors_1H are restless. State funding is increasingly limited. Plus, there is an entirely new species evolving, called “guidance₂“.

0061 Now, I ask, “How can I appreciate cultural punctuated equilibrium using the intersection? Is there more to the picture than snapshots labeled ‘before’ and ‘after’?“

Perhaps.

The intersection is a single actuality₂ composed of the contradiction-filled union of two actualities, each with its own nested form.

Here is a picture for biological evolution.

0061 Long periods of stasis (the “equilibrium” aspect of punctuated equilibrium) may be depicted as the single actuality₂of the intersection entering into a category-based nested form.

0062 As long as the normal context₃ and the potential₁ remain stable, then the single actuality₂holds together, despite the contradictions between the two wedded actualities, adaptation_2H and phenotype_2V.

Take a look at the phylogenetic trees in chapter two (A Brief History of the Human Lineage). Each branch point may be viewed as an episode where one nested form “branches” into two. Because normal contexts₃ tend to exclude one another, each lineage goes its own way.

0063 The beauty of this depiction of the equilibrium aspect of punctuated equilibrium may be found in the divergence of the chimpanzees and humans (on page 31). One lineage stays in tropical wet regions. The other moves further into mixed forest and savannah. The phenotype for the former remains knuckle-walking. The phenotype for the other shifts to bipedalism.

Once the second lineage is fully bipedal, the human niche (of the potential of triadic relations) opens up and the genome (the potential of australopithecine DNA) begins to produce phenotypes that are more attentive to signs, mediations and other triadic relations. The second lineage changes through descent with modification.

0064 So, I can label the normal context₃ for the human genus₂ as “the Lebenswelt that we evolved in” and I can imagine that the potential corresponds to actualities_2a on the content level below the situation-level actualities of adaptation_2b(2H)and phenotype_2b(2H).

0063 As long as the normal context₃ and the potential₁ remain stable, then hominins become more and more adapted to triadic relations₂, such as signs, mediations, judgments, category-based nested forms and so on. Plus, they become more phenotypically capable in cognitively processing triadic relations. This is discussed in Razie Mah’s masterwork, The Human Niche.

0064 Now, I shift to the cultural, using the example of higher ed (before 2017). Recall, higher ed₂ is the intersection of professors_2H and colleges_2V.

Here is a picture of cultural equilibrium before 2017.

Here is a picture of the category-based nested form that allows us to understand the single actuality.

Here is a picture of how I configure the normal context₃ and potential₁ for the single actuality of higher education (before 2017)₂.

Once again, the potential₁ consists in the content-level actualities that underlie the situation-level nested forms that comprise the intersection.

05/10/23

Looking at Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein’s Book (2020) “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century” (Part 11 of 16)

0065 Here is the first picture of cultural equilibrium after 2017.

In this cultural equilibrium, administrators_2H, not faculty, adapt to the niche of an education system composed of instructors_1H. Heying and Weinstein depart.

Here is a picture of how I configure the normal context₃ and potential₁ for the single actuality of higher education (after 2017)₂.

0066 Where do Heying and Weinstein migrate to?

They enter another cultural equilibrium, discussed before, where professors adapt to the challenge of applying the lessons of biological evolution to life in the 21^st century. The metaphorical genome of podcasting are individuals who sense that our current Lebenswelt is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. We are adapted to the lifestyle of hunters and gatherers. But, that is not all, we are also adapted to the potential of triadic relations.

Here is a picture of a new single actuality₂, guidance.

0067 Here is a picture of how I configure the normal context₃ and potential₁ for the single actuality of guidance (after 2017)₂.

0068 Listening to a darkhorse podcast is more rewarding to a team of moderns (remember hunters and gatherers work in teams) than attending a formal lecture by an instructor who is grading on the curve. How so? The darkhorse podcast is a conversation geared to draw people into conversation. In the course of conversation, one learns information and how to be a member of a team. If one becomes a member of the podcast community, one joins the team.

The cost is small, compared to a college course.

0069 The exorbitant cost of higher education pays tribute to the long-held belief that certification opens the door to professionalism.

So, what happens when podcasts offer alternate certification?

Then, guidance₂ will directly compete with higher education₂.

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A Horror Story by Razie Mah

Category Archives: The Human Niche