Alberg presented a quick summary of Girard’s ideas (xiv-xvi, 14-16). This summary affirms my suspicions that An Archaeology of the Fall places a discontinuity right in the middle of Girard’s hypothesis.
An Archaeology proposes that, 7800 years ago, humans began to change the way they talked, from hand-speech talk to speech alone talk, and the difference in semiotic qualities potentiated unconstrained complexity; that is, civilization.
“The world that we evolved in” is not the same as “the world that we live in”.
The world of constrained complexity is not the same as the world of unconstrained complexity.
Girard’s concept of mimetic rivalry pertains to our current Lebenswelt of unconstrained complexity. Literature is full of it. As we all know, or at least, as Girard convincingly argues, (what we once called) “literature” provides greater insight into the workings of the human mind than what we call “social science”.
But then, social science has its own “literature”. How confusing is that?]