Form: Mini Essay

  • Religion Solved a Calculation Problem

    Oct 9, 2019, 12:51 PM (core) Religion provides mindfulness. mindfulness is produced by personal sedation of powerlessness, interpersonal accounting of reciprocity, social accounting of position in hierarchy, and economic accounting of proportionality, and political insurance (defense). So to say a religion provides morality is false. A religion provides the means of instructing us on a given strategy for the preservation of reciprocity and proportionality which always and everywhere describes morality. So while we demand mindfulness across that spectrum, the only one that is not reproducible by law is personal sedation of powerlessness – which can be produced by any ritualistic means – the most scientific of which is what we call the stoic method of self construction, or what is called, cognitive behavioral therapy, and the epicurean objective (living within your means), and the social experience of collective feast, oath, sport, and festival. The ‘evil’ in the abrahamic religions is insidious on at least the following counts: abrahamic lying, denial of reality, submission instead of achievement, surrender instead of action, and the falsehood of equality, the falsehood of man as fallen angel among evil humans, rather than man as risen beast domesticated by his betters. Religion solves a problem native to consciousness which is the evolution of man in small groups where he and she have agency and full knowledge of one another and insurance of one another instead of anonymity in a chaotic world with none of the above. Institutional religion evolved as a pre-literate law code that could be taught by recitation of parables and stories, which was the only means of teaching in the era. So religion evolves into law evolves into science. And in science (Truth) we are the gods – there are none other. And those we call gods are but the memories of those who came before us, and the visions of what we wish to become. Because that is all our brains are capable of creating. I don’t err often and as far as I know all improvement in understanding of religion will simply continue to increase the precision of this description. Cheers

  • Religion Solved a Calculation Problem

    Oct 9, 2019, 12:51 PM (core) Religion provides mindfulness. mindfulness is produced by personal sedation of powerlessness, interpersonal accounting of reciprocity, social accounting of position in hierarchy, and economic accounting of proportionality, and political insurance (defense). So to say a religion provides morality is false. A religion provides the means of instructing us on a given strategy for the preservation of reciprocity and proportionality which always and everywhere describes morality. So while we demand mindfulness across that spectrum, the only one that is not reproducible by law is personal sedation of powerlessness – which can be produced by any ritualistic means – the most scientific of which is what we call the stoic method of self construction, or what is called, cognitive behavioral therapy, and the epicurean objective (living within your means), and the social experience of collective feast, oath, sport, and festival. The ‘evil’ in the abrahamic religions is insidious on at least the following counts: abrahamic lying, denial of reality, submission instead of achievement, surrender instead of action, and the falsehood of equality, the falsehood of man as fallen angel among evil humans, rather than man as risen beast domesticated by his betters. Religion solves a problem native to consciousness which is the evolution of man in small groups where he and she have agency and full knowledge of one another and insurance of one another instead of anonymity in a chaotic world with none of the above. Institutional religion evolved as a pre-literate law code that could be taught by recitation of parables and stories, which was the only means of teaching in the era. So religion evolves into law evolves into science. And in science (Truth) we are the gods – there are none other. And those we call gods are but the memories of those who came before us, and the visions of what we wish to become. Because that is all our brains are capable of creating. I don’t err often and as far as I know all improvement in understanding of religion will simply continue to increase the precision of this description. Cheers

  • Why Patriarchy Was an Evolutionary Necessity and Out-Competed All Other Forms of Order -And Always Will

    Oct 9, 2019, 1:27 PM

    1. In any competitive primate order, largely related males capture females and territory by competing with, and killing off, competing largely related males. Females often defect mate and return. Humans demonstrate this same behaviors. Males create commons – meaning territories – that contain women and their children, and at maturity genders split into their roles as warriors and mothers. This is not to state a naturalistic fallacy, only that we are not unique, and all great apes demonstrate some variation on this basic set of behaviors, and these behaviors are evolutionarily beneficial – and possibly necessary. Bonobos for example are geographically isolated from competition and could extend the feminine method of genetic expression rather than the masculine.
    2. As demand for the division of labor increased, individual productivity increased, and the atomization of property increased, so the organization of the family has increased in atomization in parallel – from the consanguineous, to matrilineal serial monogamy with frequent defection, to the paternal serial with less frequent defection and frequent polygamy, to paternal monogamous, to traditional extended less defection, to the nuclear with much less defection, absolute nuclear with little defection, and now to the single female parent – returning us to serial monogamy.

    3. Property (a system of measurement) is necessary for organizing increasingly complex polities in a division of labor, and for providing incentive to specialize and rewarding people to take initiative in that division of labor. We assume today what adam smith first documented, and that other than in purely intellectual innovation, which happens only at the extremes, the returns on cooperation are not linear but between geometric and logarithmic: depending upon the complexity of the task, ten men can be a thousand times more productive than one, not ten times.

    3.Patriarchy (Government) in a relatively consanguineous band is irrelevant. Patriarchy in a tribe with assets where reproductive anonymity is possible is necessary to prevent caloric parasitism (dysgenia). Patriarchy evolved because only men can defend property, and only men have the reproductive and status interest in defending property – women have the opposing interests. (This is the traditional complaint of marxists and feminists).

    1. A man and a woman are the most parsimonious tribe possible, where each man is a headman over a tribe of one woman (or more) and their children. This puts males and females in the optimum nash equilibrium competition insuring the least free riding, most cooperation, with the least defection. In other words, it’s the optimum return on investment under marginal rates of production (agrarianism).
    2. A pareto distribution is a power law, where the top 20% use control over 80% of the assets to provide incentives necessary to organize a society by positive incentives (opportunity) rather than forced labor. To successfully compete a population must produce a pareto distribution sufficient to organize the production of private consumption and public investment that the group can survive competition from other groups. This is an evolutionary necessity and where reversed, results in decline and dysgenia, which eventually undermine the pareto distribution. A Nash equilibrium is a condition under which everyone gets the best everyone can as a group even if some get less and some get more. Pairing off mating (serial relationships) is an example where the best get the best, the worst get the words, but everyone gets something, whereas in a disequilibrium some get most and most get none. All orders that maintain a pareto distribution of power (order), but a nash equilibrium of returns (benefits) eliminates the maximum disincentive to cooperation and minimum incentive to defect, thereby producing the optimum velocity of production, providing the least work load for every member of the polity. Elites seek rents for maintaining this, and within reason they are earned. However, rents tend to accumulate and cause calcification leading to inability to adjust to shocks, that cause collapse because not enough free capital exists to reorganize the polity during the period of stress.

    3. The principle differences between extant human groups consists of a) adaptations (Speciation) to geographic conditions consisting largely neoteny necessary for the climate, disease gradient, and population density, b) different degrees of neoteny c) producing different rates and depths of maturity, d) resulting in variations in physical and cognitive development e) different degrees of dimorphism (masculine feminine) and the greater advantage of verbal skill as complexity of social, reproductive, economic, political, and military complexity increases. As such the principle difference between human groups is the size of the underclass, lowering the possibility of a competitive pareto distribution sufficient to create a nash equilibrium under which groups can compete. This is offset by the tendency of complex groups to use anonymity, procedure, and complexity to seek rents on heretofore nash equilibria, until there is insufficient free capital whether genetic, cultural, institutional, human, or material to adjust to shocks, changes in trade routes, or warfare.

    4. In conclusion non-patriarchal groups cannot utilize maximum returns of cooperation because they lack the ability to produce a division of labor by pareto distribution of power, and nash equilibrium of benefits. This is why all paternal, monogamous, sky worshipping, metal-smithing, military, expansionist, pastoralists were able to conquer peoples who had developed earlier agriculture and failed to create equally competitive orders.

    5. Controversial Warning: men cheat but women defect, just like our ape cousins and our ancestors. This is the primary reason for a) differences in compensation, b) lack of women in headman (senior) positions outside of female consumer goods. c) preference for male managers regardless of gender at least in the competitive roles. A woman in a headman capacity whether business, political, or military is a luxury good, or a signal good. Or putting a woman in charge to manage a decline, and women rarely amass their own fortunes outside of entertainment because of it. This is the other side of why the patriarchy exists: women are devoted to their children but they are not loyal to the tribe. This is why men only tolerate female leadership in management of a decline, or inability to resolve conflict between factions. Or when there is so little risk that the symbolic value is of some value such as when a brand has been burned in the market. This is why companies prefer to hire women as CEO’s for companies that cannot recover (xerox, hp,etc) – the privilege of the role even in decline does not harm a woman’s career but destroys a man’s, and the public demonstrate genetility of women under hardship.

    6. If you can internalize this understanding, then you will avoid the naturalistic fallacy on one hand, and avoid the blank slate of possibility on the other. Human groups succeed by adapting to what is competitive despite human wants and biases, not because of them.

    7. Human beings always and everywhere are bound by the same physical laws as the rest of the universe, and while memory, consciousness, and reason give us pause to outwit the forces of time and ignorance, we can only violate those physical laws as long as our reserve genetic capital holds out.

    It’s been spending down since the mid 1800s. 97 is a limit, and 95 is a cliff and 93 is unrecoverable without political interference in reproduction.

  • Why Patriarchy Was an Evolutionary Necessity and Out-Competed All Other Forms of Order -And Always Will

    Oct 9, 2019, 1:27 PM

    1. In any competitive primate order, largely related males capture females and territory by competing with, and killing off, competing largely related males. Females often defect mate and return. Humans demonstrate this same behaviors. Males create commons – meaning territories – that contain women and their children, and at maturity genders split into their roles as warriors and mothers. This is not to state a naturalistic fallacy, only that we are not unique, and all great apes demonstrate some variation on this basic set of behaviors, and these behaviors are evolutionarily beneficial – and possibly necessary. Bonobos for example are geographically isolated from competition and could extend the feminine method of genetic expression rather than the masculine.
    2. As demand for the division of labor increased, individual productivity increased, and the atomization of property increased, so the organization of the family has increased in atomization in parallel – from the consanguineous, to matrilineal serial monogamy with frequent defection, to the paternal serial with less frequent defection and frequent polygamy, to paternal monogamous, to traditional extended less defection, to the nuclear with much less defection, absolute nuclear with little defection, and now to the single female parent – returning us to serial monogamy.

    3. Property (a system of measurement) is necessary for organizing increasingly complex polities in a division of labor, and for providing incentive to specialize and rewarding people to take initiative in that division of labor. We assume today what adam smith first documented, and that other than in purely intellectual innovation, which happens only at the extremes, the returns on cooperation are not linear but between geometric and logarithmic: depending upon the complexity of the task, ten men can be a thousand times more productive than one, not ten times.

    3.Patriarchy (Government) in a relatively consanguineous band is irrelevant. Patriarchy in a tribe with assets where reproductive anonymity is possible is necessary to prevent caloric parasitism (dysgenia). Patriarchy evolved because only men can defend property, and only men have the reproductive and status interest in defending property – women have the opposing interests. (This is the traditional complaint of marxists and feminists).

    1. A man and a woman are the most parsimonious tribe possible, where each man is a headman over a tribe of one woman (or more) and their children. This puts males and females in the optimum nash equilibrium competition insuring the least free riding, most cooperation, with the least defection. In other words, it’s the optimum return on investment under marginal rates of production (agrarianism).
    2. A pareto distribution is a power law, where the top 20% use control over 80% of the assets to provide incentives necessary to organize a society by positive incentives (opportunity) rather than forced labor. To successfully compete a population must produce a pareto distribution sufficient to organize the production of private consumption and public investment that the group can survive competition from other groups. This is an evolutionary necessity and where reversed, results in decline and dysgenia, which eventually undermine the pareto distribution. A Nash equilibrium is a condition under which everyone gets the best everyone can as a group even if some get less and some get more. Pairing off mating (serial relationships) is an example where the best get the best, the worst get the words, but everyone gets something, whereas in a disequilibrium some get most and most get none. All orders that maintain a pareto distribution of power (order), but a nash equilibrium of returns (benefits) eliminates the maximum disincentive to cooperation and minimum incentive to defect, thereby producing the optimum velocity of production, providing the least work load for every member of the polity. Elites seek rents for maintaining this, and within reason they are earned. However, rents tend to accumulate and cause calcification leading to inability to adjust to shocks, that cause collapse because not enough free capital exists to reorganize the polity during the period of stress.

    3. The principle differences between extant human groups consists of a) adaptations (Speciation) to geographic conditions consisting largely neoteny necessary for the climate, disease gradient, and population density, b) different degrees of neoteny c) producing different rates and depths of maturity, d) resulting in variations in physical and cognitive development e) different degrees of dimorphism (masculine feminine) and the greater advantage of verbal skill as complexity of social, reproductive, economic, political, and military complexity increases. As such the principle difference between human groups is the size of the underclass, lowering the possibility of a competitive pareto distribution sufficient to create a nash equilibrium under which groups can compete. This is offset by the tendency of complex groups to use anonymity, procedure, and complexity to seek rents on heretofore nash equilibria, until there is insufficient free capital whether genetic, cultural, institutional, human, or material to adjust to shocks, changes in trade routes, or warfare.

    4. In conclusion non-patriarchal groups cannot utilize maximum returns of cooperation because they lack the ability to produce a division of labor by pareto distribution of power, and nash equilibrium of benefits. This is why all paternal, monogamous, sky worshipping, metal-smithing, military, expansionist, pastoralists were able to conquer peoples who had developed earlier agriculture and failed to create equally competitive orders.

    5. Controversial Warning: men cheat but women defect, just like our ape cousins and our ancestors. This is the primary reason for a) differences in compensation, b) lack of women in headman (senior) positions outside of female consumer goods. c) preference for male managers regardless of gender at least in the competitive roles. A woman in a headman capacity whether business, political, or military is a luxury good, or a signal good. Or putting a woman in charge to manage a decline, and women rarely amass their own fortunes outside of entertainment because of it. This is the other side of why the patriarchy exists: women are devoted to their children but they are not loyal to the tribe. This is why men only tolerate female leadership in management of a decline, or inability to resolve conflict between factions. Or when there is so little risk that the symbolic value is of some value such as when a brand has been burned in the market. This is why companies prefer to hire women as CEO’s for companies that cannot recover (xerox, hp,etc) – the privilege of the role even in decline does not harm a woman’s career but destroys a man’s, and the public demonstrate genetility of women under hardship.

    6. If you can internalize this understanding, then you will avoid the naturalistic fallacy on one hand, and avoid the blank slate of possibility on the other. Human groups succeed by adapting to what is competitive despite human wants and biases, not because of them.

    7. Human beings always and everywhere are bound by the same physical laws as the rest of the universe, and while memory, consciousness, and reason give us pause to outwit the forces of time and ignorance, we can only violate those physical laws as long as our reserve genetic capital holds out.

    It’s been spending down since the mid 1800s. 97 is a limit, and 95 is a cliff and 93 is unrecoverable without political interference in reproduction.

  • Not everyone will understand the math, but many can follow the procedures, and benefit from whatever is produced by them

    Oct 10, 2019, 12:28 PM

    —“Science explains and Mathematics describes the universe. However, engineers are necessary to produce calculations and write procedures and processes for the technician that produces the machines that the clerk, and laborer use to produce the goods services and information the individual consumes. Not everyone will understand the math, but many can follow the procedures, and benefit from whatever is produced by them.”— JWarren Warren

  • Not everyone will understand the math, but many can follow the procedures, and benefit from whatever is produced by them

    Oct 10, 2019, 12:28 PM

    —“Science explains and Mathematics describes the universe. However, engineers are necessary to produce calculations and write procedures and processes for the technician that produces the machines that the clerk, and laborer use to produce the goods services and information the individual consumes. Not everyone will understand the math, but many can follow the procedures, and benefit from whatever is produced by them.”— JWarren Warren

  • Why the American Model “worked”

    Oct 10, 2019, 6:03 PM by James Louis LaSalle Law is the glue that holds American society and culture together; we are not inherently smarter, nor do we have better natural resources than other countries. What we do have is an idea, that we’re infused with our entire lives: respect for the rule of law. We go to court, we pay our fines, we show up for jury duty, the vast majority of defendants out on bond turn themselves in for their sentences, rather than flee. And it’s just an idea. Kansas City, Missouri has around 500,000 people. It has a police force of 1100 officers, working in three shifts. At any given time, there’s perhaps 300 officers on duty. Policing half a million people. It’s only possible in a society where the citizens respect other citizens’ persons, property, and space. The govt’s primary purpose is to provide me infrastructure to enhance my ability to generate income, purchase property, and protect those activities from other citizens, other countries, and the govt itself. It actually does this so well that we dwell on trivial issues, like who has to bake who a cake. Which is actually pretty awesome when you think about it. Our system isn’t implemented with force. It’s there, lurking in he background, but it isn’t the prime mover. The IDEA of the rule of law is the prime mover. It’s why Americans find concepts like “sanctuary cities”, where the rule of law is suspended, utterly infuriating. I would say it’s one of the single greatest factors in the election of Trump. Nothing offends your regular American more than someone escaping Justice.

  • Why the American Model “worked”

    Oct 10, 2019, 6:03 PM by James Louis LaSalle Law is the glue that holds American society and culture together; we are not inherently smarter, nor do we have better natural resources than other countries. What we do have is an idea, that we’re infused with our entire lives: respect for the rule of law. We go to court, we pay our fines, we show up for jury duty, the vast majority of defendants out on bond turn themselves in for their sentences, rather than flee. And it’s just an idea. Kansas City, Missouri has around 500,000 people. It has a police force of 1100 officers, working in three shifts. At any given time, there’s perhaps 300 officers on duty. Policing half a million people. It’s only possible in a society where the citizens respect other citizens’ persons, property, and space. The govt’s primary purpose is to provide me infrastructure to enhance my ability to generate income, purchase property, and protect those activities from other citizens, other countries, and the govt itself. It actually does this so well that we dwell on trivial issues, like who has to bake who a cake. Which is actually pretty awesome when you think about it. Our system isn’t implemented with force. It’s there, lurking in he background, but it isn’t the prime mover. The IDEA of the rule of law is the prime mover. It’s why Americans find concepts like “sanctuary cities”, where the rule of law is suspended, utterly infuriating. I would say it’s one of the single greatest factors in the election of Trump. Nothing offends your regular American more than someone escaping Justice.

  • Advice to Aspies(masculine Minds) Wanting to Expand Social Circles: Treat People Like Sunshine

    Oct 11, 2019, 10:30 AM (or “Advice to Aspies on how to go through life without continually failing the Turing test.” – Shannon Constantine ) There aren’t enough of ‘us’ to build a society. We are outliers. Society is built for ‘them’. They feel more than we do. They sense more than we do. They trade confirmation because they are not as sure of what they think as we are. And like anything in life, a trade must be done on the customer’s terms. So sell what they’re buying, not what you want to sell. So, I just shut my brain off, smile, and feel human presence like sunshine, not feel I need to contribute other than to confirm or compliment. I practiced ‘feeling’ others not ‘thinking’ them. Its sort of like being still so you can listen to a soft sound. We tend to listen to problems. Try not to respond to the problem but to the experience in relation to the problem, mirror his or her feelings and confirm them. I practice four disciplines. 1. I only disagree if a person will come to harm – not because the situation can be solved better. 2. I only give advice or ‘explain’ if I ask if they want it, or if they ask for it. “I have a thought on that if you want to hear it sometime”. 3. I only explain incentives, not what someone with lower agreeableness (us) would to correct the people involved. People don’t have our masculine absence of demand for agreeableness. 4. I confirm their emotions as rational for them in the circumstance. This produces trust. We operate on truth and falsehood rather than approval or disapproval, and rather than inclusion or exclusion. This is our ‘gift’. And it is a tool we can help them use. But they operate by inclusion and exclusion, and approval and disapproval, not by truth and falsehood. Once you have developed trust – sensitivity to their ned for approval and inclusion – which takes quite a bit of time, they might ask you for explanations. But don’t volunteer them. Over time, they will ask questions in such a way that they will cue you that they’re asking. Work to find fulfillment from the experience of people, not the conversation. Then the conversation will come – on their terms. I became happy when I said: how can I make everyone I meet feel comfortable, or complimented, or helped in some way no matter how small. We don’t realize that when we talk to them we are taking not giving. Give and you will receive so to speak.

  • Advice to Aspies(masculine Minds) Wanting to Expand Social Circles: Treat People Like Sunshine

    Oct 11, 2019, 10:30 AM (or “Advice to Aspies on how to go through life without continually failing the Turing test.” – Shannon Constantine ) There aren’t enough of ‘us’ to build a society. We are outliers. Society is built for ‘them’. They feel more than we do. They sense more than we do. They trade confirmation because they are not as sure of what they think as we are. And like anything in life, a trade must be done on the customer’s terms. So sell what they’re buying, not what you want to sell. So, I just shut my brain off, smile, and feel human presence like sunshine, not feel I need to contribute other than to confirm or compliment. I practiced ‘feeling’ others not ‘thinking’ them. Its sort of like being still so you can listen to a soft sound. We tend to listen to problems. Try not to respond to the problem but to the experience in relation to the problem, mirror his or her feelings and confirm them. I practice four disciplines. 1. I only disagree if a person will come to harm – not because the situation can be solved better. 2. I only give advice or ‘explain’ if I ask if they want it, or if they ask for it. “I have a thought on that if you want to hear it sometime”. 3. I only explain incentives, not what someone with lower agreeableness (us) would to correct the people involved. People don’t have our masculine absence of demand for agreeableness. 4. I confirm their emotions as rational for them in the circumstance. This produces trust. We operate on truth and falsehood rather than approval or disapproval, and rather than inclusion or exclusion. This is our ‘gift’. And it is a tool we can help them use. But they operate by inclusion and exclusion, and approval and disapproval, not by truth and falsehood. Once you have developed trust – sensitivity to their ned for approval and inclusion – which takes quite a bit of time, they might ask you for explanations. But don’t volunteer them. Over time, they will ask questions in such a way that they will cue you that they’re asking. Work to find fulfillment from the experience of people, not the conversation. Then the conversation will come – on their terms. I became happy when I said: how can I make everyone I meet feel comfortable, or complimented, or helped in some way no matter how small. We don’t realize that when we talk to them we are taking not giving. Give and you will receive so to speak.