A Post-script to the ER Intro: The Sham, the Futility of ER, and the Fate of Humankind

 

The following is a postscript to the ER intros, especially the three-part original (recent summary version). Although this is a self-contained article, reading one is strongly recommended, for ER theory explains The Sham and extralogical reasoning’s futility. 

 

 

If ER ever gains popular recognition, it will be evidence AGAINST its correctness. This essay will show this and, in doing so, offer a prognosis for humankind. 

 

A piece of writing always says much more about the author than even their most devout reader--and there’s no better example of this than ER (especially since it has none).

 

Many readers will/would overestimate how much they agree with extralogical reasoning. They may agree enough that they aren’t guilty of hypocrisy--but ONLY just enough. Conscious beliefs unsupported by unconscious beliefs and emotions have little effect on people’s actions and general perspectives, however well-understood. Even when conscious beliefs undergo significant change, the unconscious beliefs that supported them can linger indefinitely (ER calls this vestigial beliefs). Regardless of whatever beliefs and understandings some may share with ER, environmentalists and knowledge idolators (blind worshipers and unconditional promotors of knowledge, discussed in summary intro), for example, can’t be what they are without serious systemic problems in their thinking, ones that can’t be remedied by a few essays. 

 

Beliefs, in the most tangible sense, are a very new evolutionary phenomenon--but they didn’t come out of nowhere. They evolved from what Bishko’s life engineering called biosap: a precursor to beliefs too intangible to be right or wrong that are used to unconsciously model reality. Central to the human psyche though beliefs may be, the human brain remains a biosap-dominate thinking organ.

 

People, however, are socially, cognitively, emotionally, and intellectually programmed to believe the opposite, that their behavior and general perspectives are more determined by the conscious and intellectual portions of the thinking organ. Much of the same programming creates the illusion that large-scale events are usually the result of calculated human agency and organization, as opposed to self-organization and society’s natural evolution (or the proverbial “invisible hand”). 

 

Ultimately, this programming gives rise to The Sham: the widespread con/delusion that rational human agency predominates society--that human actions and events, both individual and collective, are determined by criteria that are far more rational, straightforward, calculated, and predictable than is the case. An alternative definition of the Sham on the individual level is that the human thinking organ is belief-dominant, rather than biosap-dominant. Rational human agency, in short, is nowhere near as prevalent as believed. 

 

The intros and other posts posit that an evolutionary process can’t produce a thinking organ with any appreciable degree of AWARENESS of self and non-self without an exaggerated sense of UNDERSTANDING. In other words, self-awareness can’t occur in an evolutionary process without self-DELUSION. And the smarter the “understanding machinery” (cognition for understanding reality), the smarter the “delusionary counterpart” (cognition used for deluding oneself). 

 

Oftentimes, the feeling or belief in understanding and rationality is almost as important as the real thing. Confusion, inhibition, and distractions can be almost as detrimental to an animal’s dealings with reality as understanding it is beneficial, both on the individual and group levels. Thinking organs sacrifice a certain amount of understanding to ensure clarity and resolve by connecting correlated events and twisting them into causational relationships, turning reality into a more “harmonious narrative.” This may include discarding or suppressing information that threatens the preferred narrative . 

 

I call this artificial Resonance (see summary intro or part three of the original for better explanation). Although probably more of an already-existing trait than one specifically selected for in humans, I see little reason why evolution would get rid of it. Resonance is responsible for a host of universal epistemic flaws including confusing correlation and causation as well as observation and interpretation (i.e., jumping to conclusions); an exaggerated sense of one’s rationality; the predominance of confirmatory reasoning, reasoning designed to confirm what one already believes (see works of Johnathan Haidt); the causation bias, or tendency to be way too quick to assume the relationship between cause and effect will be ascertainable and satisfying; the hindsight bias; the cognitive reflexes to rationalize and reinforce one’s beliefs and decisions; overestimation of the ease and need for correct answers (more on this later); ineptitude at probability and statistics; and, reinforced by social and emotional traits, a greater interest in opinions than correctness (both for strong opinions in general and specific conclusions that suit personal interests). 

 

Studies show that almost all human thinking is CONFIRMATORY, designed to confirm what one already believes. Only if one doesn’t have the answer or seriously doubts their best guess can they engage in EXPLORATORY thinking, thinking motivated to find a true answer (see the works of Johnathan Haidt). Since the human thinking organ only has a SIMULATION for proving right answers—convincing itself—and that smarter “understanding machinery” also means smarter “delusionary machinery,” the human thinking organ will always be trying to MAKE SENSE OF the World more than UNDERSTAND it. 

 

Though founded in Resonance, a cognitive phenomenon, The Sham is heavily reinforced by the social, emotional, and (in the modern World) financial need to conform. A person’s beliefs and especially their sentiments need to be at least reasonably compatible with their goals, motives, and circumstances; otherwise, their, motivation, happiness, and relevant functionality are compromised. Humans evolved to achieve what they perceive to be they and their kins survival, which required maintaining good relations with the pack for sufficient access to resources. Today, since mortal survival is all but guaranteed, what people perceive as survival is PROFESSIONAL survival, or making a good living. Humans evolved to survive and propagate their genes, not to philosophize and not to make sacrifices to ensure the survival of the species generations past their lifetimes.

 

Advocates of human judgment and intuition overestimate the purity, reliability, and tangibility of “commonsense” and its bastard brother “natural intuition.” Worse, they falsely believe the latter is something akin to “the common thinking machinery designed to UNDERSTAND the World AS IT IS. In reality, it’s much closer to “the common thinking machinery designed to MAKE SENSE OF a much SIMPLER ENVIRONMENT for SURVIVAL.” While it’d be unwise to dismiss this thinking machinery as worthless, it’s just as unwise to dismiss the need for serious reengineering. 

 

If people are ecological parasites by nature, they, by definition, make decisions accordingly. Without reengineering, people’s actions are too heavily influenced by their foundational nature to make decisions otherwise. 

 

This view of the common thinking machinery is a second alternate definition of The Sham on the individual level.  

 

Possibly owing to glitches in Resonance, I was less vulnerable to The Sham to begin with and too cognitively, intellectually, and socially dysfunctional to find a niche in society, further freeing me from their influences. Enlightenment does not come simply from high-power learning and rejection of dogma, but the discovery of what Bishko’s LE called an epistemic puzzle of life: the reengineering plans necessary to maximize one’s functionality and judgment in an environment they weren’t designed for. And its discovery defines the difference between one who is sentient and who is SAPIENT. ER is my personal solution to POL. 

 

Although many discover what could be called a POL, they tend to be more sentimental than epistemic and, though they may serve individuals well, are not sufficient to influence people’s perspectives and actions enough to curb their inherent ecological parasitism, according to ER (more on this later). 

 

People’s tendencies to jump to conclusions and simplify causation make them prone to overestimate the ascertainably and necessity of correct answers. Everyone has a cognitive and emotional reflex to reinforce their beliefs in mutually supporting packages, however riddled with contradictions they may be. It should, therefore, be assumed that the more a belief or model of reality deviates from the truth, the more the beliefs and models of reality that will come to support it will also deviate from it, including future beliefs and models, which can only be guessed. Wrongness tends to metastasize; it tends to lead to more wrongness. 

 

Possessing a subconscious-dominant thinking organ, you have a system of beliefs that people have limited control over; one ought to avoid making it unnecessarily large. ER advocates holistically managing beliefs by having less opinions but working harder on the ones you do have. There are more than enough things in the World to be opinionated about; you can afford to be picky—especially since cultivating epistemic opinions reduces the need for general ones, making it easier to be objective. 

 

The inescapable human condition ensures that beliefs will always be more important than correctness, avoiding being wrong, and logic; but it’s still possible to give a shit about these other things. Unfortunately, social traits and Resonance almost as inevitably ensure the former will suppress, not just outstrip, them. It’s commonly believed that a factor behind the emergence of sentient-level intelligence was the use of gossiping to ascend the social ladder to get better access to resources, including mates. Beliefs--including predictions, which ER is especially wary of—are a social tool. When something’s an indispensable means to an end, it usually becomes an end itself. LE and ER call this an Inversion. Beliefs are no exception. 

 

And naturally, correctness is hardly the only attractive property a belief can possess—to suggest otherwise would be to deny the existence of a psychology. Beliefs that are gratifying, motivating, supportive of other beliefs, etc. are often more robust and easier to find. In other words, having certain beliefs or just having a belief on a given topic at all are more important than correctness. The voting system treats having an opinion as more important than knowledge and understanding; psychiatric diagnostics fosters the need to diagnosis the mentally ill more than understand them.

 

ER also struggles to compete against the drug-like pleasures of information addiction and the religious and social benefits of knowledge idolatry. Yes, ER, especially if combined with ER Deism, provides similar benefits; and if one takes a more mature and disciplined approach, it provides better opportunities for impressing people, too. But if knowledge idolators and information addicts had such perspective, they wouldn’t be what they are in the first place—and ER principals would be all but common knowledge.         

 

Among numerous similar “confusions,” many fail to appreciate that the CAPACITY to be logical and the INCLINATION to be so in the absence of incentives (especially social) don’t fully correlate. True, a trait can’t evolve without a corresponding inclination to act upon it—otherwise, it’d lack a selective pressure—but the two aren’t necessarily proportional, either between species or members of the same. There’s SOME correlation in humans, but certainly less than people think, especially intelligent ones. 

 

Few appreciate how important self-correctivity is in ensuring the quality of human thinking and understanding. Self-correctivity is a measure of how good a pool of beliefs is at correcting itself. It's based on the strength of the pool's incentives (especially social and monetary), objectives, corrective feedback, and competition and cooperation. While science couldn’t progress without genius, few appreciate how much science and engineering owe their success to self-correctivity. And even fewer appreciate how much self-correctivity depends on irrationality.        

 

Bishko once said, “It isn’t so much people want to be happy and successful so much as happier and more successful than OTHER PEOPLE.” This is known as competitiveness. Competition, in combination with cooperation, has been indispensable in the evolution of ecosystems, industries, sports, economies—and academic fields. As I’ve pointed out many times, it’s a scientific and historical fact that ninety-nine percent of the true history of science is the story of geniuses that spent their entire lives developing scientific theories that ultimately proved to be ninety-nine percent wrong. And they weren’t just wrong in hindsight or in light of future discoveries; even at the time, they were questionable. But in order for the right, or closer to right, theories to get the right competition and catalysts, you need smart people believing in questionable ideas. Scientific discovery also requires a myopic doggedness that requires at least the temporary deviation from what would otherwise be considered wise and rational thinking. 

   

Thus, irrationality and scientific excellence are positively mutually inclusive—if not dependent.  

 

In science and other areas with high correctivity, success is more a matter of COMPETENCE, much less of JUDGEMENT. Pull someone out of such an environment, especially when one’s emotions are involved such as life, the situation is reversed. In addition to being more disadvantaged than they think to begin with, they become susceptible to a host of universal flaws in thinking that few do much about. Success is now far less ensured.     

 

ER is a life philosophy, heavily influenced by LIFE engineering. The lack of self-correctivity in society’s general pool of beliefs explains ER’s absence and--due to its logical nature--futility.  

Again: If people are ecological parasites by nature, they, by definition, make decisions accordingly. Without reengineering, people’s actions are too heavily influenced by their social, emotional, and primitive instincts to make decisions otherwise. 

 

 

The path of least resistance is the most natural path in all of Nature. Some might say it’s the only.

 

Since evolution is a competition that follows the path of least resistance, it gives rise to similarly oriented products. It may not even be possible for a complex system like society to deviate from this path. Large-scale movements can’t propagate unless they’re driven either by oppressive force, or what people perceive to be their self-interests. The first is unconscionable in the West, and there’s nothing that prompts self-interest more than short-to-midterm profits. After all, economies themselves are competitions that follow the path of least resistance.  

 

The idea that people would ever be ecologically responsible, which would go light-years beyond reducing pollution and deforestation, flies in the face of everything that’s known—everything that SCIENCE has taught humanity--about how groups of people make decisions (even if not NECESSARILY individuals). Environmentalists casually say, “We need to take care of the environment,” as if human civilization has ever not been ecologically destructive. This is like a demon saying to another demon, “We have to care of people and help ensure their spiritual well-being.” 

 

People have always been more ecologically destructive than rational, more ecologically destructive than moral, and probably more ecologically destructive than intelligent. As human knowledge has increased, they’ve only become more, not less, destructive. And the Internet made the average-citizen LESS rational and scientific. It's wise to believe that knowledge is only as useful as a person’s understanding of how to use it. Sadly, few are wise enough to appreciate this, and the rise of Trump and fake news are among the results. 

 

Species are now going extinct a THOUSAND times faster than prior to the rise of modern humans. A mass extinction isn’t forthcoming. It’s already here. And the effects are already irreversible; it’s just a matter of (geologic) time before it gets ugly. Ecological parasitism is at the core of who people are, and environmentalists (in many respects) horribly downplay it to promulgate a childish religion. However devastating, deforestation and pollution are merely SYMPTOMS. You don’t treat a disease by merely treating the symptoms; you diagnose the ailment, find its vulnerabilities, and attack. Casually “mitigating” rampant environmental destruction by tossing bottles into barrels is like passing out vitamin pills to cure cancer. If these people actually believed in science, they’d recognize that humans are an incurable ecological disease—not just say it when it’s convenient. 

 

If they truly thought humans are an INCURABLE ecological disease, I don’t see why they’d rant and rave to instill long-term measures to curb deforestation and pollution. The EPA may serve a useful purpose in preventing very immediate threats to people and animals, but that’s not the same time thing. If they really did want to mitigate the mass extinction, what they’d advocate is genocide, but that has no religious value (after all, a religion can’t persist on dead adherents alone).      

 

 

Before concluding, readers should not infer that I don’t think learning is healthy and that people don’t enjoy it or believe in it at all—of course they do. Learning, like beliefs, are an evolutionary Inversion. A species that depends on learning for survival will evolve the biochemical triggers that ensure they enjoy it, and learning can be an avocational pursuit. But as I have discussed in other posts, NO ONE’S motives for doing so are as pure as most pretend, and the involved pleasure triggers can be manipulated; that is to say, they can triggered by “mimetic stimulants” in much the same way as calorie-free artificial sweetener can elicit the pleasures of sugar—or how drugs can invoke excitement. Information addiction and (to a lesser extent) knowledge idolatry act much the same way. Insufficient recognition of these facts compromises (true) learning.  

 

In the end, math and science aren’t taught in school despite The Sham; they’re taught BECAUSE of it, to convince educators that they and other authorities are rational human agents (in addition to recruiting the next generation of scientists and engineers to feed humanity’s ever-growing addiction to technology). In other words, to mask The Sham’s very existence.        

 

ER might not be for kids, but it’s hardly sophisticated, either; it’s just simple logic and science applied to life. Even if it isn’t philosophically novel, if people could truly appreciate it, it would’ve been done enough times over that its principals would be readily employed by virtually all educated people. 

 

It should now by clear that if ER ever gained popular recognition, it would be evidence AGAINST its correctness. If it doesn’t die with me, it will die with everyone else.