// Selfie // 15.09.18
We're not one person, and the people we are can be strangers to each other. Different version of us emerge depending on where we are, what we're doing, who we're with and how aroused we happen to be.
Our minds are just one perception or thought piled on top of another. You - the person - is not separate from these thoughts.
When we set out to explain our actions, they are all post-hoc explanations using post-hoc observations with no access to non-conscious processing. The 'you' that you're so proud of is a story woven together by your interpreter model to account for as much of your behaviour as it can incorporate, and it denies and rationalises the rest.
Neural Pruning
Despite the fact that we are born with almost as many neurons as we'll ever need, the weight of a child's brain increases by more than 30% during its first 15 months. Most of this is the weight of new connections, or synapses, that are forming between cells. But then the cull begins: Connections start dying off at a rate of up to 100,000 per second. It is believed that this is one of the ways the brain shapes itself to its environment. Huge connectivity means it's prepared to deal with a wide range of potential possibilities. Then, when connections between neurons are not activated, they're killed. This is called 'neural pruning' and it works a little like a sculptor carving a face into a block of marble; it’s what's taken away, not what's added, that really makes us who we are.
The core of who we are is set at the early stages of life, during which we're effectively helpless. We're part nature, part nurture, formed by biology, culture and experience. That non-biological part might make it sound as if we’re free but - even putting biology aside - the type of person we become is principally defined by childhood events we have no control over and have very little capacity to reverse. By the time we’re old enough to really understand what our personality is, and begin wondering if there is anything we can do to change it, most of the work has been done.
The Looking-Glass Self
It’s the self that wants to be perfect, and the culture that tells it what perfect is.
To participate usefully in a social arrangement, you have to have a sense of who you are, you have to have a sense of identity. That sense of identity is a self which must be constructed by answering contextual questions - Who am I? Which groups do I belong to? - as well as the biological ones - Am I a boy or a girl? Am I black or white? You merge these answers and form in-groups. You start to develop prejudices and bias. You become preoccupied with what others think about you. Your sense of self-worth is a reflection of what other people think about you. With these hierarchies comes our obsessional concern with status. We're motivated to pursue validation from other people because of this need to keep our belief in our self-worth.
We're connected. We're a highly social species. Almost everting we do impacts on someone else, in one way or another. Changes we make to our environment form ripples that spread out, far into the human universe. The ripples are easy to ignore, especially for us Westerners. Many are invisible. But they're there, no matter how convenient or seductive it might be to pretend otherwise, and deny responsibility for anyone but our own sacred selves.
We're tribal and we're wired to want to punish, sometimes savagely, those who transgress the codes of our in-group. These are powerful and dangerous instincts that can easily overwhelm us.
Ostracized, rejected, devalued
The more you chose to be alone, the more everyone else wants to leave you alone. Isolation makes you paranoid. Your worst fears about yourself and everyone else fill all that silence you’ve created, making you feel more and more adverse to human company. Solitude can be an engine that produces its own fuel, sending you faster and faster into the quiet.
Imagine how many interactions you have every week in which it could possibly be imagined that you've been rejected in some way. These 'rejections' could range from overt acts of aggression to the subtlest interpretations of tone or body language. Your traits setting will not only guide you how many of these incidents you are actually aware of, but how you react to them. Some people will tend to shrug and think the best, while others will become angry, paranoid and vengeful. Others still won't even notice all but the most obvious confrontations. It's another alarm stem. We all have slightly different levels at which our bells start ringing, just as we have different responses to their sounds.
Capitalism has a way of absorbing dissent that communism doesn't
Part of neoliberalism's genius is that is has, as its electricity, our natural desire for status - it rewards the impulse for getting ahead of the rest of the tribe that's inherent in the human animal. Just as its founding father Friedrich Hayek had planned, this means it doesn’t have to be imposed by force, as failed ideologies such as communism and fascism did. The market manages to regulate the people by having them regulate themselves, so the state can just sit back and watch.
He got a million dollars with of advice from some of the best psychologists in the country. None of it helped. It seems an archetype: the guru who claims to have discovered the answer, yet manifestly fails to change themself. (Editor's note: Themself as opposed to themselves - used in a singular context to refer to a person whose gender is unspecified.)
We're not one person, and the people we are can be strangers to each other. Different version of us emerge depending on where we are, what we're doing, who we're with and how aroused we happen to be.
Our minds are just one perception or thought piled on top of another. You - the person - is not separate from these thoughts.
When we set out to explain our actions, they are all post-hoc explanations using post-hoc observations with no access to non-conscious processing. The 'you' that you're so proud of is a story woven together by your interpreter model to account for as much of your behaviour as it can incorporate, and it denies and rationalises the rest.
Neural Pruning
Despite the fact that we are born with almost as many neurons as we'll ever need, the weight of a child's brain increases by more than 30% during its first 15 months. Most of this is the weight of new connections, or synapses, that are forming between cells. But then the cull begins: Connections start dying off at a rate of up to 100,000 per second. It is believed that this is one of the ways the brain shapes itself to its environment. Huge connectivity means it's prepared to deal with a wide range of potential possibilities. Then, when connections between neurons are not activated, they're killed. This is called 'neural pruning' and it works a little like a sculptor carving a face into a block of marble; it’s what's taken away, not what's added, that really makes us who we are.
The core of who we are is set at the early stages of life, during which we're effectively helpless. We're part nature, part nurture, formed by biology, culture and experience. That non-biological part might make it sound as if we’re free but - even putting biology aside - the type of person we become is principally defined by childhood events we have no control over and have very little capacity to reverse. By the time we’re old enough to really understand what our personality is, and begin wondering if there is anything we can do to change it, most of the work has been done.
The Looking-Glass Self
It’s the self that wants to be perfect, and the culture that tells it what perfect is.
To participate usefully in a social arrangement, you have to have a sense of who you are, you have to have a sense of identity. That sense of identity is a self which must be constructed by answering contextual questions - Who am I? Which groups do I belong to? - as well as the biological ones - Am I a boy or a girl? Am I black or white? You merge these answers and form in-groups. You start to develop prejudices and bias. You become preoccupied with what others think about you. Your sense of self-worth is a reflection of what other people think about you. With these hierarchies comes our obsessional concern with status. We're motivated to pursue validation from other people because of this need to keep our belief in our self-worth.
We're connected. We're a highly social species. Almost everting we do impacts on someone else, in one way or another. Changes we make to our environment form ripples that spread out, far into the human universe. The ripples are easy to ignore, especially for us Westerners. Many are invisible. But they're there, no matter how convenient or seductive it might be to pretend otherwise, and deny responsibility for anyone but our own sacred selves.
We're tribal and we're wired to want to punish, sometimes savagely, those who transgress the codes of our in-group. These are powerful and dangerous instincts that can easily overwhelm us.
Ostracized, rejected, devalued
The more you chose to be alone, the more everyone else wants to leave you alone. Isolation makes you paranoid. Your worst fears about yourself and everyone else fill all that silence you’ve created, making you feel more and more adverse to human company. Solitude can be an engine that produces its own fuel, sending you faster and faster into the quiet.
Imagine how many interactions you have every week in which it could possibly be imagined that you've been rejected in some way. These 'rejections' could range from overt acts of aggression to the subtlest interpretations of tone or body language. Your traits setting will not only guide you how many of these incidents you are actually aware of, but how you react to them. Some people will tend to shrug and think the best, while others will become angry, paranoid and vengeful. Others still won't even notice all but the most obvious confrontations. It's another alarm stem. We all have slightly different levels at which our bells start ringing, just as we have different responses to their sounds.
Capitalism has a way of absorbing dissent that communism doesn't
Part of neoliberalism's genius is that is has, as its electricity, our natural desire for status - it rewards the impulse for getting ahead of the rest of the tribe that's inherent in the human animal. Just as its founding father Friedrich Hayek had planned, this means it doesn’t have to be imposed by force, as failed ideologies such as communism and fascism did. The market manages to regulate the people by having them regulate themselves, so the state can just sit back and watch.
He got a million dollars with of advice from some of the best psychologists in the country. None of it helped. It seems an archetype: the guru who claims to have discovered the answer, yet manifestly fails to change themself. (Editor's note: Themself as opposed to themselves - used in a singular context to refer to a person whose gender is unspecified.)
