0110 Even weirder, what if the organizational objective2aC of the postmodern academy3aC, arising from the righteousness of radical individualism, marxist worldviews, and big government (il)liberalism1aC, is, as Dr. Saad claims, a self-deceiving parasitic syndrome?
What if the organizational objective2aC triggers susceptible individuals to identify as “oppressed”(2b)2aC because the privileges(2c)2aC of social justice(3c)2aC coincide with what one expects from participating in harmonious social circles?
0111 Wouldn’t that be freaky?
It is like drinking the Flavor-Aid.
0112 These comment bring the arguments in Dr. Gad Saad’s book into a strange revelation.
The reason why Dr. Saad is the target of animosity from colleagues in the postmodern multiversity unites with his chosen topic of expertise, evolutionary psychology.
Evolutionary psychology applies lessons about the Lebenswelt that we evolved in to our current Lebenswelt.
In doing so, it raises post-postmodern questions concerning the adaptive natures of human will(1a)2aC, systems(1b)2aC and protection(1c)2aC and their maladaptive expressions in our current Lebenswelt.
Plus, none of these topics can be discussed in the College of Social Construction.
0113 My thanks to Professor Saad for his excellent work.
0114 Our curent Lebenswelt is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.
Cheers for an expanded range of inquiry for evolutionary psychology.
The three masterworks of Razie Mah offer a treasure trove for those interested in human evolution: The Human Niche, An Archaeology of the Fall, and How To Define the Word “Religion”.
These are all available as electronic books. Just search for the author’s name, Razie Mah, along with the title.
0115 A Course on the Human Niche is a series, available at smashwords and other e-book venues, containing the masterwork, a primer, and commentaries, including the following.
Comments on Clive Gamble, John Gowlett and Robin Dunbar’s Book (2014) Thinking Big
Comments on Steven Mithen’s Book (1996) The Prehistory of The Mind
Comments on Robert Berwick and Noam Chomsky’s Book (2016) Why Only Us?
Comments on Derek Bickerton’s Book (2014) More Than Nature Needs
Any literate adult can conduct a seminar class that reads and discusses these works.
0116 Another series, titled Buttressing the Human Niche, contains comments on articles and books on the topic of human evolution.
Here is a sample.
Comments on David McNeill’s Book (2012) How Language Began
Comments on David Reich’s Book (2018) Who We Are and How We Got Here
Comments on Christ Sinha’s Essay (2018) “Praxis, Symbols and Language”
Comments on Kim Sterelny’s Essay (2011) “From Hominins to Humans”
Comments on John Barrett and Krystalli Amilati’s Essay (2004) “Some Light on the Early Origins of Them All”
Comments on Stella Souvatzi, Adnan Baysal and Emma Baysal’s Essay (2019) “Is there Prehistory?”
These works may be purchased at smashwords and other e-book venues. They explore topics and demonstrate the practice of association and implication. They are ideal for throwing into an established study (or curriculum) on human evolution, in order to demonstrate the realness of triadic relations. Triadic relations are real enough to constitute a niche.
0117 Finally, the Razie Mah’s blog at www.raziemah.com looks at other publications. Each “looking at” blog consists of one to twenty parts. These may be used to spread the word, for enjoyment, discussion and erudition.
For example, the following appears in March 2021
Looking at Daniel Turbon’s Article (2020) “…Human Being in Evolution”
In May 2021
Looking at Chris Sinha’s Essay (2018) “Praxis, Symbol and Language”
0118 Currently, evolutionary psychology is narrowly practiced as an adjunct to cognitive psychology. Evolutionary psychology attempts to explain findings, models and evidence from cognitive psychology in terms of natural selection in the environment of evolutionary adaptation.
Now comes the Course on the Human Niche, Buttressing of the Human Niche, and other productions by Razie Mah,proposing that the ultimate human niche is the potential of triadic relations.
Yes, humans also evolve into very many proximate niches. But, all our proximate niches are bundled together by our ultimate niche. Proximate niches are like the various wooden rods bound together in the ancient Roman artifact called “religio”. This artifact serves as a metaphor for the human’s ultimate niche. Our ultimate niche binds all adaptations into proximate niches together.
0119 Professor Gad Saad’s book takes the reader outside of a narrow and closed practice of evolutionary psychology. However, since Saad does not know the hypothesis of the ultimate human niche, he cannot cross from complaining and demanding action to a wide-open practice of evolutionary psychology. Thus, he cannot fully comprehend what he is encountering in postmodern academics and elsewhere. He is moving towards a realization. It is just around the corner.
A wide-open evolutionary psychology examines our current Lebenswelt through the lens of adaptations accrued in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.
That revolution in thought begins with Razie Mah’s masterwork, The Human Niche.
0180 If David Graeber and David Wengrow’s recent book, subtitled, A New History of Humanity, is a breakthrough in postmodern anthropology, then it is so because it displays a semitic textual structure, instead of a greek textual structure.
These two styles are discussed in An Instructor’s Guide to An Archaeology of the Fall. Rather than eliminating possibilities in order to arrive at the most likely correct interpretation, these authors play literary tricks, coupling chapters one and twelve, A:A’, chapters two and eleven, B:B’, and chapters three through nine and chapter ten, C:C’.
Figure 24
0182 The semitic structure is A:B:C:C’:B’:A’. In Comments on David Graeber and David Wengrow’s Book (2021) The Dawn of Everything (by Razie Mah, available and smashwords and other e-book venues), the work is discussed in the pattern A:A’, B:B’ and C:C’. Notably, the bulk of the book covers the last layer, C:C’, and balances seven chapters (three through nine, C) against one chapter (ten, C’). Chapter ten is twice as long as any other chapter.
0183 Plus, chapter ten stands on its own, allowing me to place an examination in Razie Mah’s blog, with the title Looking at David Graeber and David Wengrow’s Chapter (2021) “Why The State Has No Origin”. If the reader first encounters the blog, the commentary is available. If the reader first purchases the commentary, then the reader can call the blog to the attention of others.
0255 Graeber and Wengrow’s exploration of the dawn of everything ends with a cruel joke.
The “state”2b, as defined by social science, cannot indirectly emerge from (and situate) righteousness1aC, while, at the same time, manifesting the characteristics of “domination”2a.
So, how is the contemporary left’s dream of achieving the virtues of liberty, equality and fraternity through the apparatus of the state2b going to work?
Thus ends the third layer, C:C’, of the author’s wide-ranging exercise in the semitic textual style. The Dawn of Everythingis contemporary postmodern social science at its finest. The authors start by searching for the origins of social inequality. They end with the promise of a new history of humanity.
These authors do not know what they do not know. But they do suspect this…
0256 …A new history of the world awaits. There is a new way to describe the dawn of everything, where “everything” corresponds to “our current Lebenswelt”.
Yet, their explorations play out as a dark joke, almost as cruel as the joke that, long ago, a talking serpent plays on a naive young woman.
My thanks to the authors. My condolences as well, on more than one level.
These comments provide views that dramatically re-present the vistas intimated in David Graeber and David Wengrow’s book. Welcome to a new age of understanding: The Age of Triadic Relations.
0001 Biologist Daryl P. Domning and theologian Monika K. Hellwig collaborate in a work, entitled, Original Selfishness: Original Sin and Evil in the Light of Evolution. Domning professionally studies the evolution of sirenians, sea cows, while maintaining an interest in Catholic theology. The sea cows, like the whales and the seals, are land mammals that adapted to an aquatic environment… or should I say?… niche.
0002 In terms of human imagination, sea cows associate to mermaids. Mermaids are chimeric. They are half woman and half fish.
0003 The titular word, “selfishness”, is chimeric as well. It starts in Germany as an emphatic, added to a pronoun (A). For example, I can say, “I myself” or “you yourself” or “he himself” or “she herself” and so on. Then, in Old English, the emphatic coalesces into a noun, “self” (B). Then, the noun becomes an adjective with an added,”-ish” (C). “Selfish” denotes an emphasis on self by self. Then, the adjective converts back into a noun with an added “-ness” (D). Selfishness (D) is the state of being selfish (C).
0004 So, there is an evolution to the word, “selfishness”, as well.
What games we play with words.
It makes me wonder whether the evolution of this spoken word has anything to do with evil in the light of evolution.
0005 If I change the mode of talk to hand-talk, I may say POINT TO MYSELF. I may not say I POINT TO MYSELF, because the pronoun, I, is signified by pointing to myself. I may gesture, POINT TO MYSELF twice, or with dramatic flair, but that is not equivalent to the spoken word, “self” (B) or “selfish” (C). It may be equivalent to the emphatic, “I, myself” (A).
0006 If language evolves in the milieu of hand talk, then our distant ancestors do not hand talk the equivalent of the spoken words, “self”, “selfish” or “selfishness”.
Does this fact provide a clue to original sin in light of evolution?
At least, it provides a clue to a divide in the course of human evolution.
The emphatic, I-myself (A), associates to hand talk and the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.
The explicit abstractions of self (B), selfish (C) and selfishness (D) associate to speech-alone talk and our current Lebenswelt.
0007 Our current Lebenswelt is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.
In 2006 (and perhaps, anytime before Domning reads this), the author does not suspect that there may be a twist in human evolution. In general, evolutionary biologists have no idea. Like Domning, they are focused on genetics and natural history, not cultural turns. The hypothesis of the first singularity first appears in 2012 with the masterwork, An Archaeology of the Fall, available at smashwords and other e-book vendors.
0017 If “selfishness” is a noun with a scientific affiliation, then what about Domning’s titular adjective, “original”?
What is “original selfishness”?
0018 To Domning, “original” means “evolved”.
“Original selfishness” is an adaptation into (what I will call) the niche of natural selection and genetics. This niche is more complicated than my quick-and-dirty labeling. See Comments on Dennis Venema and Scot McKnight’s Book (2017) Adam and the Genome. (Search for Razie Mah and this title. It is available in smashwords and other e-book venues.)
This niche operates since the origin of multicellular eukaryotic life on Earth.
The adaptations promote self-preservation and reproductive success.
Here is a definition.
Figure 05
0019 Of course, “original selfishness” locates Adam as the earliest microscopic creature, perhaps the first eukaryote, appearing hundreds of millions of years ago.
On one hand, this association may seem to be a disadvantage to Domning’s association of original selfishness to original sin.
On the other hand, Domning’s association accounts for the universality of original sin, as well as its moral reality.
Yes, that is the claim.
0020 These deficits and benefits are wrestled with in chapter 10, in a paragraph starting with, “in regards to concupiscence”. Our disordered selfish desires act out our original selfishness. So, the moral character (the acting out of a disorder) is distinct from the universality of selfishness (as an evolved trait, an adaptation into the niche of natural selection and genetics). The former calls for grace and salvation. The latter is what Christ transcends.
In sum, Domning separates the source of original sin’s universality (which, traditionally is descent from Adam, but now, Adam is a microorganism at the base of the tree of life) and its moral character (which is tied to human free will, and, to me, is the noun that “selfish” applies to).
0021 Domning’s move is clever, except for a critical implication. There is a sequence of adaptations within the Homo lineage that follows and builds on the primal adaptation into the niche of natural selection and genetics. So, the universal aspect of Original Sin, dealing with descent from a progenitor, and the moral reality of Original Sin, concerning the disordered expression of original selfishness in humans, are not fully separate.
Domning offers a graphic.
Here is my re-enactment of figure 10.1.
Figure 06
0022 Original selfishness does not implicate moral deliberation. Human selfishness does.
0023 What is “X”?
Domning places the word, “evolution”, here.
I ask, “How can this be?”
How can natural selection eventually yield human free will… er… selfish human free will?
Is selfish human free will an adaptation?
How does the Homo lineage pass from instinctive behaviors to deliberate choices?
0024 I suppose that Domning covers this challenge in chapter nine, titled, “Evolution and human ethics”.
What does he say?
Evolutionary selfishness is one thing, corresponding to adaptation into a niche of natural selection and genetics. Psychological selfishness is a second thing, corresponding to “original selfishness”. Psychological selfishness that intentionally disregards the interests of others is a third thing, corresponding to “human selfishness”.
So, X describes the evolution of psychological states. Selfish human free will, the foundation of human selfishness, evolves from original selfishness.
0025 However, I already am inclined to think that there must be another step, the evolution of self, that enters into the picture. Why? If human free will is to be selfish, then there must already be a self.
Here is a picture.
Figure 07
0026 Isn’t that curious?
The four waystations in the historic development of the word, “selfishness”, recapitulates the evolutionary sequence from “original selfishness” to “human selfishness”.
Okay, I immediately wonder, is there another word that also parallels some sort of evolutionary progression, from noun to adjective then back to noun?
Yes, there is.
0027 The term is “concupiscence”.
Concupiscence is a technical term used in theological discussions of the doctrine of Original Sin. It may be derived from Latin roots in more than one fashion.
Here is a picture.
Figure 08
0028 Of course, my preferred derivation is the lower option. To me, “concupiscence” is the state of being with Cupid. Cupid is an implicit abstraction from two features of natural selection: cooperation (Venus) and competition (Mars).
What do I mean by the term, “implicit abstraction”?
In some way, Cupid may be stated in hand talk, in the same fashion that Cupid is portrayed in visual art. PANTOMINE DRAWING A BOW, PANTOMIME ARROW FLYING, POINT TO MY OWN HEART. This fully linguistic statement in hand talk does not make sense, at first. Later, it does.
Cupid is the self, in the presence of other selves.
Cupid shoots arrows of desire, in the presence of other selves.
0029 I ask, “How could hominin awareness of the counterintuitive nature of Cupid evolve?”
This question does not surface in Domning’s chapter on evolution and human ethics.
Ethics among animals is mediated through ritual and emotion. The rules of the game say that cooperation may be necessary for surviving to the next competition.
In contrast, human ethics transcends an animal’s sensible and amoral tendencies. Human ethics demands social construction. Social construction is addressed in the masterwork, How To Define The Word “Religion”, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.
0030 In chapter nine, on evolution and human ethics, Domning envisions a short step from an amoral psychology (original selfishness) to a moral psychology associated with Original Sin (human selfishness). All that is required is the evolution of creatures capable of self-reflection.
Is that the same as the evolution of self?
Or, is that the evolution of cupid, the self in the presence of others?
Uh oh, the term, “cupid”, now has a technical definition.
0031 Is our capacity for self-reflection an adaptation into an ultimate niche or is it an evolutionary spandrel, an architectural feature of adaptations into diverse proximate niches?
Domning suggests the latter, by noting that intelligence is a composite of a wide variety of faculties, many of which are contradictory. Trade-offs favor a psychological ambivalence, which looks more and more like free will.
Does this imply that human free will arises from a diversity of “original selfishnesses”, each specific to a dilemma in the environment of evolutionary adaptation, psychologically expressed as behaviors consistent with the emphatic, I-myself?
So, the “self” seems to be a spandrel, where all these architectural (and archetypal) psychologies come together to form something, that ends up labeled as “self”.
0032 Remember this one?
Figure 09
0033 Item A entails no moral deliberation.
Item D involves moral deliberation.
0034 Item B, the consolidation of psychological expressions of I-myself into a single entity, the self, does not entail moral deliberation.
Item C, the tendency to put one’s own interests above other interests in the exercise of human free will, implicates moral deliberation.
0035 Now, I would like to substitute my newly minted technical term, “cupid” (B’), in for “self” (B) and see what happens.
Figure 10
0036 Right off, the nature of “cupid” as an adaptation accounts for the spandrel-like “self”. Its niche entails some sort of judgment (a triadic relation) in which the self is socially constructed out of a variety of psychological expressions of I-myself.
Here is the key.
Psychologically, self-interest is composed in response to other selves. Cupid is the self becoming aware of its own self-interests in a social world where others exhibit their own interests through psychological expressions of I-myself. In order to consolidate my self, from my own expressions of I-myself, I must consolidate the selves of others, from their own expressions of I-myself.
In brief, the self (B) does not arise in a vacuum. Cupid (B’) designates that fact.
0037 In prior blogs, I associate a sequence of four waystations in the history of the word, “selfishness”, to four elements in Domning’s visualization of original sin.
0038 Traditional theological accounts of original sin fuse its universal and its moral realities.
The universal reality is direct descent from Adam and Eve, as proposed by Saint Augustine seventeen centuries ago. This universal reality has been debunked by modern genetics.
The moral reality is a corruption of human free will. People tend to be selfish, even with moral deliberation. This implies a fall from full rationality and self-control.
0039 Domning’s theological account separates original sin’s universal and moral realities. But, the separation is not complete, because original selfishness (A) evolves into the self (B).
Evolutionary selfishness (pre-A) culminates in psychological expressions of I-myself (original selfishness, A), which I associate to the initial terminus of the term, “human selfishness” (D). The passage involves the terms, “self” (B) and “selfish” (C). Moral deliberation enters the picture with the term, “selfish”.
The moral reality, the disordered practices of human selfishness, is nothing more than original selfishness, but now with moral deliberation.
0040 The association between four waystations in the history of the word, “selfishness”, with four elements in Domning’s visualization of Original Sin appears convincing.
So, I want try my luck with another composite term, “concupiscence”.
“Concupiscence” builds upon three technical expressions. These technical expressions associate to waystations (B, C and D) in this development of the word, “selfishness”.
Figure 11
Note that these technical definitions do not correspond to traditional definitions of these words. I will get to that difficulty later.
0041 Once again, where am I going with this?
0042 The development of the word, “selfishness”, parallels Domning’s argument about the nature of original sin, once its universal and moral realities are separated.
The key step is the transition from the emphatic, I myself (A), to self (B), a noun. Domning attributes this step to evolution. The next step is the adjective, “selfish” (C), describing a tendency towards placing one’s own self above others. Here, moral constraints may come into play. “Selfishness” (D) reifies the adjective.
0043 Now, I want to repeat the procedure with the word, “concupiscence”. Concupiscence is traditionally used to describe the moral reality of original sin. The universal reality is descent from Adam, which now has been debunked by science.
0049 In the competition to cooperate (D’), one must have theories of mind. One must be able to anticipate the desire to belong (concupiditas, C’) of others. One must fashion the selves of oneself and others (B’) through clues, including the expression of emphatics, such as I-myself, in various situations (A).
Figure 15
0050 In the end, a deep irony emerges.
These alternate technical formulations of cupid (B’), concupiditas (C’), and concupiscence(D’) describe original justice, not original sin. In other words, the niche of triadic relations allows forms of cooperation (associated to the goddess Venus) that are so rewarding that original selfishness drives us to compete (associated to the god Mars) in order to participate and flourish in cooperative social circles.
Does the term, “original justice”, describe the state of humans in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in?
Concupiscence (D’) is so adaptive that we evolved a willingness to sacrifice, even die, for one another.
0051 The most productivity-oriented social circle is the team. Being a member of a successful team increases self-preservation and reproductive success. Teams are task oriented, voluntary, opportunistic and spontaneous. Teams are most effective in scavenging resources in mixed forest and savannah, where opportunities are seasonal and varied. Teams are so successful that they share their bounties with family, band and community. Hand talk is an adaptation to team activity.
So, why do I say that the human niche is triadic relations, rather than cooperation?
0052 Cooperation and competition already are adaptations into the niche of evolutionary selfishness. Domning is clear on this. Original selfishness is a psychological adaptation that spontaneously expresses one’s presence. That psychological adaptation opens the door to the realization of self. That realization is not a thing. It is a triadic relation.
Is this way the technical definition of cupid (B’), proposed here, is precisely the opposite of the thing known in Greek mythology as Cupid, who is not a relation at all.
