Ideological divisions are born of a shared problem, infinite complexity. There's too much information and sensation to process, but there are a limited number of theories that claim to organize the complexity of experience. So we cling to explanatory theories like rafts in an infinite sea.
We choose a theory, usually in the form of a story, based on another batch of complex influences impossible to untangle. Once we find a theory that feels comfortable, we build an identity there. This is why we get irritated if another human being with a different complexity management theory crosses our boarder and reawakens the troubling sensation of complexity.
Biologist David Sloan Wilson: Einstein observed that "It is the theory that decides what we can observe”. The world is so complex that we cannot possibly attend to everything, so a theory—broadly defined as a way of interpreting the world around us—is required to tell us what to pay attention to and what to ignore. Without a theory, we are literally blind. If we up the amount of information that must be processed, then the need for theory to cure blindness becomes even greater.
* So, we need these theories to help us see, but they also limit our vision.
* Some theories are more true than others, but they all need regular reexamination.
* Some theories result in an increase of violence, others in a decrease.
* There's always work to do thickening and clarifying one's own story.
* We're all clinging to rafts in a sea of infinite complexity.
We choose a theory, usually in the form of a story, based on another batch of complex influences impossible to untangle. Once we find a theory that feels comfortable, we build an identity there. This is why we get irritated if another human being with a different complexity management theory crosses our boarder and reawakens the troubling sensation of complexity.
Biologist David Sloan Wilson: Einstein observed that "It is the theory that decides what we can observe”. The world is so complex that we cannot possibly attend to everything, so a theory—broadly defined as a way of interpreting the world around us—is required to tell us what to pay attention to and what to ignore. Without a theory, we are literally blind. If we up the amount of information that must be processed, then the need for theory to cure blindness becomes even greater.
* So, we need these theories to help us see, but they also limit our vision.
* Some theories are more true than others, but they all need regular reexamination.
* Some theories result in an increase of violence, others in a decrease.
* There's always work to do thickening and clarifying one's own story.
* We're all clinging to rafts in a sea of infinite complexity.
