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To: Maurice Winn who wrote (169491)3/14/2021 7:47:11 PM
From: sense  Respond to of 217802
 
Yours is useful...

What it points at is a division between herd behavior... and pack behavior.

The herd... is not altruistic. Get picked out of the herd (flock/school)... and (except for Muskox) you are on your own, then contributing to the survival of the rest of the herd by proving to be easily enough eaten to distract predators.

The pack... pairs a baring of teeth in discipline necessary for the pack to be able to work as a team... with altruism necessary to the pack succeeding as it values individuals skills, and contributions... made in helping to pick snacks out of the herd. Minor members of the pack baring teeth and challenging for leadership from time to time... should work to dispatch the feeble elders no longer capable of leading... unless the leash prevents it...

Herd members risks are not limited to predators... including also the bovine or porcine (etc.) pleasure of domestication in being protected and well cared for until the farmer decides to eat you... then, hopefully, you might quickly learn how to herd sheep to grow your value and win prizes...

The analogy reaches limits in noting not all predators are pack animals... and that parasites also exist.

As, beyond that, human behavior has unique elements in systems of belief and faith... team sports based on herds and packs organized around ideas other than basic instinct and survival... including huge capacity for error in belief, and faith... as also in both reasoning, and in instinctual or emotional decision making, that is ill suited to the different drivers of successful choices in context of modernity. Learning more to make more adaptive choices in that context... requiring time spent in the library or the lab... as well as the arena.

And, with all that complexity... also comes new forms of deviation and dysfunction in predatory behavior... or in that of the herd or the pack, or parasites, or otherwise... new ecosystems enabling new niches.

The ultimate skill in the game... as Sun Tzu would note... is getting your opponents, not just to make mistakes enabling their defeat, but to do exactly what you want them to do... cooperating... while thinking it is their own idea. The virtuous herd are always amenable to doing the opposite of what is in their interest... even only in order to pose as virtuous. The virtue of sheep... never preventing them being shorn... sold or eaten... as the occasion requires.



To: Maurice Winn who wrote (169491)3/15/2021 10:04:06 AM
From: Cogito Ergo Sum1 Recommendation

Recommended By
Follies

  Respond to of 217802
 
First...
MQ.. good to see you still around.. we've both been here a long time :) I'm glad of that truly :)


She was very opposed to both altruism and sacrifice. And also opposed to animal spirits. She was for the mind and reason, not altruistic animalistic thinking/spirits.


Yes but her followers interpret her as believing in animal spirits primarily .. surely you see that.. You know already I am not some dogmatic take OPM do gooder.. That is not doing good :) She existed in in an unrealistic bubble.. of impossible existence.. were it not for most of what she decried.. she would never have survived..

I disagree with your reasons for human success = animal spirits + altruism. All animals have animal spirits. Chimps have plenty and plenty of people are like chimps. So that's nothing special in people. Altruism is no use either. The greatness of people derives more from individual men having great ideas, thinking power and desire for success. That people cooperate is a necessary but not sufficient condition.

Then you are missing the key point Mq.. it is the altruism which sets us apart.. and as posted .. THAT is certainly NOT the exclusive purview of the LEFT.. NO WAY !!!!! .. Our thinking minds.. gave is that extra option .. It is occasionally demonstrated lower down the evolutionary ladder.. but is in short supply ..

Inasmuch as these great men (not women), do their greatness for the benefit of everyone, there's an altruistic aspect to it, in that they are not doing it just for themselves, but they are not sacrificing themselves which is the normal meaning of altruism.

The reality .. in all cases is as my recent quote attributed to TE Lawrence would suggest..
http://www.siliconinvestor.com/home.aspx
T.E. Lawrence: My friends, we have been foolish. Auda will not come to Aqaba. Not for money...
Auda abu Tayi: No.
T.E. Lawrence: ... For Feisal...
Auda abu Tayi: No!
T.E. Lawrence: ...nor to drive away the Turks. He will come... because it is his pleasure.
Auda abu Tayi: Thy mother mated with a scorpion.


altruists are like that.. in some ways it is self serving .. it makes them feel good :) I will freely admit.. my profile says.. Pay it Forward.. I get pleasure from that :)