The symbolic professions aggressively select for those who are highly educated and cognitively sophisticated. This is a key source of their dysfunction.
I like to say that we decide what to believe by deciding who to believe. This essay explains why intellectuals can be dogmatically wrong. It is an outstanding piece. But it still leaves questions to be explored. What motivates the intellectual dissenters (conservatives, libertarians)? Why did the symbolic capitalists converge on the particular set of beliefs that we call Woke? Perhaps these are explored elsewhere in your book.
I definitely do talk about why symbolic capitalists converged on "wokeness" as a means of struggling over power and status (starting with the coda for Chapter 1). The book does spend some time talking about antiwoke and conservative symbolic capitalists too.
But the broader question of conformity and dissent will be the topic of my next Substack post. Stay tuned!
So if I understand correctly symbolic capitalism is neither inherent good or bad. It just is. Correct?
Yesterday I wrote:
"The sophistication of this capitalism kept growing, until it became possible for some people in the community to become bookish, mathematical and brainy. Some became scribes. Some became engineers. Some became philosophers. Some became religious leaders. Some became teachers. Some became accountants. Some developed designs for weapons, others devised business plans. All of these people read, wrote, and thought more than other people in their community. They solved abstract problems. Their intellectual abilities and innovations gave them power and wealth.
Rather than trade materials, they traded ideas, designs, solutions, words, concepts, and knowledge.
Their innovations, accumulated knowledge, and wealth eventually made it possible for me to be born and raised in the harsh climate of Lake Tahoe. Only a modern capitalist baby could be born and raised there."
Is this an accurate description of symbolic capitalists?
Beyond the point you made about reproducibility in sciences, just pointing out that the dramatization of scientific discoveries has led to the emphasis being put on the scientists' interpretation of the data rather than the data themselves when the data never say anything beyond "reject or fail to reject the null hypothesis" ... but that doesn't sell >.<'
Have you considered whether the evidence indeed says that "smart people are especially prone to tribalism, dogmatic and virtue signaling" and that "salience" is not both a confounder and collider?
For example, if those smart people who become popular are popular specifically because of the intelligent things they say, and if all people are equally susceptible to reactive biasing relative to the things they are socially seen saying, then the "social salience" underpinning popularity may be the confounder, relative to the claim in the title, and a collider relative to the biased, yet intelligent things said in rhetorical defense, and so on.
"Symbolic capital" might likewise invoke classical social capital that is both underpinned and amplified by the "social salience" of modern echo chamber effects and the use of social capital to accrue more.
Perhaps this and many other ails are, in part, a matter of "Salient selection" where Goodheart's Law is pathologically ignored in both standard and social capital markets, which is made no better when one is traded for the other. It might also relate to Berridge and Robinson's work on the "incentive salience model of addiction" where "wanting" and "liking" are distinct systems that can diverge.
"In reality, people who are highly educated, intelligent, or rhetorically skilled are significantly less likely than most others to revise their beliefs or adjust their behaviors when confronted with evidence or arguments that contradict their preferred narratives or preexisting beliefs. "
I shared this sentence with friends and a discussion arose about the research behind the assertions and how belief revision was measured, what the sample population was, whether 'highly educated' meant having a graduate degree or distinguished by field, etc. I was able to access the first article you linked to, regarding belief revision, but cannot find answers to these questions. I'm wondering if you can direct me further.
Wow. I loved your book and your work continues to surprise and delight. You mention that the woke era seems to be in decline, and I remember that your book sort of predicted this. And yet the cognitive biases you talk about seem relatively persistent, which suggests that it might be replaced with another ideology.
Do you have any thoughts or ideas about what kinds of “politically correct” ideas are likely to come next?
P.S. Your article reminds me of a paper by Chris Argyris, one of my favorites, Teaching Smart People How to Learn.
Questions for you. In what ways were hunter-gatherers capitalists? In what way were the first farmers in Mesopotamia capitalists? What are the universal themes of human nature as expressed by Adam Smith in his two books?
Why weren't they capitalists in any way? Because the capitalist system was created after them. It would be like asking "in what way we're hunter-gatherers Christians?"
Is there a discontinuity between the Christian era and the pre-Christian era? Or was it gradual?
Answer that and you answered your question as well: it was gradual over a very narrow time window compared to the time window between hunter-gatherers/Mesopotamians farmers and capitalism; thus, it is back to your original question does not even make sense (see my previous comment).
Let’s see if you can justify the limits of your time window by defining its characteristics with evidence and dates. Will your ideas hold up or collapse under scrutiny? I’m betting collapse.
I like to say that we decide what to believe by deciding who to believe. This essay explains why intellectuals can be dogmatically wrong. It is an outstanding piece. But it still leaves questions to be explored. What motivates the intellectual dissenters (conservatives, libertarians)? Why did the symbolic capitalists converge on the particular set of beliefs that we call Woke? Perhaps these are explored elsewhere in your book.
I definitely do talk about why symbolic capitalists converged on "wokeness" as a means of struggling over power and status (starting with the coda for Chapter 1). The book does spend some time talking about antiwoke and conservative symbolic capitalists too.
But the broader question of conformity and dissent will be the topic of my next Substack post. Stay tuned!
So if I understand correctly symbolic capitalism is neither inherent good or bad. It just is. Correct?
Yesterday I wrote:
"The sophistication of this capitalism kept growing, until it became possible for some people in the community to become bookish, mathematical and brainy. Some became scribes. Some became engineers. Some became philosophers. Some became religious leaders. Some became teachers. Some became accountants. Some developed designs for weapons, others devised business plans. All of these people read, wrote, and thought more than other people in their community. They solved abstract problems. Their intellectual abilities and innovations gave them power and wealth.
Rather than trade materials, they traded ideas, designs, solutions, words, concepts, and knowledge.
Their innovations, accumulated knowledge, and wealth eventually made it possible for me to be born and raised in the harsh climate of Lake Tahoe. Only a modern capitalist baby could be born and raised there."
Is this an accurate description of symbolic capitalists?
https://substack.com/@scottgibb/p-152436769
Beyond the point you made about reproducibility in sciences, just pointing out that the dramatization of scientific discoveries has led to the emphasis being put on the scientists' interpretation of the data rather than the data themselves when the data never say anything beyond "reject or fail to reject the null hypothesis" ... but that doesn't sell >.<'
Fantastic essay.
Have you considered whether the evidence indeed says that "smart people are especially prone to tribalism, dogmatic and virtue signaling" and that "salience" is not both a confounder and collider?
For example, if those smart people who become popular are popular specifically because of the intelligent things they say, and if all people are equally susceptible to reactive biasing relative to the things they are socially seen saying, then the "social salience" underpinning popularity may be the confounder, relative to the claim in the title, and a collider relative to the biased, yet intelligent things said in rhetorical defense, and so on.
"Symbolic capital" might likewise invoke classical social capital that is both underpinned and amplified by the "social salience" of modern echo chamber effects and the use of social capital to accrue more.
Perhaps this and many other ails are, in part, a matter of "Salient selection" where Goodheart's Law is pathologically ignored in both standard and social capital markets, which is made no better when one is traded for the other. It might also relate to Berridge and Robinson's work on the "incentive salience model of addiction" where "wanting" and "liking" are distinct systems that can diverge.
I look forward to the book and future posts.
Cheers!
"In reality, people who are highly educated, intelligent, or rhetorically skilled are significantly less likely than most others to revise their beliefs or adjust their behaviors when confronted with evidence or arguments that contradict their preferred narratives or preexisting beliefs. "
I shared this sentence with friends and a discussion arose about the research behind the assertions and how belief revision was measured, what the sample population was, whether 'highly educated' meant having a graduate degree or distinguished by field, etc. I was able to access the first article you linked to, regarding belief revision, but cannot find answers to these questions. I'm wondering if you can direct me further.
Thanks for any insights.
Hahaha. QED.
Wow. I loved your book and your work continues to surprise and delight. You mention that the woke era seems to be in decline, and I remember that your book sort of predicted this. And yet the cognitive biases you talk about seem relatively persistent, which suggests that it might be replaced with another ideology.
Do you have any thoughts or ideas about what kinds of “politically correct” ideas are likely to come next?
P.S. Your article reminds me of a paper by Chris Argyris, one of my favorites, Teaching Smart People How to Learn.
Questions for you. In what ways were hunter-gatherers capitalists? In what way were the first farmers in Mesopotamia capitalists? What are the universal themes of human nature as expressed by Adam Smith in his two books?
They were not capitalists.
Why not?
Why weren't they capitalists in any way? Because the capitalist system was created after them. It would be like asking "in what way we're hunter-gatherers Christians?"
Is there a discontinuity between the capitalist era and the pre-capitalist era? Or was it gradual?
Is there a discontinuity between the Christian era and the pre-Christian era? Or was it gradual?
Answer that and you answered your question as well: it was gradual over a very narrow time window compared to the time window between hunter-gatherers/Mesopotamians farmers and capitalism; thus, it is back to your original question does not even make sense (see my previous comment).
Let’s see if you can justify the limits of your time window by defining its characteristics with evidence and dates. Will your ideas hold up or collapse under scrutiny? I’m betting collapse.