The Holobiont's Decisional System: A Comment by Helga Ingeborg Vierich

Helga in Botswana with two Kua friends (image source)

A post by Helga Ingeborg Vierich


Here, Helga comments on my previous post "Why do we Always Choose the Decisional System that do the Most Damage," where I discuss the case of the sinking of the "El Faro" ship, caused by the way the command structure was organized. "Pyramidal" decisional systems place the power in the hands of a single person, (typically a man) and the person in charge doesn't have the flexibility to change his opinion, nor the capability to access the data on what's really happening. A Holobiont-like decisional system is much more flexible and attuned to the real world, as Helga describes here.  



Dear Ugo; this is wonderful.

It explains the danger of hierarchies of powerful authority so clearly! I am teaching introductory sociology this term and will be making this one of the supplemental readings, for the topic right now is the development of state-level societies. It is, indeed, in state-level societies that we see the development of these kinds of hierarchies.

People have frequently pointed to the pecking order of chickens, and the evidence of hierarchies based on aggression in chimpanzees and baboons, and used this as a justification for human hierarchical social organization. As if it were, thus, "natural". But everything we know now, about the social organization and behaviour of people in "tribal" and "band" level societies (based on hunting, gathering, fishing, swidden horticulture, or nomadic pastoralism) suggests that before the state developed, seniority-based hierarchies of authority rare, and socio-economic and power-based hierarchies were unknown. Decisions were rarely made without extensive discussion.

The whole dynamic of morality in forager economies is to enforce a degree of social equality: the networks are based on relationships of mutual support, not chains of authority. There are no permanent leadership positions. Group actions to enforce punishment of transgressors appear to arrive through consultation and consensus.

We find these forms of consensus-creation preserved in tribal societies as well, even those with more permanent leadership positions. This is perfectly articulated in the following:

“...Roland Chrisjohn, a member of the Iroquois tribe and the author of The Circle Game, points out that for his people, it is deemed valuable to spend whatever time necessary to achieve consensus so as to prevent such resentment. By the standards of Western civilization, this is highly inefficient.

“Achieving consensus could take forever!” exclaimed an attendee of a talk Chrisjohn gave. Chrisjohn responded, “What else is there more important to do?”” (quoted from
http://www.filmsforaction.org/articles/the-more-a-society-coerces-its-people-the- greater-the-chance-of-mental-illness/ )

Unlike the hierarchical systems in many larger primates, like chimpanzees, ranking systems among foragers and even among pastoral and horticultural peoples, are not derived from intimidation and aggression, but by acquired reputation for demonstrated moral virtues - like articulating a consensus. Such people are valued by the community and thus listened to, only after a history of demonstrated integrity involving a list of highly valued signs of good character: generosity, diplomacy, honesty, loyalty and recognized proficiency at important skills (hunting, gathering, cooking, singing, trance-dancing, music, storytelling or comedy).

In other words, they are people of high rank and good reputation. Among hunter-gatherers, therefore, differences in social rank rarely result in social inequality of access to vital goods and services, but instead, ensure such access.

Indeed, aggressive hierarchies are not even innate, even in baboons. Such behaviour is cultural - learned and shared. This was shown very clearly in Richard Sapolsky's story of his Keekorok baboon troop, and how after the alpha males died from tuberculosis, the troop very quickly transformed into a very peaceful troop, and since then, a peaceful approach has become a cultural norm for them. This was in contrast to the normal high levels of stress in the aggressive hierarchies of baboons. Sapolski's research indicates that stress created by hierarchies is a killer in human societies, and he is not alone in saying this. Gabor Mate has been very clear on this too, and has linked stress, addictions, and even the addiction to power.

Yes, our societies, in the world today, need to become more of a holobiont: the integration of many co-dependents is always going to produce a less dangerous and stressful alternative.


regards, Helga

Holobionts of all the world, unite against totalitarianism!

 

Image from the Genetic Literacy Project

This is taken from a discussion we had with the members of the mailing list "The Proud Holobionts" a couple of weeks ago. It is inspired by the chapter that I am preparing for the book "Life and the Construction of Reality" edited by Pierre Imbrogiano and David Skrbina. 

I keep finding hugely interesting things on the Web. Too many, and I am losing a lot of time following links that lead me to unexpected discoveries. But so is life and, just to make you suffer as much as I do, let me alert you about this paper by Harald Walach, researcher in the field of medicine and psychology. The post is a comment about Mattias Desmet's "The Psychology of Totalitarianism" -- another hugely interesting thing that I am trying to avoid reading because it would completely absorb me for days.

So, here is the link to Walach's paper

https://harald-walach.info/2022/10/17/a-middle-way-in-difficult-times/

The point that Walach makes does not look like it is related to Holobionts, but, in my opinion, it is. Read this, first, from the paper:

"The ideology of naturalism has become more and more widespread since the beginning of the Enlightenment and dominates the brains and hearts of many people, especially those in important positions in science, politics, business, the media, and perhaps even religions. It leads to people feeling more and more like isolated atoms in a world without meaning or purpose. This gives rise to fear. But this fear has no goal, it just lies there. In psychology, we speak of “free-floating fear”. It leads to frustration and aggression. If this is the case with a large number of people, then this fear will always look for a new object to direct itself towards Terrorists, Islamists, foreigners, climate catastrophe – or a pandemic.

"In such a situation, self-organization processes emerge that lead relatively quickly to new structures, new patterns, and new orders – the “new normal” – which then suddenly seem very logical. These self-organization processes seem to be so well coordinated that one cannot imagine them arising of their own accord. But they do in fact arise of their own accord. Towards the end of his book, Mattias Desmet presents a few striking examples from chaos theory that explain how such things work.

"And now something important happens: the formerly atomised individuals, each bobbing along in a meaningless and empty world, now suddenly feel a new sense of purpose. And above all: they feel new connectedness with others. All are united in fighting this new threat and something emerges that they have not felt for a long time: a sense of belonging, of connection, of solidarity with others.

This in turn leads to the in-group of believers, similar to the members of religious groups or political parties, feeling good internally and delimiting themselves externally: against the others, the pagans, the unbelievers, the sceptics and doubters. Their arguments, threats against the newly created world view, are thus devalued, no longer find a hearing, no longer penetrate the channels of reporting of the mainstream media, but have to look for side channels."

Walach (and Desmet) have a perfectly fundamental point. Atomized individuals seek "something" -- an idea, a religion, a leader, a master, something that gives meaning to their life. The result is often "totalitarianism" in the sense that the atomized individuals find themselves at home under an "umbrella" organization that rules them from above. If you have friends in the military, you may notice how many of them feel about that. They recognize the enormous defects and inefficiency of military organizations but, all the same, they feel comfortable with the idea of belonging to a tight group that gives them a purpose.

Walach proposes a solution. He says, "The solution is to speak. Words trigger hypnosis. Words can also release it. By speaking, writing, discussing, whether in public, at home or at work." It can't work with the true believers, but Walach doesn't suggest speaking to the hypnotized, but to that fraction of the population that's not completely dazed by the propaganda barrage they receive. But it is not easy, and you always risk pushing the lukewarm ones into the group of those burning with faith.

It may work, but I am not sure about that. Walach and Desmet may have identified the problem, but that doesn't mean that the solution is good. The way I see this matter is that totalitarian structures are "vertical." That is, a true totalitarian organization is one in which you only communicate with those above you, and those below you, but not with those at the same level. Because of this structure, whatever comes from the top diffuses down, and is not subjected to discussion. You know that it is bad: it means that the mistakes made at the top cannot be corrected -- there is just no mechanism for the bottom layers to influence the top layers. If there is, it is very weak and easily perverted, just like our election. But it is a structure that makes you feel safe, so you accept it. 

So, if we want to change the vertical structure we must propose a different form of organization that can provide some of the same benefits, without being so rigid and inflexible as the typical hierarchical pyramid. So, what if we were to propose the holobiont as the social structure that avoids totalitarianism? If you are part of a holobiont, you don't have a master. Holobionts are non-hierarchical networks mainly based on local interactions among nodes (e.g. people). Typically they are smaller than hierarchic networks and tend to form higher order holobionts forming fractal structure. Mutual holobiontic interactions are based on self-respect and they have harmony as their purpose. It is a horizontal kind of network. 

A holobiont may be slower to react than a hierarchical structure because the signal that comes from an outside perturbation needs to diffuse from node to node, and that takes time. But it is more flexible and I believe it can avoid the terrible mistakes that pyramidal structures are known to do. 

Could that be the way to avoid totalitarianism? I am not sure, but I think it is at least a promising idea. And, in any case, the push toward localism and relocalization is evident everywhere. We still have to learn how to make large hierarchical organizations, and maybe the best idea is just to avoid building them! 

Onward, fellow holobionts!