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Before I started reading about rationality, I used to get frustrated because I felt like people often acted ‘irrationally’ when talking about politics. Then I started reading things like, “I Can Tolerate Anything Except The Outgroup” and “The Scout Mindset”. Everything started making sense; people have a desire for tribal belonging and they need to signal allegiance to a tribe as well as establishing their place in the tribe. When someone says something, it often isn’t meant to be taken as an objective claim about how the world really it is. It is often just a social ritual.
Often people are consciously unaware that they are participating in these social signaling games. They just believe whatever they are saying is true even if they are presented with an obvious and rational explanation for why the belief is incorrect. I speculate at the subconscious level creating a ‘boo outgroup’ post on social media is releasing dopamine because the brain is wired to reward social approval from your tribe. Then people come up with a rationalization for why they have to keep repeating the tribal behavior.
Once I updated my model of the world with people having these tribal behaviors things become much more predictable. On the other hand observing the tribal model being accurate leads to a kind of depressing realization. Most people are just soldiers for their tribe and if you don’t have a position of power in the tribe it is very hard to get people to change and get people to act in a more ‘rational’ way. The soldiers have positions of power and make rules/laws/social conventions that they force on other people. Sometimes the primary outcome of decisions is just to punish the outgroup regardless of the cost to society.
Furthermore, technology allows people to exploit this tribal thinking to manipulate other people to act in their economic or political interest. A lot of the internet is just designed to make people feel like they are part of ‘a tribe’ and most people end up consuming/creating a ton of ‘boo outgroup’ content. Combined with scope insensitivity, the availability heuristic people, and other cogitative biases many people end up with an incredibly inaccurate understanding of reality.
How do you cope with the reality that these tribal incentives drive a lot of human behavior? We are destined to live an ‘irrational’ world where people are caught up in these tribal games. I feel like many people don’t have much to offer beyond their tribal behavior. If all someone does is repeat political talking points they aren’t useful. It is a waste of my time and energy to interact with these people. How do I avoid become jaded and disconnected from people?
I start by recognizing that I never had a connection with them in the first place. After that, I look for connection elsewhere.
The simulation of proximity the Internet brings us is parasocial, like the experience of watching a performer or reading an author. They don’t know me. The purpose of a tribal ritual is to reinforce tribal cohesion; interrupting the ritual would be like answering a rhetorical question spoken in a play by calling out an answer to the actors.
I would also question my desire to talk with “tribal ritual people.” If my goal is rationality, I know immediately that 3/4 of people are not interested in changing their worlds with thought like I am. I value truth, logic, and knowledge more than I do experiences, exercise, and emotion.
I would argue that obtaining rational goals and pursuing them is our tribal identity, and seeking connection on that basis is our tribal ritual! So, find people who share this and connect with them instead.
That makes a lot of sense and I have slowly been taking my life in a direction where I just cut out people if they are too politically tribal or obnoxious. I have been much happier as a result and I’m slowly rebuilding my social network with people who enjoy rational nuanced conversations.
But sometimes the “tribal ritual people” have things that you need and you are forced to interact with them. For instance, at college or work you must go along with many tribal rituals if you want a degree or to continue working for an employer.
I also have internal conflicts with just cutting people out of my life. I feel like I should help them be more rational because it will improve their life. I know I can’t help them though. In an idealistic hypothetical world everyone is nice to each other and tries to help everyone, not just their tribe. It somehow feels morally wrong to not try to help people in need. Rationally, it is probably correct to cut ‘irrational’ out of your life because the net benefit of focusing on rational goals is better for society than me wasting time/energy on people that I can’t change. It still produces an emotional dissonance where it doesn’t feel like I’m doing the right thing.
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