All things equal, it’s going to be difficult to weld two pieces of metal together with a hammer. Equally, it’ll be difficult to drive a nail with a welder. So, before welding or driving nails, you need to understand the difference between a hammer and a welder. In order to tell the difference between a hammer and welder, you need some idea about what they do and why they’re good for doing it. For hammers and welders, those things are pretty obvious for virtually everyone. No one’s going to try to drive nails with a welder or weld with a hammer. People, however, are harder to understand. Like the telling the difference between a hammer and welder, most people have some innate understanding of how other people work. There is a subset of people who don’t understand the motivations and thought processes of other people. Why do people believe things that clearly don’t make sense? Why aren’t my logical arguments changing anyone’s minds? Why am I constantly frustrated and disappointed in people? This guide is for those of us who don’t get it and wish we did.
The reason understanding anything is important is because understanding influences quality of life. Other people are probably the most important factor in most people’s lives that influence quality of life, positively or negatively, so it’s important to understand ourselves and each other as well as possible in order to increase our quality of life as much as possible. Setting the right expectations for virtually anything heavily influences quality of life and you can’t set expectations correctly if you don’t understand the subject those expectations are based on. If you don’t understand that dogs can’t fly, you will be constantly frustrated and disappointed when teaching your dog to fly doesn’t result in a flying dog. That diminishes your quality of life to some extent, and, generally, the more your expectations aren’t met, the more miserable you’ll be. Understanding, in order to set appropriate expectations, is fundamental to quality of life. People are, arguably, the most important subject to understand.
Human evolution can be traced back as far as you want, but our genus, Homo, developed around two million years ago, give or take. Since then, various human species have come and gone, and, as of this writing, Homo Sapiens is the only human species remaining. That species, however, has been successful. That evolutionary success has come from the programming of our genes on both the species-wide level and the individual level.
Humans are social, individualistic animals. Even though we tend to live together in groups, each of us seeks to fulfill our own individual ends to whatever extent we can secure the means to do so, generally through cooperation and the division of labor. We’re more like lions and wolves, social, but individualistic, and less like natural social collectivists like bees or ants who are all of one mind to advance the hive or colony. Through the course of our evolution we have tended to group together in small tribes as is common for many species throughout the animal kingdom; herds of cattle, packs of wolves, flocks of birds, schools of fish, or prides of lions, for example. The reason for this is simple; survival is easier in greater numbers. We’re better able to defend ourselves and to provide for ourselves if we have others to help us. If a lone individual fails in a hunt, gets injured or wanders into a region barren of food, he will much more likely die than if he has a group of friends whose successes can offset his losses and vice versa. One big difference between human social groups and other animals is the wide division of labor.
The Division of Labor is an economic term that labels the tendency for individuals to specialize in one or more means of production. For example, some people become plumbers, electricians, teachers, engineers, doctors, etc. and that is how they create value in the human social arrangement. The division of labor allows individuals to survive without being good at everything. Instead of providing everything for themselves, individuals can provide what they’re best at and trade with others for the things they otherwise need. The division of labor is an innate characteristic of the human social structure, genetically ingrained in each of us through the natural selection process of evolution.
The Tribal Survival Instinct
One of the keys to understand is that this type of social arrangement requires social cohesion. The way that this social cohesion most likely developed was through the genetic encoding of tribalism. On December 4th, 2021, Jeff Leskovar’s essay, The Psychology of Human Action was published on the libertarian website, lewrockwell.com. In his essay, Leskovar makes the argument that humans depended on their tribes for survival. Those who were best at integrating into the tribe were those who tended to survive. Those who tended to survive, also tended to pass on their genes. Through that natural selection, humans became genetically coded to seek inclusion in the tribe in order to survive. In other words, humans developed an instinct to survive by gaining the approval and acceptance of the tribe. The Tribal Survival Instinct is one of two concepts required to understand others and why they do the things they do.
Leskovar argues that humans gain approval and acceptance by the tribe by adopting the tribe’s prevailing cultural norms and practices and by serving and supporting the tribal elite, often by adopting the beliefs and opinions of those elites while shunning those who refused to do so. This is a self-reinforcing mechanism; those who support the elites and shun those who don’t are more likely to survive and procreate and those do not support the elites and are shunned are less likely to survive and procreate.
This idea, the “Leskovar Insight”, has tremendous explanatory power applied to today’s society. It’s arguable that human evolution has largely been halted by the agricultural revolution, facilitating permanent settlements and the concentration of resources allowing virtually all people to live long enough to procreate. However, the agricultural revolution is a relatively recent development (10,000 years ago vs the two million years of humanity’s evolution) and if indeed it’s true that humans are no longer evolving, or evolving much more slowly, then we are the same creatures as we ever were, operating under the same instincts. We all have a genetically hard-coded instinct to be accepted by the tribe and looked favorably upon by the tribal elite. That is why we see groups of people who, if they hold Belief A, they probably also hold Belief B, even though the two beliefs are otherwise unrelated and, more often than not, nonsensical, or, at least, illogical.
Holding illogical beliefs could be attributed to a lack of intelligence or a belligerent ignorance, however, highly intelligent people often fall victim to these beliefs. It isn’t because they’re stupid, it’s because they have a strong tribal survival instinct wired into them at the genetic level.
All human characteristics are on a curve. Toward the extremes, there are fewer people and in the middle, there are more people. This is also true for the tribal survival instinct, though skewed towards more people having a stronger instinct than a weaker one. Some people have an instinct so strong that they can’t overcome it. Some may have a very weak instinct. People with a strong instinct, no matter how smart they are, will be more likely to adopt the beliefs and opinions of whoever they see as their tribe and that tribe’s elites. But this only applies to subjects that have a cultural component. Politics, religion, tradition, regional affiliation, team sports, etc. will be subject to tribalism, where subjects like physics, engineering, construction, individual sports, etc., will not be. We can see it in smart people who hold dubious ideas and beliefs on anything cultural, unable to reason out of them, but who are able to reason through other complex ideas without cultural components. Those with weak tribal survival instincts will be better at reasoning through ideas with cultural components.
This is not a critique of tribalism. Tribalism is a fact of our genetics and has been a strong factor in our ability to survive and thrive over the eons. In order to understand human nature, it’s necessary to understand the tribal survival instinct and to recognize that many people have the instinct so strongly that they can’t overcome it. They may read this explanation and recognize the instinct in others, but they’ll never see it in themselves. The smarter they are, the better they’ll be able to deny, justify and excuse their own tribalism, but they will never be able to reason their way around it because the instinct is a function of their genetic code. Good or bad, nothing can be done about it.
Tribalism is, at least, implicitly known by most people and exploited constantly by religious, business and political interests and often, even in interpersonal relationships, even when the exploiter isn’t explicitly aware of the tribalist phenomenon. It’s important to understand that the tribal survival instinct is a leash around people’s necks that allows them to be pulled this way and that way and there’s nothing they can do to stop it. Expecting people who have a strong tribal survival instinct to have logical beliefs in subjects with a cultural component will inevitably lead to disappointment. That expectation is unrealistic and leads to frustration where there need be none and a tendency toward incivility to people for simply being human; a lose/lose situation that lowers everyone’s quality of life.
Talent Theory
The tribal survival instinct is genetic, but so is every human characteristic. The tribal survival instinct is variable among individuals; some have the instinct more or less than others, and the same is true for all other human characteristics.
The division of labor was previously mentioned and alluded to the phenomenon of human diversity of talent. Talent, for the purposes of this guide, is defined as the degree to which an individual has a genetically determined capability. Like the tribal survival instinct, talents are on a curve. Some people have more or less of any given talent compared to other people. This concept is widely known and accepted. What isn’t widely known or accepted is the range of talents. Some talents are recognized by everyone, like athleticism or musicality. Others aren’t, like business, communication, strategy, reason, mechanics, discipline, persuasion and more. All of these talents are genetic. You either have them to an appreciable extent, or you don’t. Talents can be improved upon over the baseline genetic level through practice, but not to a great extent. For example, on a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being the lowest level of talent, 10 being the highest, one may have a baseline genetic talent level of 5 in Talent X. With practice, the capability Talent X represents may be may be increased to a 6 or 6.5, but, regardless of the amount of practice, it will never be a 7, due to genetic limitations.
Many argue that Stephan Curry, point guard for the NBA’s Golden State Warriors, is the greatest shooter in professional basketball history. If you were to ask him how to become rich and famous, he may tell you, “It’s easy! Just throw the ball through the hoop!”. To him, it is easy. To him, it may seem so natural that his talent isn’t obvious to him. But no matter how well you understand the mechanics and physics of throwing the ball through the hoop and no matter how much work you put into learning to throw the ball through the hoop, you will not be able to do it to a level that even comes close to Curry’s. Curry has a talent at an extremely high level. You may also have that talent to some extent and you may be able to work your capability up to a higher level, but, because of your genetic limitations, you will not accomplish what Curry’s accomplished.
That’s obvious, and no one would encourage people, en masse, to spend their time and money pursuing a professional basketball career because they recognize athleticism as a talent. But it’s common to see people with a talent for business encouraging people, en masse, to pursue business, because they don’t realize that success in business, like success in basketball, requires talent. Like Stephan Curry, their talent is such a natural part of who they are, that they don’t even recognize it in themselves. How do you become rich? Just create a successful business! Well, if you don’t have business talent at a sufficient level, no amount of work or understanding will make you successful. “You can do anything you put your mind to”, is false.
That is not a criticism toward people who encourage others or want to help others. Even people with the requisite talents need help and encouragement. The point is to understand people. People are only capable of what their genes allow. Expecting people (including yourself) to be capable of what their genes do not allow is, inevitably, disappointing. That expectation is unrealistic and leads to frustration where there need be none and a tendency toward incivility to people for simply being who they are; a lose/lose situation that lowers everyone’s quality of life.
Less relevant to the subject at hand, but worth mentioning; if you have significant talents, you will probably discover them. You will find yourself drawn to them over time. The more you’re exposed to in life, the quicker you will find them. However, the older you are when you discover those talents, the riskier it will be to pursue them. Interest in a subject doesn’t always indicate talent; if you’re interested in engineering and you decide to find out if you have engineering talent at age 40, you risk much more going to engineering school than if you had explored that interest at age 10. It’s important for people to discover and develop their talents as early as possible.
The tribal survival instinct and talent theory explain the basis for why people are the way they are and allow us to set our expectations of ourselves and others better, therefore, at least theoretically, achieving a better quality of life.
There are other considerations, however.
Simple Mistakes
Logical, honest, conscientious people of good faith make mistakes. Occasionally, even the best people have a lapse in judgment or set sub optimal expectations. Any one you see at any time doing something stupid could be a great person (like you) making a mistake. If we all extended each other a basic level of forgiveness to account for simple mistakes, we’d all be better off. That’s not likely to happen, but accepting the fact that people make mistakes and allowing for it isn’t something you do for them, it’s something you do for yourself. It’s a failure to set expectations correctly if you expect that people won’t make mistakes and setting expectations incorrectly lowers your quality of life.
Phase of Discovery
No one is born wise and developed. While most people are not seeking truth, wisdom or understanding, some are. If you look out into a crowd, you couldn’t tell one from the other. Take into consideration that you didn’t become the wise and knowledgeable person you are today overnight and that there may be people who are genuinely seeking truth, wisdom and understanding who haven’t gotten to the point that you have because they’re young or slower to develop. They may not have the talent for reasoning that you do and have a harder time figuring things out than you. Maybe they think they’ve found truth, but, in fact, are simply at a waypoint on their journey. They will one day discover truth and become wiser, but they will have many false positives along the way. Allowing for the fact that some people will seek virtue but take a long time to develop it will allow you to better set your expectations. An additional key to setting expectations is to identify those who are seeking virtue and those who aren’t.
Those seeking truth may be worth guiding or engaging with and those who aren’t will not be open to engagement or guidance. Don’t try to teach dogs to fly. If people are tribal enough, they may not be able to seek virtue. They will see the only virtue as tribalism and that’s determined by their genetics. If they lack the requisite talent level in curiosity, reasoning, discipline or if virtue ranks low on their value scale, which is determined by their personality, which is determined by their genetics, then they may not be able to seek virtue. Set expectations accordingly.
Environment Matters
Genes may express differently in different environments. The nature of the environment may determine how certain genetic predispositions like cancer, depression, violent behavior, degenerative disease, etc., appear or are suppressed. Poor diet may cause one person’s genes to express in a way that causes cancer, while another person with the same diet may not. Someone raised in an abusive household may develop depression while his sibling, raised alongside him, may not.
The Intent of This Guide
None of the above is intended to excuse anyone’s behavior for any reason. It isn’t implying that anyone should have sympathy for anyone else. It’s purpose is only help us to understand others and, hopefully, increase our quality of life by giving us a basis on which to set better expectations for the behavior of others. Some people are benevolent, maleficent, a little of both or neutral. This guide makes no recommendation on how to deal with those people, but only on how to understand them and set appropriate expectations. The primary source of our displeasure in life is poorly set expectations.
Understanding the concepts described herein allow the reader, with practice, to remove the emotions of disappointment and frustration from their exposure to human behavior by setting realistic expectations and to react strategically and purposefully to the actions of others. Ideally, we would find ways to benefit from the results of other’s illogical behaviors, where previously we had been impeded. For example, people become much more interesting when expressing illogical ideas and beliefs, because of the insight that can be gained into their psychology. That insight can be used to filter those who can be persuaded by logic and those who can’t. It can also be used to understand techniques that may be employed to persuade those with a strong tribal survival instinct. Instead of using reason only such as, “buy my goods and services because they’re a good value”, try “buy my goods and services because we are members of the same tribe (of course, with subtlety) and they’re a good value”. It can also simply be fascinating, from a psychological perspective, to hear people express their ideas and opinions when viewed from this perspective without feeling the need for rebuttal.
When people do annoying things, those things no longer need to be annoying because it’s clear why they’re doing them. A few examples:
– People driving badly. Some lack the talents necessary, some don’t and will become better over time.
– People who block traffic in the grocery store. They lack self-awareness (a talent) or their genes dictate a personality where other’s inconvenience is not important. Maybe they’re going to learn not to do it, but haven’t yet. Maybe they’re just making an uncharacteristic mistake.
– People who parrot nonsensical political, religious or cultural ideas or beliefs in accordance with their tribal survival instinct. It makes no sense to look down on them.
– People who can’t seem to do any of the things you find easy, or vice versa, despite your significant talent as a teacher, because they lack talent.
– People who have talent in intellect and curiosity and have wide and varied interests can understand why no one else cares about those interests.
– We can appreciate our talents and excuse our weaknesses or tribalism, if desired. Bob might be a helpful and generous friend, a great piano player, but also a hardcore tribalist. Maybe excuse the tribalism.
These ideas are intended to be applied to normal people. They may need to be altered to apply to those with psychological maladies.
This guide will probably benefit only a small group of particularly clueless people. Hopefully you got something out of it. If not, congratulations on being a normal person.
