The Evolved Self-Management System

[xchrom]

http://edge.org/conversation/the-evolved-self-management-system


NICHOLAS HUMPHREY has held posts at Oxford and Cambridge Universities, and is now School Professor Emeritus at the LSE. He is a theoretical psychologist, internationally known for his work on the evolution of human intelligence and consciousness. His most recent book is Soul Dust.

THE EVOLVED SELF-MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

NICHOLAS HUMPHREY: I was asked to write an essay recently for "Current Biology" on the evolution of human health. It's not really my subject, I should say, but it certainly got me thinking. One of the more provocative thoughts I had is about the role of medicine. If human health has changed for the better in the late stages of evolution, this has surely had a lot to do with the possibility of consulting doctors, and the use of drugs. But the surprising thing is that, until less than 100 years ago, there was hardly anything a doctor could do that would be effective in any physiological medicinal way—and still the doctor's ministrations often "worked". That's to say, under the influence of what we would today call placebo medicine people came to feel less pain, to experience less fever, their inflammations receded, and so on.

Now, when people are cured by placebo medicine, they are in reality curing themselves. But why should this have become an available option late in human evolution, when it wasn't in the past.

I realized it must be the result of a trick that has been played by human culture. The trick isto persuade sick people that they have a "license" to get better, because they'rein the hands of supposed specialists who know what's best for them and can offer practical help and reinforcements. And the reason this works is that it reassures people—subconsciously —that the costs of self-cure will be affordable and that it's safe to let down their guard. So health has improved because of a cultural subterfuge. It's been a pretty remarkable development.

I'm now thinking about a larger issue still. If placebo medicine can induce people to release hidden healing resources, are there other ways in which the cultural environment can "give permission" to people to come out of their shells and to do things they wouldn't have done in the past? Can cultural signals encourage people to reveal sides of their personality or faculties that they wouldn't have dared to reveal in the past? Or for that matter can culture block them? There's good reason to think this is in fact our history.

Go back 10 or 20,000 years ago. Eccentricity would not have been tolerated. Unusual intelligence would not have been tolerated. Even behaving "out of character" would not have been tolerated. People were expected to conform, and they did conform, because they picked up the cues from their environment about the right and proper—the adaptive—way to behave. In response to cultural signals people were in effect policing their own personality.

And they still are. In fact we now have plenty of experimental evidence about the operation of "sub-conscious primes", how signals from the local environment get to people without their knowing it and, by changing their character and attitudes, regulate the face they present to the world. It can be a change for the worse (at least as we'd see it today). But so too...

I realized it must be the result of a trick that has been played by human culture. The trick isto persuade sick people that they have a "license" to get better, because they'rein the hands of supposed specialists who know what's best for them and can offer practical help and reinforcements. And the reason this works is that it reassures people—subconsciously —that the costs of self-cure will be affordable and that it's safe to let down their guard. So health has improved because of a cultural subterfuge. It's been a pretty remarkable development.

I'm now thinking about a larger issue still. If placebo medicine can induce people to release hidden healing resources, are there other ways in which the cultural environment can "give permission" to people to come out of their shells and to do things they wouldn't have done in the past? Can cultural signals encourage people to reveal sides of their personality or faculties that they wouldn't have dared to reveal in the past? Or for that matter can culture block them? There's good reason to think this is in fact our history.

[patrice]

1. K&R for vast cultural and social implications!

[Shankapotomus]

2. ...

"But why should this have become an available option late in human evolution, when it wasn't in the past."

Because people today are chronic complainers, perhaps?

[xchrom]

3. well that was...interesting

[Shankapotomus]

10. sorry

wasn't being sarcastic or anything...just trying to point out that maybe we have so many "illnesses" that can be cured by placebos because people today subconsciously are looking to invent things to complain about...i should have been more explicit...my apologies.

[bemildred]

4. Well, mind-body dualism is bullshit. The mind is something the body does, sort of a sub-system.

But it's a thorny issue. so I have to do some reading here ...

[xchrom]

5. i am very much a science -- western science minded kind of guy.

but this guy -- w/ his background and expertise kind of has me thinking.

[bemildred]

6. Well, I can tell you that reductive rationalism has failed utterly as an explanation for everything.

Though it has been very productive in some ways, it has well-defined limits.

And anyone who pays attention knows that the mind and body are each cabable of having dramatic effects on each other. I like to think of it as the body is the hardware and the mind is the software, like a computer, but that won't take you very far either, because the mind is not a computer, it's pretty bad at what we call computing, but I think that that analogy works as long as you remember it's just an analogy.

I'll get back after I read this and think it over.

[xchrom]

7. I might fall on science side but I would not

Disagree w/ your opening sentence.

It's fair description for our contemporary existence.

[bemildred]

8. Hmmmmm ....

Well, it's true reductiive rationalism has been very successful when it comes to developing technical means and scientific understanding. But that is not what I dispute. And then there are things like this:

Formally proving within a logical system that it is either trivial or incomplete:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del%27s_incompleteness_theorems

Mathematical statement which is consistent and useful but not provable or disprovable, i.e. it must be an axiom, because it is not provable in a system without it or an equivalent, it's independent.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuum_hypothesis

They don't call it "chaos" because they understand it well:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory

And that is just the math, and the problems are theoretical, it's not just a matter of finding some new trick.

Then there is quantum theory and the new physics, and that is the best stuff, from a reductive rationalism POV, and it's a mess of speculation and guessing.

[bemildred]

9. Just wait a day or so, we will have a nice chat.

[xchrom]

11. Cheers! You might like the whole Edge. Org site. Nt

[bemildred]

12. I am impressed.

Very sharp.

There are things I don't like about his framing, but they are quibbles. I followed his line of argument, and while speculative, I think it works.

I'll just rattle the rest of these off, some of them are quibbles:

1.) Based on what he says, I would think one could then use placebos to cure cats and dogs too. Fool them into thinking it's Summer and food is everywhere. Seems like something you could test.

2.) I think what we usually think of as being ourselves, our egos, evolved precisely to be our social presentation. Are we not different when we think we are alone? Do we not feel guilty about it?

3.) Humans are very good mimics, it's a necessary social trait. This is another use for his management system.

4.) I have read of studies that showed that when you move your arm, for example, the decision was made, the nerve impulse started, some hundredths of a second before you become aware of it. Not saying I know how they did that.

5.) I would think the light cycle trick would still work fine on people, they should do it in Hospitals.

6.) Could this lead to an "Intellectual takeover" of the human organism, where the thinking mind finally finds a way to put itself firmly in control? Are we smart enough to handle that yet?

Do you want to post it in Health, or should I?

[xchrom]

13. Go ahead and X post it. HuckleB comes to mind

As some one who might be interested.

Retired Trotskyite(?) is another.

I posted & will try to re-post something similar but not so placebo oriented.

I'm so glad you found this interesting.

[bemildred]

14. LOL.

This guy has a pretty good argument, we'll see. Could sink like a stone too.

That was a rich feast. I should thank you.

[xchrom]

15. I thank you for being interested.

Guys like these are Thinking deep - & they're educated, science backgrounds & still very, very creative.