[ExI] Meta on Upon pondering your freedoms: _The Soviet Story_ documentary

Keith Henson hkeithhenson at gmail.com
Sat Jul 5 07:51:37 UTC 2008


On Fri, Jul 4, 2008 at 11:44 PM, Amara Graps <amara at amara.com> wrote:

> Spike:
>
>>  ...On Behalf Of Amara Graps
>>
>>
At the meta level, the question arises as to why humans act in the
particularly disturbing ways they do.  The story of the Nazis and the
Communist and their leaders in WW II I have come to see as being
situational.  I.e., there are situations that induce groups of humans to act
in ways that we have a hard time understanding.  And while we personify
leaders as evil, they were more caught in roles than they were independent
agents.

There is, I believe, a reason we look back on those events and cannot
understand them. I think the reason we can't is that humans in such times
were running an alternate operating system.  In _Evolutionary Psychology,
Memes and the Origin of War_ I discuss what induces switching between peace
mode and war mode and what ultimately is the reason for the switch.  It
involves the bizarre concept that at times humans and their genes can have
divergent goals.

Keith Henson
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