Griff wrote:
<Griff> I think the key to understanding those with "normal" social development (though oddly delusional natures) is the understanding of any social structure as a type of super-organism birthed by the interactions between one or more "cells." It may seem a myth of social interaction, but so is the human mind in a sense. It is a gestalt much like human consciousness is a gestalt of diverse yet unified components
<Griff> See a group of people not as their component individuals but as a single, living beast
<Griff> For there to be a city-state of Athens, one must believe in such things as city-states, or you will have only a number of people living in close proximity to one another and generally being slightly disgruntled with the entire farce
<Griff> If that makes any sense
<Griff> It works much in the way an ant colony, acting in conjuction with one another, can give the appearance of having some slow, primitive form of intelligence.
Even if the more socially inclined individual is less sophisticated on its own, understanding them in these terms can help one to understand the manner in which they can behave as a higher form of intelligence.
That's fair enough from my POV, but how could one really understand the complexity of interactions? People I observe have many individualistic traits. I see individualism promoted in marketing campaigns for products and services. More cultures are being scattered among us than ever.
I pretty much agree with your analogies for social structures but it still leaves me with an incomplete understanding. I cannot reconcile how people are so assimilated into the whole with their interactions yet maintain their different worlds. Too complex? I need it broken down? When I talk to a person, I am not speaking to an ant colony. Understanding how an individual works as a person and part of a whole, is what lots of us spent so much time worrying over.
17 Dec 2006, 9:37 pm
