This is the basic intuition behind “war on X” framing of political topics. Making Drugs, or Cancer, or whatever the “outgroup” triggers that sense of us-vs-them. But it doesn’t work that well, because human brains are more complicated than that, and are highly tuned to the mix of competition and cooperation with other humans, not non-agentic things.
One of the first things people do in their conception of members of outgroups is to forget or deny their humanity. This step fails for things that already aren’t human, and I suspect will derail that path to cohesion.
One of the first things people do in their conception of members of outgroups is to forget or deny their humanity. This step fails for things that already aren’t human, and I suspect will derail that path to cohesion.
Humans are so fucked up.
“We need an enemy that we can believe is inhuman, so we can unite to fight it.”
“Okay, what about Death? That’s a logical choice considering that it is already trying to kill you...”
This is the basic intuition behind “war on X” framing of political topics. Making Drugs, or Cancer, or whatever the “outgroup” triggers that sense of us-vs-them. But it doesn’t work that well, because human brains are more complicated than that, and are highly tuned to the mix of competition and cooperation with other humans, not non-agentic things.
One of the first things people do in their conception of members of outgroups is to forget or deny their humanity. This step fails for things that already aren’t human, and I suspect will derail that path to cohesion.
Humans are so fucked up.
“We need an enemy that we can believe is inhuman, so we can unite to fight it.”
“Okay, what about Death? That’s a logical choice considering that it is already trying to kill you...”
“Nah, too inhuman.”