Some inconvenient truths (well, “facts”) from the quotes in the latest slatestarcodex post (see the sidebar):
The most reliable way to create a lasting community is basing it on shared religion AND costly personal sacrifices. Secularity doesn’t cut it, even if demanding sacrifices.
Being religious signals trustworthiness: “The highest levels of wealth …[is]… created when religious people get to play a trust game with other religious people.”
″ religion in the United States nowadays generates such vast surpluses of social capital that much of it spills over and benefits outsiders.”
Liberals are the least accurate in modeling the views of other political groups (moderates and conservatives).
Note that this is all based exclusively on the US data.
The most reliable way to create a lasting community is basing it on shared religion AND costly personal sacrifices. Secularity doesn’t cut it, even if demanding sacrifices.
What kind of secular communities was used in the research? The “secular community” without further specification feels a bit like a non-apple.
Maybe this is because religious communities try to solve all aspects of their member’s lives, while secular communities usually have a single purpose. Single-purpose communities can fall apart when their members focus on some other aspect of their lives. For example, yesterday they wanted to save the whales or start the proletarian revolution, today they want to start a family. A religious community can satisfy a wider range of needs. Also, your relatives are often part of the same religious community.
Being religious signals trustworthiness
I imagine this is because religion has a clearly defined set of rules, and members are punished by other members if they break them. I can imagine that a christian who would steal from many people, would be unpopular within their own community. On the other hand, when a social justice warrior would steal from many people, their victims would be probably told to check their privilege, and called sexist / racist / …phobic for trying to avoid them. Okay, I exaggerate a bit here to illustrate the point.
Being a member of a group is an evidence of a trait if the group tries to change or avoid people who lack the trait.
What kind of secular communities? This question is answered in the linked post. The answer, for both secular and religious is: nineteenth century American communes. The paper is here.
Not quite—for a counterexample consider whether being a highly religious Muslim signals trustworthiness in the contemporary US.
I think in local terminology this can be generalized as an observation that high-cost precommitment to avoid certain behavior provides a convincing signal :-)
Looking at the whole thing from 10,000 feet I am impressed by how much the high-trust societies are more productive than low-trust societies.
being a member of the dominant religion signals trustworthiness
I think being a member of the same religion as you signals trustworthiness. The position of Orthodox Jews in the diamond industry was quoted as an example—Judaism isn’t a dominant religion (in Amsterdam and New York), but Orthodox Jews trust *each other*.
Because it would indicate that you are a person of strong integrity, whose moral convictions mean a lot to you
Interesting. So do you, then, buy into the popular perception of atheists as people without moral convictions and lacking integrity?
There is also the empirical reality of a lot of visibly highly religious people turning out to have serious problems with integrity and honesty.
And, of course, being really religious means the subordination of the mundane life to the pursuit of religious goals. You can trust such a person to be who he is, but you may be mistaken about the ranking of his values :-/
Interesting. So do you, then, buy into the popular perception of atheists as people without moral convictions and lacking integrity?
It’s more that I’d think of non-practicing religious or “spiritual but not religious” folks as that. Serious, committed atheists, those who sacrifice popularity, time and money for the sake of their atheism, I would accord the same trust (and for the same reasons) as the committed Muslims.
The most reliable way to create a lasting community is basing it on shared religion AND costly personal sacrifices. Secularity doesn’t cut it, even if demanding sacrifices.
Cialdini’s Influence presents a pretty strong case for Sacrifice being a very powerful method for ensuring group cohesion all by itself. For example, Fraternities and Hazing or indigenous peoples and coming-of-age rituals.
The first reason I would think of that religion does a good job of holding groups together is that it’s an interest that you’re “not supposed to” grow out of, unlike things like drinking/partying and playing sports.
I should try taking one of these ideological Turing tests some time.
I listen to a lot of conservative talk radio, and I find myself able to predict their arguments with some regularity; on the other hand, I’m probably just falling prey to confirmation bias. Also I’m not certain I’m a liberal. :-/
What the political compass calls “Libertarian” would more accurately be described as “Socially Progressive”. Actual libertarianism is the political compass’s bottom-right quadrant.
Once there was a confusion about what “liberal” really means, so some people decided to call themselves libertarians instead. Now there is a confusion about what “libertarian” really means.
Seems to me we have some kind of ideology-name treadmill here, which works like this:
start a political movement
become popular
many people will use the name of your movement, even if they disagree with a few (or later: many) points
at some moment those people will complain that you want the definition to include you, when you are obviously merely a fringe member of this movement
And it’s not even universal in the US. Or at least, it wasn’t at some point. Noam Chomsky has often referred to himself as a libertarian, and he is certainly not a right-libertarian. Glenn Greenwald is also sometimes called a libertarian, and he doesn’t have right-wing economic views either.
Strong communities tend to have a shared religion but this doesn’t tell us which way the casual arrow points. Given that trustingness is heritable, I think its likely that trustingness increases both religiosity and the ability to form a community. The sacrifice result seems a bit more robust since it was done with both religious and secular groups.
About liberals, they are the least accurate in modeling how other political groups describe themselves. However, this could mean that other groups are less genuine in their self description: for example conservatives that think that gays are gross will probably appeal to “family values” rather than being honest. And really all this tells us is that other groups are harder to understand. This doesn’t tell us if they are right or not.
Some inconvenient truths (well, “facts”) from the quotes in the latest slatestarcodex post (see the sidebar):
The most reliable way to create a lasting community is basing it on shared religion AND costly personal sacrifices. Secularity doesn’t cut it, even if demanding sacrifices.
Being religious signals trustworthiness: “The highest levels of wealth …[is]… created when religious people get to play a trust game with other religious people.”
″ religion in the United States nowadays generates such vast surpluses of social capital that much of it spills over and benefits outsiders.”
Liberals are the least accurate in modeling the views of other political groups (moderates and conservatives).
Note that this is all based exclusively on the US data.
What kind of secular communities was used in the research? The “secular community” without further specification feels a bit like a non-apple.
Maybe this is because religious communities try to solve all aspects of their member’s lives, while secular communities usually have a single purpose. Single-purpose communities can fall apart when their members focus on some other aspect of their lives. For example, yesterday they wanted to save the whales or start the proletarian revolution, today they want to start a family. A religious community can satisfy a wider range of needs. Also, your relatives are often part of the same religious community.
I imagine this is because religion has a clearly defined set of rules, and members are punished by other members if they break them. I can imagine that a christian who would steal from many people, would be unpopular within their own community. On the other hand, when a social justice warrior would steal from many people, their victims would be probably told to check their privilege, and called sexist / racist / …phobic for trying to avoid them. Okay, I exaggerate a bit here to illustrate the point.
Being a member of a group is an evidence of a trait if the group tries to change or avoid people who lack the trait.
What kind of secular communities? This question is answered in the linked post. The answer, for both secular and religious is: nineteenth century American communes. The paper is here.
Not quite—for a counterexample consider whether being a highly religious Muslim signals trustworthiness in the contemporary US.
I think in local terminology this can be generalized as an observation that high-cost precommitment to avoid certain behavior provides a convincing signal :-)
Looking at the whole thing from 10,000 feet I am impressed by how much the high-trust societies are more productive than low-trust societies.
This is a good point, being a member of the dominant religion signals trustworthiness, and most Americans probably assume religious means Christian.
I think being a member of the same religion as you signals trustworthiness. The position of Orthodox Jews in the diamond industry was quoted as an example—Judaism isn’t a dominant religion (in Amsterdam and New York), but Orthodox Jews trust *each other*.
Doesn’t it? It might not win you many friends, but I’d think it will still make you a popular business partner.
Why would being a highly religious Muslim make you a popular business partner?
Because it would indicate that you are a person of strong integrity, whose moral convictions mean a lot to you, and thus someone to be trusted.
Interesting. So do you, then, buy into the popular perception of atheists as people without moral convictions and lacking integrity?
There is also the empirical reality of a lot of visibly highly religious people turning out to have serious problems with integrity and honesty.
And, of course, being really religious means the subordination of the mundane life to the pursuit of religious goals. You can trust such a person to be who he is, but you may be mistaken about the ranking of his values :-/
It’s more that I’d think of non-practicing religious or “spiritual but not religious” folks as that. Serious, committed atheists, those who sacrifice popularity, time and money for the sake of their atheism, I would accord the same trust (and for the same reasons) as the committed Muslims.
Cialdini’s Influence presents a pretty strong case for Sacrifice being a very powerful method for ensuring group cohesion all by itself. For example, Fraternities and Hazing or indigenous peoples and coming-of-age rituals.
The first reason I would think of that religion does a good job of holding groups together is that it’s an interest that you’re “not supposed to” grow out of, unlike things like drinking/partying and playing sports.
I should try taking one of these ideological Turing tests some time.
I listen to a lot of conservative talk radio, and I find myself able to predict their arguments with some regularity; on the other hand, I’m probably just falling prey to confirmation bias. Also I’m not certain I’m a liberal. :-/
Probably closer to a libertarian: fiscally conservative, socially “progressive”.
I… don’t know. I don’t identify with the self-identified libertarians in my peer group.
EDIT: Just scored −6.62 (Leftist) and −6.21 (Libertarian) on the political compass. So I suppose I am. Weird.
What the political compass calls “Libertarian” would more accurately be described as “Socially Progressive”. Actual libertarianism is the political compass’s bottom-right quadrant.
I think the use of “libertarian” to refer to right-libertarian specifically is a mostly US thing.
Once there was a confusion about what “liberal” really means, so some people decided to call themselves libertarians instead. Now there is a confusion about what “libertarian” really means.
Seems to me we have some kind of ideology-name treadmill here, which works like this:
start a political movement
become popular
many people will use the name of your movement, even if they disagree with a few (or later: many) points
at some moment those people will complain that you want the definition to include you, when you are obviously merely a fringe member of this movement
And it’s not even universal in the US. Or at least, it wasn’t at some point. Noam Chomsky has often referred to himself as a libertarian, and he is certainly not a right-libertarian. Glenn Greenwald is also sometimes called a libertarian, and he doesn’t have right-wing economic views either.
Hurrah for increasing self-knowledge!
Strong communities tend to have a shared religion but this doesn’t tell us which way the casual arrow points. Given that trustingness is heritable, I think its likely that trustingness increases both religiosity and the ability to form a community. The sacrifice result seems a bit more robust since it was done with both religious and secular groups.
About liberals, they are the least accurate in modeling how other political groups describe themselves. However, this could mean that other groups are less genuine in their self description: for example conservatives that think that gays are gross will probably appeal to “family values” rather than being honest. And really all this tells us is that other groups are harder to understand. This doesn’t tell us if they are right or not.