Origin Of Consciousness
Origin Of ConsciousnessMore completely, TheOriginOfConsciousnessInTheBreakdownOfTheBicameralMind by JulianJaynes. ISBN 0395563526
Jaynes suggests that mankind was not really conscious until the 1st millennium BC.
Jaynes studied metaphorical usage as a way of teasing mental states out of old texts. This was just a means to his end, defending his radical hypothesis which I would summarize as follows:
The book is a mind stretcher. It got me interested in common metaphor as an atom of thought. I've since read:
Note that MetaphorsWeLiveBy and WomenFireAndDangerousThings, although they do certainly 'study metaphorical usage', don't support and don't really have anything to do with Jaynes' more wacky^Wunconventional ideas.
One of the most startling of Jaynes' assertions is that the human brain, until very recently (~3000 years ago) was truly split into very distinct hemispheres: the left half allowed a person to function in day-to-day routine matters; the right side came into play under stress, providing guidance through hallucinated voices, usually those of authority figures, alive or dead leaders, or gods. People were not self-conscious, and operated almost as automatons in responding to the hallucinated voices. This phenomenon provided social stability, order, and safety in ancient societies. Jaynes even postulates that the construction of the pyramids of Egypt were only possible with this type of social control. which enabled the builders to function at a level of activity seen in our own times only in obsessive psychotics. Indeed, he attributes such modern maladies as psychosis, Tourette's Syndrome, and religious hallucinations to brain activity under stress that results in this loss of self as its source.
The rapid change in how people utilized brain structures, Jaynes believes, came about as natural disasters pushed people of different cultures into encounters with one another. Marching to different voices, which may have caused violence to erupt, those individuals who could ignore their hallucinated voices would best survive such encounters by learning to become devious, i.e. to exhibit behavior contrary to what they actually thought.
As proof throughout this work he offers that nowhere in ancient literature is there a reference to a thinking self which chooses among options weighed and pondered. His arguments in support of the hypothesis span sculpture, literature, medicine, and other fields in an amazing journey through the history of human consciousness. Language, according to Jaynes, preceded thought, and in fact is all that made it possible.
But don't read this; get the book!
-- DonOlson
A fun idea, but I gather that serious anthropologists, archaeologists and cognitive scientists view it as analogous to the notion that Martians built the pyramids.
One apparent but false strength in JulianJaynes' argument is that he builds up and tears down straw men. For example, the idea that thought is based on language is now pass? for a more plausible skewering of the SapirWhorfHypothesis, see TheLanguageInstinct by MIT linguist StevenPinker.
Do you consider DanielDennett serious? If you do, have a look at his "JulianJaynes's Software Archeology." Canadian Psychological Association Symposium on Consciousness (1985, Halifax, Canada). Canadian Psychology (April 1986), 27(2):149-154. Online at http://www.julianjaynes.org/pdf/dennett_jaynes-software-archeology.pdf
In the same issue are two(?) other commentaries on Jaynes's book and a reply by Jaynes.
"As proof throughout this work he offers that nowhere in ancient literature is there a reference to a thinking self which chooses among options weighed and pondered."
I don't believe it. Consider the book of Job in the Bible. Job is supposed to be very old, probably as old as any other part of the Bible. It is poetry about the meaning of suffering, why God doesn't punish evil, and lots of other questions that people still ask. The main character never gets his questions answered.
Job 27 is (NIV translation) "As surely as God lives, who has denied me justice, the Almighty, who has made me taste bitterness of soul, as long as I have life within me, the breath of God in my nostrils, my lips will not speak wickedness, and my tongue will utter no deceit. I will never admit you are in the right; till I die, I will not deny my integrity. I will maintain my righteousness and never let go of it; my conscience will not reproach me as long as I live."
Can these be the words of an unconscious being?
Or Job 31:1 "I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a girl". Or Job 32 "I waited while you spoke, I listened to your reasoning; while you were searching for words, I gave you my full attention. But not one of you has proved Job wrong; none of you has answered his arguments."
I don't have any trouble putting myself in the place of the person who wrote these words. It is clear that they are the words of someone struggling with what is right and wrong, who thinks about decisions to be made, who determined a course of action but keeps wondering whether it was right.
-- RalphJohnson
I am no biblical scholar, but I took a look at the NIV translation of the book of Job and it seems that there is also evidence in support of Jaynes' thesis right in the very verses Ralph quotes.
Worry about your own fate. Job's fate is secure.-- DonOlson
I was not arguing against all of Jaynes' thesis, just the idea that old writings didn't have the idea of a self that weighed what was right and wrong and made choices. I agree with DonOlson that the first quote implies that Job feels abandoned. The second also implies that he thinks that God punishes evil-doers and rewards good-doers. But it doesn't imply that he automatically does good because God made him so that he does good. The point I was trying to make is that Job is claiming that he made a decision to do certain things. He made that decision because he thought God would reward him for it. He is not being rewarded, so he thinks that God is not holding up his end of the bargain, but he has decided to go on doing what is right anyway.
This seems to me to be the act of a conscious being (with a conscience). Maybe I don't know what "conscience" means, but it certainly seems to me that Job is weighing and pondering options, and choosing one.
An interesting meta-observation is that I was tempted to go back and fix my earlier comments, because I can see that I didn't explain things well. But that would make DonOlson's comments look out of place. Perhaps Don and I should send each other e-mail until we understand each other's point of view, and then edit the comments to reflect that. If we did that, this page wouldn't explain the history of how it came to be. But books rarely do. Most books have a history that is mostly lost, and most of the readers don't care.
-- RalphJohnson
RalphJohnson is right on the money regarding Job's choices revealing what we would call conscience. I thought some more about all this, and when I recall Jaynes' belief that it was under stress that man hallucinated the voices, it makes sense that Job would have to make up his own mind, given that God had abandoned him. And Job certainly was under a lot of stress. Perhaps Job is the earliest example of "modern" consciousness, but at the expense of terrible suffering. Thanks and a tip of the hat to RalphJohnson, for adding new insight to Jaynes and Job.
-- DonOlson
Job's choices as presented in the NIV bible reveal nothing. It's one of JulianJaynes' points that translations of pre-conscious writings are butchered by translators. Consider all the references to "soul" in Job. To be able to prove that there are references to conscious thought in the older parts of the Judeo-Christian Bible, you would have to, at a minimum, be able to read it in the original language.
Further, there's a very interesting slip when Ralph says that the passages in Job reveal a "conscience" being, as opposed to a conscious one. A "conscience" in its more literal form (eg, persecutive alter or Freudian super-ego) is just a weakened divine voice. IOW, a weak form of bicamerality.
As for the claim that Job's decisions show consciousness, this is problematic at best. Reading it, I find no evidence of any decision-making at all, let alone conscious decision-making which implies hypotheticals (see WhatIsConsciousness) and not simply "being of two parts". What I find most striking about Job 31 is all the references to disconnected body parts. "If my eyes", "If my heart", "If my tongue" blah blah blah. Where is the reference to a self that performs any actions? Ignoring all of this to focus on a couple of obscure passages that may or may not show consciousness after a lot of imaginative interpretation isn't good policy. -- RichardKulisz
Richard, how about:
2:7 So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord, and he afflicted Job with a malignant ulcer from the sole of his feet to the top of his head.
2:8 Job took a shard of broken pottery to scrape himself with while he was sitting among the ashes.
2:9 Then his wife said to him, “Are you still holding firmly to your integrity? Curse God, and die!”
2:10 But he replied, “You’re talking like one of the godless women would do! Should we receive what is good from God, and not also receive what is evil?” In all this Job did not sin by what he said.
That appears to be "conscious decision-making" to me. It shows reasoning "Should we receive what is good... and not what is evil?" -- BrucePennington
I read Jaynes book long ago when it was first published. It is a fascinating book, which isn't the same as saying that it's at all probable as an explanation of anything. I'd compare it more to "Chariots of the Gods" than anything cogent. On the other hand MetaphorsWeLiveBy by Lakoff is quite a different matter. The idea that somehow metaphors play a fundamental role in our cognitive makeup seems both intuitive and correct, especially when you examine Lakoff and Johnson's material. I particularly like the idea of entailment - which shows that metaphors explain parts of concepts and that one gets a coherent picture by combining many metaphors - that sort of idea seems particularly appropriate on a connectionist kind of model which the brain would appear to be. How it all might work is yet to be discovered. Jaynes' book's most significant virtue is that it point up the problem and is so outrageous that you have to answer it at least in your own intellectual makeup. His data depends on the emergence of written language going from simple accounts to reflexive self-reflection - he sees this as the emergence of consciousness, but it isn't. It's the emergence of written language which is a very different thing. -- RaySchneider
Is it? You're suggesting that people had deep self-conscious thoughts which they spoke to each other, yet nobody ever bothered to write any of them down? And of the things that were written down, you have stuff like Hammurabi's laws and that Assyrian king's proclamations which are completely alien to us conscious people. Why did written language "emerge" in a form completely devoid of, and gratuitously antithetical to, consciousness? How is that even possible if people were conscious at the time?
You're suggesting that some large class of historical artifacts is completely unrepresentative of history. I think that this is an extraordinary belief which requires extraordinary evidence. The burden of proof is upon you. -- RichardKulisz
Whatever Jaynes is looking at, it can't possibly be an artifact of early writing styles. One of the things he considers most is the Iliad after all, and while I don't think anyone has precisely settled the nature of its composition, it is definitely reflective of a long oral tradition.
It is interesting that Jaynes speaks of the localization, in Iliad, of various human characteristics in body parts, just as Job does: thumos is where courage is, kradie is where fear is, and so on... Perhaps the most poignant passage he cites is of the character who suddenly becomes aware of an idea in mind, recognizing that it is not a god-voice: "But wherefore does my life say this to me?"
Something I've just discovered, and which came as a shock, is that if JulianJaynes is right about the development of spoken language, NoamChomsky is wrong about the existence of a Universal Grammar.
Given that chimps display consciousness, without a need for a written language, I find the thesis to be unlikely.
This is wrong, chimps do not display consciousness. See WhatIsConsciousness.
I looked at it. I see nothing that prevents a chimp from being conscious. They can abstract themselves. They can refer to themselves. They can empathize. What evidence do you need to be conscious by your definition?
Not really science. More the kind of thing that gets done in bars and golf clubs. Pop up an untestable theory and then translate a bunch of vague evidence into hypersyllabic rationalization. Good if you also like astrology.
I would really, really like to think the above was written by someone who actually read the book.
Hmm. Disagree with it?
Only halfway. But, agree or disagree, I think it's a hell of a book, one which has much food for thought, and certainly deserves more of a review than a half-paragraph dismissal.
Maybe it's not really science, but then, lots of things - such as skiing and gardening, but also philosophy or fiction - are also not science, and we don't criticize books on these topics for not really being science. It seems to me that what gets done in bars is mostly drinking (too much of that by solitary people who don't talk much), and I'd be surprised if a lot of conversation in golf clubs (where I expect people relax after playing golf) revolved around Jaynes. His theory isn't untestable; the vagueness of his evidence and hypersyllabism are substantial critiques, which I might take seriously if they were expanded somewhat, with examples or citations. The dig at astrology, while understandable, is no less gratuitous than the other things.
Is sniping at astrology understandable? It offers a world model, just as science and religion do. If predictions made using that model prove useful, then the model is worthwhile. The only way I can see to justifiably criticize astrology is to show that it isn't a useful model of the world. The jibe at astrology and the "not really science" comment speak to me of inflexibility of the little grey cells. Happily, this discussion - and this forum - are remarkably lacking in such attitudes. -- SteveMerrick
Science provides hypothesis that can be tested anytime, anywhere by anybody so that the results will be what the hypothesis predicts. Astrology produces generally vague estimations of general patterns of behavior, and in fact follows a general pattern of belief about human nature. The upshot of this is that the more you practice astrology, the more you buy into it's depiction of human nature and the more you begin to follow along in the general plan of it's unique psychology. This is what's know as an Art. More specifically, it's an Art of Human Nature based on seasonal birth order and larger decade long cycles. However, it provides little or nothing in the way of objective testable hypothesis that can be confirmed or disproven, so, no it is not a science.
-- DonLindsay?
The physical sciences unfortunately (and almost admittedly) tend to be rather simplistic, studying mostly atomic (as in, indivisible, not atomic particles) entities in abstract models of systems. Science rarely investigates they whys or whens of long term events. What you might call "vague estimations" others might call "large-scale-" or maybe even "meta-" patterns. The fact that something cannot be strictly quantified and wrapped up in an equation, or written in some domain specific notation which can be abstractly and mechanically manipulated and (a la Chemistry) doesn't make that something useless or meaningless -- esp. not the latter, being as meaning is, by it's very nature "vague" or ill-defined. Perhaps I should simply defer to RobertPirsig's LilaAnInquiryIntoMorals for more on the inherant problems in the search for pure quantifiability. -- IsaacFreeman
That about covers why I don't like the review. It would be much more interesting to see substantial reasons why the original author didn't like the book.
Which is why I hoped she'd actually read it.
"Hypersyllabism" isn't a serious critique of the book at all. The author rarely uses words which people shouldn't know already and the very few he does, he explains quite thoroughly. Similarly, the theory is eminently testable and JulianJaynes presents plenty of evidence for it. If it's not quite enough evidence for some readers, well that's always the case with every book presenting a grand theory. So the "review" is just a bunch of outright lies and slander, and I don't know why you bothered to take it seriously instead of just erasing it.
In an early chapter, Jaynes relates that he experienced auditory hallucination in response to (academic?) stress. I wonder how much that contributed to the importance of auditory hallucination in the body of his theory. Granted he's provided the arguments from brain research for why auditory hallucinations are the preferred kind for bicamerals, but still the idea had to come from somewhere, and there's this thing called SelectionBias?.
I'm re-reading this book. The bit I don't get is how he thinks consciousness spread. He seems to think the Incas were bicameral and pre-conscious when the Spaniards invaded. Does he really think consciousness came from Europe?
I haven't read the book, but this to me would be the fatal flaw in the hypothesis. If consciousness were not present anywhere in the world and then suddenly appeared fully formed all over the world circa 1000 BC, we would have to be able to explain this sudden evolution. The mind must have been capable of consciousness long before 1000 BC; in fact it must have been capable before humans spread across the entire globe, which off the top of my head is closer to 40 000 years ago. That written expressions of consciousness might not be evident until recently is more due to the recentness of writing than the recentness of consciousness. Nobody wrote computer programs until very very recently, but does that mean that people of 500 years ago were incapable of writing computer programs or thinking algorithmically?
A more accurate comparison would be with Object-Oriented programming. Had people been conscious since the invention of writing, then the earliest writing would reflect a conscious mind. Had OO been invented before the first computers, then the first programs would have been OO. Neither is the case of course.
So people were not capable of thinking in an object-oriented style before OO was invented? Still doesn't wash. Technologies and their applications don't pop into the world fully formed. New applications for old technologies are constantly discovered. Writing simply hadn't been around long enough for people to realize that they could express their consciousness via writing. This was a technological discovery, not a biological evolutionary change.
Except that conscious expressions are absent from writings derived directly off of oral traditions, like the Iliad. This was already explained above. Writing was a few millennia old by the time it shows any signs of consciousness in it, which would be extremely peculiar were it around.
I disagree. Math was around a long time before calculus was invented. The ultimate test (for me) would be this: If I took a human infant from >3000 years ago and raised it in today's modern culture, would it be able to do calculus, express consciousness, cry at a good movie, etc.? I have little doubt that the answer is yes, although this experiment is impossible. What we are seeing is the evolution of culture and technology, not biological evolution. Biological evolution takes much longer, and can't jump from mind to mind.
Jaynes isn't arguing that people were incapable of consciousness for biological reasons, but that they weren't conscious, presumably because of social reasons. So your disagreement is entirely valid, but isn't with anything Jaynes was saying. I suspect this resolves a number of the points below as well. For instance, it explains why human development being inherently social is absolutely critical to the point at hand.
Well, then maybe some of the discussion on this page is misrepresenting Jaynes. For example:
Except it is learned, because as you said, it doesn't develop in absence of suitable stimulus. If another mental state is possible, it should correspond to a different sort of activity. The exact type Jaynes is suggesting isn't as different as you think, but it is the weak point in his hypothesis and shouldn't be considered as crucial to the rest.
Baseball is learned. The ability to learn baseball is a developmental issue. It's like growing up with a deformed arm and not being able to throw a ball versus growing up with a normal arm and not being able to throw a ball because you've just never tried it before.
Another flaw in your reasoning is that the mind must have been capable of consciousness before it actually appeared. It's only the brain that must have been so capable, and it was almost as soon as humans appeared.
What's the difference between the mind and the brain? There isn't much of one as I see it.
Brains don't have to exhibit all the behaviors they're capable of. It should be clear someone can lose their mind without losing their brain.
"Lose your mind" is simply an expression. Can someone become incapable of consciousness without some damage to their brains? I severely doubt it.
I don't think if often happens, but I would be surprised if a person kept alive in a sensory deprivation chamber for a few decades was still capable of conscious thought. There is good evidence that babies denied interaction in their first few years don't develop conscious minds. This without any physical damage to the brain being necessary.
And surely his brain would be beyond repair. The brain needs sensory input or it atrophies. This is well known. Babies denied interaction also have malformed brains. Without the proper environment, the brain simply fails to develop the proper physical structure and chemical balance.
Consciousness did not appear until a few millennia ago because it had to evolve. Or more precisely, it had to co-evolve along with the specific childrearing practices that encourage the formation of consciousness in children. To see how this is so, observe that children raised by animals do not ever acquire consciousness, yet there is no doubt they possessed the potential for it as infants.
This only shows that human development is inherently social, which doesn't seem relevant to me. Back to the question of the Incas and Native Americans. So, you're saying that they weren't conscious until Europeans discovered them, and then suddenly they were conscious? Or did everyone around the world become conscious all at once? If they weren't conscious, then why wasn't this apparent to the European discoverers?
[And why isn't that apparent from talking to them? Anthropologists continued to make contact with isolated groups of people up through the 20th century. Why do they seem so much like us when it comes to consciousness? Where are the bicameral voices?]
Consciousness would have spread through cultural influences. I can't speak for the presence of bicameral voices, but there are strong suggestions that extremely isolated groups aren't like us when it comes to consciousness. These arguments have nothing to do with Jaynes, and in fact they predate his work. The European discoverers noticed the difference, but because they labelled essentially everyone they came across as sub-human, their opinions of them are rather devalued.
[But there is extensive ethnographic research on isolated groups. They use words and concepts that Jaynes claims are post-bicameral. They don't report hearing voices without ingesting psychoactive plants. Yes, their consciousness differs from ours in some ways, but they show no signs of lacking consciousness. Does the act of talking to an anthropologist cause a bicameral mind to break down?]
If indeed consciousness is a recent event, we should be able to trace the spread of consciousness throughout humanity. There should be evidence of consciousness 'catching on' in each culture at certain periods of time. I know of no such evidence. Doesn't mean it doesn't exist, but at least we have some way of identifying that such a thing did or did not occur.
I'm not convinced by Jaynes' arguments, specifically about the time that consciousness arose and the widespread existence of hallucinated voices before that time, but there was a time when our ancestors weren't conscious in any way we would recognize it. So when did our kind of mind come about? I don't think its older than 100,000 years, but I don't think it's younger than 40,000 years either.
What makes you think that? What's wrong with Jaynes' evidence about when the transition occurred?
I think that from archeological evidence, much of which has been found since Jaynes published. There is evidence for ceremonial burial going back almost 100,000 years in South Africa. Our brains seem to be pretty much the same as those of our ancestors going back 40,000 years. Rather than brains evolving the propensity for consciousness tens of thousands of years before it evolved, it seems more likely that consciousness co-evolved with brains as a successful survival strategy. I don't have hard evidence for any of this, but I'm not publishing books on the subject.
Trust me, Jaynes was well aware that there was ceremonial burial and indeed well-functioning cities centuries before what he considered the transition mark. If you regard these as evidence of consciousness, it may be worth looking into why he does not.
I know, he claims ceremonial burial as evidence for bicameral minds. But he offers no reason I should believe this. My culture practices ceremonial burial, but we aren't bicameral. I can apply OccamsRazor and lop off the bicameral stuff. People bury their dead because they love them.
The point isn't that ceremonial burial is evidence for bicamerality, but that it isn't evidence for consciousness. The assumption that people did things in the past for the same reasons they do now gets you into trouble fast. We bury our dead to commemorate them. We don't sacrifice artifacts and slaves for their subsequent use, recite formulae to keep them from coming out again, try feeding them while they are there, and feel a desperate need to have children so we will be so provided for. Ancients did, which suggests they didn't do things for the same reasons we do.
All of those behaviors can be explained by applying our motivations to a different working model of death. Regardless, I see no evidence for a bicameral past in this book.
Sort of. Ancient societies can definitely be explained by considering their beliefs and values, but the result is extremely alien. People scarcely had the notion that they were doing anything, instead attributing everything to gods, and spent their entire lives worrying about them. Well after the transition began, Spartan men would take arrows because the auspices had not yet told them to fight back, and their women would mourn the survivors and rejoice in the dead because the city wanted them to. Once you have the full picture, it's very difficult to say the people thought the same way we did. Jaynes is not unique, or even notable, in having realized this. What he does is offer some suggestion as to what the difference is.
This doesn't seem alien to me at all. I was raised by people who believed angels and demons were directing their actions and determining the outcome. As far as I can tell, those people possess the same sort of consciousness as I do. Perhaps Jaynes would not consider me conscious?
There is a severe difference in degree. Even people who believe their actions are preordained act as if they are making the choices. If you look at the ancient literature, they rarely act that way. Inscriptions end just about every sentence with a reference to a god. Telemachus does not have ideas, Athena appears to him. And so forth. Why would they have written and talked like this, unless they thought that way?
I'm not convinced they wrote that way. The ancient literature I look at shows ample evidence of consciousness, decision making, self awareness, etc. Jaynes claims that's because it's improperly translated, but he offers no evidence for that claim. And even if they did write that way, that wouldn't prove they talked that way or thought that way. Literary forms are often distinct from spoken forms.
Fine. I don't know what you think ancient societies were like, or why they wrote so differently from how they spoke, but whatever. I've said several times the Iliad reflects primarily oral traditions, so this isn't a textual artifact, and as you haven't even acknowledged this, I expect there is small chance I will be able to say anything that will be of any value to you. In that case, I won't bother trying.
Jaynes' evidence doesn't seem like evidence to me. He claims that early writing shows no sign of consciousness, and when it does, he claims that's bad translation. There's no way to disprove that kind of claim. He doesn't offer hard evidence of why consciousness arose or how it propagated, just conjecture based on his idea that the right hemisphere used to send auditory commands to the left hemisphere. I started the book willing to be convinced, but he doesn't even try. He assumes his point of view and applies it to ancient cultures. At one point he describes contemporary Mesoamericans using peyote to induce hallucinations, then says it must be an attempt to reproduce the voices of their bicameral past. He skips over the much simpler idea that they've been using peyote all along.
That's possible - Jaynes, like all people with new ideas, is liable to be overzealous in their application. He doesn't explain how the origin and propagation of consciousness occurred, but that's because it's enough of a task to explain their history. The evidence that ancient people thought very differently seems fairly reasonable to me. As for the notion that translations are bad to work off of, I have seen plenty of translated texts that would enable me to conclude the ancient Greeks were monotheists, because they constantly invoke a singular God. Saying the careful examination of the source texts is necessary doesn't make his hypothesis unfalsifiable.
Saying that any translation that doesn't support his hypothesis does, though.
[Heck, the Japanese think very differently than I do. That's just culture, not consciousness.]
The Japanese have different beliefs and values, but they do have a sense of self. The argument here is that ancient people didn't.
If this change provided such an advantage that every culture everywhere on Earth would eventually adopt it, and this change was so easy to make that it was simply like flipping a switch in somebody's head, then why wasn't it adopted much earlier than 3000 years ago?
If it was not as easy as flipping a switch in somebody's head, then how did it spread so thoroughly into every culture everywhere on Earth?
The change involved social evolution, and could not occur until it reached a particular stage. This is already discussed above. But fine, don't read before contributing.
Don't assume ignorance. I read it, but it doesn't make sense. There are two possible interpretations of 'social evolution': The biological evolution of the human ability to be social, and the cultural evolution of a society (ideas, not genes). Biological evolution takes a long time. This seems to disqualify the 3000 years ago idea. Cultural evolution doesn't explain the pervasiveness of human consciousness, and also doesn't explain why it waited until 3000 years ago to happen. Example of cultural evolution: It took thousands of years for writing to spread, and there are still cultures that don't have a written language, and there is still a high degree of illiteracy in many countries. Consciousness seems like a much more drastic change, and yet it is everywhere.
I don't know why it waited until 3000 years ago, or was so pervasive. But I don't know why cities and writing waited until 5000 years ago to develop, or why the widespread infanticide practiced in ancient societies is so uncommon now. Asking for causes is somewhat unfair, when so little of social development is understood, and people are barely will to say the effect exists!
Who said it was always just around the corner, or spread so quickly?
Because simpler explanations aren't better when they don't explain as much, and without Jaynes it's much harder to explain why ancient peoples wrote and behaved the way they did?
What's to explain? You can walk into any bookstore and read contemporary accounts of gods telling people what to do. Visit any funeral home and witness short term mummification, the application of makeup to corpses, ceremonies conducted with corpses on display and the incantation of ancient texts. In a few weeks we'll celebrate the Day of the Dead in my part of the world. People will create altars for their deceased loved ones and offer them food, drink, tobacco, books, music, etc. as if they were still alive. Perhaps Jaynes lived in a less superstitious world than I do. Perhaps Jaynes felt the need to build his theory to explain why ancient peoples wrote and behaved the way they did, but I don't.
The superstitions of today are not the same as the all-pervasive religions of the past, despite some elements they derive from them. People have definitely changed over the millennia, as Jaynes is not the only one to note. If you're not interested enough in historical sociology to wonder how or why, though, it's no surprise his hypothesis holds no appeal for you.
I'm interested enough to read the book twice. His hypothesis holds appeal for me, but appeal alone isn't enough reason to believe it. People have changed, we agree about that, but Jaynes fails to convince me those changes took them through a bicameral mind period.
A few things I'd like to state, though I've never read the book. I suppose that could provide an unprejudiced viewpoint, though.
It is (at the least) possible that there are some today that are not conscious, and it is quite probable that few are conscious the majority of the time. Look at yourself and those around you as an example. Are there times when you are not fully conscious? When you are not completely aware, when you are simply doing as you normally do? And are there ever times where you don't even think about what's going on?
Just as well, not all people today are necessarily "conscious." I'm not certain what definition of consciousness is being applied, but consider a "civilized" example. Middle school - or even high school. Read "Why Nerds are Unpopular" and "Lord of the Flies." These depict the civilizations in question in an utterly savage, but sadly accurate manner. Certainly one cannot state that all (or even most) members of those societies were conscious! And just as well, the same is true in our every day lives. Not everyone is conscious.
Just as well, the aforementioned argument strengthens another of my opinions. Consciousness is a learned and acquired trait - and as such, it is an evolving trait. It is neither an end nor a beginning, and it is something that is not defined by either restraints upon time or culture. For example, suppose that Job, mentioned above, was conscious - this is an indication that Job acquired the trait of consciousness through his suffering. It is further indicative of the possible lesser consciousness his culture possessed - had he been completely conscious when he had begun his struggles, it is probable he would have been "enlightened" at their conclusion. Therefore, if my reasoning holds true, consciousness is based both on the culture surrounding a person and, more so, that person's own experiences. Consciousness is a trait which can evolve in a civilization without influence from outside cultures - where else would it have originated from? It requires only a method and a cause. Without a method of introducing a culture or person to consciousness, that culture or person cannot attain consciousness. Without a cause, there is no reason for them to attain consciousness, and therefore, they will not attain consciousness. For a specific instance of this cause-method-effect theorem, I'll refer back to the formerly mentioned "Middle school" example. The students mentioned have no need for consciousness at that stage in their development, and just as well, most have no method of attaining it. Some may have attained consciousness - the nerds mentioned in the article - but the majority have not. However, once reaching High School, or a more subsequent stage in their life, they have both a cause and method for attaining consciousness. Their reason is that they MUST, in order to survive. The method is provided via a more complete, helpful, and suddenly accessible source of information. In some situations, this information is forced on them. In other situations, they seek it, and in some situations, neither occurs, and they may either acquire consciousness through interaction with others or they may not acquire it. Some never attain consciousness. It doesn't come from nowhere - it comes from the knowledge and wisdom of those before you.
Something else I would like to propose. It is possible that all (or most) humans are conscious part of the time. However, being conscious a small portion of the time does not necessarily imply conscious. Perhaps if one is conscious a Significant portion of the time, then they can be considered "conscious." However, there will evidently be distorted beliefs on the meaning of the word significant - anywhere from one percent to ninety nine. I'm in favor of it falling somewhere around ten percent. And just as well, if one attained a greater level of consciousness, and more often, they could be considered "enlightened," or something similar to it. This could be anywhere from two percent to one hundred percent of the time. However, this is merely speculation, and my own unfounded opinion. If you can (intelligently) support or refute it, do so.
A few things I've mentioned - consciousness does not require consciousness to be formed - but it does require some source, and generally, but not necessarily, a reason. (Cause-Method-Effect.) Also, consciousness is based on a person's personal experiences primarily, and secondarily on their environment. In addition, not everyone in the world today is conscious, and just as well, very few people are conscious most or all of the time.
Blah. That was fun. JaekTheBarbarian? (@Aim)
This page is in SeriousNeedOfRefactoring, and as one of the participants there's every chance I'd do a horrible job of it. As someone interested in the time period, I'd love to see arguments as to whether or not Jaynes is correct, based on evidence about ancient peoples - like the discussion of Job, above. Most of the material here, however, is based on simple incredulity and assumptions, sometimes without even having read the book. This makes for a lot of chaff, and seems to be making it hard for people to tell what has been addressed.
I don't have the interest or energy to do it, but when I chose to do such things, I worked in stages:
If I believed this hypothesis to be true, I would point out, that it might not be culturally learned (which I even more strongly doubt), but instead be a mutation, which quickly converged. There is a study, that the LeastRecentCommonAncestorOfMen might have lived 2-5 thousand years ago.
A collection of related Italian and English articles may be found on http://www.neuroingegneria.com/.
There is some comment on this book in the more recent TheMasterAndHisEmissary.
See also: WhatIsIntent
Example of BookDiscussion
EditText of this page
(last edited July 10, 2013)
or FindPage with title or text search