(I've done some more thinking about my last entry. Here is an expanded version.)
Evolution did not equip us for solitary living. It has been done, but only
rarely, and most of us would find it hellish even if we could do it. For most of
human history, rejection by one's tribe was practically a death sentence. There
were usually no other tribes nearby, and if there were, there was no assurance
they would accept another tribe's outcast.
So there is no point in denouncing tribalism as such. Like all our other
emotions, the good or the bad lies in how we apply it. What we can denounce is
the kind of tribalism that says no person with good sense or good morals would
belong to any tribe but our own. The prevalence of this kind of tribalism is a
major reason for the current troubles.
This is especially pernicious with ideological or doxastic tribes, which are
those defined by doctrinal systems. Certain religions are the archetypal
ideological tribes, but many political movements these days seem to fit the
category, too. It is as though, at least among secularists, political movements
have taken the place of religion.
Yes, we need other people. But why the divisions? Why can't we just all work
together for everyone's benefit? Because we're not all alike. In particular, we
don't agree on what is beneficial to everyone. Some of our differences are
trivial and some are not, and what some of us think are trivial differences,
others regard as being of supreme importance.
For the sake of self-preservation, we have a default entitlement to defend our
own tribe — to assume that we are correct in believing what our epistemic
community tells us. This means that we are not obliged to unthinkingly reject the notion that
we'd be better off joining another tribe. At the same time, any tribe
collectively is entitled to oppose betrayal and punish disloyalty as it chooses.
But, no tribe is more entitled to that than any other.
Recruitment is, unavoidably, a solicitation of betrayal. To leave an ideological
tribe is to betray it. That is one among many reasons why it is so difficult to
change people's minds. It is pointless to observe that some tribes really ought
to be betrayed, because their members cannot be faulted for failing to realize
that. We are all relativists when judging the morality of loyalty: Their people
should not be loyal, but ours must be.
Perhaps our first battle must be against infallibilism. How can we even begin to
argue with people who think it impossible that they might be mistaken? There is
this oddity of the current intellectual climate. We see intransigence everywhere
at the same time that the air is saturated with postmodern relativism. The
postmodernists think nobody knows anything, but if you belong to a tribe that
accepts such a notion, it will also think the tribe itself knows what is right.
It’s a bit like a religious group that might say: God is no respecter of
persons, but we are his chosen people. Or like those who say that no worldview
is superior to any other, except that we know it is OK to condemn and, whenever
possible, to silence, any racist worldview.
Next: On the disrepute of reason, science, and humanism
(This page last updated on October 17, 2019.)