Situational Mode of Thinking

[Heyo]

Yes, in way. I'm curious, now, about the evidence for the idea that pre-literate people think differently. I'm sure it could be the case, but I would like to see how it can be known, or why it is suspected.

I don't know about the epistemology historians (or anthropologists or sociologists) use but as a tangent I offer the Flynn Effect. Throughout the 20th century IQ scores have been rising in western countries. One possible explanation is a higher prevalence for abstract thinking.
"Environmental changes resulting from modernization—such as more intellectually demanding work, greater use of technology, and smaller families—have meant that a much larger proportion of people are more accustomed to manipulating abstract concepts such as hypotheses and categories than a century ago. Substantial portions of IQ tests deal with these abilities. Flynn gives, as an example, the question 'What do a dog and a rabbit have in common?' A modern respondent might say they are both mammals (an abstract, or a priori answer, which depends only on the meanings of the words dog and rabbit), whereas someone a century ago might have said that humans catch rabbits with dogs (a concrete, or a posteriori answer, which depended on what happened to be the case at that time)." - James Flynn, 2007

 

[crossfire]

Do you have access to the German version? Was the word used kiebitzen, or more well known as the Yiddish Kibitz?

 

[Secret Chief]

I don't think so. It's talking about Mediaevals as a whole. The paragraph much earlier in the book might help,

'Research conducted in the twentieth century into preliterate nations has given us a new insight into what these barbarians brought with them. One key factor to emerge was that they displayed an additive rather than a subordinative way of thinking, approached things in an aggregative rather than analytical manner, essentially took cognizance of surroundings on the spur of the moment, and were incapable of abstraction. In other words, this way of thinking did not organise its environment into categories, but instead preferred to cling tenaciously to familiar, traditional modes of thought and action.'

The passage in the OP is talking about the Carolingian Court, so Early Middle Ages.

Essentially I think it's like the rabbit, dog, carrot situation. When asked to find the odd one out of these three, most Westerners pick the carrot, but those not trained in Western forms of thinking may group the rabbit with the carrot and consider the dog the odd one, as rabbits eat carrots. I.e., relational thinking instead of categorisation by

I picked the dog.

 

[Rival]

Do you have access to the German version? Was the word used kiebitzen, or more well known as the Yiddish Kibitz?

I'll see if I can find it.

 

[crossfire]

I'll see if I can find it.

It certainly sounds like Kibitz in the older sense of the word--reading the room or the cardholders' expressions in a gambling card game.

 

[crossfire]

 

[Rival]

Do you have access to the German version? Was the word used kiebitzen, or more well known as the Yiddish Kibitz?

I can't find either word, so wondering if the search function is broken; nor do I have access to the whole book, either though Das Mittelalter

 

[wellwisher]

I haven’t come across it. From a quick search, the adjective “situational” seems to mean situation-dependent, varying according to each situation. The passage you quote does not seem to offer many clues as to what is meant. Who are the “them” the author is talking about?

Situational thinking, in modern experience, is more like political or diplomatic thinking and posturing, where you say and do what is politically expedient, in any given situation. The truth and facts may not work. For example, if you were a Conservative in a Liberal College, you may need to forget about logic and reason, and simply recite the mantra du jour, or else you will become a target, instead of accepted.

In situational thinking, you play the games needed and expected to blend in social situations, based on who you with and their mood at that time. Some people may require the Queen, flirt, while others need her to be harsh. But in all cases, it allows her to blend and even control with needs of the situation.

Situational thinking appears to be connected to the mother and child, when her child is moody and flighty, and needs different tactics to get them to cooperate, based on their whims du jour. The King, Queen and their Court were all over privileged, so they could be like spoiled children in adult bodies with mood swings and swords. One had to deal with big ego while also having to maintain cooperation, for other matters. You needed to know how to play the game in all four quarters of the game, since one person could need several tactics, while with others watching, you may need to shuffle the cards, again. The Queen would learn from her mother, the art of diplomacy.

 

[Augustus]

I am reading a book about the Middle Ages; it has been translated from German so it's already pretty wooden, but this has me thinking:

'Through them, the queen and queen mother could gain influence and political weight. It was through such signs, gestures, and personal constellations that a "language" with its own semantics developed, and like any other language, it underwent changes during the course of the Middle Ages. This idiom was rooted in a situational mode of thinking and rarely used abstracts; today we struggle to understand it. Aspects that are familiar to us, such as categories of clear cause and effect or the operations of formal logic, were largely absent. After all, "terror" was more effective than argument and blood relations more important than logic.'

(The Middle Ages, Johannes Fried, pg. 45).

What is 'situational thinking' exactly? Is this a recognised mode of thought lacking abstracts, or has the author invented this term? It seems to denote a more immediate kind of thought. If we struggle to understand it, could any example be provided of what we would struggle with today?

@Augustus @exchemist @Quagmire

Sorry I keep tagging you, but because the new threads feature isn't available these threads become lost quickly.

What is the "them" through which the Queen and her mother get power mentioned at the start btw?

My guess is that the pasage is referring to something along these lines where political decisions are made based on the exercise of tangible self-interests (either benefits or the avoidance of negative consequences) mediated by the ability of the actors to project physical force:

“Finally, the fact that the wielders of political power were not forced to render account of their activities to outsiders promoted the view that politics consisted of gentlemanly agreements between members of the club. The reduction of public decision-making to private agreements had the advantage of keeping the lines of communication short and ensuring that whatever decisions were taken were agreeable to the individuals involved.

By contrast, impersonal rules tend to make decision-making cumbersome and to produce results indifferent or contrary to the private interests of the decision makers, which is of course their very point. Impersonal rules are however only imposed and observed where the administration is open to inspection by outsiders, be it by means of courts, parliaments or mass media.

Pre-industrial rulers were rarely held to be accountable to anyone apart from God; normally, their servants were not held to be responsible to anyone except their superiors either; and mass media did not exist. In short, the political process was thoroughly shielded from the public gaze, leaving everyone free to engage in endless private bargaining behind the scenes.”

Pre-Industrial Societies
Patricia Crone

 

[Brickjectivity]

'Through them, the queen and queen mother could gain influence and political weight. It was through such signs, gestures, and personal constellations that a "language" with its own semantics developed, and like any other language, it underwent changes during the course of the Middle Ages. This idiom was rooted in a situational mode of thinking and rarely used abstracts; today we struggle to understand it. Aspects that are familiar to us, such as categories of clear cause and effect or the operations of formal logic, were largely absent. After all, "terror" was more effective than argument and blood relations more important than logic.'

I am not sure but suspect this turns about speech censorship and also thought censorship. In a hierarchy such as in an office people will not only talk differently but think different around their boss. There is a kind melty thinking, and the language bows to whatever is acceptable. Like electricity takes the shortest path, people will take the easiest route. For example suppose corporate wants something done but doesn't want to explain 'Why'. Corporate might train the boss to say 'Budget'. "Its because its not in our budget." "We don't have money for X." It becomes impolite to question this in the office, and it is therefore Truth. Its just easier to accept it. That doesn't mean its true but that there is only one acceptable way to talk about the corporate decision which is hidden behind a magical budget. In truth unless we are marketing executives we have no idea where such a budget comes from. It is not an explanation, yet it silences objections. Magic.

In the presence of a royal this sort of language control can be brought fully to bear. It can be impolite to say all kinds of things, and speaking in the presence of royal could be analogous to running through an obstacle course. It can also be a red light / green light game.

 

[Rival]

What is the "them" through which the Queen and her mother get power mentioned at the start btw?

The rest of the King's court, basically, 'his friends and relatives'.

 

[Brickjectivity]

The rest of the King's court, basically, 'his friends and relatives'.

All walking on eggshells. It must have been a terrifying life.

 

[Rival]

@exchemist @Augustus @Heyo @LuisDantas @Quintessence

This is interesting (the whole article is very good),

'In summary, Luria [x] showed that, compared with people who could read and write, the thinking of illiterates is much more tied to the immediate situation (that is, the here-and-now) than to abstract reflections on the past and future. This meant that intellectual tasks which were elementary for literate people, for example simple classification, were difficult or impossible for them. In one of Luria’s experiments, semi-educated and only recently literate collective farm activists were easily able to sort skeins of wool in terms of category, shades of blue, red, yellow and so on. On the other hand illiterate peasant women who, as expert embroiderers, were perfectly well aware of subtle variations of colour, usually named the skeins concretely, with terms like ‘pig’s dung’, ‘a lot of water’, ‘cotton in bloom’, ‘rotten teeth’. When asked to classify the colours into groups, for example shades of brown, the women would say things like ‘It can’t be done, they’re not at all alike; this is like calf’s dung, this is like a peach.’'

'Luria tested illiterate men on their ability to complete simple syllogisms. One sequence went like this: In the North, all bears are white. Novaya Zemlya is in the North. What colour are the bears there? Most of the men were unable to give the correct answer, saying things like, ‘How should I know, I’ve never been to the North. I’ve seen a black bear.’ More crucially, people also seemed not to have much conception of themselves as individuals. For example when asked questions such as ‘What sort of person would you say you were?’ illiterates were unable to describe themselves and suggested to Luria and his assistants that they should ask some else to answer for them.'

'Luria realized that such responses were not due to lack of intelligence, but to the structure imposed on thought by illiteracy. Literacy continues the process of individualisation initiated by the ability to speak, but with much greater impact. Literacy extends memory, permits us to classify and to generalize and gives us the ability to move in our imagination out of the concrete here-and-now and into lengthy abstraction. Above all, literacy opens the possibility of a private world and the ability to have a uniquely personal point of view, limited only by the size of one’s library. In an important sense, literacy opens the door to personal freedom.'

Why spirituality is difficult for Westerners

This is Chapter 9 from David Hay’s book Something There: The Biology of the Human Spirit, published in London by Darton, Longman & Todd, 2006. ISBN 0-232-53637-0; and in Philadelphia by Templeton Press in 2007. ISBN-10: 1599471140; ISBN-13: 978-1599471143.

www.theosthinktank.co.uk

 

[LuisDantas]

@exchemist @Augustus @Heyo @LuisDantas @Quintessence

This is interesting (the whole article is very good),

'In summary, Luria [x] showed that, compared with people who could read and write, the thinking of illiterates is much more tied to the immediate situation (that is, the here-and-now) than to abstract reflections on the past and future. This meant that intellectual tasks which were elementary for literate people, for example simple classification, were difficult or impossible for them. In one of Luria’s experiments, semi-educated and only recently literate collective farm activists were easily able to sort skeins of wool in terms of category, shades of blue, red, yellow and so on. On the other hand illiterate peasant women who, as expert embroiderers, were perfectly well aware of subtle variations of colour, usually named the skeins concretely, with terms like ‘pig’s dung’, ‘a lot of water’, ‘cotton in bloom’, ‘rotten teeth’. When asked to classify the colours into groups, for example shades of brown, the women would say things like ‘It can’t be done, they’re not at all alike; this is like calf’s dung, this is like a peach.’'

'Luria tested illiterate men on their ability to complete simple syllogisms. One sequence went like this: In the North, all bears are white. Novaya Zemlya is in the North. What colour are the bears there? Most of the men were unable to give the correct answer, saying things like, ‘How should I know, I’ve never been to the North. I’ve seen a black bear.’ More crucially, people also seemed not to have much conception of themselves as individuals. For example when asked questions such as ‘What sort of person would you say you were?’ illiterates were unable to describe themselves and suggested to Luria and his assistants that they should ask some else to answer for them.'

'Luria realized that such responses were not due to lack of intelligence, but to the structure imposed on thought by illiteracy. Literacy continues the process of individualisation initiated by the ability to speak, but with much greater impact. Literacy extends memory, permits us to classify and to generalize and gives us the ability to move in our imagination out of the concrete here-and-now and into lengthy abstraction. Above all, literacy opens the possibility of a private world and the ability to have a uniquely personal point of view, limited only by the size of one’s library. In an important sense, literacy opens the door to personal freedom.'

Why spirituality is difficult for Westerners

This is Chapter 9 from David Hay’s book Something There: The Biology of the Human Spirit, published in London by Darton, Longman & Todd, 2006. ISBN 0-232-53637-0; and in Philadelphia by Templeton Press in 2007. ISBN-10: 1599471140; ISBN-13: 978-1599471143.

www.theosthinktank.co.uk

That is really informative, @Rival . And sure makes sense to me.

Reminds me of Paulo Freire, an educator who felt the need to teach literacy to adults with the use of subject matters that they could relate to.

I want to point out that it is not objectively wrong to say that different colors are not alike. Color is a psychological phenomenom, even if it is strongly tied to a physical one. To distinguish them requires training, albeit training that is very often embedded in everyday activities.

It was just a few months ago that I finally understood why the purple color is different in nature and more complex than violet, despite the two of them being sometimes literally indistinguishable from each other. Abstractions such as light wavelengths and neurological perception - well tied as they are to physical reality and medical knowledge respectively - won't just spring well formed and well understood into people's brains as soon as proposed even if they happen to be 100% correct and well demonstrated.

Training is a big factor there - and illiterate people tend to have a lot less opportunities for achieving it, alas. That creates something of a vicious circle, since a lack of professional training strongly leads to work opportunities that demand bigger commitments of time and physical effort both in the work itself and in commuting to it, which does not help in eventually achieving better training.

 

[exchemist]

@exchemist @Augustus @Heyo @LuisDantas @Quintessence

This is interesting (the whole article is very good),

'In summary, Luria [x] showed that, compared with people who could read and write, the thinking of illiterates is much more tied to the immediate situation (that is, the here-and-now) than to abstract reflections on the past and future. This meant that intellectual tasks which were elementary for literate people, for example simple classification, were difficult or impossible for them. In one of Luria’s experiments, semi-educated and only recently literate collective farm activists were easily able to sort skeins of wool in terms of category, shades of blue, red, yellow and so on. On the other hand illiterate peasant women who, as expert embroiderers, were perfectly well aware of subtle variations of colour, usually named the skeins concretely, with terms like ‘pig’s dung’, ‘a lot of water’, ‘cotton in bloom’, ‘rotten teeth’. When asked to classify the colours into groups, for example shades of brown, the women would say things like ‘It can’t be done, they’re not at all alike; this is like calf’s dung, this is like a peach.’'

'Luria tested illiterate men on their ability to complete simple syllogisms. One sequence went like this: In the North, all bears are white. Novaya Zemlya is in the North. What colour are the bears there? Most of the men were unable to give the correct answer, saying things like, ‘How should I know, I’ve never been to the North. I’ve seen a black bear.’ More crucially, people also seemed not to have much conception of themselves as individuals. For example when asked questions such as ‘What sort of person would you say you were?’ illiterates were unable to describe themselves and suggested to Luria and his assistants that they should ask some else to answer for them.'

'Luria realized that such responses were not due to lack of intelligence, but to the structure imposed on thought by illiteracy. Literacy continues the process of individualisation initiated by the ability to speak, but with much greater impact. Literacy extends memory, permits us to classify and to generalize and gives us the ability to move in our imagination out of the concrete here-and-now and into lengthy abstraction. Above all, literacy opens the possibility of a private world and the ability to have a uniquely personal point of view, limited only by the size of one’s library. In an important sense, literacy opens the door to personal freedom.'

Why spirituality is difficult for Westerners

This is Chapter 9 from David Hay’s book Something There: The Biology of the Human Spirit, published in London by Darton, Longman & Todd, 2006. ISBN 0-232-53637-0; and in Philadelphia by Templeton Press in 2007. ISBN-10: 1599471140; ISBN-13: 978-1599471143.

www.theosthinktank.co.uk

This is fascinating stuff. I had before come across the idea that the Reformation led to literalist creationism, by starting to treat the bible as a science textbook. However your link, which I have now read, puts that development in a far broader context. Certainly food for thought for you, as you try to get inside the Medieval mind!

Interesting too that the author links the development of individualism all the way through to the poisonous modern cult of selfishness, as currently embraced with gusto on the US right in the popularity of Ayn Rand.

The other thing about this is it has a curious resonance for me, personally, as someone trained in physical science (i.e. detached objectivity) but brought up as a Catholic. The role of religious ritual (i.e. practice as opposed to abstract thought) as a way of getting into a different world, in which intellectualising is temporarily dropped, starts to make a lot of sense. I also find features of ancient religious practice, such as singing Gregorian chant, make me feel a sense of continuity with the people of past ages, which is strangely comforting and makes one feel less alone. In fact, when we left The Hague, I wrote as much to Fr. Ad, the parish priest, whose sung masses we had attended during our time there. My wife (then recently diagnosed with the cancer that was eventually to kill her ) commented that I had captured exactly her own feelings too.

 

[Quintessence]

This is interesting (the whole article is very good),

'In summary, Luria [x] showed that, compared with people who could read and write, the thinking of illiterates is much more tied to the immediate situation (that is, the here-and-now) than to abstract reflections on the past and future. This meant that intellectual tasks which were elementary for literate people, for example simple classification, were difficult or impossible for them. In one of Luria’s experiments, semi-educated and only recently literate collective farm activists were easily able to sort skeins of wool in terms of category, shades of blue, red, yellow and so on. On the other hand illiterate peasant women who, as expert embroiderers, were perfectly well aware of subtle variations of colour, usually named the skeins concretely, with terms like ‘pig’s dung’, ‘a lot of water’, ‘cotton in bloom’, ‘rotten teeth’. When asked to classify the colours into groups, for example shades of brown, the women would say things like ‘It can’t be done, they’re not at all alike; this is like calf’s dung, this is like a peach.’'

'Luria tested illiterate men on their ability to complete simple syllogisms. One sequence went like this: In the North, all bears are white. Novaya Zemlya is in the North. What colour are the bears there? Most of the men were unable to give the correct answer, saying things like, ‘How should I know, I’ve never been to the North. I’ve seen a black bear.’ More crucially, people also seemed not to have much conception of themselves as individuals. For example when asked questions such as ‘What sort of person would you say you were?’ illiterates were unable to describe themselves and suggested to Luria and his assistants that they should ask some else to answer for them.'

'Luria realized that such responses were not due to lack of intelligence, but to the structure imposed on thought by illiteracy. Literacy continues the process of individualisation initiated by the ability to speak, but with much greater impact. Literacy extends memory, permits us to classify and to generalize and gives us the ability to move in our imagination out of the concrete here-and-now and into lengthy abstraction. Above all, literacy opens the possibility of a private world and the ability to have a uniquely personal point of view, limited only by the size of one’s library. In an important sense, literacy opens the door to personal freedom.'

Why spirituality is difficult for Westerners

This is Chapter 9 from David Hay’s book Something There: The Biology of the Human Spirit, published in London by Darton, Longman & Todd, 2006. ISBN 0-232-53637-0; and in Philadelphia by Templeton Press in 2007. ISBN-10: 1599471140; ISBN-13: 978-1599471143.

www.theosthinktank.co.uk

I'll have to give the full article a read; bits of this really echo themes from "Spell of the Sensuous" by Abram. He directly discusses how the ways indigenous peoples (animistic cultures) interacted with the other-than-human world were largely as a function of being pre-alphabetic. When you've got a pre-alphabetic (pre-literate) culture you can't project symbols and abstractions onto letters on a page which transforms modern notations of time, space, and self more than one might think.

What's interesting is that the OBOD (Order of Bards, Ovates, and Druids) course is very much about giving modern peoples tools to highjack us out of these modern post-alphabetic problems to develop authentic religious and spiritual practice, so as a member I get what both Abram and this passage are getting at. It's something I would have just plain not comprehended and possibly outright scoffed at earlier in my life when I was still too stuck in books and not spending enough time on practice and being. Not that books are bad, but religion fundamentally grew out of relationships with the world around us. You've gotta actually live life and experience and feel things to foster that - just so many words on a page won't cut it.