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The monomyth is itself a myth not science. Is this how people really interpret people like J. Campbell (and J. Peterson)? I don't take him so literally. When a

The monomyth is itself a myth not science. Is this how people really interpret people like J. Campbell (and J. Peterson)? I don't take him so literally. When a meta-story is described I imagine it is described not in a general abstract way (as in mathematical laws) but in a list of prototypes and archetypes that also contain aspects that are idiosyncratic and don't apply generally. I guess you could think of it as the synthesis of the specific and the general done in a wise way. That is lossy compression + mnemonic additions of non-general properties. That is the hero's journey is a meta-myth not an abstract general law like the Pythagorean theorem. The reason that mythological communication (and meta-mythological communication) as opposed to precise, mathematical/scientific communication is used is because it serves more purposes than just an attempt at perfect predictability. Like memorability and being widely understood by even children. I just thought of Campbell as saying "here are some interesting comparative parallels that contain interesting some tendencies", but the general implicit point is that of the lesson of developmental processes being nonmonotonic. That is development occurs through periodic degenerate movement. This is even true of the nonliving world. My chemistry knowledge is zero, but I wonder if this applies to even nucleosynthesis (the emergence of the periodic table). That is opposing periodic trends create a progression of electron configurations and so the energy levels have degeneracies. (but in this example I don't remember if the degeneracies have to be "moved through") Also in chemistry we have the idea of a reaction barrier. In the domain of consciousness people speaking of a metaphor to annealing from metallurgy. This pattern is ubiquitous and in mythology and psychology is about the value of progressively and iteratively confronting our fears. More generally it is just about the concept of indirection.

sshine 4y ago
First off, thank you for a very interesting response. > More generally [this pattern] is just about the concept of indirection. What do you mean? How does the metaphor of annealing relate "hero's journey" to "the concept of indirection"? > That is development occurs through periodic degenerate movement. I understand physical annealing as heating a material up to a point where it can recrystalise, and controlling the speed at which the material cools causes crystals to form in intended patterns determined by the material's ability to form certain crystal structures at certain temperatures. I understand simulated annealing as the metaheuristic where the metaphorical heat of a system determines the probability that an iterated search for an optimum is found close to or far from existing optima. I can also imagine the chemical reaction barrier as a metaphor. But I don't understand how that relates to indirection, or what's even meant by this.
- arisbe__ 4y ago
  Sorry just seeing this now. By indirection I just meant taking a longer path than the direct shortest path. This could be seen as being in a local minima and by climbing that hill so arrive at a lower more stable even lower minima. The monomyth isn't best concetualized as a perfect circular cycle but as a 3D upward spiral. That is because it is considered to be progressive. As the T S Eliott quote goes "...Will be to arrive where we started. And know the place for the first time." My point is that this spiral isnt always upward as it cycles. It also has to go downward (degeneration) in order to go upward. Mythologically speaking this is the descent into hell or facing your fears. We understand this in our everyday life in that we hardly ever approach goals directly. Think of how people endure the suffering of exercise so they can minimize suffering/death later in life (well there is more than one reason for exercise). In fact another way of seeing it is through finance. We save and invest rather than spend because of the present/future value trade-offs. Think of a maze for an AI, where you know the coordinates of the goal ahead of time. Do you assume that the navigation will be the shortest path and never move in a way that increases your distance from the goal? There will likely be instances like this. The annealing examples if I remeber correctly have to do with the notion of getting to a lower more stable energy state by going up first (climbing a hill).

sshine 4y ago

First off, thank you for a very interesting response. > More generally [this pattern] is just about the concept of indirection. What do you mean? How does the metaphor of annealing relate "hero's journey" to "the concept of indirection"? > That is development occurs through periodic degenerate movement. I understand physical annealing as heating a material up to a point where it can recrystalise, and controlling the speed at which the material cools causes crystals to form in intended patterns determined by the material's ability to form certain crystal structures at certain temperatures. I understand simulated annealing as the metaheuristic where the metaphorical heat of a system determines the probability that an iterated search for an optimum is found close to or far from existing optima. I can also imagine the chemical reaction barrier as a metaphor. But I don't understand how that relates to indirection, or what's even meant by this.

arisbe__ 4y ago
Sorry just seeing this now. By indirection I just meant taking a longer path than the direct shortest path. This could be seen as being in a local minima and by climbing that hill so arrive at a lower more stable even lower minima. The monomyth isn't best concetualized as a perfect circular cycle but as a 3D upward spiral. That is because it is considered to be progressive. As the T S Eliott quote goes "...Will be to arrive where we started. And know the place for the first time." My point is that this spiral isnt always upward as it cycles. It also has to go downward (degeneration) in order to go upward. Mythologically speaking this is the descent into hell or facing your fears. We understand this in our everyday life in that we hardly ever approach goals directly. Think of how people endure the suffering of exercise so they can minimize suffering/death later in life (well there is more than one reason for exercise). In fact another way of seeing it is through finance. We save and invest rather than spend because of the present/future value trade-offs. Think of a maze for an AI, where you know the coordinates of the goal ahead of time. Do you assume that the navigation will be the shortest path and never move in a way that increases your distance from the goal? There will likely be instances like this. The annealing examples if I remeber correctly have to do with the notion of getting to a lower more stable energy state by going up first (climbing a hill).