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Many texts on such things dive deep into psychology and evolutionary biology, but ignore sociological and anthropological studies that draw a clear picture of h

Many texts on such things dive deep into psychology and evolutionary biology, but ignore sociological and anthropological studies that draw a clear picture of how this system works. In this text there are just 2 references to them, and though Webber's works were foundational, there've been a lot of works in sociology in the past 100 years. The two most promiment names, that this text doesn't even mention, are Erving Goffman and Pierre Bourdieu. Goffman systemized a lot of social interactions. Pierre Bourdieu focused on classes and their reproduction. Instead, a lot of authors and laymen theorize by building a bridge from, say, macroeconomics and geopolitics, directly into human psychology or bio-psychology, deriving big trends and state structures from simple knee-jerk-like psychological reflexes.

philprx 3y ago
I'm looking for the paper called something like "TLDR Bourdieu Goffman Webber: How Social system of fame, status, reputation work?" ;-) any reco? ;-)) btw, I found "The Prince" by Machiavelli very telling on social dynamics: basic you will say, but that kind of fits my TLDR needs ;-)
- xoac 3y ago
  Usually the TLDR for any philo/sociology/theory text is it’s introduction as authors tend to expose their argument there so: try the introduction to Distinction for Bourdieu.
- throwaway173738 3y ago
  The Prince was a satire of the political dynamics of the time.
  - bazoom42 3y ago
    What makes you think it is a satire?
    - rdevsrex 3y ago
      Exactly, it seems like a clear eyed instruction manual for the time.
    - mikrl 3y ago
      I don’t necessarily think it is an obvious satire, but IIRC, at the time he wrote it he was a persona non grata at the Florentine court and was attempting to curry favour. It was most definitely written to confirm the Medici’s biases and stroke some egos.
      - bazoom42 3y ago
        > It was most definitely written to confirm the Medici’s biases and stroke some egos Yes, that is the opposite of satire.
        mikrl 3y ago
        Not necessarily. Machiavelli certainly seems the type to play to the Medicis while simultaneously showing them up in a subtle manner. Did he believe what he wrote in the Prince was noble or just? Probably not, based on his democratic tendencies. Imagine if you wrote a send-up of Silicon Valley VCs (for example) and tried to be subtly ridiculous about it, but they took your work extremely well and even applied it. Is that not the most successful and hilarious satire of all?
  - spicymapotofu 3y ago
    This idea is popular, but controversial. After looking into it a bit with the help of historians on reddit, I no longer believe this conclusion, but I recommend everyone curious looks for themselves.
  - pessimizer 3y ago
    The Prince was a hardheaded analysis of governance that was sponsored by a prince, so had to pretend that the prince was the hero. I think the same about Hobbes (or Spinoza or Descartes); with Protestantism came a huge and multiplying number of heresies from Catholic orthodoxy, and materialist atheists could write about rationality through extremely abstract metaphors that they referred to with Christian labels. The same applied to royalty, who were the intermediaries between God and man, and often the patrons of these secular scholars. i.e. don't deny God, don't deny the King, and you can finally write about reality.
    - HPsquared 3y ago
      The Prince wasn't sponsored by anyone. Machiavelli wrote the manuscript on his own initiative as a gift to a prince, with the hope of being given a job. It was basically his (unsuccessful) application letter. The same motivation for flattery remains in both cases, however.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
gsatic 3y ago
It's not hard to connect it to economics. Social status = currency.
- meinheld111 3y ago
  More like credit rating
  - gsatic 3y ago
    What's the diff? They both signal value.
- cnity 3y ago
  Rewatch Titanic for a (yes, fictional) case study in how this is not true.
jychang 3y ago
Sounds interesting. I feel like I (and most techies as well) am prone to commit the sin of trying to derive all human behavior from economics/psychology, since we like deriving concepts from first principles. What simple introductionary readings/videos on Goffman and Bourdieu would you recommend?
- culebron21 3y ago
  Definitely Goffman. Bourdieu wrote way too hard, except for some separate articles.
- orwin 3y ago
  Bourdieu is easy to read, or at least understand. 'La distinction' is the book I would start with. Its a great book to read if you have small family issues, even if you despise us post-Marxists, if you have troubles with a son/brother/sister/daughter, it might give you keys to build a more resilient family. The first 3 chapters are essential imho, and there is a lot of value reading further (and other books) with the caveat that it's a foundational author, and like most foundational authors, he have blind spot (he did not had real contradictors with good arguments until the last years of his career (and BTW, handled it way better than Chomsky did) (free shot, sorry).
  - AlotOfReading 3y ago
    I don't think the statement "Bourdieu is easy to read" has ever been uttered before. The normal advice is to go read one of Wacquant's works (e.g. "An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology") before you start with stuff like "Distinction" because Bourdieu's academic prose is famously terrible. His verbal prose and the works intended for laypeople are much less obscurantist.
- Matumio 3y ago
  > sin of trying to derive all human behavior from economics/psychology To remedy to that, I highly recommend Joseph Henrich's "The Secret of Our Success". What we call "human behaviour" in such discussions is often culturally learned (or at least shaped). His point: our psychology is "programmable", and prestige plays a key role in that programming. Western culture (market norms, trust towards strangers, monogamy as the norm, etc.) is forming our psychology in a way that is very far from (historically) typical humans. (That said, I'm no expert in this area and cannot put Henrich's work into context.)
_glass 3y ago
It's the science envy. Psychology (despite the replication crisis) firmly established itself as a hard science. Taking the classical distinction of psychology as based on the individual, and sociology on the emerging properties of social systems, we cannot simply infer that the properties of the individual align to social situations. I think we in the social sciences with our departure from positivism are unable to produce clear laws, or direct applications, we're more concerned with understanding, and not explaining. I think I am just expanding on your point.
- eimrine 3y ago
  > Psychology (despite the replication crisis) firmly established itself as a hard science. What a shameless lie! Replication is the key distinction between sciences and talkings. Do you even know what "Nullius in verba" motto is about?
  - culebron21 3y ago
    No, it's not "talkings". Definitons of science are not based on replication/reproducibility. Harder one, Popper's, says that a theory must provide a verifiable/falsifiable prediction, and it should be correct. (Problem is, there are too many probabilistic things, so you must lower the bar, by checking error rate/margin.) But not everything is verifiable or falsifiable strictly to this definition. Then it's Kuhn's definition: a systematic observation and description of nature phoenomenons in own strict terms. Anthropology and sociology are exactly in this department. Just an example what discovery sociologists made in mid-XX century: poor people tend to learn habits that lead them to risky and reckless behavior, stop them from getting education, etc. (What's the cause is another big talk, too broad for this thread.) And just talks by intellectuals would be like "they're just fools", "they have some genetic deficience", or maybe "they just haven't money, with enough money they'd be fine". That's talks. Popular psychology that drops broad and seemingly profound judgements and commands, but that have nothing of substance -- that is talks too.
    - eimrine 3y ago
      Thank you for a thoughtful response! I always used to have some suspicions about my opinion on psy* studies. I used to search any systematic observations here and I have found exactly one knowledge bomb - Weber-Fechner law [1] You gave me examples which are not even defend psy* fields as a scientific ones because your examples are from economic fields (I made pro-psy* argumentation here reasonably better). But one systematic observation per all the field is not enough to build a science. It is enough to build religion. Do you want a proof that psy* is a religion? Everything in psy* which is neither neuro-physiology nor economy nor philosophy nor talkings nor [1] nor palliative medicine is... a legal enforcement. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weber%E2%80%93Fechner_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weber%E2%80%93Fechner_law

philprx 3y ago

I'm looking for the paper called something like "TLDR Bourdieu Goffman Webber: How Social system of fame, status, reputation work?" ;-) any reco? ;-)) btw, I found "The Prince" by Machiavelli very telling on social dynamics: basic you will say, but that kind of fits my TLDR needs ;-)

xoac 3y ago
Usually the TLDR for any philo/sociology/theory text is it’s introduction as authors tend to expose their argument there so: try the introduction to Distinction for Bourdieu.
throwaway173738 3y ago
The Prince was a satire of the political dynamics of the time.
- bazoom42 3y ago
  What makes you think it is a satire?
  - rdevsrex 3y ago
    Exactly, it seems like a clear eyed instruction manual for the time.
  - mikrl 3y ago
    I don’t necessarily think it is an obvious satire, but IIRC, at the time he wrote it he was a persona non grata at the Florentine court and was attempting to curry favour. It was most definitely written to confirm the Medici’s biases and stroke some egos.
    - bazoom42 3y ago
      > It was most definitely written to confirm the Medici’s biases and stroke some egos Yes, that is the opposite of satire.
      - mikrl 3y ago
        Not necessarily. Machiavelli certainly seems the type to play to the Medicis while simultaneously showing them up in a subtle manner. Did he believe what he wrote in the Prince was noble or just? Probably not, based on his democratic tendencies. Imagine if you wrote a send-up of Silicon Valley VCs (for example) and tried to be subtly ridiculous about it, but they took your work extremely well and even applied it. Is that not the most successful and hilarious satire of all?
- spicymapotofu 3y ago
  This idea is popular, but controversial. After looking into it a bit with the help of historians on reddit, I no longer believe this conclusion, but I recommend everyone curious looks for themselves.
- pessimizer 3y ago
  The Prince was a hardheaded analysis of governance that was sponsored by a prince, so had to pretend that the prince was the hero. I think the same about Hobbes (or Spinoza or Descartes); with Protestantism came a huge and multiplying number of heresies from Catholic orthodoxy, and materialist atheists could write about rationality through extremely abstract metaphors that they referred to with Christian labels. The same applied to royalty, who were the intermediaries between God and man, and often the patrons of these secular scholars. i.e. don't deny God, don't deny the King, and you can finally write about reality.
  - HPsquared 3y ago
    The Prince wasn't sponsored by anyone. Machiavelli wrote the manuscript on his own initiative as a gift to a prince, with the hope of being given a job. It was basically his (unsuccessful) application letter. The same motivation for flattery remains in both cases, however.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

gsatic 3y ago

It's not hard to connect it to economics. Social status = currency.

meinheld111 3y ago
More like credit rating
- gsatic 3y ago
  What's the diff? They both signal value.
cnity 3y ago
Rewatch Titanic for a (yes, fictional) case study in how this is not true.

jychang 3y ago

Sounds interesting. I feel like I (and most techies as well) am prone to commit the sin of trying to derive all human behavior from economics/psychology, since we like deriving concepts from first principles. What simple introductionary readings/videos on Goffman and Bourdieu would you recommend?

culebron21 3y ago
Definitely Goffman. Bourdieu wrote way too hard, except for some separate articles.
orwin 3y ago
Bourdieu is easy to read, or at least understand. 'La distinction' is the book I would start with. Its a great book to read if you have small family issues, even if you despise us post-Marxists, if you have troubles with a son/brother/sister/daughter, it might give you keys to build a more resilient family. The first 3 chapters are essential imho, and there is a lot of value reading further (and other books) with the caveat that it's a foundational author, and like most foundational authors, he have blind spot (he did not had real contradictors with good arguments until the last years of his career (and BTW, handled it way better than Chomsky did) (free shot, sorry).
- AlotOfReading 3y ago
  I don't think the statement "Bourdieu is easy to read" has ever been uttered before. The normal advice is to go read one of Wacquant's works (e.g. "An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology") before you start with stuff like "Distinction" because Bourdieu's academic prose is famously terrible. His verbal prose and the works intended for laypeople are much less obscurantist.
Matumio 3y ago
> sin of trying to derive all human behavior from economics/psychology To remedy to that, I highly recommend Joseph Henrich's "The Secret of Our Success". What we call "human behaviour" in such discussions is often culturally learned (or at least shaped). His point: our psychology is "programmable", and prestige plays a key role in that programming. Western culture (market norms, trust towards strangers, monogamy as the norm, etc.) is forming our psychology in a way that is very far from (historically) typical humans. (That said, I'm no expert in this area and cannot put Henrich's work into context.)

_glass 3y ago

It's the science envy. Psychology (despite the replication crisis) firmly established itself as a hard science. Taking the classical distinction of psychology as based on the individual, and sociology on the emerging properties of social systems, we cannot simply infer that the properties of the individual align to social situations. I think we in the social sciences with our departure from positivism are unable to produce clear laws, or direct applications, we're more concerned with understanding, and not explaining. I think I am just expanding on your point.

eimrine 3y ago
> Psychology (despite the replication crisis) firmly established itself as a hard science. What a shameless lie! Replication is the key distinction between sciences and talkings. Do you even know what "Nullius in verba" motto is about?
- culebron21 3y ago
  No, it's not "talkings". Definitons of science are not based on replication/reproducibility. Harder one, Popper's, says that a theory must provide a verifiable/falsifiable prediction, and it should be correct. (Problem is, there are too many probabilistic things, so you must lower the bar, by checking error rate/margin.) But not everything is verifiable or falsifiable strictly to this definition. Then it's Kuhn's definition: a systematic observation and description of nature phoenomenons in own strict terms. Anthropology and sociology are exactly in this department. Just an example what discovery sociologists made in mid-XX century: poor people tend to learn habits that lead them to risky and reckless behavior, stop them from getting education, etc. (What's the cause is another big talk, too broad for this thread.) And just talks by intellectuals would be like "they're just fools", "they have some genetic deficience", or maybe "they just haven't money, with enough money they'd be fine". That's talks. Popular psychology that drops broad and seemingly profound judgements and commands, but that have nothing of substance -- that is talks too.
  - eimrine 3y ago
    Thank you for a thoughtful response! I always used to have some suspicions about my opinion on psy* studies. I used to search any systematic observations here and I have found exactly one knowledge bomb - Weber-Fechner law [1] You gave me examples which are not even defend psy* fields as a scientific ones because your examples are from economic fields (I made pro-psy* argumentation here reasonably better). But one systematic observation per all the field is not enough to build a science. It is enough to build religion. Do you want a proof that psy* is a religion? Everything in psy* which is neither neuro-physiology nor economy nor philosophy nor talkings nor [1] nor palliative medicine is... a legal enforcement. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weber%E2%80%93Fechner_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weber%E2%80%93Fechner_law