Words from Others on this Topic

In large societies that consist of many groups, relationships among groups must embody the same principles as the relationships among individuals within groups. This means that the core design principles are scale-independent….

David Sloan Wilson, 2019, from the book This View of Life: Completing the Darwinian Revolution

Domesticating a wolf brain or an ape brain is impressive. But when you domesticate a human brain – this is when the real magic begins. An ultracultural species is born. A unique type of friendliness must have evolved in our species that allowed for larger group sizes, higher population densities, and more amicable relations between neighboring groups that in turn created larger social networks. This encouraged the transmission of more innovations between more innovators. Cultural ratcheting went from slow and sporadic to fast and furious. The result was exponential growth in technology and the emergence of behavioral modernity.

Hare, Brian, Woods and Vanessa, 2020, from the book Survival of the Friendliest: Understanding our Origins and Rediscovering our Common Humanity

…by the late twentieth century, it became hard to miss that cultural patterns — of societies and of individuals — were in flux. Across the world, societies were evolving as globalized generations developed new lifestyles through selective retention of their parents’ ways and heightened borrowing from other traditions. Individuals were migrating more than ever but not always assimilating — instead, maintaining multiple cultural worldviews that they switched between situationally. Scholars began to appreciate that it was not simply collective institutions or individual psychologies that determined culture, but the interplay between them. Cultural institutions shape the individual’s mind, and the individual’s mind shapes cultural institutions. Culture and psyche are inexorably intertwined.

Michael Morris, 2024, from the book Tribal: How the Cultural Instincts That Divide Us Can Help Bring Us Together

Where a society’s political divisions are crosscutting, we line up on different sides of issues with different people at different times. We may disagree with our neighbors on abortion but agree with them on health care; we may dislike another neighbor’s views on immigration but agree with them on the need to raise the minimum wage. Such alliances help us build and sustain norms of mutual toleration. When we agree with our political rivals at least some of the time, we are less likely to view them as mortal enemies.

Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, 2018, from the book How Democracies Die

Relevant Reference Models

Postmodern Level of Development

• An element of Developmental Levels