aurum

There's an interesting new study out on the neurobiology of authoritarianism. I'd suggest reading the punchline from this article: https://www.psypost.org/authoritarian-attitudes-linked-to-altered-brain-anatomy-neuroscientists-reveal/ If you are really into the science, you can read the actual study: https://www.ibroneuroscience.org/article/S0306-4522(25)00304-5/fulltext Basic idea? Authoritarianism is correlated with physical brain structure and psychological traits. We are in a dark age when it comes to making sense of politics through the lens of neurobiology. When was the last time you heard a right-wing or even left-wing commentator seriously talk about this? Almost never. People still assume that people's political positions could easily be changed, or that all people should conform to their political positions. But what happens if politics is literally baked into the brain you are born with? Notably, the study is cross-sectional and only finds correlation, not causation. But whether neurobiology causes your political positions or not, it still shows the challenge of politics. If millions of people have an authoritarian brain, how would you convince them not to vote for an authoritarian? In addition, this opens up an interesting possibility for deliberately rewiring political beliefs in the future. Imagine doing neurofeedback not for ADHD, but for authoritarianism. You could even mandate such brain training for democratic politicians. Or perhaps gene therapy will begin to influence our politics, as we begin to change the genetics of our brain development. There could be an entire intersectional subfield of neuroscience and political science in the future focused just on this.

If you are living somewhere that hasn't yet developed democracy, someone has to do it.

It matters from a pragmatic, teaching POV. If I posted a video of some rambling fool and said they grasped God, that would confuse a lot of people and lead them down the wrong path. So yes, ultimately grasping God is for you. But assessing teachings still matters.

Those are good points. The only issue I have is with the framing of physiology as inert. It's not inert, it is active and shaping your experience all times, demogogue or no demagogue. Physiology is like gravity.

But your emotional leanings will dictate what scaffolding you choose to erect and keep in place. So making a clean distinction here doesn't work. The ideologies don't have to be identical in surface-level content, just in structure. You can have Christian authoritarianism, Islamic authoritarianism, socialist authoritarianism, capitalist authoritarianism, etc. The point is that they are all authoritarian, and they all have the same structure because they are all coming from the same deeper biological drivers. Many will. But if they don't have the right biology for it, ultimately they will not subscribe to it. This takes for granted how significant biology is. The studies cannot and don't need to predict specific ideology. They just have to show a link to authoritarians structure, and that's exactly what they have done. That conclusion does not follow because culture is rooted in biology. The soil is not inert. It is active in shaping what ideologies survive or exist at all.

Royal bloodlines is just a formalization of tribal authoritarianism. It's part of the scaling up. It's also not historically accurate to say "almost no European king was ever deposed". A quick google / AI search will show you this. You have King Louis XVI during the French Revolution, King Charles I during the English Civil War, King Ferdinand VII in Spain (multiple times), and on and on.

It's a good explanation of non-duality. But I don't get the sense this guy has really grasped himself as God.

They're not wrong though either. The glazing is real.

Another meaningless distinction. A king ALWAYS has support of the people. If they lose a sufficient amount of that support, they will either be assassinated, overthrown or exiled. Which is why kings and other authoritarians are often so paranoid. It's badly incorrect to assume authoritarians rule without support from the people. This is populist, progressive nonsense.

Is that the correct conclusion of your anecdote though? If your friend who previously supported progressive causes got flipped by a demagogue, that would suggest authoritarian physiology has a lot to with our current situation. There are probably many others just like your family member.

That’s not a meaningful distinction. A king is just authoritarianism scaled up, not the beginning of it.

Early tribes WERE deeply authoritarian. They were not a SD Green, egalitarian, liberal democracy.

Awesome. Let us know how it goes!

Clever rebuttal but it still has a lot of problems. The chart is misleading because you cannot scale biological influence in that way. You are operating on an assumption that "if biology accounted for only 40% of political beliefs in identical twins, then it must be way less for normal people". But that's incorrect. Twin studies are designed precisely to estimate how much genetics contributes to variance in a trait across everyone, using twin comparisons as a tool. So if we take these studies at face value, you would have to conclude 40% biological influence for everyone, not just identical twins. Which is still a huge effect, and would show that biology has a significant influence on your political positions, even if it's still less causal than environment. In fact, the study you actually referenced is extremely clear that there is profound link between biology and political ideology. A few quotes: That last quote is particularly significant, because it supports what I have been trying to say from the beginning. There is still much to be understood about how biology influences your political ideology. Heritability is likely to be underestimated when it comes to measuring a downstream disposition like authoritarianism. So the full extent of biological influence on political cognition is still being uncovered, and it is likely stronger than early estimates suggest, not weaker.

“Correctly” being the very key word.

An ear piece AI cannot possibly replicate good game. At best, it could give you general guidance. But even this is cringe. I doubt any woman would be okay with it if she knew.

Two bananas

Targeting Act Blue: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/trump-expected-sign-memo-targeting-act-blue-rcna202673

Yes, your point is right.

AI generated:

Selling dick pills by the river

This is somewhat of a moot point though. The function of masculinity is to protect against threats. A better frame would be to ask whether it's adaptive or not.

Disintegrating into bufo white light?

The evolution of society can sometimes be overstated, yes. But the issue is that society is still evolving. And it’s correct to adapt to that evolution. In practice, a perspective of “men don’t need to evolve” will be used to justify all kinds of toxic behavior. Like a romantic partner who refuses to take feedback. It’s wiser to allow for the need of evolution.

Men can still evolve as society evolves. You don't have to accept everything about traditional masculinity.