Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief
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Last annotated on April 12, 2017
Something we cannot see protects us from something we do not understand. The thing we cannot see is culture,Read more at location 142
The thing we do not understand is the chaos that gave rise to culture.Read more at location 143
I was raised under the protective auspices, so to speak, of the Christian church. This does not mean that my family was explicitly religious. I attended conservative Protestant services during childhood with my mother, but she was not a dogmatic or authoritarian believer, and we never discussed religious issues at home. My father appeared essentially agnostic,Read more at location 149
When I was twelve or so my mother enrolled me in confirmation classes, which served as introduction to adult membership in the church. I did not like attending. I did not like the attitude of my overtly religious classmates (who were few in number) and did not desire their lack of social standing.Read more at location 156
No one really opposed my rebellious efforts, either, in church or at home—in part because those who were deeply religious (or who might have wanted to be) had no intellectually acceptable counter-arguments at their disposal. After all, many of the basic tenets of Christian belief were incomprehensible, if not clearly absurd. The virgin birth was an impossibility; likewise, the notion that someone could rise from the dead.Read more at location 164
I started working as a volunteer for a mildly socialist political party, and adopted the party line. Economic injustice was at the root of all evil,Read more at location 179
I had attended several left-wing party congresses, as a student politician and active party worker.Read more at location 190
My college roommate, an insightful cynic, expressed skepticism regarding my ideological beliefs. He told me that the world could not be completely encapsulated within the boundaries of socialist philosophy. I had more or less come to this conclusion on my own, but had not admitted so much in words.Read more at location 196
Socialist ideology served to mask resentment and hatred, bred by failure. Many of the party activists I had encountered were using the ideals of social justice to rationalize their pursuit of personal revenge. Whose fault was it that I was poor or uneducated and unadmired? Obviously, the fault of the rich,Read more at location 203
It was not socialist ideology that posed the problem, then, but ideology as such. Ideology divided the world up simplistically into those who thought and acted properly, and those who did not.Read more at location 211
What people valued, economically, merely reflected what they believed to be important. This meant that real motivation had to lie in the domain of value, of morality. The political scientists I studied with did not see this, or did not think it was relevant.Read more at location 225
My confidence in socialism (that is, in political utopia) vanished when I realized that the world was not merely a place of economics.Read more at location 228
The world can be validly construed as forum for action, or as place of things.Read more at location 443
The former manner of interpretation-more primordial, and less clearly understood-finds its expression in the arts or humanities, in ritual, drama, literature and mythology.Read more at location 444
The latter manner of interpretation-the world as place of things-finds its formal expression in the methods and theories of science.Read more at location 448
No complete world-picture can be generated without use of both modes of construal. The fact that one mode is generally set at odds with the other means only that the nature of their respective domains remains insufficiently discriminated.Read more at location 452
Adherents of the mythological worldview tend to regard the statements of their creeds as indistinguishable from empirical “fact,” even though such statements were generally formulated long before the notion of objective reality emerged. Those who, by contrast, accept the scientific perspective—who assume that it is, or might become, complete-forget that an impassable gulf currently divides what is from what should be.Read more at location 453
Human beings are prepared, biologically, to respond to anomalous information—to novelty. This instinctive response includes redirection of attention, generation of emotion (fear first, generally speaking, then curiosity), and behavioral compulsion (cessation of ongoing activity first, generally speaking, then active approach and exploration).Read more at location 902
3 APPRENTICESHIP AND ENCULTURATION Adoption of a Shared MapRead more at location 5920
Ideologies may be regarded as incomplete myths—asRead more at location 5921
The philosophy attributing individual evil to the pathology of social force constitutes one such partial story.Read more at location 5923
Although society, the Great Father, has a tyrannical aspect, he also shelters, protects, trains and disciplines the developing individual—andRead more at location 5923
Subjugation to lawful authority might more reasonably be considered in light of the metaphor of the apprenticeship. Childhood dependency must be replaced by group membership,Read more at location 5925
membership provides society with another individual to utilize as a “tool,” and provides the maturing but still vulnerable individual with necessary protection (with a group-fostered “identity”).Read more at location 5927
The capacity to abide by social rules, regardless of the specifics of the discipline, can therefore be regarded as a necessary transitional stage in the movement from childhood to adulthood.Read more at location 5928
Discipline should therefore be regarded as a skill that may be developed through adherence to strict ritual, or by immersion within a strict belief system or hierarchy of values.Read more at location 5930
Adoption of this analytic standpoint allows for a certain moral relativism, conjoined with an absolutist higher-order morality. The particulars of a disciplinary system may be somewhat unimportant. The fact that adherence to such a system is necessary, however, cannot be disregarded.Read more at location 5940
4 THE APPEARANCE OF ANOMALY Challenge to the Shared MapRead more at location 6374
integrated morality lends predictability to behavior, constitutes the basis for the stable state, and helps ensure that emotion remains under control. The emergence of anomaly constitutes a threat to the integrity of the moral tradition governing behavior and evaluation. Strange things or situations can pose a challengeRead more at location 6385
A prolonged drought, for example, destructive at the social level—or the occurrence of a serious illness or disability, destructive at the personal—can force the reconstruction of behavior and the reanalysis of the beliefs that accompany, follow, or underlie such behavior.Read more at location 6389
The appearance of a stranger—or, more commonly, a group of strangers—may produce a similar effect.Read more at location 6391
Cultures may be upset internally, as well, as a consequence of the “strange idea”—or, similarly, by the actions of the revolutionary.Read more at location 6394
the capacity to abstract has also undermined the stability of moral tradition. Once a procedure has been encapsulated in image—and, particularly, in word—it becomes easier to modify, “experimentally”; but also easier to casually criticize and discard.Read more at location 6397
Our capacity for abstraction is capable of disrupting our “unconscious”—thatRead more at location 6402
Such disruption leaves us vulnerable to possession by simplistic ideologies, and susceptible to cynicism, existential despair, and weakness in the face of threat.Read more at location 6404
We are conscious enough to destabilize our beliefs and our traditional patterns of action, but not conscious enough to understand them. If the reasons for the existence of our traditions were rendered more explicit, however, perhaps we could develop greater intrapsychic and social integrity. The capacity to develop such understanding might help us use our capacity for reason to support, rather than destroy, the moral systems that discipline and protect us.Read more at location 6416
5 THE HOSTILE BROTHERS Archetypes of Response to the UnknownRead more at location 8301
He faces the unknown with the presumption of its benevolence—with the (unprovable) attitude that confrontation with the unknown will bring renewal and redemption.Read more at location 8307
This “spirit of unbridled rationality,” horrified by his limited apprehension of the conditions of existence, shrinks from contact with everything he does not understand. This shrinking weakens his personality, no longer nourished by the “water of life,” and makes him rigid and authoritarian, as he clings desperately to the familiar, “rational,” and stable. Every deceitful retreat increases his fear; every new “protective law” increases his frustration,Read more at location 8311
The fascist wants to crush everything different, and then everything;Read more at location 8319
Anomalies manifest themselves on the border between chaos and order, so to speak, and have a threatening and promising aspect. The promising aspect dominates, when the contact is voluntary, when the exploring agent is up-to-date—when the individual has explored all previous anomalies, released the “information” they contained, and built a strong personalityRead more at location 12220
The threatening aspect dominates, when the contact is involuntary, when the exploring agent is not up-to-date—when the individual has run away from evidence of his previous errors, failed to extract the information lurking behind his mistakes,Read more at location 12223
Pursuit of individual interest means hearkening to this spirit's call, journeying outside the protective walls of childhood dependence and adolescent group identification, and returning to rejuvenate society. This means that pursuit of individual interest—development of true individuality—is equivalent to identification with the hero.Read more at location 12230
Such identification renders the world bearable, despite its tragedies, and reduces neurotic suffering, which destroys faith, to an absolute minimum.Read more at location 12233
