Not aliens. Not animals. Only us humans. We do operate at all levels from the primitive
to the high intellectual. All of us,
with the same brains, do similar things and in similar ways. But the
organization changes are the requirements change. The early tribes needed some rules to follow,
plus many taboos about danger. The great modern civilizations also need rules
to be sure but more than that, they need theories and beyond. We assemble the bunch of them into a
hierarchy of organizational traits or operational containers.
This outline is not about
epistemology or even ontology, topics having precise but different
meanings. This is about doing, assembling,
understanding, and realizing. It is about multiple categories that mix up,
contradict, conflict, and reject. You can have a taboo but reject and confirm
it on the same day. These categories can be individual, yet commonplace,
tribal, and societal.
·
Skills – how to hunt, farm, marry, fish,
protect, vigilance, etc
·
Taboos
o
To do not
o
To eat not
o
To forbid
·
Ritual
o
Incantations
o
Rights of passage
o
Holy books, scripture
o
Emotions
o
Beliefs
·
Methods
o
Hunting/fishing/farming
o
Construction
o
Comprehensive schemes
o
Random
o
Programmed
·
Rules
o
Regulations
o
Policy
o
Procedures
o
Steps to follow
o
Social
o
Games
·
Models
o
General and robust, allowing testing, Ptolemy
vs. Newton
o
Scientific
o
Political
o
Social
o
Logical
·
Visions
o
Hopes
o
Dreams
o
Ideas
o
Inspiration
o
Innovation
o
Pre-analytic cognitive acts* such as intuitions
·
Theories –
o
Opinion,
o
Pre-theoretical
o
Explanatory
o
Comprehensive with or without models
o
Axiom-based
o
Fact-based
o
Fuzzy, stochastic, random
o
Rigorous/logical
·
Laws –
o
Canon
o
Legal
o
Universally accepted
o
Propositional
*Thomas Sowell, A Conflict of Visions, 1987.
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