Summary
I propose that the S-ORG is a sentient entity, that it is more than the sum of its parts. This entity has its own agenda, its own group mind, its own memory that persists beyond the mortality of its individual components and even its own analogue to genetic inheritance.
These claims are controversial to say the least. When reading the literature in Anthropology and Sociology this assertion is challenged vigorously. My goal in the entries rooted here is to debate this assertion. Oddly enough, Sociology ignores the assertion for the most part. Yes, Sociology does discuss groups of individuals, but generally these groups are not considered to be actors. The unit of analysis is generally the individual. Groups of individuals are discussed statistically but the group itself is not considered to be more than the sum of its parts. I believe this obstructs useful analysis of social phenomena of the past and prediction of social behavior in the future. To me, it is like trying to understand the behavior of a rain drop by analyzing the behavior of the water molecules rather than the abstraction of the raindrop as a sphere or teardrop. Without understanding surface tension (a group phenomena), analyzing the molecular behavior is pretty much impossible. True, surface tension can be deduced from analyzing molecular behavior, but to deduce it and then ignore it is similar to knowing that individuals behave differently in groups and then ignoring that fact when doing analysis. Anthropology seems to come to grips with group phenomena but also resists the assertion explicitly. I don't think this is an accident; Anthropology is not a particularly predictive discipline and doesn't really deal with the problem of predicting what populations will do. "Populations" is the term that is used for the closest analogy to S-ORG that I've found so far in reading Anthropology. Political Science does use groups and individuals to do predictive analysis. But again, they would tend to see groups in much the same way that Anthropologists deal with "populations".
One challenge to my assertion is that there is no such thing as a "group mind". Richardson and Booth, in their book, The Evolution of Culture, state that "there is no point of consciousness". I believe that their error is a concept of the mind that has been disproved by neuroscientists. The authors conceive of consciousness as a single computing entity that we perceive as consciousness. The reality is that the mind is a network of neural entities. This network, in fact, mirrors the network of individual minds in a social organism and the network of computers on a computer network. The real question is what is the analogue of human conscious expression and action? I propose that the answer is twofold and helps distinguish between Super-Tribal S-ORGS and Post-tribal S-ORGS. The Super-Tribal generally has a single individual that serves as the analog. The Post-tribal has democratic mechanisms that work through group selected individuals to provide the analogue. The fact that a single individual is elected to articulate the group mind is a pivotal difference in S-ORG classification and I'll discuss this at more length in further blogs.
The are many potential challenges to my assertion but I am not going to be able to deal with them all. Feel free to bring up any that come to you and we'll discuss them. For now I'd like to talk about the analogues to human individuals that S-ORGs possess.
The group memory is more complex than simply the memories of the individuals who make up the S-ORG. The group memory mechanism has evolved along with the technical evolution of the S-ORGs. We think of technology level as an attribute of human individuals, but it is actually an attribute of S-ORGs. An individual without language could only discover tools on his own or by watching another individual use a tool. Ape research has documented how tools are discovered or invented and how the technology is passed on or dropped. The technical level of individuals is only as good as the technology level of the group and how the group memory functions. This is not a matter of acquisition of language (as if it were invented or bought one day) but the evolution of language. As language became more complex the group memory became more efficient and could hold more information. But it was still limited to individual memory and language. The big jump in technology occurred with written language. Perhaps "jump" gives the wrong impression. Written language evolved in the same way language evolved.
The group memory stores more than technology. It stores procedures or programs as well. The analog to computers is not a bad one. In order for the group to act as a group, the group memory has to store procedures for individuals to follow. In order for the group to consume resources, the individuals have to be trained to hunt. To hunt as a group requires actions predicated on communication. Working in an office, you know how hard it is to get staff to understand procedures that are far simpler than "turn left at the corner". imagine how hard it is to communicate "yell at the mastodon unless it is larger than we can handle with four hunters". The next level of group memory evolution occurs with literacy. I believe the next jump in S-ORG size and the emergence of stable Super-Tribal S-ORGS occurs at this point. If there are any Super-Tribal S-ORGs that existed before literacy, it is hard to know since we rely on literacy to inform us of those S-ORGs. I think it probable that Super-Tribal S-ORGs existed under the right circumstances, but I would argue that they were not, generally long lived. Generally, S-ORGs that have a written language consider themselves (as a group) to be superior to S-ORGs they encounter without a written language or with a language different from their own.
Finally, S-ORGs have an analog to genetic inheritance. The verbal histories, myths and rules that S-ORGs pass down through generations function as a rudimentary DNA. In much the same way that DNA encodes the characteristics that individuals put into play in evolutionary survival, the rules passed down to generations of individuals determine survival of the S-ORG. These rules comprise strategies for survival and S-ORGs that have losing strategies are destroyed or absorbed by other S-ORGs . Nature provides within the genetic mechanisms ways of resisting mutation of the genetic codes. I believe that myths, and other verbal history mechanisms work to the same purpose. When literacy occurs, S-ORGs evolve new ways to preserve this genetic material. That discussion requires another blog entry.
