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What is consciousness? Is it like a computer in our heads? Some cognitive scientists think so but others, like Berkeley neuroscientist Terrence Deacon, say it’s more like a programmer than a computer.
We all make gazillions of decisions every day that don’t rise to conscious attention, instead handled efficiently by habit. I could run naked through the streets just now, but it doesn’t come to mind (except to illustrate my point). Not running naked is a no-brainer for me. That option doesn’t rise to consciousness.
Conscious attention (mulling thinking, wondering, inquiring, investigating) is for handling uncertainties, doubts, dilemmas, tough judgment calls that are too close to call, ambiguous situations that stir our ambivalence and aren’t yet handled by habit.
Thinking, which involves both emotions and concepts, is wondering or doubting. Doubt feels emotionally unsettling, like an alarm going off saying “does not compute”—in other words, “not yet a habit.” That unsettling feeling motivates us to find a way to offload the doubt from conscious attention to unconscious habit. The function of conscious attention is to produce no-brainers, programming as many behaviors as we can into a reliable habit, basically, “I have an app for that.” And we get a lot of help from culture.
Our cultures have apps that resolve lots of tough judgment calls. They’re called social norms and laws. For example, though as a toddler I did a little naked street running, I was socialized out of it easily. We offload lots of dilemmas onto our cultures. “What should I do? What everyone is doing!”
Humans are to their cultures what fish are to water. We can't survive without it. The rare “wild” or “feral” child raised without culture is barely recognizable as human. We aren’t born humanized; we’re socialized into it. We claim far more independent-mindedness than we have.
Buddhists sometimes talk about returning to "beginners mind," the mindful state we had as children. We may be able to observe how culture influences us, but returning to beginner’s mind is a myth or perhaps a goal to strive for that can’t be attained. Even hermits removed completely from their culture still have the habits they learned in their culture. Offloading doubts to our local cultural norms is efficient. We don't have to think everything through for ourselves.
Wondering can be fun, like a satisfying itch that’s easy enough to scratch. Many of us like wondering about the big picture or crossword puzzles. But when the stakes get personally high, the itch becomes more like poison ivy.
Persistent and pervasive doubt triggers self-doubt, doubt about whether one has what it takes to resolve doubts. Self-doubt is more emotionally unsettling than doubt, leaving us feeling paralyzed and unsafe. Self-doubt can be triggered by an overwhelming quantity of little or persistent doubts.
During COVID, many of us are experiencing a lot of uncertainties. Many of our old habits, individual and cultural, aren’t working as well as they were. They’re being kicked back upstairs to our conscious attention in ways that can stir a lot of self-doubt. It’s times like these that people might dream of some can’t-fail way to feel absolutely safe and free.
That’s what cults are for.
Cults are extremely efficient and effective ways to offload both doubt and self-doubt onto a society that makes the decisions for us. Some cults brainwash forcibly, but most don’t have to. People volunteer for what could be called brain-purging, since purging is the root of the term purgatory, the place people go when they’re destined for heaven but are still paying their dues.
Cult members have relaxed into the maximum efficiency of becoming socially-programmed cyberweapons, defending their freedom and safety in part by attacking other people’s freedom and safety.
Though cults are often mortal enemies of each other, they are all fundamentally the same. To argue in favor of this cult over that is like arguing over different brandings of the exact same product. Often members of one cult reject one for another, out of the frying pan into the fire. We make a grave mistake to pay attention to the branding when it’s all the same generic cult formula for offloading doubt and self-doubt onto unconscious social habits.
To feel totally free and safe, cultists declare the equivalent of holy war regardless of whether they’re religious or atheist, left or right—that’s all just branding. Holy war is an oxymoron. It’s holy because we’re saints. It’s war ,which means anything goes. No deed too dirty for saints like us.
The Holy War formula is actually very simple:
Attacking my rivals is always heroic.
My rivals attacking me is always villainous.
My victories are always the triumph of truth and virtue.
My defeats are always temporary, unjust oppression by evil deceivers.
What do I stand for? Absolutely everything right and righteous!
What do I fight against? Absolutely everything wrong and evil.
Those who seek more details than that are just spiteful, jealous dullards.
How do cultists rationalize such claims? The answer is also simple. We talk of cult members as having drunk the Kool-Aid, but what flavor? It’s tutti-fruity, which is Italian-ish for “all fruit,” everything sweet.
Cult members I talk to declare themselves independent, critical thinkers and vehemently anti-cult. Actually, they claim all the virtues. If it’s sweet they’ve got it. Tutti fruity:
Critical thinking? We're the best.
Polite? We're the best.
Moral? We're the best.
Patriotic? We're the best.
Independent- minded? We're the best.
Religious values? We're the best.
Honest? We’re the best.
Bravest? We're the best.
Humble? We're the best.
Broadly informed? We're the best.
Anti-cultists? WE'RE THE BEST!
Seeing the big picture? We're the best.
Everything virtuous? We're the best.
Though what's considered sweet changes from era to era and cult to cult, the tutti fruity pan-virtuousness doesn't. “If it’s good, we’ve got it. If it’s evil, our rivals in this holy war have it.”
How does one justify all of this tutti-fruity self-flattery? First, through circular reasoning. For example, “I’m most honest because I say I’m most honest and you should believe me because after all, I’m most honest.” Circularity alone gives cultists the false sense that they are safe and free. Whatever virtue they claim for themselves must be true. I call this “talkiswalkism” the assumption that what you say about your behavior is an accurate description and that those who don’t believe you are just biased.
Second, they justify through the equivalent of charm bracelets with trinket amulets to ward off all challenges to their virtue and authority: Find some lightweight symbol, one for each of the virtues you claim for yourself. String them together and wear them as proof of your merit.
Call your fellow Communist cultist “comrade,” and it proves that you’re wholly committed to equality. Declare yourself pro-life and it proves that you’re always compassionate. Be baptized once and you are forgiven all your sins. Condemn some rival cult and you prove that you are absolutely anti-cult.
Ornament yourself in a bracelet with each virtue represented by a trinket on it. From your high-horse of pan-virtuousness, you can flash the right trinket down into the face of anyone who challenges you, whichever trinket convinces you at the moment that you're the best. Beyond that, all it takes is reliable amnesia to ignore your inconsistencies.
That is the most efficient way to feel permanently safe and free. Every cult promotes it. Same lightweight bag of tricks, different brandings.
Spotting the trick in some cult you hate is a good start, but it in no way proves you’re not in one yourself. We can all fall for what I call “exempt by contempt”: “I hate when my enemy uses that trick, which proves I couldn’t possibly be using the same trick.”
Cults are attempts to escape all possibility of ever losing.
Being human means accepting that there's no escape. We have to track and adapt to changing reality to minimize our chances of losing.
