theoildrum | We evolved to favor the ‘in group’ over the ‘out group’, for
resource, defensive, and ultimately reproductive advantages. The
internet has spawned millions of ‘in-groups’ – peak oilers, tea-party
evangelizers, deflationistas, gold-bugs, Austrian economics followers,
anti-abortion activists, and myriad less controversial groups such as
‘Claremount High School Boosters", "Kerr Jar Enthusiasts", “Earthworm
Snack Creators” and the like. People gravitate towards groups they
identify with. And they usually stay there. (After all, a room full of
clowns feels a lot less clown-like).
Achieving status is a primary driver in the biological kingdom and
remains a key driver in our human social groups. But today, for the
first time in our species history, the same ‘feelings’ we get from
moving up in a real life social hierarchy can be attained cheaply and
easily online. Being the most vocal, most persuasive or most
interesting in a small group of dedicated/interested followers engenders
the same neural reward as being the head of a small business, or a
Mayor, or a high school basketball star. Our brains don’t really know
that being the head of the “Morel Foraging Society” or “Nudists for
Nader 2012” with several hundred members online is different than being
County Treasurer in real life – we receive respect, positive feedback,
deference etc. from the people in our ‘in-group’ (the fact they might be
just anonymous mushroom pickers or passionate nude people is not
relevant to our brains).
Human ethologists liken this phenomenon to 'dispersal phenotype' prevalent in nature:
Dispersal is important in biology. Often a species will produce two forms:
1) a maintenance phenotype (the outcome of genes and the structures they produce interacting with a specific environment) that is adapted to the environment in which it is born, and (2) a dispersal phenotype that is programmed to move to a new area and that often has the capacity to adapt to a new environment.
According to the present theory, humans have developed two dispersal phenotypes in the forms of the prophet and the follower. The coordinated action of these two phenotypes would serve to disperse us over the available habitat. This dispersal must have been aided by the major climatic changes over the past few million years in which vast areas of potential human habitat have repeatedly become available because of melting of ice sheets.
The dispersal phenotypes might have evolved through selection at the individual level, since the reproductive advantage of colonizing a new habitat would have been enormous. They would also promote selection between groups. Factors that promote selection at the group level are rapid splitting of groups, small size of daughter groups, heterogeneity (differences) of culture between groups, and reduction in gene flow between groups. These factors are all promoted by the breaking away of prophet-led groups with new belief systems.
Cult followers have been studied and found to be high on schizotypal traits, such as abnormal experiences and beliefs. They have not yet been tested for the sort of selfish attitudes and behavior that characterize free-riders. If a large cohort of people were tested for some measure of selfishness, it is predicted that those who subsequently joined cults would be low on such a measure. Predictions could also be made about future cult leaders. They would be likely to be ambitious males who were not at the top of the social hierarchy of their original group. If part of why human groups split in general is to give more reproductive opportunities to males in the new group, it can also be predicted that leaders of new religious movements would be males of reproductive age. Female cult leaders are not likely to be more fertile as a result of having many sexual partners, but their sons might be in an advantageous position for increased reproduction.
From THE BIOLOGY OF RELIGIOUS BEHAVIOR, Edited by Jay R. Feierman (bold added my me)
[pp. 184-186] DISPERSAL
Most people are both reasonable, and passive. Some people are either
unreasonable or assertive (or both). In a free form forum one
unreasonable or assertive person will drown out 10 or more who are
either reasonable or passive. Especially for those whose assertion or
unreasonableness in real life leads to fewer social opportunities, the
internet has been a godsend. Either anonymous or in their own name,
they can easily accumulate a following by articulating what people
already believe or like to hear. Given the self-selected audience,
there doesn’t exist the normal social checks and balances. As such, due
to the myriad different categories, those assertive and/or social
acceptance seeking souls who find their niches online dig in hard and
‘feel’ as if they are true celebrities. Combine that with the
iterations and scale that come from long time periods, little or no
barriers to entry and an apathy/lack of interest from those not spending
time on the internet and these folks have become ensconced at all sorts
of cyber guideposts on topics that cover the map. Dispersal
phenotypes.
Basically, since people believe in authority figures, and nominate their own authority figures based on their own belief systems,
it is no wonder that time and numbers has by circa 2010 amassed an
internet army of 'clowns'. We see increasingly hysterical caricatures
emerge on the internet/media that undergo some perceived status/ego
boost that they wouldn't/couldn't have gotten in normal situations. The
feedback from the true believers (of whatever tribe they communicate
to), then locks these personalities into an utterly confident belief in
their own position as an expert, and their actions become considerably
(and understandably) clownlike over time to people not in their
sub-group, especially magnified in those cases of borderline mental
illness (which I suspect are not few). I notice this dynamic in numerous
areas of discourse but its particularly prevalent in the the peak oil,
finance and climate change circles where I have spent alot of time.
