To apply a metaphor to The Vital System of Ideas let us imagine a Cultural Pyramid.

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The height is a metaphor for the rate of learning and innovation, the edges for the distance from the center of that learning and innovation. Each face stands for one of the four innovative social roles, scientist, philosopher, artist, valuator (a role played in all fields of science, art, and philosophy).

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The pyramid is best viewed behaviorally and historically, and better understood expressed in the proposition that all behavior is continuous and hierarchical. And by hierarchy we mean simply the most developed explanations in the areas of problem-solving and significant innovation.

This is all that was ever meant by the term High Culture, ie; high-level problem-solving, innovation, explanation, and the corresponding behavioral patterns associated with these activities.

These activities are also referred to as Survival Skills, for a reason, since they are directed toward ensuring the survival, success, and growth, not just of our social-institutions, but of our species. Ignoring their value is fatal.

We can illustrate this by relating the skills briefly to child-development.

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The innocent curiosity and love of experiment found in all children becomes Science, which strives to improve our predictive powers.

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A child makes a mark in the sand with a stick, or on a piece of paper with a crayon. From these simple marks develop the paintings of a Raphael. Creativity in its infancy becomes Art, which works toward improving our powers of the creative imagination.

 

Before children can speak they utter nonsense syllables in their attempt to communicate with us and make sense out of the new world they've just entered. Experience and study can turn these nonsense syllables into the thoughts of Philosophy, which strives to improve our control over explanatory behavior.

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Valuation, which strives to improve our control over our value behavior, begins in infancy when a child is told they are good for learning to do something competently. Though ascription of value is often separated from judgment of competence they usually go together.

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For example, if we ascribe value to an individual and are asked why, we respond with judgments of competency, "He's a good father, She loves her children, He's a good leader who cares about his employees and clients, They're a good company who care as much about social responsibility as they do economic profit." This is of the greatest possible importance in terms of any kind of social-management, from the family, to small and large business, to world leaders on a global stage.

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By far the most important manifestation of this is the ability of an individual, family, company, or culture, to ascribe value to itself and others through fair and competent judgment. All four, science, philosophy, art, and valuation, are forms of Communication, linked by Explanation and Social-Institutions.

 

Thus, human behavior is identifiable with communication. We are not animals that use communication; in so far as we are human beings we are communication, and that is all we are.

 

To break down old barriers and penetrate new frontiers requires effective communication and exceptional leadership, both of which emerge from our knowledge of the vital system of ideas. Ideas that help us live  Beyond Technology.