Q: Ok. We left off with a few words about the Individual. You said that the individual is the cyclonic center of disturbance in the structure of human behavior, the Catch-22.
So, could you take it from there?
A: The first and most important thing to point out would be that the individual as a biological entity is not identical with the behavioral individual, and second, that the behavioral individual is the deposit of the organization and control of human behavior.
Q: Could you say more about the behavioral individual?
A: The individual as persona is the selective, deceptive, and coherent semiotic interpretation of the behavioral individual, either by the individual themself, or by someone else.
Q: So the response to oneself is an interpretation?
A: That’s right. Specifically, it’s an interpretation of a randomly assembled package of learned behavioral patterns.
Q: In other words, the persona is a construct?
A: Yes. And the persona construct assumes that the behavioral individual is a conjunctive category (a category in which certain attributes are found in all members of that category), but is in fact a disjunctive category (a category in which there are no attributes in common to all members, and which is a cultural and social convenience, or a heuristic convenience).
Q: Why does the persona assume that it's a conjunctive category?
A: Because of the primary attribute of the human brain.
Q: You lost me.
A: Well, it's like we talked about before. Two things that human beings absolutely need to survive are stability and innovation, both of which are irreconcilable, and both of which are explained by the primary attribute of the brain. The problem, of course, is in confusing conjunctivity with something permanent, perfect and absolutely true, when in fact it's just a construct.
Q: Is that what accounts for the words selective, deceptive and coherent, in your description of the Individual as persona?
A: Yes. Exactly.
Q: How does any of this relate to Culture and Behavior?
A: Well, we can put it this way: Personality is to the Individual what Culture is to Human Behavior.
Q: Could you elaborate?
A: Sure. Personality organizes and stabilizes the behavioral individual and ascribes attributes to it. From this it follows that an interest is a strategy that maintains personal stability.
Q: This is kind of how you started PRC, by asking questions about personal interests and professional responsibilities, no?
A: That’s right.
Q: What was the thinking or justification behind that?
A: Ah, well, there’s a lot. In the first place, asking questions is a great way to get to know my partners, as I prefer to call them (as opposed to clients) and from their perspective, answering questions is a great way for them to get to know themselves.
A: Because, to avoid the technical, it alters the thinking we do when someone asks us questions, as opposed to just lecturing.
Q: But sometimes lecturing is necessary, no?
A: Yes. It’s good for a number of reasons. One, as a really good piano player I knew in college once said to me, Sometimes it’s just good to listen. It sounds so obvious and of course it was what I was doing a lot of at the time. But, well, it’s one of those cases when someone else says it and you have that click and a light goes off in your head and you just get it. Or, as I like to say, It's always the obvious that eludes us. Another reason lecturing is good is because it’s great for acquiring a body of information that you don’t know but need to know or is useful for you to know. And, of course, it's also good to listen to someone talk about something that might seem irrelevant and even boring, but that they bring to life with their interest, intellect, passion and humanity. Through such speakers the listener can have a transformation of consciousnes. And, finally, as with a Q & A, if the lecturer loves what they do and cares about the student or learner's progress, they can become a mentor. Which is a lot healthier intellectually, socially and morally, than a guru.
Q: While we’re on the subject and before continuing with our discussion about Explanation and Power, don’t you have another approach to PRC?
A: Yes. I have three basic approaches. The discussion group (or conversation class, or Q & A), the lecture, and the dissertation, which is when someone gives a presentation and then defends their position against questions designed to challenge their position, or point of view. A fourth one is negotiations, where we have Red Team/Blue Team-type role playing to practice for negotiations. But we don’t do that as often as the other three.
In any event, the important point is that in all four one can see Explanation and Power: The Control of Human Behavior being played out right in front of them. There’s simply no escaping it.
And now we’re back to the subject of our discussion.
Q: Great! So, to continue, you were saying that personality organizes and stabilizes the behavioral individual and ascribes value to it and that from this it follows that an interest is a strategy that maintains personal stability, right?
A: Yes, and an interest as a strategy that maintains personal stability is more obvious in non-economic interests (though an interest can be economically functional, but that’s probably a rarity in modern society).
Q: Could you give an example of an interest that is used as a strategy for maintaining personal stability?
A: Sure. One example would be collecting.
Q: Collecting?
A: Yes. As affluence in the United States increased after WWII, discretionary income and discretionary time also increased.
One consequence was an enormous increase in the behavioral phenomenon of collecting. This was a repetition of the collecting behavior which historically has always been a behavioral pattern of members of an affluent class.
Q: So, collecting is an interest?
A: Collecting is an interest. The important point is this:
Interests are the repressive oppressor of the individual upon themselves, a way of controlling and stabilizing behavior.
Drugs and alcohol are also examples of interests.
Agape and Eros are further and almost universal modes of interest. Agape or Social Love resolves temporarily the tension arising from the struggle to maintain the equilibrium between aggression and control. Eros (whether sexual or mystic) on the other hand resolves the tension that arises from maintaining the distinction between figure and ground and from maintaining the categorical stability of the figure so distinguished, particularly the persona as a disjunctive category. Both arise from the irresolvable tension of maintaining relatively stable explanatory regresses without restoring to or being overcome by the ultimate sanctions.
Q: The whole thing about Agape and Eros sounds interesting. Could you say something more about them?
A: Sure. First and foremost, they’re both seen as redemptive.
Q: What does that mean?
A: It means that Agape (social) and Eros (personal) in their various modes are seen as resolving the tensions experienced by simply living. For that reason it’s important to direct attention to the fact that both are safe enough when used as vacations, so to speak, but immensely destructive when seen as absolutes.
Q: What do you mean in this case by “absolutes”?
A: When the language of any idea used to direct action in the real world is hypostized into an ideal of permanent stability, behavioral, cultural, and institutional. Even more specifically, when it comes in the form of absolute freedom from the basic tensions of human behavior. So, in this case, redemptionism is ultimately the attempt to escape from randomness.
Q: To play Devil’s Advocate, why is that bad?
A: Because randomness is the source of human adaptability.
Q: So, redemptionism is maladaptive?
A: Yes.
Q: Could you give an example?
A: Revolutionary Utopianism. Of course!
Q: Is that what you think the whole Woke thing is?
A: That is what the whole Woke thing is, independently of what I think about it.
Q: I was going to ask you how this relates to our discussion in this part of our talk with the Individual. But maybe it would be a good idea to stop now and continue the discussion in Part IX. Does that sound good to you?
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