UnWoke Essay Series: Scaffolds & Sophistry

On the relationship between consciousness, language, and competence

Zachery Strong is a scholar, educator, and human development professional from Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. His paper “Scaffolds & Sophistry” is the first to appear in Woke Watch Canada’s new UnWoke Essay Series. Our aim is to feature essays that directly or indirectly relate in some way with the culture war struggles of the West.

This essay fits that goal by dealing with the epistemics involved with modern sense-making. It is not just raw intellectual skill, but also the ability to understand and relate to the mindsets and philosophies of those you disagree. There are levels. Keep reading…

I encourage you to visit Zachery’s website for more of his writings and unique perspective. From Zachery:

Since 2019, I have been weaving together insights on human development from a wide variety of disciplines and sources. To my amazement, there is a high degree of consilience between many different lines of thinking, which has not yet been documented. This is how I spend most of my spare time.

Zachery Strong Independent Scholar

Scaffolds & Sophistry : On the relationship between consciousness, language, and competence

Abstract: The proliferation of information in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, combined with  the advent of electronic communications technology, has fostered a cosmopolitan and  misinformation-rich environment that has left many individuals vulnerable to deception, sophistry,  and ideological possession. Linguistic and developmental root causes of these vulnerabilities are  examined, with a focus on the human language habit and ego development theory. Opportunities for  the scalable development of misinformation-resistant human beings are outlined, and the necessity  of faith in the context of education and human development is discussed. 

Keywords: language habit, ego development, mental models, misinformation

I. INTRODUCTION 

It is commonly accepted – perhaps a truism –  that humankind is living in the “Information  Age”, a period of history marked by the  invention of the transistor, the advent of digital  computing, the creation of the internet, and  the proliferation of facts, statistics, knowledge,  and advice of all kinds. Indeed, over the last  two hundred years, the average person’s  information intake has grown from the  morning’s newspaper and workplace gossip to  a bouquet of books, podcasts, television  shows, legacy media broadcasts, online news  articles, and social media posts, punctuated by  the occasional Google or Wikipedia search. 

The power to choose, the ability to search, and  the freedom to share granted by electronic  media have given individuals the ability to  understand and change the world in new ways.  Radio, one of the first forms of electronic  media, fuelled important countercultural  movements in the mid-1900s (Land 1997,  Crider 2020). Social media, and the access of  information it provided in the face of  repressive regimes, played a key role in the  Arab Spring by enabling the widespread  dissemination of stories about injustice,  oppression, and hope (Howard et al. 2011). The internet, a portal to vast stores of accumulated knowledge and a “marketplace of ideas” in the  truest sense, has served to heighten consumer  awareness (Booth & Matic 2011), create a new  class of entrepreneurs through peer-to-peer  communication (Godin 2008), and provide new  ways for people to learn outside of the  traditional classroom (Strong 2021a).  

However, despite the many positive impacts of  electronic media, the affordances of choosing,  searching, and sharing come with inversions  and drawbacks (McLuhan 1964). Although the  medium of radio did allow for grassroots  broadcasts to flourish, the prevailing interests  were able to nearly monopolize the airwaves:  in the 1930s, this facilitated Hitler’s rise to  power, for example, by inviting his compelling  oratory into the homes of desperate Germans  across the nation. Similarly, television is almost  entirely the domain of entrenched interests  and massive corporations: for decades, the  dozens of channels available to consumers  gave the illusion of choice while privileging  content that reflected and reinforced the  mainstream culture. 

The internet, despite allowing for a plurality of  voices to be heard, has created new issues to  contend with. The existence of so-called “fake  news” and “disinformation” is a major concern amongst governments and media outlets, who  find that they are communicating to an  increasingly skeptical public and competing  with social media influencers who may have  more charisma than integrity or authority. The  suggestive algorithms built into many search  and suggest features have unintentionally  created “echo chambers” where people can  develop profound biases as a result of the  information they are provided. Finally, the  internet has allowed for the creation of many  different subcommunities, some of which are  believed to contribute to violent radicalization  (Koehler 2014). 

In addition to these immediate and obvious  problems, the new ways in which people  access and consume information have subtly  altered their relationship to that information.  People of today may have the world at their  fingertips, but they have also become  responsible for developing their own  understanding of that world from the streams  of information they encounter (Kelly 2016). The  certainty that was characteristic of Western  cultures in the early 1900s and the Cold War,  driven in part by the mediums of newspapers  and television, has given way to a more  provisional, relativistic, and hesitant way of  knowing that is more suitable for life online(i). 

Unfortunately, the demands and pressures of  this new media environment have proven to be  too much for many. Conspiracy theories like  QAnon have captivated millions of minds  (Moskalenko & McCauley 2021), and the  growing chasm between political groups  suggests that even “average” people are losing  their ability to develop a balanced viewpoint  (Garimella & Weber 2017). These trends are  perhaps most clearly evidenced by the  disparity in public opinion regarding the  COVID-19 pandemic and the international  response: one “side” believes wholeheartedly  in the efficacy and safety of the vaccines, while  the other is alleging crimes against humanity  or refusing the vaccine at all costs. 

Although the effects and consequences of  “misinformation” are becoming especially  pertinent in a post-COVID world, the tendency  for people to be led astray by bad information  is in fact a perennial problem. Ancient Athens  was home to the Sophists, who honed the  Western capacity for rhetoric in the search for  worldly power. The dogmatic teachings of the  Catholic Church held Europe in thrall for over  one thousand years after the end of antiquity.  Following the Enlightenment, founders of  universities publicly lamented about the state  of general knowledge (Newman 1852),  scholars observed the rise of an “intellectual  class” with more influence than insight (Hayek 1949), and even modern thinkers deride the  “intellectual-yet-idiot”; people of too much  reading and not enough common sense (Taleb  2017). 

Given the ubiquity and unavoidability of  misleading information in the public sphere  and the persistence of those who peddle this  false knowledge, it is becoming increasingly  necessary to develop an understanding of the  mechanisms by which people become  susceptible to these influences as well as  potential solutions for these eternal problems.  To that end, this paper will explore some of the  root causes of our collective susceptibility to  deception, sophistry, and ideological  possession. It will suggest that some of the  problems we are experiencing may be  linguistic and developmental in nature. Finally,  it will explore potential solutions to the  misinformation epidemic, the importance of  real-world experience in developing a  resistance to information-based manipulation,  and the inescapable necessity of faith. 

II. MODELS AND MAPS 

At the root of the human vulnerability to  deception and misdirection is our  inexhaustible need for information of any kind.  The drive to acquire knowledge is so  fundamental to the human experience that  information is often metaphorically equated with life-giving sustenance in phrases like  “thirst for knowledge”, or even explicitly  conflated with food, such as in the Biblical story  of Adam, Eve, and the forbidden fruit. 

This natural curiosity, or desire to know, emerges from the primary way in which  human beings relate to the world around  them: through the creation of internal  representations, or “mental models”, which  help direct attention, interpret surroundings,  and coordinate productive responses to  stimuli (Strong 2021b). For example, an  emergency room doctor’s mental model of a  healthy human body, based on years of  rigorous study and a wealth of medical  information, helps them quickly identify a  patient’s symptoms and develop preliminary  diagnoses. Similarly, someone’s internal model  of their romantic partner might prime them to  notice subtle cues that indicate a shift in their  partner’s mood, as well as empower them to  determine what change in behaviour is  required to maintain harmony in the  relationship. 

Beyond helping humans respond effectively “in  the moment”, internal representations also aid  in the construction of long-term plans. Julian  Jaynes, a Princeton psychologist, identified the  existence of an “Analog I”, or a hypothetical  self, that can be projected into potential future  scenarios: this allows for experimentation  without risk as well as the development of  multiple provisional futures (Jaynes 1976)(ii).  Jordan B. Peterson, a clinical psychologist from  the University of Toronto, has explored at  length the existence and structure of what he  calls “maps of meaning”, internal models that  represent both external facts and the  motivational significance of those facts for our  immediate and distant goals (Peterson 1999)(iii). 

The human propensity to model our  surroundings has even been found in infants,  who have often surprised researchers with  their ability to deduce the workings of  mechanical puzzles, as well as in toddlers, who  seem to be in a constant state of learning and  asking “why?” (Gopnik 2016). Although every  parent has found themselves exasperated by  their child’s “insatiable” curiosity at one point  or another, the construction of mental models  through questioning, research, and  experimentation is a prerequisite for survival.  Without these models, even trivial questions  like “What will happen if I touch this stove?  Should I eat all the cookies in the cookie jar?  What will happen if I throw this rock at that car?  How do I get to school? What should I do for a  career?” could only be answered by taking  random action and hoping for a positive result.  Therefore, the development of internal  representations, mental models, or maps of  meaning that correspond to the real world and  engender productive action becomes an  important part of not only childhood, but  adulthood as well. 

The mental model of the world that someone  possesses not only influences how they  respond to situations, but also the types of  goals that they set, the beliefs that they have,  and even how they perceive environmental  stimuli (Peterson 1999). Thus, there exists the  potential for a recursive effect, or vicious cycle,  where bad information leads to a false belief,  which leads to misinterpretation of  downstream events and more false beliefs.  This can be seen in the special case of child  abuse, where foundational assumptions about  the self and the world formed in the early years  of life have subtle-yet-powerful influences in  later years (Miller 1979, Erikson 1994). 

It naturally follows from this phenomenon that  “fixing” or “correcting” someone’s mental  model is key to addressing misinformation,  deception, sophistry, and ideological  possession. However, a deeper understanding  of how these internal models work is required  in order to do so. Specifically, it becomes  necessary to investigate the “substance” of  these internal representations, and to ask what  they are “made of” and how they come to exist.

III. THE PHENOMENON OF JARGON

The existence of jargon, or meaning-laden  words or expressions used between experts in  a particular discipline, provides a helpful  bridge between the idea of internal  representations and the linguistic dimension  of the misinformation problem. Take, for  example, the concept of a king in chess. “King”  is an arbitrary sound that we make, a set of  scribbles on a piece of paper, a male ruler of a  state or country, or a small figurine with a cross  on its head. Yet, to a chess player, the king is  also the piece that can only move one square  in each direction, can be put in “check” by other  pieces, and must be protected at all costs to  avoid “checkmate”, or losing. For chess players,  the word “king” conjures up a gestalt of images,  rules, strategies, moves, and even board  positions. To non-players, “king” is simply a  male head of state, and nothing more. 

Another example is the popular mnemonic  “BEDMAS”, which stands for “Brackets,  Exponents, Division, Multiplication, Addition,  Subtraction”. This elegant construction, which  bundles six mathematical operations and their  order of execution into an easily remembered  format, has been used for many decades to  help students comprehend and solve  mathematical problems. The acronym is  completely unintelligible to anyone who has  not learned arithmetic, yet immensely helpful  to those who have. 

In the hands of experts, or those versed in the  terminology of a particular subject, pieces of  jargon like “king” or “BEDMAS” are far more  than words or acronyms: they are reference  points that evoke concepts, memories, and  parts of one’s mental model. These “mental  objects” can then be manipulated and  experimented upon in the conscious mind.  This connection becomes even more apparent  in some special circumstances: consider a marketing student who views every problem  through the lens of the elementary “4Ps”  (Product, Promotion, Place, Price), which allows  them to sort between different types of  information and construct solutions. The 4Ps,  themselves pieces of jargon, serve as the  foundation for the construction of this  student’s entire mental model, and without  this jargon, marketing problems would be  rendered unintelligible to this student. 

From these examples, it would seem that  language use somehow precedes, coincides  with, or otherwise enables mental modelling  activity in human beings. However, these  isolated situations do not fully capture how  closely language and mental activity are  related and the implications that arise from  this relationship. 

IIII. THE LANGUAGE HABIT 

If “jargon” denotes a word that has a special  meaning or connotation for a select ingroup,  then it stands to reason that every word in  every language could be considered a form of  jargon, as words are intelligible only to those  fluent in that language, evoke gestalts of  meanings and connotations that depend  heavily on context, and are used to construct  mental models in ways that make the words  themselves functionally inseparable from the  models they help to create. 

Consider, for example, the word “anger”. As we  learned when we were young, this refers to a  certain emotional state that usually results  from an unfortunate event or a frustrated goal  of some kind. To “be” angry is to be consumed  or dominated by this emotional state.  However, anger is just an arbitrary word;  scribbles on a page, sound waves in the air. It  does not – and cannot – capture the full extent  of this emotion. The best this word can do is  provide a linguistic reference point for an  individual, or a group of individuals, regarding  a complex concept. Yet, when we feel angry,  our experience of the emotion is almost  inseparable from the word itself, so deeply has  the relationship been established. 

In fact, the relationship between our  experiences and our words is rather complicated. Although it is true that  prelinguistic infants are quite capable of  modelling their surroundings and responding  to them, developmental psychologists have  consistently noticed a correlation between  verbal and cognitive development (Bloom &  Kiel 2001), as well as specific arrestations of  development in children that grew up in  nonverbal, isolated, neglectful, or abusive  environments (Vyshedskiy et al. 2017). Notably,  not only do nonverbal children perform poorly  on tests involving language, they also struggle  to understand spatial concepts like “behind”,  “into”, or “under”, and struggle with mental  visualization tasks that involve, for example,  the imaginary rotation of an object.  

The link between language acquisition and  cognition extends beyond the special and  unfortunate cases of feral children: slight  differences in spatial reasoning have also been  found between speakers of different  languages (Levinson 1996), and even the  mental manipulation of numbers has also  been shown to depend on one’s language  ability (Bloom & Kiel 2001).  

Given this array of evidence, it becomes  apparent that many mental operations people  take for granted may actually rely on a  foundation of language, where individual  words, symbols, sounds, or images serve as internal reference points for complex abstract  concepts. Since virtually every human being is ensconced in a world of words from the time they are born, it is easy to see how this relationship could have gone unnoticed until  the days of modern psychological inquiry. 

At this point, it may seem logical to conclude  that every thought that humans have is  therefore “made of” language. However, the  matter becomes more complicated when the  phenomena of intuition (Strong 2021b) and unsymbolized thought (Hurlburt & Akhter  2008) are taken into account. In the case of  intuition - particularly expert intuition - a  detailed mental model appears to facilitate a kind of “knowing” that is instinctual and  prelinguistic and can actually outpace  conscious thought: in this way, language can  give rise to nonlinguistic responses. In the case of unsymbolized thought, entire thoughts may  appear in the mind in an undifferentiated, nonlinear, and “complete” manner, which  suggests that one need not necessarily  construct sentences in order to think. 

The complexities that researchers have  encountered in this area may be partially  explained by the unique responsibilities of  each hemisphere of the brain. It has been  found that the left hemisphere tends to  operate in a more linear fashion and tends to  be the main center of language, whereas the  right hemisphere works holistically and  metaphorically (Peterson 1999). Although both  hemispheres are involved in language  processing (Chiarello & Beeman 1998), the  differences between the logical and  metaphorical approaches employed by each  side of the brain seem to give rise to different  mental capacities and operations. While the  left hemisphere grants us the capacity for  “rational” processing people are familiar with in the Western intellectual tradition, the right  hemisphere seems to be the center of general  comparisons, intuition, “leaps of logic”, and  metaphor. 

Defined as “a word or phrase for one thing that  is used to refer to another thing in order to  show or suggest that they are similar”, a  metaphor is most often seen in Western  culture as a stylistic addition to a piece of  writing. However, as some scholars have  shown, the use of metaphor is deeply  embedded in language and serves to make  abstract phenomena or experiences  comprehensible by rendering them in physical  or spatial terms (Lakoff & Johnson 1980). For  example, the concept of “good” or “positive” is  often associated with the direction “up”: people  speak of being “down” when they are sad, or of  “rising to the top” of an organization after a  string of promotions. The virtue of dependability is associated with the dominant  hand in most of the species, and is  encapsulated in the term “right hand man”. We  even anthropomorphize inanimate objects by  speaking of the “foot” of a mountain, the “leg”  of a chair, or the “head” of a table. Even a  simple sentence like “Julia pointed the gun at  Harry” invokes the metaphor of “point”, a  physical quality of an object that is typically  dangerous and focused in a single direction.  

Indeed, humans are constantly using  metaphors to describe things in terms of other  things, often using the physical world as  inspiration. Interestingly, this practice is even  used when describing various functions of the  mind: people who “grasp” an idea often say  they can “see it clearly”, and people who are  “slow” to understand are said to be “dim”,  “thick”, or “dull”. We often say that we “grapple”  with problems and have moments when  “lightbulbs go off” in our heads. It has even  been argued that consciousness itself is an  emergent human property that stems from  language, as constructing a mental model of  one’s own self and mind requires the use of  language, and therefore of metaphor (Jaynes  1976). 

As can be seen, the relationship between  human mental activity and language is  extraordinarily complex and deep: this is a  topic that requires focused attention from  researchers in the future. However, it seems  highly likely that cognition is intrinsically linked  to consciousness in two ways: not only are our  mental models made out of language one way  or another, but those models then interact  with the world in ways that are “metaphorical”  or otherwise not explicitly linguistic, such as  through spatial reasoning, intuition, and  unsymbolized thought. 

For these reasons, the key to understanding  deception, sophistry, and especially ideological  possession lies in the realm of language and its  relationship to the mental models humans  create to understand the world. As will be shown, deceptive language serves to corrupt  people’s mental models and divorce them  from reality, but mechanisms by which people  can be emancipated from such a state do exist  and have yet to be deployed at scale. 

V. DECEPTION AND SOPHISTRY

When viewed within the context of mental  models and language, the impact of a lie on a  human being becomes easier to comprehend  and elucidate. Essentially, a lie is a piece of information encoded in a set of words that is  introduced into someone’s mental model and  then taken to be true. If left unchallenged, the  false information may corrupt other parts of  the mental model that are related to it, creating  a situation where someone ends up acting out  of accordance with reality. 

A simple example of such deception would be  in the archetypal scenario of an unfaithful  spouse. Their unfortunate partner, who is  unaware of the existence of an affair, models a  large part of their life on the assumption that  the marriage is sound, and will celebrate  anniversaries and other milestones in a state  of blissful ignorance. They may even discount  or misinterpret “warning signs” because  infidelity is so far outside of the bounds of their  mental model that it is not even a  consideration. Of course, the charade is  maintained over time with a continuous  stream of lies, serving to further entrench the  original deception in the unfortunate partner’s  mental model. 

Sophistry, like deception, uses words in the  pursuit of power. However, unlike deception,  sophistry operates primarily by confusing  people and preventing them from using their  mental models effectively. It does this by using  misdirection rather than outright lies,  encouraging people to focus on the wrong  parts of their model or to discount their  instinctual response. If the archetypal cheating  spouse is caught, for example, it is unlikely they  will deny the facts: instead, they may attempt  to give their partner the run-around by using excuses, blame, and other “language games” to  move the focus of the conversation away from  their infidelity and onto a less inconvenient  topic. More subtle versions of sophistry are  employed by marketers, journalists, and public  relations professionals to manipulate public  sentiment. A well-placed adjective in a  headline, the framing of a broadcast news  story, a publication’s editorial strategy, and the  practice of corporate branding are all attempts  to activate specific aspects of consumers’  mental models and avoid others. 

Despite the ever-present threat of deception  and sophistry in the realm of human affairs,  people seem to have a natural defense  mechanism in the form of intuition  (Albrechtsen et al. 2009). When something we  are told does not correspond to our mental  model, we “feel” that something is wrong, even  if we aren’t able to explicitly refute the lie.  However, this defence mechanism can be  bypassed or overpowered, particularly by  authority figures (Milgram 1963). Additionally,  we are especially vulnerable to deception and  sophistry when we do not possess full  knowledge of the matter or situation at hand,  and therefore lack the capacity for accurate  intuition.  

VI. IDEOLOGICAL POSSESSION

A more extreme and pernicious form of  corrupted mental modelling is ideological  possession, whereby someone becomes  consumed by an external set of ideas to the  point that their personality is indistinguishable  from “their” ideas. Examples of such  possession can be found on both sides of the  political aisle, in every world religion, and in  some sports leagues: in all of these contexts, a  set of ideas or a series of well-placed words can  be utilized to overcome the natural human  revulsion against violence and encourage  individuals or groups to commit heinous acts. 

Unlike deception or sophistry, ideological  possession is a long-term affair that can take  months or years to occur. It usually entails sustained involvement in a subgroup or cult like atmosphere, restricted access to outside  information, and a strong disincentive against  asking questions. By way of these tactics, and  others like them, leaders of niche groups - or  entire nations - can replace the information in  their followers’ mental models with language  of their own design, gradually revising how  people think, feel, and act. 

Interestingly, one of the “symptoms” of  ideological possession, particularly in the  political sphere, seems to be the extensive and  unreflective use of jargon. On the political left,  critical race theory, a highly technical set of  ideas which originated in the field of law  (Delgado & Stefanic 1995), has consumed the  rhetoric of activists and politicians alike. Similar  uses of highly specialized language can be  found within Christianity and Scientology.  Additionally, when put under pressure or in a  debate, ideologues tend to revert back to  “talking points”, which seem to be well entrenched aspects of their language-based  mental model. Two particularly obvious  examples of this are the tendency of some Christians to quote from the Gospel of John  and the Epistles instead of forming an  argument in their own words, or left-wing  activists reverting to accusations of racism and  homophobia in almost every discussion. 

For the possessed, their mental model - which  is likely founded on lies and sophistry, if not  human error - becomes more real than the  world itself. This becomes a significant  problem, as interactions with the “real” world  become increasingly strained and problematic,  and inconsistencies with doctrine, dogma, or  the “party line” become more difficult to justify.  Although some people are able to gather  enough internal resources to see through the  manipulation and escape, oftentimes a  combination of strong authority figures and  the threat of social isolation keeps many minds  in proverbial shackles.

VII. EGO DEVELOPMENT THEORY

To better understand why ideological  possession is so pervasive and persistent, it  becomes necessary to examine the types of  people who are most susceptible to such  influences. Although the existing literature has  found risk factors for cult involvement to  include personal distress, spiritual  “seekership”, family dysfunction, and  disillusionment with life (Almendros et al.,  2007), ideological possession is a deeper issue  than simply joining a subculture or niche  group. As evidenced by the bloodshed of the  1900s, it can affect people of any educational  level and societal background, and therefore  deserves a closer examination. 

Take, for example, a stereotypical Ku Klux Klan  recruit. It could be argued that such a person  likely possesses a poor education, a restricted  media diet, and lives in a rural area with very  few opportunities for meaningful social  interaction with immigrants. They came from a  rough family background, don’t have a well developed personality, and don’t have much in  the way of social support or connection. They  also lost their manufacturing job a month ago  when the plant got moved to Bangladesh,  leaving them disillusioned and anxious about  the future, albeit fiercely patriotic. It becomes  very easy to see how a charismatic leader can  begin to convert this person: perhaps it begins  with a conversation at a bar, where national  news is re-interpreted through a “new light”  and the “real problems” of society are set forth  for discussion. The recruit is later given a role  within the Klan, which comes with a title and  the feeling of meaning. At the point where the  recruit is proactively seeking out alt-right  sources and rejecting viable ones, the  possession has taken hold and has become  self-perpetuating. 

What is crucial to observe in the above  example is the lack of a well-defined sense of  self, particularly in the context of a complex  and multicultural world. Having a difficult  upbringing can have profoundly negative effects on personal development, and a  substandard educational experience will likely  create more problems than it solves. A lack of  a social group leads to an underdeveloped  sense of self with regard to other people, and  the dearth of opportunities to interact with  people from different races leads to an  underdeveloped sense of self with regard to  other ways of life. In effect, this hypothetical  Klan recruit doesn’t know who they are, nor do  they have any way of understanding or  interacting with other cultures. Furthermore,  their difficult job situation has placed them in a  situation where they feel like they do not have  control over their life, which leads to  frustration and the urge to blame: such an  internal milieu is fertile ground for charismatic  leaders and manipulators, who stand ready to  offer easy answers to anyone willing to listen. 

Although the example given may seem  uncharitable to rural white Americans, several  of the characteristics in that hypothetical  situation are now endemic in Western society,  particularly disillusionment, fear of the future,  a perceived lack of control over one’s life, and  a high level of resulting frustration. Put simply,  the mental models that many people currently  possess are not able to handle the pace of  change and the volatility present in the  modern economy, leaving them vulnerable to  external influences that appear to solve their  problems but actually lead them astray. 

Another example that highlights these  particular difficulties of modern living would be  a hypothetical young professional, perhaps  female and in her late twenties. After several  years working as an individual contributor in  her field, she is promoted to a managerial  position where she is tasked with running a  small division within her organization. In  addition to a number of new personal  responsibilities, she must also “wear new hats”  and spend time coaching, training,  reprimanding, and following up with her team,  some of whom are male industry veterans who  are older and more experienced than her. 

In this situation, it is easy to see how  disillusionment, fear of the future, and a  perceived lack of control could create an  unhappy situation for this young professional.  Perhaps the new role is more work than  expected, or there is a six-month review that  creates future anxiety. Perhaps the (older  male) team does not respond well to this  woman’s attempts to manage them, leading to  missed deadlines and dysfunction. Perhaps  she is given targets that are impossible to hit,  leading to a feeling of lost control. 

It is unlikely that this young professional would  join a cult or hate group as a result of her  challenges at work. However, the general  pattern of her challenges is similar to that of  the Klan recruit. What they both lack is a  mental model that can accommodate an  increasingly complex world, what they seek is  information that will help them make sense of  their situation, and what they get, at least in the  case of the Klan recruit, is a ready-made  mental model that helps the world make sense  again. Given the young professional’s situation,  she might seek out some things to add to her  mental model by way of executive coaching or  nonfiction reading. 

Indeed, when people are placed into situations  that are beyond their ability or  comprehension, the new information they  receive cannot be reconciled with or processed by their mental model. The resulting tension  between the “old” ideas of the mental model  and the “new” ideas they have encountered  gives rise to confusion, frustration, or cognitive  dissonance. Here, either external guidance  becomes necessary to navigate the situation,  or the mental model must be reconfigured to  accommodate the novelty. This is how  ideologues and charismatic leaders exert their  influence, as they offer seductively easy  answers that can resolve internal tensions and  provide a coherent sense of direction and  meaning in a complex world. 

It is important to emphasize that mental  models are not static entities: they are under a  constant process of construction and  reconstruction as people move through their  lives. Although this is generally accepted to be  true for the case of children (Piaget 1964),  changes in adults’ mental models have also  been the subject of study since the mid-1900s  and are the purview of a field called ego  development theory, or EDT. Pioneered by  independent scholar Jane Loevinger in the mid 1900s and furthered by researchers at Harvard  and elsewhere since then, this robust-yet underappreciated body of research is largely  founded on the relationship between language  and mental models (Cook-Greuter 1999). 

At the heart of this theory is the concept of the  “ego”. First conceptualized by Freud as the  component of personality that is responsible  for channeling selfish impulses into socially acceptable expressions, researchers in EDT  have refined the concept to refer to the part of  the psyche that interprets experience, makes  sense of it, and constructs a stable self-identity  (Cook-Greuter 2013). 

It has been found that the adult ego is capable  of developing through several unique stages in  a lifetime, which encompass unique ways of  making meaning and relating both to the world  and to the self (Kegan 1994, Cook-Greuter  2013). Additionally, empirical evidence has  demonstrated that the meaning-making  capacity of humans is reflected in their  language and can be measured using open ended questions (Cook-Greuter 1999, Lahey et  al. 2011). Research also suggests that stage appropriate interventions can catalyze or  facilitate growth in someone’s level of  development (Manners et al. 2004).

Listed below are the stages of ego development (included is the % of the adult population):

SELF-PROTECTIVE 4.3%

- Gains at the expense of others, wins any way possible - Self-oriented, “might makes right” attitude - Relationships primarily based on power 

CONFORMIST 11.3%

- Accepts traditions, inherited values, and orders from authority - Gains meaning from belonging to a group or “tribe” - Avoids and soothes group conflict 

EXPERT 36.5%

- Differentiates self from group based on skill or talent - Prioritizes “doing things right” as defined by them, their data - Excellent individual contributor, causes friction on teams 

ACHIEVER 29.7%

- Finds success within the system, achieves goals through teams - Can “step into a role” or “wear a hat” as situations demand - Often entrepreneurial, intrapreneurial, or leaders of some kind 

INDIVIDUALIST 11.3%

- Questions one’s own beliefs, assumptions, inherited values - Steps outside of convention to propose unique ideas - Can hold and appreciate multiple perspectives simultaneously 

STRATEGIST 4.9%

- Breaks convention and standard procedure… strategically - Sees change as an iterative and emergent process - Minimum level required to reliably lead organizational change 

ALCHEMIST 1.5%

- Able to reinvent and transform self and others - Finds a “third solution” to paradoxes and conflicts - Capable of leading societal change through visionary action 

UNITIVE 0.5% 

- Can appreciate the need for the ego while taking perspective on it - Taking part in the ongoing process of humanity - Dualistic, unconventional, wise perspectives 

The above is Information from “Nine Levels Of Increasing Embrace In Ego Development: A Full-Spectrum Theory Of  Vertical Growth And Meaning Making”, Susanne R. Cook-Greuter (2013) & “Seven Transformations of  Leadership”, David Rooke, William R. Torbert (2005) 

In terms of population, the most common  developmental stages that human beings  occupy are known as “Conformist”, “Expert”,  “Achiever”, and “Individualist”, together  comprising over eighty-five percent of the  adult population. These four different styles of  meaning-making can be understood as four  different configurations or types of mental  models, and are responsible for many of the  intrapersonal and interpersonal phenomena  we experience in the modern era. 

For example, the “Conformist” stage is  experienced by most human beings during  their pre-adolescent and teenage years, and is marked by a desire to “play by the rules” and  “fit in with the crowd”. People in this stage tend  to be defined by their group affiliations - one  might think of a high school student dressing a  certain way or an activist lost in their cause. It  is easy for people with this type of mental  model to view social relations in a simpler “us  and them” dichotomy: this division can be  drawn along racial, religious, national, political,  or ideological lines. To the Conformist,  traditions are supremely important, and  inherited values are accepted unquestioningly.  As is typical of adolescents and some adults,  trends and fads are not seen as such, but rather enjoyed unironically. The diehard  Trump fan, the “woke” activist, and teenagers in cliques at school can all be seen as  manifestations of the Conformist stage. 

The maturation process, which for most now  includes a primary and secondary education,  and for many includes some kind of  postsecondary education or training, develops  within the adolescent a capacity for genuine  self-reflection. This is seen in the striving of the  Western teenager for a sense of identity, which  is eventually channeled into a stable  identification with some kind of role within  society. Thus, the “Expert” stage can primarily  be characterized by a need to excel at a  particular function or skill, or to occupy a  position within the social and economic  system. People at this stage have often  progressed beyond traditional or inherited  values and may even define themselves in  opposition to them, much to the shock and  dismay of their kin groups. However, the  Expert’s powers of introspection are not yet  fully developed, and they may unwittingly  define themselves in relation to people that  they define as luminaries, thought leaders, or  authorities. At work, they may be so focused on  “doing things right” that they may lose sight of  larger organizational objectives, or even the  importance of key relationships. The cloistered  university professor, many young startup  founders, and the self-assured engineer are all  manifestations of the Expert stage. 

Although researchers have identified several  stages past the “Achiever” stage, this particular  stage seems to be the current “ideal”  developmental level of Western civilization.  Characterized by a rational, logical, or scientific  worldview and the beginning of an  appreciation for systems, Achievers care less  about “doing things right”, like Experts, and  more about “doing the right things”. True to  their nickname, Achievers often prioritize  success, accomplishment, and self improvement. They are more independent  than previous stages, and often become entrepreneurs, managers, or leaders in some  way: unlike previous stages, they are  developmentally capable of navigating the  varied demands presented by these complex  roles. Whereas Experts tend to have a myopic  view of their career trajectory, Achievers have  a better sense of how they exist “across time”  and how they might grow and change. Because  of their logical nature, Achievers care about  root causes and reasons. They analyze  situations and find optimal solutions. Most  importantly from a Western perspective, they  are able to “think critically”. 

Between the Achiever and the Individualist, a  significant change in perspective occurs that  marks the beginning of a radically different  way of meaning-making. Whereas the  “conventional” growth trajectory between the  Conformist, Expert, and Achiever stages is  marked by increasing individualization, an  embrace of rational scientific thinking, and the  pursuit of productive goals within society, the  “postconventional” stages are characterized by  the development of intersystemic thinking,  holistic and harmonious approaches to  problem-solving, and the capacity for self transformation.  

People who develop beyond the Achiever stage  to the Individualist stage find themselves at the  beginning of an entirely new kind of journey.  For example, one becomes able to genuinely  grasp the idea that there is value to having a  multiplicity of perspectives at hand. A benefit  of this “realization” is that Individualists  become capable of holding more than one  perspective internally at one time, and can  even begin to take “perspective on  perspective”. This means they can question  how they came to believe certain things or hold  certain ideas, and therefore begin to step  outside of the cultural programming they were  exposed to as a child. Individualists, and  people of even higher stages, typically become  potent forces for change in their workplaces  and communities as a result of their unique, unconventional, holistic, and visionary  perspectives. 

When viewed within this framework, the  challenges faced by the hypothetical Klan  recruit and the young manager can be  appropriately contextualized and understood.  For example, given the Klan recruit’s lack of  identity outside of a group, it is likely that they  are operating at the Conformist level of  development. Although this hypothetical  recruit may have a rough definition of who they  “are”, this definition is subject to strong  influence by external relationships and  inherited values, and in the case of ideological  possession would be indistinguishable from  them. On the other hand, the young manager  is likely at the Expert level, as she has been an  individual contributor for many years and is  struggling to master the management skills  typically displayed by Achievers. 

The problems that society is currently facing,  such as the QAnon conspiracy theory, rising  levels of populism, and extreme polarization,  can also be viewed through a developmental  lens. Testing of the general population has  revealed that approximately fifteen percent of  adults are operating at the Conformist level or  lower and are therefore particularly vulnerable  to ideological possession. Furthermore,  another sixty-five percent of the population is  operating at the Expert or Achiever levels,  which means that they are incapable of fully  appreciating the diversity of perspectives  available in the modern world, like  Individualists, and therefore will have difficulty  addressing political polarization without  external guidance. Less than one in five  individuals is operating at the Individualist level  or higher and therefore empowered to  navigate our increasingly cosmopolitan society  with adequate proficiency. 

The implications of these accumulated insights  are profound. From a historical perspective,  the mindless bloodshed of the World Wars, the  Crusades, and other catastrophic conflicts can likely be attributed to a population largely  stuck in the Conformist stage, without access  to the information made more freely available  through progressive technological innovation  and the creation of the public school system. It  is notable, for example, that the first war to be  televised in the United States - the Vietnam  War - was also the first war to be met with  widespread resistance on the home front, and  also coincided with the explosion in access to  higher education in the second half of the  twentieth century. Furthermore, the  connective and informative properties of radio  and television facilitated an international  consciousness-raising that eventually drove  the countercultural and justice-oriented  movements of the 1960s. 

Furthermore, it seems as though some of  society’s most pressing problems, which have  emerged in response to a more connected,  diverse, and information-rich world, are  developmental in nature and are the result of  mental models unequipped to handle the  types of problems presented by our brave new  world. This suggests that a review of the  educational curriculum is in order, at the very  least, as the demands being placed on people  today have clearly outstripped the boundaries  of their preparation in school (Kegan 1994,  Strong 2021a). 

Perhaps one of the thorniest social issues  faced in the modern day is what ought to be  done about the internet and the free flow of  peer-to-peer information it has enabled. As  previously discussed, the proliferation of  information sources and the bewildering array  of seemingly-viable perspectives now available  have left many people confused, unbalanced,  frustrated, or radicalized. When seen through  a developmental lens, the various forces at  play in Western society become more easily  understood. For example, the Proud Boys and  Antifa in the United States, the Yellow Vests in  France, and people under the spell of social  media influencers are likely operating from a  Conformist mindset and are ideologically possessed as a result of their inability to adjust.  Even the population-at-large, consisting mostly  of Experts and Achievers, have found  themselves frustrated and confused by a world  now suited for postconventional thinkers, and  increasingly resort to the use of “experts” and  “fact-checkers” to buttress their meaning making processes. The subject matter  authorities and fact-checkers that one  chooses, however, determines one’s opinion  on events: this need for externally-provided  coherence in a cosmopolitan world is a feature  of “conventional” stages and therefore a  developmental issue in disguise. 

VIII. SCAFFOLDS 

At this point, it may be helpful to invent a new  metaphor that can capture the essential  characteristics of the mental modelling  process outlined in this paper, which is both  linguistic and developmental in nature.  Whereas previous scholars have used terms  like “map” (Peterson 1999) or “lexical field”  (Jaynes 1976) to describe the substance or  form of these models, it is proposed that the  models constructed and maintained by human  beings over the course of their lives be referred  to as “scaffolds”. 

This term is not entirely original. It has four  influences of note: first, the term is well-known  in the field of education and stems from Lev  Vygotsky’s “zone of proximal development”  (Van Der Stuyf 2002). In Vygotsky’s theory, the  zone of proximal development consists of  what learners are able to accomplish with  assistance, as opposed to what they can do  entirely on their own. In this situation, the  educator is said to provide “scaffolding” to the  learner, much in the way construction workers  would build a temporary scaffold to aid in the  completion of a standalone building. Outside  of an educational context, it could be said that  people who acquire information from outside  sources and incorporate it into their mental  models are constructing their own scaffolds to  help them navigate an otherwise unintelligible world. An example of this might be a young  entrepreneur reading a book about sales and  then employing strategies from that book in  their work, or people taking cues from others  about how to act in unfamiliar situations. One  researcher has even referred to proactive  information-seeking activity in the face of  novelty as “self-scaffolding” (Bickard 1992). 

The second influence comes from ego  development theory, which is also called  vertical development theory by some  researchers and practitioners (Petrie 2015).  Here, the vertically-oriented nature of physical  scaffolds fits particularly nicely with the type of  development described in much of the  literature, as each successive ego stage is said  to encompass, or build upon, the insights of  the last. In this way, one can imagine that  someone farther along the EDT continuum will  have more “layers” to their mental model,  much like scaffolds are built level by level. In  this way, the vertical dimension afforded by the  scaffolding metaphor facilitates the  conceptualization of mental models in terms of  their level of sophistication in ways that the  “map” or “field” metaphor cannot. 

Third, this metaphor is inspired by the qualities  of physical scaffolds themselves. Although  health and safety regulations in many parts of  the world have greatly improved worker safety,  by their very nature scaffolding is provisional  and unstable compared to an actual building.  It is also modular and can be assembled and  disassembled over time. Indeed, much like  their physical counterparts, mental scaffolds  are amassed from a kaleidoscope of  influencers, thought leaders, and media  sources, and are therefore shaky, temporary,  and subject to change. 

Fourth and finally, scaffolds are ultimately a  building metaphor, and therefore concordant  with the “ideas as buildings” metaphor  prevalent in Western culture (Lakoff & Johnson  1980). In our language, ideas are often spoken  of as structures: there is a “foundation” or a “core” of an idea, arguments are “strong” or  “weak”, can be “buttressed”, can “collapse” or  “fall apart”, one idea might “build upon” another, and so on. Talking about mental  models as buildings is something that we are  largely used to, and developing this metaphor  further will likely facilitate more effective  communication about this complex  psychological topic. 

When viewed in this way, mental models and  their development become much easier to  discuss. The case of the young professional  promoted to a managerial role becomes a case  of a well-developed scaffold at the Expert level  being forced to rapidly assemble new ways of  thinking at a higher, more complex level.  Ideological possession becomes the adoption  of a sophisticated multi-level scaffold that can  interface with reality at a number of different  developmental stages, providing a means of  interaction and the illusion of completeness.  Corporate mentorship, coaching, and training  activities - particularly workshops in “systems  thinking” or “innovation” - can be seen as  scaffold-building endeavours meant to  prepare employees for contemporary  economic challenges. To the extent that the  new information acquired reflects reality, the  scaffold is a sound addition to the mental  model; to the extent that it is not, it is shaky  and liable to collapse when stressed or  challenged. 

It may be helpful to emphasize that the  substance of these scaffolds is language.  Particularly in the earlier stages of  development, such as the pre-Conformist and  Conformist stages in EDT, the scaffolds that  people develop are largely informed by the  enculturation and education processes they  are subjected to, which is effectively a vast  number of concepts, ideas, and commands  that constitute the cultural commons and are  encoded and propagated by way of language.  As people enter adulthood and become  independent, they become largely the masters  of their own journey, and add things to their scaffold based on what they find on the job,  from the media they consume, or while  seeking out external help for their problems.  And, as EDT researchers have found, as people  reach new stages of development, their  language patterns change in subtle ways to  reflect their new ways of making meaning. 

This metaphor also conveniently gives  language to a persistent phenomenon that has  been observed by researchers in EDT involved  in assessing peoples’ stages of development. In  some cases, people who score at  postconventional levels on the tests  experience great difficulty embodying the  ideas in practice. It is suggested that in these  cases, intellectually gifted people have been  able to acquire sophisticated language  patterns before being able to fully put those  ideas into practice, thus building a fragile-yet tall scaffold that “looks” impressive yet  crumbles under stress. 

VIIII. POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS 

Although the literature on ego development  theory provides valuable new ways of  conceptualizing the issues at hand, it also  illuminates a path towards viable solutions. In  the literature, the challenges that people  experience which are outside of their current  comprehension are called “heat experiences”,  and actually represent developmental  opportunities (Petrie 2015). Indeed, the  experiences we have that disrupt our current  ways of thinking create the conditions for new  ways of meaning-making to be developed, if  external guidance and exposure to new  information are provided along with the  challenge. 

Given this reality, it can be argued that society  is currently facing a number of misinformation related crises as the result of an innumerable  multitude of missed or corrupted learning  opportunities. People log on to social media  and encounter a world that is simultaneously  polarized and cosmopolitan, and are merely  offered partisan media and biased “facts” to buttress their mental model. Executive  coaching and therapy, both of which provide  access to advanced ways of meaning-making for their clients, are prohibitively expensive  and therefore difficult to access. Parents, who  grew up in a simpler world without many of  these problems, are unable to provide the  scaffolds that their children require, creating a  cascading and self-perpetuating issue. Finally,  the school systems, which should have been  addressing emerging educational needs  proactively, have largely been navel-gazing and  frittering away their time on fringe matters  (Strong 2021a). It is no surprise that so many  people’s mental models have become  corrupted as a result of this ecosystem. 

Given the developments in technology and  society over the past three decades and the  irrevocable changes they have wrought, it has  become necessary to think beyond the  “conventional” paradigm in terms of education  and human development in the West.  Elements of postconventional thinking, such as  systems understanding and inquiry from  multiple perspectives, will have to find their  place in the curriculum. Educators will have to  be made aware of the powerful ideas  contained in EDT and the implications that this  has for their practice, especially at the  secondary level. Eventually, everyone will need  to be given access to the meaning-making tools  available at postconventional levels if they are  to have a fair shot in the modern world. 

This process has already begun in the  executive coaching world, where organizations  like Coaches Rising and Leadership Circle are  sharing and deploying the ideas in the EDT  literature to positive effect. It seems logical that  career services professionals would also be  able to use these ideas, as such professionals  are employed by many school boards and  universities and are freer to adjust their  methodology than curriculum-focused  teaching staff. Additionally, the process of  career discovery often entails a process of self discovery, which makes career counselling a likely avenue to help people develop a  “postconventional” sense of self that can  withstand the challenges of the modern labour  market and protect them from falling prey to a  polarizing media landscape. 

Given the close relationship between thought  and language that exists, it also seems safe to  assume that language-based solutions will  serve to refine one’s thoughts. The current  evidence suggests that writing exercises,  particularly guided writing exercises that focus  attention on specific aspects of one’s mental  model, can lead to benefits for mental well being, physical well-being, academic  performance, and life satisfaction (Cohen &  Sherman 2014, Schippers et al. 2015). Such  tools must be refined, adjusted to reflect EDT  principles, and made as accessible as possible.  

Additionally, the methods of testing someone’s  level of ego development must be adapted.  Current methods of assessment are exacting  and time-intensive to complete: although such  assessments certainly have their place, rough  measures that can differentiate between  preconventional, conventional, and  postconventional thinking would be of great  benefit in educational and corporate settings,  where high-potentials often receive additional  attention and resources to further accelerate  their development. It is arguable that in the  same way that “intellectual giftedness” is an  asset worth testing for in the early grades,  signs of developmental maturity in young  people should be seen as important indicators  of potential for educators and human  development professionals. 

Finally, solutions informed by ego  development theory could be designed and  deployed to prevent or ameliorate intellectual  possession. The key to solving this type of  problem is to understand that once someone  adopts a sophisticated ideological scaffold,  they will have ready-made responses for  almost anything people say to them.  Therefore, instead of attempting to force them to change their mental model through debate  and argument, it may be more helpful to help  them to make that model more explicit so that  they can take perspective on it. For example, in  the case of QAnon believers, getting them to  elucidate exactly what they believe will happen  in the future and why may help them gain  perspective on what they hold to be true, and  will provoke internal reflection when their  sources prove to be unreliable. Getting such  people to speak about why they believe  something will happen, or the details  surrounding the event, will further crystallize  their mental model and help them to take  perspective on it: essentially, they need to be  given the space and the safety to prove  themselves wrong. Such a strategy could be  applied to anybody in the grip of a set of ideas.  

In a proactive sense, giving people scaffolds  through community education activities that  provide explicit defenses against ideological  possession could prevent radicalization from  even happening: in many ways, this is already  being done by practitioners working on  intuition and with their own vocabularies for  the issues. 

X. THE NECESSITY OF FAITH 

A discussion of scaffolding, mental models,  and inherited ideas would not be complete  without mentioning perhaps the greatest  scaffolds currently in existence: organized  religions. From East to West, the great religions  of the world offer elaborate moral codes and  systems of meaning-making that pertain to  every aspect of a believer’s life. In the West,  Christianity’s influence on the moral and  psychological structure of society cannot be  understated, and the progressive rejection of  such structures following Darwin’s discoveries  has coincided with a rise in nihilism, despair,  and conflict (Peterson 1999). Additionally, the  apparent incompatibility of scientific and  religious worldviews has spawned a wealth of  literature about the relative value of faith and  reason that stretches back to the Enlightenment, leaving many people  fundamentally confused about what is “true”  and how they should engage with the world. 

Given the totalizing nature of religions such as  Christianity, the problematic history of the  religion, and the many societal challenges  posed by the Evangelical Christian worldview,  many in the West now associate the concept of  “faith” with a blind belief in an ancient  document or the unquestioning acceptance of  dogma. However, nothing could be further  from the truth: in the English dictionary, faith is  characterized as “trust” or “confidence”, and  this characterization even holds in a Christian  sense, as the Biblical Greek word for faith,  pisteuo, has connotations of trust and  confidence in something. 

In some cases, faith can certainly refer to an  unquestioned or naive belief. But in many  others, it means to be genuinely persuaded of  something, or to have trust in someone based  on a solid track record of interaction. Seen in  this way, faith is not a negative character trait - it is a necessity of life in a world full of  uncertainty. Although secularly-minded  Westerners may scoff at the mere mention of  faith, the vast majority of the Western world  just consented to a mass vaccination campaign  using a new type of genetic technology, largely  on the basis of their trust - or faith - in the  medical and scientific institutions offering  those treatments. Remarkably, they did so  without knowing the three-year, five-year, or  ten-year effects of the injections, which in  many ways constitutes an even bigger leap of  faith than is asked of many religious converts.  

It would therefore seem that faith is an  inescapable part of living in a complex world,  especially when it is impossible to become an  expert on every issue that one cares about.  Whether one places one’s trust in the Church,  in science, in the government, or in another  belief system entirely, one is still choosing to  have faith in something. Furthermore, such  choices are inescapable - even fundamental civic actions like choosing a candidate at the  ballot box or placing one’s child in school  become, in part, acts of faith that are justified  either by independent research and the  historical performance of the candidate or  institution in question. 

From the perspective of ego development and  mental modelling, to have “faith” means to  have consciously adopted a scaffold that  extends beyond one’s current level of  meaning-making with the expectation that the  scaffold will prove to correspond to reality. In  the context of Vygotsky’s zone of proximal  development, where someone is learning  something new, and in ego development,  where someone is moving from one stage of  development to the other, they must rely on an  external source of guidance in order to  progress. This strongly suggests that faith is a  necessary component of human development,  rather than a negative character trait. 

Although we are not used to speaking like this  in the West, it would seem like one of the most  important things in life may be the allocation of  one’s faith. In a world that is impossible for any  individual to fully comprehend, the  information sources, spiritual influences, and  advice that one uses to make sense of things  must be carefully chosen, as these have  downstream effects on thought, emotion, and  action. Furthermore, the instruction of young  children must be undertaken with special care,  as the development of the lower levels of  someone’s scaffold affects the construction of  the “upper layers”. 

Ultimately, the construction of a sophisticated  mental model is a lifelong affair and a task of  the utmost importance for survival and  flourishing in the modern world. Although it  may be a laborious process, achieving higher  levels of development brings with it the ability  to be a more effective guide to others and take  part in the ongoing project of consciousness raising that has been part of the human  experience for thousands of years. Given the  current social situation in the Western world, it  seems like universal enlightenment can’t come  soon enough.

REFERENCES  

Albrechtsen, J.S., Meissner, C.A., Susa, K.J., “Can intuition improve deception detection performance?”,  Journal of Experimental Social Psychology (2009) 

Almendros, C., Carrobles, J.A., Rodríguez-Carballeira, A., “Former Members’ Perceptions of Cult  Involvement”, Cultic Studies Review (2007) 

Bickard, M., “Scaffolding and self-scaffolding: Central aspects of development.”, Children's  Development Within Social Context: Research and methodology (1992) 

Bloom, P., Kiel, F.C., “Thinking Through Language”, Mind & Language (2001) 

Booth, N., Matic, J.A., “Mapping and leveraging influencers in social media to shape corporate brand perceptions”, Corporate Communications (2011) 

Chiarello, C., Beeman, M., “Introduction to the Cognitive Neuroscience of Right Hemisphere Language  Comprehension”, Right Hemisphere Language Comprehension (1998) 

Cohen, G.L., Sherman, D.K., “The Psychology of Change: Self-Affirmation and Social Psychological  Intervention”, Annual Review of Psychology (2014) 

Cook-Greuter, S.R., “Postautonomous Ego Development: A Study of Its Nature and Measurement”,  Integral Publishers (1999/2010) 

Cook-Greuter, S.R., “Nine Levels Of Increasing Embrace In Ego Development: A Full-Spectrum Theory  Of Vertical Growth And Meaning Making” (2013) 

Crider, D,, “’Great Sounds and Wonderfulness’: KMPX and the Birth of Freeform Radio”, Journal of  Radio & Audio Media (2020) 

Delgado, R., Stefanic, J., “Critical Race Theory” (1995) 

Erikson, E., “Identity and the Life Cycle”, W.W Norton (1994)  

Garimella, V.R.K., Weber, I., “A Long-Term Analysis of Polarization on Twitter”, Proceedings of the  Eleventh International AAAI Conference on Web and Social Media (2017) Godin, S., “Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us”, Portfolio (2008) 

Gopnik, A., “The Gardener and the Carpenter: What the New Science of Child Development Tells Us  About the Relationship Between Parents and Children”, Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux (2016) 

Hayek, F.A., “The Intellectuals and Socialism”, The University of Chicago Law Review (1949) 

Howard, P., Duffy, A., Freelon, D., Hussain, M., Mari, W., Mazaid, M., “Opening Closed Regimes: What  Was The Role of Social Media During the Arab Spring?” (2011) 

Hurlburt, R.T., Akhter, S.A., “Unsymbolized thinking”, Consciousness & Cognition (2008) 

Jaynes, J., “The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind”, Houghton Mifflin,  Mariner Books (1976) 

Kegan, R., “In Over Our Heads: The Mental Demands of Modern Life”, Harvard University Press (1994)

Kelly, K., “The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future”,  Penguin Books (2016) 

Koehler, D., “Daniel Koehler: The Radical Online: Individual Radicalization Processes and the Role of  the Internet”, Journal for Deradicalization (2014) 

Lahey, L., Souvaine, E., Kegan, R., “A Guide to the Subject-Object Interview: Its Administration and  Interpretation”, Minds at Work (2011) 

Lakoff, G., Johnson, M., “Metaphors We Live By”, The University of Chicago Press (1980) Land, J., “Pacifica’s WBAI: Free radio and the claims of community”, Jump Cut no. 41 (May 1997) Levinson, S., “Language and Space”, The Annual Review of Anthropology (1996) 

Manners, J., Durkin, K., Nesdale, A., “Promoting Advanced Ego Development Among Adults”, Journal of  Adult Development (2004) 

McLuhan, M., “Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man”, McGraw-Hill (1964) Milgram, S., “Behavioral Study of obedience”, The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology (1963) Miller, A., “The Drama of the Gifted Child”, Basic Books (1979) 

Moskalenko, S., McCauley, C., “QAnon”, Perspectives on Terrorism (2021) 

Newman, J.H., “The Idea of the University” (1852) 

Peterson, J.B., “Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief”, Routledge (1999) Petrie, N., “The How-To of Vertical Leadership Development”, Center for Creative Leadership (2015) Piaget, J., “Development and Learning”, address at Center for Genetic Epistemology (1964) Rooke, D., Torbert, W.R., “Seven Transformations of Leadership”, Harvard Business Review (2005) 

Schippers, M., Scheepers, A., Peterson, J.B., “A scalable goal-setting intervention closes both the  gender and ethnic minority achievement gap”, Palgrave Communications (2015) 

Strong, Z., “Micro-Universities” (2021a) 

Strong, Z., “The Bicameral Expert” (2021b) 

Taleb, N.N., “Skin In The Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life”, Random House (2017) Van Der Stuyf, R.R., “Scaffolding as a Teaching Strategy” (2002) 

Vyshedskiy, A., Mahapatra, S., Dunn, R., “Linguistically deprived children: meta-analysis of published  research underlines the importance of early syntactic language use for normal brain development”,  Research Ideas and Outcomes 3 (2017)

Zachary Strong (zacharystrong.net) 19 

November 2021 

HELPFUL QUOTES 

i K. Kelly, “The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our  Future” (2016) 

“Ironically, in an age of instant global connection, my certainty about anything has decreased. Rather  than receiving truth from an authority, I am reduced to assembling my own certainty from the liquid  stream of facts flowing through the web. Truth, with a capital T, becomes truths, plural. I have to sort  the truths not just about things I care about, but about anything I touch, including areas about which  I can’t possibly have any direct knowledge. That means that in general I have to constantly question  what I think I know. We might consider this state perfect for the advancement of science, but it also  means that I am more likely to have my mind changed for incorrect reasons. While hooked into the  network of networks I feel like I am a network myself, trying to achieve reliability from unreliable parts.  And in my quest to assemble truths from half-truths, nontruths, and some noble truths scattered in  the flux, I find my mind attracted to fluid ways of thinking (scenarios, provisional belief, subjective  hunches) and toward fluid media like mashups, twitterese, and search.” 

ii J. Jaynes, “The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind” (1976) “A most important 'feature' of this metaphor 'world' is the metaphor we have of ourselves, the analog  'I', which can 'move about' vicarially in our 'imagination', 'doing' things that we are not actually doing.  There are of course many uses for such an analog 'I'. We imagine 'ourselves' 'doing' this or that, and  thus 'make' decisions on the basis of imagined 'out-comes' that would be impossible if we did not  have an imagined 'self' behaving in an imagined 'world'. In the example in the section on spatialization,  it was not your physical behavioral self that was trying to 'see' where my theory 'fits' into the array of  alternative theories. It was your analog 'I'. If we are out walking, and two roads diverge in a wood, and  we know that one of them comes back to our destination after a much more circuitous route, we can  'traverse' that longer route with our analog 'I' to see if its vistas and ponds are worth the longer time  it will take. Without consciousness with its vicarial analog 'I', we could not do this.” 

iii J.B. Peterson, “Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief” (1999) 

“Along with our animal cousins, we devote ourselves to fundamentals: will this (new) thing eat me?  Can I eat it? Will it chase me? Should I chase it? Can I make love to it? We model facts – there is no  doubt about that. But we model facts to keep track of meaning. We may model facts, and it is no doubt  useful to do so. We must model meanings, however, in order to survive. Our most fundamental maps  of experience – maps which have a narrative structure – portray the motivational value of our current  state, conceived of in contrast to a hypothetical ideal, accompanied by plans of action, which are our  pragmatic notions about how to get what we want.”

Zachary Strong