Why a Giver Culture?
October 17, 2007
This is a continuation of ideas presented in part 1, “The Giver Culture“.In this time in history, a number of dividing opinions exist regarding whether humanity is progressing towards an improved world or whether we are dooming ourselves (and countless other species). Answering the question, “Are we doomed?” is a little more complex than offering a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer.One group of people might suppose that we, as humanity, are fine. Why add more complexity and divisions by creating yet another cultural branch of humanity? This group may argue that science and technology will help solve our problems, that we are living in a Golden Age of humanity, and as we progress, current problems will be rendered meaningless, as some of our old problems were rendered meaningless by current advances. Another ultra-positive viewpoint heard in some circles—is the belief that humanity is on the brink of a spiritual revolution and that we will become collectively enlightened. (I’m personally hoping for this one, however I feel that we have much more progress to make before this happens.)Yet these are others who tend to think that we on the verge of extinction due to an imminent and devastating environmental catastrophe. They point out that our way of life is based on growth and consumerism—that this lifestyle the majority of us live is destroying the Earth. Often technology is blamed. Sometimes human nature is blamed. Either way, I seldom hear truly practical solutions presented. A few solutions, such as the New Tribal movements, wish to turn the clock back to our pre-civilized past arguing that was the only time that human beings fit naturally into the circle of life. It would take all of humanity, simultaneously in alignment to return to a Hunter-Gathering society—and it is obvious that is not going to happen any time soon, if ever.So are we doomed to extinction or will we somehow transcend these problems?When I was in my early twenties, I read an excellent book by Daniel Quinn that echoed some thoughts I had been having about the problems that civilized culture was facing. Before I read this book, had been doing some science fiction story writing at the time and wrote a short story that hinted at two cultures of humanity that ended up living amongst the stars. One culture was based from Earth, one was based from the colonists of Mars. Each had opposing viewpoints on how to colonize the Galaxy. The Terrans, having discovered faster-than-light travel before the Martians, were the first to discover planets with life outside our solar system. They colonized these life-rich worlds. The Martians, having created a life-rich world on the previously dead planet of Mars, skipped the life-filled worlds and gave life to dead worlds with potential. In hindsight, the Terrans of my story were part of a Consumer Culture, based on the one that is dominant on Earth today. The Martians were a Giver Culture, one that is just appearing on Earth now.(This was just a subtle background for a story, in which the Terrans finally face a sentient species. These aliens viewed the Terran world snatching as sacrilegious—thus wordlessly declared war on them.)Daniel Quinn’s book, Ishmael, allowed me to put this little science fiction back-story into a truer perspective. It seemed to me that the Consumer Culture that Daniel Quinn talked about in this book (he calls it the Taker Culture), was truly a cultural anomaly, believing in unlimited growth and consumption, that would and could truly bring humanity and countless other species to the brink of extinction. This book also widened my perspective by showing that, since we seem to view history as only existing when civilization appeared, we often forget that we existed for far longer without civilization. Countless other cultures preceded the rise of our Consumer Culture . The Consumer Culture was not the only way humanity could live. Ishmael never truly gave any solution besides stepping outside the Consumer/Taker culture to try to find a way to live.With my Martian society, I realized that there could be another way for humanity to live. I expanded the idea of the Giver culture, somewhat, for a science fiction novel that I had planned to write. Eventually, however, I started to think that this culture should not be regulated to simply one of countless ideas in the world of speculative fiction, but should, instead, become a real way for humanity to live.One thing I noted, after reading Ishmael, and thinking about these questions further, is that the Consumer/Taker Culture simply had to appear. Take a time machine, for example, armed with a powerful ray gun. Go back in time, and blast the initial Consumer/Taker cultural anomaly out of existence—before it had a chance to spread. Would this solve the problem? Is this cultural mess-up simply a one-chance wonder, or would it have appeared in a different form, at some other time, regardless? I place a strong bet in the latter.This brings me to branch of mathematics called Game Theory. Many people have seen the movie or read the book, A Beautiful Mind, about a Nobel Prize winning game theorist, John Nash. Many students of sociology and psychology are given a peek at Game Theory, by playing one of its most well known examples, Prisoner’s Dilemma. Without going into many details (although some of the details in Game Theory are fascinating) Game Theory often deals with what is called Evolutionary Stable Strategies. An Evolutionary Stable Strategy is a strategy, if adopted by a population, which prevents invasion from an alternate, competing strategy. In Ishmael, Danniel Quinn’s two major branches of human cultures are, the Takers (what I term as Consumers) and the Leavers, which are tribal, hunter-gathering oriented societies. He shows that the early Leaver societies dominated human culture on Earth until some indeterminate point of time roughly around ten thousand years ago when the first Taker cultures appeared. The Taker culture then systematically drove the neighboring Leaver societies into extinction, either by absorbing them, or by destroying them by waging wars for local resources. The reason the Taker lifestyle was more successful, at first, is that they waged war with any competing species to increase their food supply. With an increased food supply, their population increased, forcing them to step up resource gathering—including more vigilant attempts to cut off any competition for their growing demands of food. Eventually, in the present day, you can only find a handful of Leaver cultures. Most humans live in Taker cultures, and we are nearing our limitations of this type of lifestyle. The Taker Culture, in comparison to the Leaver Culture seems to be an Evolutionary Stable Strategy, at least until our resources run out.The fact that the Taker Culture can only be a superior strategy when there are newly available resources, strongly hints that it is not a true Evolutionary Stable Strategy. It is just simply one that has not run its full course. And if it is not, what alternate type of strategy could truly be a more stable solution? Would this new idea of a Giver culture be closer to a true Evolutionary Stable Strategy? Evidence exists that it might be so.Richard Dawkins, the famed evolutionary biologist and science popular writer, wrote a chapter, in his critically acclaimed book, The Selfish Gene, titled ‘Nice Guys Finish First’. He pointed out that game theorists have often shown that cooperative strategies beat out competitive or purely selfish strategies in the long term. Although the Consumer/Taker Culture may seem, at first glance, to have strong elements of cooperation, it also has a very marked history of competition, especially when resources dwindle. Much evidence suggests that we are nearing a major problem, as the population explosion on Earth is accelerating, and resources are becoming increasingly harder to find.This is where a Giver Culture may be a more stable strategy in the long term. A Giver Culture, would have the technical know-how to create solutions to our problems. Food could be grown with the most limited of resources using cutting-edge scientific knowledge. Having high levels of education, especially amongst women, would prevent population growth. To ensure that the Giver Culture grows in numbers, families would become larger partially through adoption. As members of the Consumer/Taker culture grow beyond their ability to feed themselves, many of their children may be abandoned, just as what happens in famine stricken areas today. The Giver Culture, a compassionate culture rooted in spirit of cooperation, would be a natural place for these abandoned children to turn. A Giver Culture could also lessen the Consumer Culture’s resource thirst, by weaning them off the purchase of material goods somewhat, by the consumption of virtual entertainment and goods in their stead. As energy costs spike, in response to global oil shortages, people will be unable to travel as often. Improved virtual worlds, evolved from today’s video games, combined with generations of new consumers, who are increasingly more computer-savvy, will help generate a large market for such goods. Their social standings in these virtual worlds may slowly surpass their social standings in the real world (this is already happening). A Giver Culture may take advantage of this by being the creators of the most premier content—since it is a culture where creativity is practically worshiped. The profits of such creative endeavors can help to secure land that is protected against the machinations of the consumer lifestyle.So do we need a Giver Culture to survive? Unfortunately the answer to that question is uncertain. It has a good chance, however, of increasing our likelihood, as there is evidence that such a culture may be closer to a true Evolutionary Stable Strategy. In the beginning of this article, I divided the question of whether humanity survives or thrives into two possible answers—‘yes’ or ‘no’.But is that the most important question, whether we, as a species, survive? Is life only about survival? For many members of the Consumer/Taker society, it seems so. The pinnacle of the consumer society is a comfortable existence. In this modern age, we surely have almost mastered this goal, yet for most it is a very unsatisfying way to live. In modern countries, where most people live a fairly comfortable existence, people are often left wondering whether there is anything more to life. Many members of modern society are increasingly finding themselves to be depressed, lonely, anxious and with deep feelings of despair. To choose a Giver Culture simply on survival, so that we may lessen our chances for extinction, is a choice based on fear. Fear of extinction feels like an extension of the individual’s fear of death. Living a life centered upon the fear of death is often a very poor choice. Human beings grow and thrive on risk and experience, none of which can be had if the fear of death is too strong. Likewise, the Giver Culture does not simply exist so that we may stave of our own extinction.The Giver Culture is necessary for humanity to raise the bar, for us to start living more authentically. It exists for us to find out exactly what are the limits to what we can know, experience, create, love, find, make. What are humanity’s limits? How can we find out what they are? A creative culture, such as the Giver Culture, would seek out the limits of these questions. By exploring the inner and outer universe, we can find out what it truly means to exist. This reason alone is why we need a Giver Culture.For more on this subject, please read part 2, “Foundations of a Giver Culture“
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