Shared myths - the foundation of society

One of Homo Sapiens' most powerful skills is our ability to work together and strategize on a larger scale than any other animal. It is believed that this is what helped us edge out our other hominid competitors.

Why are we able to collaborate better than other animals?

It seems we have a unique ability to communicate abstract concepts using specialized language centers in our cerebral cortex. We are able to communicate concepts like possibilities, flow of time. For example "yesterday there was a lion near the river, and I saw it go near the mountain. It is possible you might encounter it near the hill today" vs "lion near river, dont go". This way we can share more nuanced information and benefit from each other's knowledge and coordinate better at greater distances and at a larger scale. 

(Thanks to S. Ramachandran's The Tell Tale Brain for giving me a really interesting primer into the brain, introducing me to Broca's and Wernicke's areas their quirks and sharing theories on how they must have evolved)

This ability also extends to creating shared myths. When you reach a scale where you cant see or interact with someone else, where it is impossible for all individuals to have direct access to all other individuals, shared myths can hold them together. We all agree to believe in some stories, so we have a common framework to work together towards a larger goal.

Most of the shared myths I brought up earlier - capitalism, liberalism, democracy, independence, fairness, tolerance, justice, equality, religion - all serve the purpose of enabling unprecedented scale of cooperation. They form the basis for our modern day countries and economies.

So shared myths aren't just some inconvenient by-product of society we have to deal with, it seems perfectly plausible that they forms the basis of human superiority.

This is a rather sobering thought for me. I place a lot of importance on truth and reality. But if our entire society is based on and flourishes on imagination, what is reality?

I take solace in one of my favourite quotes -
"Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?"

Shared myths

Wow, it's been 3 years since I wrote. I want to practice putting my thoughts into words again, so here we go.

Let's talk about shared myths.

The reason we, homo sapiens have been able to scale our societies so well (> 7B globally and almost fully interconnected) is our ability to create and believe in shared myths. It is what differentiates us from our ape ancestors, and it is the reason we have become the dominant species on earth (by being able to coordinate at unprecedented scale). This is one of the core ideas of "Sapiens" by Yuval Noah Harari.

What is a shared myth? An idea that is not real and only exists in our minds (the myth) that a group of us agree to believe collectively (shared). Fashion is an easy example of a shared myth. Societal norms are another.

Now, I don't believe in shared myths. Everything I believe has gone through stringent quality control and I hold very few ideas to be absolute truths. I do not blindly follow cultural and societal norms. I am aware of my biases, actively seek to understand them. What is not verifiable is always up for debate.

At least, that's what I thought till Mr. Harari helped me see the all-pervasive nature of shared myths. Our entire society for tens of thousands of years has been built on these stories, and it is very hard for us to be part of one without having strong faith in multiple stories.

Capitalism, liberalism, democracy, independence, fairness, tolerance, justice, equality, religion are all shared myths. Languages are shared myths. So is money and the idea of a country. Even Mathematics is a shared myth. What mathematics seeks to explain may be real, but numbers, algebra, integrals - the language of mathematics, is a story.  1 + 2 = 3 is true only because we all agree on the meaning of 1, 2 and 3.

Hmm.. I believe strongly in most of the examples above. As if they were true.

Yet, for each of these myths, successful societies have existed where these myths are not true. The only reason they are true now is because a large group of us believe in them unquestioningly.

Suppose I go into a coma for 5 years. Meanwhile, one of the shared myths I hold to be true - say, equality ("all persons are created equal") - has changed. Every single co-conspirator has relinquished their belief in equality.

What happens to my story now? Would I still believe it? *Should*  I still believe it? Why? Fact is - we are all not created equal. Every person is different.