The Virtues and Toxicities of Popularity
Popularity is a metric and it is a metric that has its basis in biology. Those who are popular tend to be the best to breed and continue the species. If a person in a group is popular, it is because they are the best at furthering the survival of the group in the face of often predatory nature competing for survival in an ecosystem, fit to lead. If a food is popular to an intuitive eater, it is because that food meets the chemical and physiological needs of their body.
Those are some of the biological bases of popularity. Because of these biological bases, as long as we are creatures, we are not going to just root it out and discard it. Besides, there is another complication for humans that seem to be non-existent or nascent in other creatures, the biological advantage of imagination. We are not bound by the simple limits of the ecosystem, we can actually forge ecosystems in our minds and we can share those visions. We can then create them physically, a seeming defiance of nature.
Suddenly, we like foods quite bad for our bodies because another has put together a packaging of ingredients designed for cheap mass production and not health. A leader can likewise sell us on immediate gain over long-term survival. This is the point at which popularity becomes a potentially faulty metric, for it doesn't accurately assess those elements that will lead to the health and happiness of the individual or the survival of the species.
This isn't all bleak news. Indeed, some, like me, would see it as the logical outcome of one stage of human growth and development, not the end of the species or the end of health and happiness. As the sea dwellers can go to the land through gradual, painful adaptations, adaptations providing locomotion and the ability to extract oxygen directly from the atmosphere, humans can progress on their journey from biological creatures to extra-biological consciousness through trial and error, failures and successes. Not all creatures make the transitions without self-destruction, but our odds aren't necessarily that bad for we are able to give them trial runs in our imaginations rather than putting our bodies directly on the line. We have probably already avoided global nuclear annihilation, although very dangerous potential remains. We are, as makes sense, now just confronting more subtle and nuanced challenges of our nature than simple destruction of one another through combat. Climate change, for example, is more abstract and deniable than nuclear confrontation, but has the same serious potential destruction.
We haven't faced the last of our challenges as we climb out of the sea and the judgment of our success will lie in our physical and psychological survival. The one thing that we can assure ourselves of is that popularity won't any longer be the best way to judge our best path, but it may still be one of the best ways to motivate it.
Those are some of the biological bases of popularity. Because of these biological bases, as long as we are creatures, we are not going to just root it out and discard it. Besides, there is another complication for humans that seem to be non-existent or nascent in other creatures, the biological advantage of imagination. We are not bound by the simple limits of the ecosystem, we can actually forge ecosystems in our minds and we can share those visions. We can then create them physically, a seeming defiance of nature.
Suddenly, we like foods quite bad for our bodies because another has put together a packaging of ingredients designed for cheap mass production and not health. A leader can likewise sell us on immediate gain over long-term survival. This is the point at which popularity becomes a potentially faulty metric, for it doesn't accurately assess those elements that will lead to the health and happiness of the individual or the survival of the species.
This isn't all bleak news. Indeed, some, like me, would see it as the logical outcome of one stage of human growth and development, not the end of the species or the end of health and happiness. As the sea dwellers can go to the land through gradual, painful adaptations, adaptations providing locomotion and the ability to extract oxygen directly from the atmosphere, humans can progress on their journey from biological creatures to extra-biological consciousness through trial and error, failures and successes. Not all creatures make the transitions without self-destruction, but our odds aren't necessarily that bad for we are able to give them trial runs in our imaginations rather than putting our bodies directly on the line. We have probably already avoided global nuclear annihilation, although very dangerous potential remains. We are, as makes sense, now just confronting more subtle and nuanced challenges of our nature than simple destruction of one another through combat. Climate change, for example, is more abstract and deniable than nuclear confrontation, but has the same serious potential destruction.
We haven't faced the last of our challenges as we climb out of the sea and the judgment of our success will lie in our physical and psychological survival. The one thing that we can assure ourselves of is that popularity won't any longer be the best way to judge our best path, but it may still be one of the best ways to motivate it.
For the world of me, I just cannot find the words to express my admiration for this post Fossil. You have taken a route that I could not have in my wildest imaginations and the punches are hard hitting and brutal. Way to go. Shackman called your mind robust and I couldn't agree more.
ReplyDeleteFine praise from a source I highly value. Thank you. I disagree in your self assessment. This is well within your wheelhouse!
Deleteinteresting take - politicians have demonstrated for years the toxicity of popularity and how/why it is not worthy ofbeing the marker for judgment of success or failure
ReplyDeletePoliticians and many corporations with their ad campaigns.
Deletebravo mister fossil. bravo.
ReplyDeletea cool head indeed. and much appreciated.
Thanks, Tammy. I'm still shaking off rust. Blog posts are starting to flow again.
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