Having been brought up fairly and squarely in the Western tradition, I’ve never had a really good take on the essential differences between that and the Eastern traditions. So I was delighted that YouTube served up this 14 minute video for me, “Why do they see the world differently than us?” - The influence of Eastern and Western philosophies. Discourse is trying to help me see other relevant threads on the forum here, and there are several which are slightly related, but none that seems to jump right in and look at this head on.
I found this video very useful as an introduction. And when watching through, I find myself in an eclectic position — a bit of both. I value some of the Western traits like independence, yet I have been repeatedly critical of what I see as the over-individualisation of life, and being stuck in a deconstructivist postmodernism with nihilist tendencies. I value some aspects of the Eastern collectivist approach, but I am naturally critical of deference to authority figures, as I see this as leading to conformism, and regression to old cultural paradigms.
And I don’t think this is about left vs right hemispheres. I suspect that the qualities of L and R are seen differently in East and West, but I haven’t thought through just how. I would find that very interesting.
As the 2R approach is ostensibly trying to integrate Eastern approaches, I’d value some conversation around the basic “101” issues raised in this video, as I think it is very accessible and could bring in plenty of others who are not clear about the basics.
@Asimong you may like this book the Geography of Thoughts which walks through quite a bit of this (it’s in the Life Itself library btw):
Henrich also covers the differences to an extent especially in the original BBS paper on the WEIRD idea.
Personally i’m not sure the whole L/R distinction is so useful in this kind of area – and gets a bit overdone in general (cf my comments back on the McGilchrist / Vervaeke dialogues). I think we can focus on the perceptual and cognitive differences on their own.
Exactly, we want a transcend and include integration: combining self-expression and autonomy with ability to move and be with the collective. And … that’s hard to do. But it’s the ambition. I think some very interesting work on this is being done by Thomas Steininger and Elizabeth Debold with their work on Emergent Dialog and transindividuation. See
Thanks @rufuspollock that looks great for more detailed study. I was looking to engage at a more elementary level with people who might find the video much less daunting than wading into the book
I’ve been interested in a few major differences focusing primarily on Japanese culture, which might help illuminate the East-West philosophical divide mentioned in the video.
It starts with ontology. The Eastern (Buddhist) view is that everything is empty of inherent meaning. It is only through relation that things arise. Whereas the West’s view is rooted in substance. Things exist first and relations arise between them. This fundamental difference has shaped religious concepts - leading to a Christian God that is a super substance or super being that exists and is all powerful, versus Eastern traditions that often emphasize interconnectedness and impermanence.
Then there is the West’s free association versus complex kin-based systems in the East. Joseph Henrich identified this difference in The WEIRDest People in the World. The Catholic church did away with the existing clan-based structures allowing for people to choose which institutions they associated with (e.g., universities). The East mostly kept the kin-based approach, leading to more insular and traditional societies where family relationships and hierarchies remain central to social organization.
These ontological and social differences feed into different sets of rules and morality. The West is more interested in systematization of values aimed at individuals. Figures like Kant rationalized morals, utilitarians focus on outcomes, and Christians have their commandments - all approaches that codify ethics explicitly. The East takes a group, spiritual approach. The focus is on the influence of non-rational, cultural means to influence people to be good. Instead of “Thou shall not kill,” one becomes incapable of killing through cultural and spiritual cultivation. Any retribution is more collective, with the kin-group paying for it. It’s a bottom-up instead of top-down approach.
Like you, I find myself drawn to aspects of both traditions. Perhaps the 2R approach you mention could integrate the Western emphasis on individual agency with the Eastern recognition of our fundamental interconnectedness.
@SilentShaun I generally share your research interests. (Just pulled a copy of Henrich off the shelf to check into some references there.) Specifically, I wanted to see if Henrich cites McGilchrist. He does not. That surprised me a bit, because it strikes me the two work well together.
Circa 1500 CE, Western European history took off in a direction that no other part of the world had ever done. After that, East-West has not been a side-by-side contrast of equal alternatives. It’s been a dialectic of the colonized and the colonizers. The central questions to me are why the Western way rose to global power, why it failed to impose itself 100%, and what are the prospects of a different synthesis emerging in our current time period?
Like you note, Henrich flags an assortment of institutional factors. Family structure is key, but things like literacy, markets, and voluntary associations factor in. To me, the simplest model to account for what worked for Western dominance is a sort of systemic Darwinism. For many reasons, the West allowed unbridled competition between nations, religions, firms, technologies, and other systemic alternatives. Henrich’s institutional factors gained traction, precisely because they worked best in such power competitions, driven by constant innovation. But will such practices keep outperforming the others in our current world? There are many reasons to doubt that.
Disconnected thinking and disconnected people have great advantages when the rapid conquest of a global resource frontier is what’s at stake. The sustainable management of a fully occupied planet is a different matter entirely. It strikes me lately that more holistic thinking and more attention to relationships may provide evolutionary advantages in future cycles. It would not shock me tremendously if a place like Japan might arrive at solutions the world in general might find worth emulating.
I agree that the old ways of Western success are no longer working. I think of the cultural acceptance of novel ideas. This has led to scientific, religious and cultural innovations. But now there is rapid, fractious spread of ideas that aren’t based on truth. People stand out with radical takes, outlandish drab, and conspiracy theories. Kin-based societies are far more traditional, where being different is shamed. Change is slow but the group is united in beliefs, dress, and conduct. I love diversity but can’t help but feel like there needs to be sacrifice of individuality to bring people together. At least a pulling back from the extremes seen in the U.S.A.
Niall Ferguson is a historian I respect for analysis of the past, but with whom I don’t agree on the topic of political futures. Ferguson in Civilization: the west and the rest identified six “killer apps” that led to western domination:
competition
science
property rights
medicine
consumer society
work ethic
Of these, property rights was the main target of the medieval church’s struggle against clan society. The church wanted wealthy donors to bequeath estates unchallenged by extended relatives. Medieval monasticism also piloted the western work ethic. Medieval church-state struggles prevented political consolidation on continental scales. Science benefited from the resulting political pluralism, and by extension, so did scientific medicine. Consumer society is essentially how the west won the cold war: jeans and the Walkman. A correlation of all this with Henrich’s analysis of the WEIRD will find plenty of overlap.
There is also plenty of 2R writing and discussion about all the ills of modernity, so I won’t rehash all that. A more interesting question for me is what to keep from the western experience, and why? (Ferguson, in short, wants the full package continued ad infinitum).
On your point above about too much post-truth variation and the need for more relational consistency, note that in the US just now anti-science mob action seems to be having its moment. Traditional societies featured lower life expectancy due to ignorance of germ theory. The current US administration is evidently keen to roll back the work of Florence Nightingale. If we are facing a binary choice between modernity and pre-scientific medicine, I’ll stick with modernity, thank you very much. Unity at the cost of superstitious tribalism is not any unity worth having.
My preferred approach would be to course-correct away from radical individualism through voluntary communitarianism. I’d rather form relationships with the like-minded, as opposed to locking my loyalties into extended clans sharing DNA but not much else. An open question for me right now is, can the highly educated figure out how to stop debating every little conceptual point with one another long enough in order to get organized for political action? Whether “progress” or “regress” comes next for the world hinges quite a bit on that question.
