Diversity and Inclusion
Tribal hatred contaminates any heterogeneous community and weakens the social fabric of that society, and compromises productivity in corporations. To deal with tribal hatred, one must be able to identify its organic roots in mind. This independent study by Mark Abraham, The Interactions Between Instincts and Intellect, and Their Impact on Human Behavior, published in six books, unveils the roots of tribal conflicts and a few other human mysteries. Here, I will cover the gist of the relevant parts of this study to create a context conducive to explaining tribalism, its perils, and how to overcome it.
This study shows that the human mind alone comprises instinct and intellect, and thus, it is bipolar. However, solely instinct governs the world of animals, and that renders their mind as a single polar entity, and this most distinctly separates humans from animals.
Instinct alone governs the world of animals; hence it is the essence of being an animal. Also, because instinct never changes, it is a primitive force in humans and animals. Just as instinct is the essence of being animal, intellect being unique to humans is the essence of being human. Because these two mental forces coexist in mind, they function jointly, and an instinct becomes the common mental denominator between humans and animals. Each instinct drives a similar mode of behavior amongst the members of each species. Thus, all the members within each species behave the same way, except for humans. The behavior of individual humans fluctuates in between the two extremes of good and evil because of the bipolar nature of the human mind. When refined intelligence guides human deeds, people act normal. But, when the primitive instincts drive individuals, some people can behave in the crudest ways.
The intellect part of the mind comprises the utilitarian Intellect and Moral Intellect. The utilitarian intellect consists of the following abilities of reasoning, learning, imagination, creativity, calculation, assessing, contemplation, science, technology, inventions, and discoveries. These are mental tools at human disposal that people use to solve problems and achieve objectives. But, human pursuits are neither exclusively good nor evil, but a combination of both. This segment of the human intellect unconditionally and indiscriminately avails itself to achieve both good and evil objectives. Because it does not take any stance, it lacks personality and character, and that is where the danger looms. However, the sole function of the Moral Intellect is the induction of honesty, fairness, justice, compassion, and human decency that tries to inject sanity into the way people deal with each other to mitigate aggression.
The instinctual part of the mind consists of 17 different instincts, a total of 19 various mental forces. The same mental forces together drive all humans. However, the intensity of each changes from person to person, and that separates people from each other. Each instinct strives for a unique sort of pleasure and satisfaction, and nothing else. The strongest instinct in each person creates their deepest pleasure, and the irresistible temptations such instincts induce lead them to their gravest mistakes. Everything each person does result from the joint function of these mental forces. Without grasping this, it is impossible to understand why we do what we do, much less the behavior of others.
The instinctual part of the mind comprises of the following:
1. tribalism
2. Territoriality
3. Sexuality
4. Fear
5. Aggression
6. Adventure
7. Greed
8. being social
9. the maternal/paternal instinct
10. divulgence
11. dominance/will to power
12. laziness
13. survival
14. politicking, Machiavellianism
15. language
16. curiosity
17. Rhythm
Sometimes different instincts pursue opposite goals and fall into conflicts, while some other times they overlap and reinforce one another. When they overlap, they become much more potent and disturbing.
For example, the three instincts of tribalism, chauvinism, and aggression together are responsible for many tribal conflicts at all scales within and amongst societies. Such conflicts prevail in heterogeneous societies at all levels, including corporations. For instance, litigation and settlements have become an enduring expense for organizations because of ethnic and gender conflicts Companies invest money to train their staff to prevent such conflicts, but to no avail. Those who do the training are oblivious to the bipolar nature of the human mind and the organic roots of such conflicts that are essential for solving such a problem.
The way this instinct of tribalism works is that it fragments humans into increasingly smaller tribes defined by language, religion, race, gender, age, the country of origin, education, and wealth. Then, it further fragments tribes into sub-tribes. Thus, each race divides into complexions, religions divide into sects, languages divide into accents and dialogue, nationalities divide into regions, wealth divides into old money, new money, and societies divide into political parties. The people who share the most tribal identities attract one another most intensely, and those who share the least repel one another most. These tribes see each other as rivals, they distrust and dislike each other, and take hostile posters against one another and the stage is set for conflicts. Thus, small sparks enkindle huge inferno amongst them, and this weakens the social fabric every heterogeneous human assembly. However, the instinct of tribalism is not the only force at work that leads to conflicts.
The instinct of chauvinism magnifies the effect of the instinct of tribalism. Chauvinism injects a sense of self-aggrandizement into many people. It makes them feel much more significant than they are individually and tribally, and they feel superior over many of the others. Thus, they perceive their race as being the most intelligent, their language the sweetest, their religion the most divine, their nationals the bravest, their history the richest, their values the most refined, their women the most beautiful, their food the most delicious, and their music the best. They contrive to validate such self-indulgences for themselves and others. This sense of supremacy makes them feel entitled to dominate their perceived inferiors. When they do not have the means to impose their will and interest upon others, they just advertise their greatness, but when they can impose themselves, they do so forcefully. Thus, the instinct of tribalism fragments humans into increasingly smaller tribes, and the instinct of chauvinism makes them feel entitled to control each other. This feeling induces all prejudices, discrimination, and bigotry originate. Inevitably, the targeted people react, and conflicts occur. No laws or preaching, short of educating to show people the primitive roots of such sentiments, will change their feelings or conduct.
The feelings tribalism, chauvinism, and tribal supremacy are all feeble fantasies. For example, natives in countries such as Egypt, England, Mexico, Peru, Bolivia, India, China, Cambodia, Turkey, Iran, and elsewhere have erected phenomenal monumental structures that manifest to the superb intelligence of the natives that comprise all races, religions, languages, and nationalities. Many countries worldwide have become superpowers in different historical epochs that further attests to the intelligence of the people of all backgrounds. You find beautiful music, delicious food, and beautiful women and brave men in all communities. Neither good nor evil is exclusive to any people or region in the world. Because instincts emerge and function in the absence of reasoning and intellect, and often even in their defiance, one cannot rationally expect to find any logic in them. To be sure, some individuals are superior to others, which is why not everyone is another Shakespeare or Bill Gates. Genuinely great people blessed with the virtue of humility do not think or act in such ways.
When you immerse in different cultures, you learn that each culture is rich with their brands of wisdom and enjoy their own colorful and admirable cultures. However, one must remove the blinding prejudices for these values to come into view. Then, the very people that one might have hated based on stereotypes might admire them based on facts, intellect, and reasoning. As such, individuals get to know more people from their disliked tribes, they realize that all people have the same aspirations, needs, desires, fear, flaws, goals, glories, failures, and successes. And most people are content with a simple living for which they are willing to work hard, and they do not deserve to be harassed just because they are different. The same color of blood runs in the veins of all of us. Of course, instincts being a natural human phenomenon, the resulting tribal tendencies become a natural human fixture. But, as people mature intellectually, they snap out of it and realize that they are not as good as they thought they were, nor were others as bad as they thought.
In extreme cases, those who are plagued with profoundly potent dosages of these instincts the sentiments spill over and trigger the instinct of aggression. Thus, they savagely attack innocent people because they are black, Jewish, Muslims, Christians, or a mixture of all of them and because they can. Has anyone ever seen these people attack a herd of animals this way out of anger? They only sometimes attack certain tribes, and sometimes randomly because they project their evil on the rest of humanity, hate all of them, and enjoy eliminating them. Thus, one might interpret this as their reaction to self-hatred, and he might be right. But in destroying, they get destroyed. As I mentioned before, people’s strongest instincts induce their most profound passion. However, they also lead them to their gravest mistakes, and this is one of endless such examples. Such disasters occur when people act not under the guidance of their refined intellect, but rather when they enact their primitive animal instincts. When people reach the state of the mind that wants to act inhumanely, that might trigger what they have learned. In that, they would realize that what is driving them to do such evil acts is the same force that also sets animals in motion, instinct, devoid of any glory.
There is one more layer to this phenomenon. In that, when the instinct of territoriality joins the instincts of tribalism, chauvinism, and aggression, you get ultra-nationalism that leads to ethnic cleansing, wars, and catastrophes that the world is painfully aware of it. You examine the effects of each of the 17 instincts, and you will see how effectively each of them impacts our lives individually and collectively. Despite their importance, instincts are utterly understudied and severely misunderstood that this study fills much of this void.
People need to get educated to learn about the organic roots of their tribal sentiments to snap out of it. Vanity is a strong, but untapped motivator that stands ready to serve important causes. In that, people always strive to present themselves as the most sophisticated, progressive, and modern as they can, and would resent appearing as being backward, primitive, or crude. If you convince them that tribal hatred is instinctive, primitive and animal-like, they would actively refrain from behaving in manners that would label them as being uncivilized and primitive. Achieving this would solve the problem.
This exposure of the employees to this knowledge would solve much of organizational and corporate levels conflicts substantially. However, this society needs a more significant scale change. A comprehensive spread education of this sort starting from high schools and colleges would gradually transform this culture away from a culture of violence and mass shootings to lasting peace and tranquillity, essential for the wellbeing of any society.
These mental forces function at a subconscious level, and in the vacuum of reasoning and intellect. They engender feelings and thoughts, some of which lead to action. Thus, people are unaware of the working of their minds. However, because all of these mental forces reside in every mind, people readily understand this phenomenon when you point them out. Learning about their subconscious mind enables people to elevate it on to a conscious level and manage it instead of being controlled by it. Vanity would motivate them to mind how they behave, and the ability to manage their subconscious mental trends would make them more deliberate in their feelings, thoughts, and deeds. These two factors together would help them transform their personal and professional lives.
While diversity brings excellent benefits to any human assembly, it also plagues all layers of heterogeneous societies with needless frictions. Often rival foreign powers and even domestic opportunistic politicians can quickly instigate these tribes against each other for political gains. In extreme cases, it could cause momentous social upheavals and even civil wars. What has been happening in Iraq, Syria, Libya, and Yemen are only some of the current examples of this reality. Even in the 2016 election in the United States, Russia managed to steer up conflicts between black and white Americans effectively.
This new understanding of the structure and function of the human mind lends itself perfectly well to inoculate the society against such tribal strives. Eradicating ethnic hatred starting from high schools and colleges would also inoculate them against radicalization. With this change of culture, corporations and governmental organizations would also rip the benefit of diminished hostilities and conflicts in workplaces. Implementing this plan would make a unified and robust society out of this otherwise intensely heterogeneous society such as the United States.
Furthermore, knowing the strength of the 19 different mental forces separates people from one another. Our personality and behavior assessment test does exactly that and helps corporations with their staffing challenge. For a more accurate comparison between our tests and others, please read the Scientific Principles among the blogs. That will show why ours is a disrupter in this industry.
Copyrights© Mark Abraham