Here's a major hypothesis: There can be only one grand narrative in a society at any given time, and it can only supply psyche energy to 50% of the people it is about. The other 50% have to find dark energy to live off of because they're socially dead. A no-free-lunch theorem.
Conversation
Replying to
I think that's more complex. It's not a grand narrative so much as the shadow of one.
1
This Tweet was deleted by the Tweet author. Learn more
Replying to
Not necessarily a contradiction there. Grand narratives recursively contain smaller subcultural ones all the way down to individual. But there most certainly are levels of narrative consensus above individual. It is belief in only the individual layer that's platonic.
1
5
Show replies
Replying to
I think this is only true for societies structured to be at war with themselves (e.g. market democracies).
This Tweet was deleted by the Tweet author. Learn more
Replying to
I wouldn't map it so directly to votes though. Most of the time, even if your candidate doesn't win, you don't switch from light to dark or vice versa. It's the rare election on which dark/light rides.
1
Replying to
a "consensus technology" like a blockchain is similar to a grand narrative, integrating potentially billions of individual histories, without the need for a memeplex as a lowest common denominator
1




