Arrived in Hong Kong

I have arrived in Hong Kong. I am still a bit jet-lagged and trying to get settled in, so there won't be a regular post this week. I have a busy schedule while I am here, but I will try to get the next cognitive system overview up for next week.

Tired now, time to sleep.

Travel Prep and Delayed Posts

I am preparing for a trip to Hong Kong to do some work with local educators and teach some workshops. I will be traveling next weekend, and arrive late Sunday, so next week's post will probably just be a short update, too. I will continue the overview of our ideas/philosophy of cognition as soon as I can - probably Nov. 3rd at the latest. Sorry for the delay.

The next post will be from Hong Kong!

Thinking about CBA: Mystical Materialism

Where CAB appears to arise from and lend itself to an analytical form of mysticism, CBA shares characteristics with BCA. Where BCA has a strong focus on tradition followed by emotional/mystical considerations, CBA places the greatest emphasis on relational/mystical harmony.  Because of this, spiritual harmony and the family become a substantial deciding factor in how we would understand and act in the world. As with CAB, the mystical/emotional is given the highest decision-making priority, but it is strengthened not by analysis, but by tradition and rote learning. The goal of such thinking is less to transcend the physical world, but to ensure the proper functioning of the entire world, physical and mystical. Analytic and conceptual thinking assists with this, but is not generally given a strong priority. This is not to say that CBA people or cultures are incapable of abstract thinking. In fact, one of the cultures Dr. Cook identified as predominately CBA was Japanese culture – a culture known for high levels of technological and scientific development. It is not the strength of A that is in dispute, but the priority it has on daily decision making and understanding. For CBA thinkers, relationships and tradition are often most important, while reason or logic often take on a supplementary role in their cognitive system.

As with CAB cultures, Dr. Cook's direct exposure to CBA cultures was limited. IRI has not had much interaction with these cultures, either, so much of our assessment of the implications of CBA thinking come through analysis or second-hand. This is an area we hope to correct in the future, as learning more about this style can only improve our ability to understand all cognitive systems.

Thinking About CAB: Conceptualized Mysticism

Dr. Cook originally identified CAB thinking as a cognitive style common to people groups with a history of formal discussion of spiritual matters. One of his primary examples was Hinduism in India,* which has a (very) long history of religious exploration and discussion. CAB cultures tend to emphasize the spiritual component of such discussions over the analytic/conceptual component, with a goal of transcending our human understanding. Values in this system are not particularly “earthly,” and as a result, the concrete reality is often viewed with skepticism. Instead, the focus is on mystical enlightenment to overcome the illusion of mundane life (whether that illusion is metaphorical or literal would depend on the particular belief system). In many cases, this is accomplished through understanding “higher truths” about reality, which are often organized and structured into a more formal religion or sets of principles. Thus, the mystical (C) component of thought is given the highest priority, and is strengthened through understanding (A). The tangible world and our operations in it, however (B), are not necessarily seen as particularly important, in the grand scheme of things, and attentiveness to one's physical state or environment is often devalued.

Unfortunately, Dr. Cook's contact with cultures he believed were strongly CAB was limited. We are beginning to investigate this area of cognition more with our work in South Pacific and Asian cultures; we have already had nationals identify characteristics of CAB thinking in Buddhism, for example.  I, personally, believe there may also be some evidence of this kind of thinking among some western animist practices (often lumped into the category of paganism), as well as certain ascetic traditions recorded throughout the history of the Christian Church. In any case, we look forward to further investigation into this cognitive style and its ramifications.

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*I feel obligated to note that generalizations are generally true. India and Hinduism contain several examples of CAB approaches to understanding, but this does not mean that all Indians or Hindu practitioners are CAB thinkers.

BAC Thinking: A Theoretical Cognitive System

Let's finish off our B-prioritized systems. Where BCA is a very commonplace system, however, BAC represents one of the (as far as we know) purely theoretical thinking styles. That is, we haven't encountered any cultures which seem to evidence a priority on concrete particulars, followed by abstract reasoning, and then taking the emotional/mystical into consideration. With that caveat, allow me to take a moment to speculate wildly.



Since B, as we mentioned before, is strongly grounded in concrete reality (the physical world and things we do in it), and tends toward habituation and past experience for decision-making, we would expect that a BAC culture (or individual) would show evidence of the same traditionalism and attention to detail as a BCA culture. The main difference, however, would be an emphasis on conceptualization over the emotional/mystical. In cultural terms, this might also mean a lower prioritization of social and/or religious ties that we see in many BCA cultures, such as African tribes. Note that this does not mean family or social bonds are necessarily weak – just that “good” decision making takes into account tradition first, then analysis, then emotional, mystical, or social implications. Such a society might look very traditional in its operation, but have substantial areas of innovation and development that occur according to socially-ingrained protocols or procedures. On the other hand, strong social traditions are often a result of social pressure (motivated by C), which is weaker in this type of thinking structure. Perhaps a strong state which sets broad parameters within which individuals can innovate and conceptualize, but doesn't have a strong relational aspect to it? That may resemble some fictional dystopia, but most totalitarian regimes tend to substantially suppress their people, which appears to result in a “survival mode” BCA mindset.




This style is one of two that Dr. Cook described as mathematically possible, but non-cultural. That is, the math works out such that the system could exist, but the structure of human society and human nature don't really allow it to be the case. On the other hand, it may just be that we are looking for the wrong cues for this type of thinking, and there is, in fact, a person or culture that does embody this kind of thinking. If so, finding such a person or group would be tremendously helpful in advancing our understanding of human cognition.