A few questions that came to my head while reading this and based on my observation of others and myself: you don't have to answer all of them.
1.Where is the difference between mimesis and just getting and generating an idea from your environment or a person?
2.Where does the original desire come from?
3.Are we more mimetic in areas where we have attached our identities to, for example if every smart person goes into finance, would you want to go there because you will still be seen as smart rather than because you want/care to make money ?
4. Does the full realisation of mimesis in oneself and broader culture inevitably lead to asceticism?
I first came across Girard in a podcast from Robert Pogue Harrison and then much later on the internet when he was linked to Peter Thiel. Thiel seems to have quiet an original mind, and minds like that tend to process everything through their own perspective, do you think his reading of Girard is accurate. Thanks
Thank you very much for this comment, W.K. Brief thoughts on each of these excellent questions:
1. My focus is generally on mimesis as it pertains to desire—mimetic desire. How one generates an idea from one's environment or interaction with others is an epistemological question, but there are fascinating connections between mimetic desire and how one arrives at an idea. Many smart Girard scholars (like Dupuy) would argue that the idea of pure reason is fantasy and that all thought itself is mimetic. I disagree with him.
2. Hard to answer this question without getting into theological perspectives. In the Bhagavad Gita, desire created the universe. In Judeo-Christian theology, God's desire would be the "first desire"—desire being another word for love. If we extract ourselves from that and think about desire on the level of an individual human life, I would imagine the original desire of any one of us came from our parents.
3. I think the answer to this is usually Yes—I took on a job on Wall Street shortly after college and I can tell you that the primary reason was not the money (which was good). Today, many people seem to have attached their identities to politics, which makes it one of the most mimetic areas of life.
4. I believe it has to lead to some forms of asceticism if anything is going to change. But more often than not—at least if history is any guide—asceticism is forced on people rather than freely chosen.
5. I don't think Thiel is correctly reading Girard on everything, but what do I know. He certainly seems to me to be applying Girard's thought in an odd way by focusing so much on technology. I'm skeptical that this approach is the best way forward. I don't think humans are going to save themselves from themselves simply by building better technology or by having really smart people build new systems that supposedly "fix" mimetic desire or diffuse it better, that sort of thing. The only way out is through—and that means through each person.
Luke, maybe you are going to cover this (or did cover this) in subsequent posts. I'm a new subscriber and am catching up, as it were. But here goes. What role does temptation play in the mimetic cycle of things?
Today I will give a practical example from my own life. I currently live in Budapest, where cigarette smoking is still socially acceptable or at least not socially stigmatizing. In the last few months I have started to smoke here and there; usually at the end of a long day, with a sip of an adult beverage. But deep down, I always tell myself that I'm not a smoker because I know it's an unhealthy habit, and I know that in my own culture (the United States) smoking is terribly shunned. It is not a habit that brings me social capital, respect, etc. etc. On the contrary. At the moment I am not smoking. Nor did I wake up today wanting to smoke or indeed thinking about cigarettes at all.
That being said, as I was walking around town today, I saw a small group of restaurant workers who were taking a cigarette break, standing in a small group talking to each other. I immediately wanted to ask them for a cigarette. Having read your first mimesis essay just two hours prior to this encounter, I naturally asked myself: Why do I want to smoke now? Do I simply crave nicotine? I don't think so. I've never been so engrossed in the habit that I felt a physical urge to satisfy it.
Okay, so what then? It seems to me that the source of my sudden craving was relational/social. The group looked like they were enjoying each other's company on what I imagine one of several short smoke breaks today (socially sanctioned "smoking breaks" being to some extent an international phenomenon).
So was source of my desire was negative; that is, envy for my lack of social connection that I perceived the smoking group enjoys? Or was my sudden urge to light up simply a substitute for a good desire? I do tend to connect smoke breaks as a method of combating stress. Also, I should note that before I saw the group smoking, I felt no stress personally. But seeing the group reminded me how nice it has been in the past to smoke and talk to people as a way to combat stress.
Does that make sense? How does mimesis play into an everyday situation like this?
"(That’s precisely why Internet memes are not memes, in Dawkins’ purist view. An Internet meme is intentionally altered by different people to be funnier or to be more ‘viral’)"
"Memes seek to imitate or replicate themselves perfectly"
Common confusions... Genes or Memes do NOT "seek to replicate perfectly"
Differentiation/variability that enhances replication produces more replication [tautological]
It does not matter whether the differentiation is intentional (by some external actor) or accidental (from random thermal/biological activity); differentiation creates an implicit "competition" for resources, and as Darwin said: the fittest (most able to use the available resources to replicate) survive to replicate again (and again...)
There is no need for "striving" and no "intention" is required (in *natural* selection),
But the same dynamics of differentiation and selection apply for "intentional" variation.
Wonderful article, Luke. Loved the bit regarding marital double binds. I was lucky enough to stumble upon Girard about a year into a very rocky marriage and began to notice they very thing you described. It was revelation which, along with a little counseling, saved our marriage...though it's still too easy to fall back into old patterns. What advice do you have for couples attempting to escape from a double bind?
Daniel, thank you for this very gracious reply. I highly recommend "The Genesis of Desire" by Jean-Michel Oughourlian, if you haven't read it yet.
Oughourlian describes the odd case of divorces couples who become the best of friends after their divorce. It's as if the divorce was in some sense a renunciation of the seesaw game. The divorce freed them of the fierce rivalry that their marriage fueled. They were then able to put themselves on solid ground and see themselves not as rivals, but as friends and persons with much in common.
It's not easy to get off the seesaw while still in the marriage. It requires what is usually a heroic level of renunciation and self-awareness. This is Oughourlian's view, at least.
As one who is not yet married (I am slated to be very soon), I am not one to speak. I can only hope I can withstand the test myself.
There is, though, in my experience, a strong temptation to rivalry in ANY vocation—whether that is one's state in life, or work, or whatever else.
That is why understanding one's calling as unique, specific, and unrepeatable is of the utmost importance. We have only to measure ourselves against what we have been uniquely asked to do—the unique circumstances that we are in, which no other person in the world (and no person who has ever before lived in history) has previously encountered.
Every moment we are given is a moment to love in an unrepeatable way.
Also, it occurs to me that the differentiation borne of mimetic rivalry you described so well, tends to be the means by which most people, especially today, define themselves, and add up to what we term a "personality." Does that seem right? Are many of us simply the sum of false distinctions we've drawn in our rivalries with others?
I am a bit von Hildebrandian in my understanding of personality—I think it's possible to form a personality as unique as one's personhood (and personhood is unique and unrepeatable). In Hildebrand's terms, personality is a quality acquired (in greater and lesser degrees) in accordance with how well a person learns to respond to what is true, and good, and beautiful. In this sense, I think that most people have a "deviated" personality that is made up of, as you say, false distinctions. But it is possible to rid ourselves of those.
Luke, thank you so much for your thoughtful reply. I read your article to my wife and she agreed that the dynamic you described approximates our own. We're going to read Oughourlian's book together. Appreciate the recommendation.
Congrats on your upcoming marriage! I wish you the best.
A few questions that came to my head while reading this and based on my observation of others and myself: you don't have to answer all of them.
1.Where is the difference between mimesis and just getting and generating an idea from your environment or a person?
2.Where does the original desire come from?
3.Are we more mimetic in areas where we have attached our identities to, for example if every smart person goes into finance, would you want to go there because you will still be seen as smart rather than because you want/care to make money ?
4. Does the full realisation of mimesis in oneself and broader culture inevitably lead to asceticism?
I first came across Girard in a podcast from Robert Pogue Harrison and then much later on the internet when he was linked to Peter Thiel. Thiel seems to have quiet an original mind, and minds like that tend to process everything through their own perspective, do you think his reading of Girard is accurate. Thanks
Thank you very much for this comment, W.K. Brief thoughts on each of these excellent questions:
1. My focus is generally on mimesis as it pertains to desire—mimetic desire. How one generates an idea from one's environment or interaction with others is an epistemological question, but there are fascinating connections between mimetic desire and how one arrives at an idea. Many smart Girard scholars (like Dupuy) would argue that the idea of pure reason is fantasy and that all thought itself is mimetic. I disagree with him.
2. Hard to answer this question without getting into theological perspectives. In the Bhagavad Gita, desire created the universe. In Judeo-Christian theology, God's desire would be the "first desire"—desire being another word for love. If we extract ourselves from that and think about desire on the level of an individual human life, I would imagine the original desire of any one of us came from our parents.
3. I think the answer to this is usually Yes—I took on a job on Wall Street shortly after college and I can tell you that the primary reason was not the money (which was good). Today, many people seem to have attached their identities to politics, which makes it one of the most mimetic areas of life.
4. I believe it has to lead to some forms of asceticism if anything is going to change. But more often than not—at least if history is any guide—asceticism is forced on people rather than freely chosen.
5. I don't think Thiel is correctly reading Girard on everything, but what do I know. He certainly seems to me to be applying Girard's thought in an odd way by focusing so much on technology. I'm skeptical that this approach is the best way forward. I don't think humans are going to save themselves from themselves simply by building better technology or by having really smart people build new systems that supposedly "fix" mimetic desire or diffuse it better, that sort of thing. The only way out is through—and that means through each person.
Just superb. So excited for your book—already preordered!
Paradigm-changing explanation for the meaning of the Sermon on the Mount!! Wow.
Luke, maybe you are going to cover this (or did cover this) in subsequent posts. I'm a new subscriber and am catching up, as it were. But here goes. What role does temptation play in the mimetic cycle of things?
Today I will give a practical example from my own life. I currently live in Budapest, where cigarette smoking is still socially acceptable or at least not socially stigmatizing. In the last few months I have started to smoke here and there; usually at the end of a long day, with a sip of an adult beverage. But deep down, I always tell myself that I'm not a smoker because I know it's an unhealthy habit, and I know that in my own culture (the United States) smoking is terribly shunned. It is not a habit that brings me social capital, respect, etc. etc. On the contrary. At the moment I am not smoking. Nor did I wake up today wanting to smoke or indeed thinking about cigarettes at all.
That being said, as I was walking around town today, I saw a small group of restaurant workers who were taking a cigarette break, standing in a small group talking to each other. I immediately wanted to ask them for a cigarette. Having read your first mimesis essay just two hours prior to this encounter, I naturally asked myself: Why do I want to smoke now? Do I simply crave nicotine? I don't think so. I've never been so engrossed in the habit that I felt a physical urge to satisfy it.
Okay, so what then? It seems to me that the source of my sudden craving was relational/social. The group looked like they were enjoying each other's company on what I imagine one of several short smoke breaks today (socially sanctioned "smoking breaks" being to some extent an international phenomenon).
So was source of my desire was negative; that is, envy for my lack of social connection that I perceived the smoking group enjoys? Or was my sudden urge to light up simply a substitute for a good desire? I do tend to connect smoke breaks as a method of combating stress. Also, I should note that before I saw the group smoking, I felt no stress personally. But seeing the group reminded me how nice it has been in the past to smoke and talk to people as a way to combat stress.
Does that make sense? How does mimesis play into an everyday situation like this?
"(That’s precisely why Internet memes are not memes, in Dawkins’ purist view. An Internet meme is intentionally altered by different people to be funnier or to be more ‘viral’)"
"Memes seek to imitate or replicate themselves perfectly"
Common confusions... Genes or Memes do NOT "seek to replicate perfectly"
Genes/Memes replicate [period]. Genes/Memes differentiate ("sh*t happens")
Differentiation/variability that enhances replication produces more replication [tautological]
It does not matter whether the differentiation is intentional (by some external actor) or accidental (from random thermal/biological activity); differentiation creates an implicit "competition" for resources, and as Darwin said: the fittest (most able to use the available resources to replicate) survive to replicate again (and again...)
There is no need for "striving" and no "intention" is required (in *natural* selection),
But the same dynamics of differentiation and selection apply for "intentional" variation.
Wonderful article, Luke. Loved the bit regarding marital double binds. I was lucky enough to stumble upon Girard about a year into a very rocky marriage and began to notice they very thing you described. It was revelation which, along with a little counseling, saved our marriage...though it's still too easy to fall back into old patterns. What advice do you have for couples attempting to escape from a double bind?
Daniel, thank you for this very gracious reply. I highly recommend "The Genesis of Desire" by Jean-Michel Oughourlian, if you haven't read it yet.
Oughourlian describes the odd case of divorces couples who become the best of friends after their divorce. It's as if the divorce was in some sense a renunciation of the seesaw game. The divorce freed them of the fierce rivalry that their marriage fueled. They were then able to put themselves on solid ground and see themselves not as rivals, but as friends and persons with much in common.
It's not easy to get off the seesaw while still in the marriage. It requires what is usually a heroic level of renunciation and self-awareness. This is Oughourlian's view, at least.
As one who is not yet married (I am slated to be very soon), I am not one to speak. I can only hope I can withstand the test myself.
There is, though, in my experience, a strong temptation to rivalry in ANY vocation—whether that is one's state in life, or work, or whatever else.
That is why understanding one's calling as unique, specific, and unrepeatable is of the utmost importance. We have only to measure ourselves against what we have been uniquely asked to do—the unique circumstances that we are in, which no other person in the world (and no person who has ever before lived in history) has previously encountered.
Every moment we are given is a moment to love in an unrepeatable way.
Also, it occurs to me that the differentiation borne of mimetic rivalry you described so well, tends to be the means by which most people, especially today, define themselves, and add up to what we term a "personality." Does that seem right? Are many of us simply the sum of false distinctions we've drawn in our rivalries with others?
I am a bit von Hildebrandian in my understanding of personality—I think it's possible to form a personality as unique as one's personhood (and personhood is unique and unrepeatable). In Hildebrand's terms, personality is a quality acquired (in greater and lesser degrees) in accordance with how well a person learns to respond to what is true, and good, and beautiful. In this sense, I think that most people have a "deviated" personality that is made up of, as you say, false distinctions. But it is possible to rid ourselves of those.
Luke, thank you so much for your thoughtful reply. I read your article to my wife and she agreed that the dynamic you described approximates our own. We're going to read Oughourlian's book together. Appreciate the recommendation.
Congrats on your upcoming marriage! I wish you the best.