The Master and His Emissary

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In a manner reminiscent of Julian Jaynes’s, Iain McGilchrist breaks the human brain down into left and right hemispheres and note that they have evolved to handle very different tasks:

The left hemisphere focuses on narrow, detailed, categorical thinking, the right on providing broader context, relationships, and meaning. These are not, as has previously been suggested, simply "rational vs. emotional" differences, but are complementary ways of attending to reality.

The right hemisphere was naturally the “master” of the two — it is the big picture guy. It did, and should, naturally take precedence in understanding reality. The left hemisphere “emissary” evolved to be a glorified gopher to serve the master’s broader perspective.

BUT — And JC does go on about this in the shape of data modernism and financialisation — contemporary Western technological society has increasingly allowed the left hemisphere’s approach to dominate. We have become increasingly focused on abstraction over lived experience — form over substance: We prioritise metrics over qualitative understanding. There’s a growing disconnect between analytical knowledge and wisdom — metis. This affects everything from education to healthcare to governance

This hemispheric imbalance has accelerated since the Enlightenment. We have grown worse at appreciating context and implicit meaning — betweenness — as we reduce complex realities to simplistic models. At the same time as we have venerated empathy we have become worse at it; we have a diminished capacity for understanding others’ perspectives. Increasingly we are alienated from each other and from nature. This is the anti-simulation hypothesis.

The challenge is how to restore balance between hemispheric perspectives and reintegrating right-hemisphere insights. Value of art, music, and other right-hemisphere-oriented activities.

See also

• Financialisation
• data modernism
• Great delamination
• Informal systems