Il lato oscuro delle storie: Come lo storytelling cementa le società e talvolta le distrugge

by Jonathan Gottschall, Giuliana Olivero (Translator)

L'essere umano è l'animale che racconta storie. Jonathan Gottschall ha usato questa fortunata metafora in "L'istinto di narrare", descrivendo magistralmente quell'ecosistema di finzione narrativa nel quale siamo immersi e che caratterizza in maniera così peculiare la nostra specie. Le storie creano la struttura delle nostre società, fanno vivere a ogni persona migliaia di vite, preparano i bambini alla vita adulta e formano i legami che ci consentono di convivere in pace. Ma tutto questo ha un lato oscuro che non possiamo più ignorare: le storie potrebbero anche essere la causa della nostra distruzione. Con questo libro Jonathan Gottschall torna sul tema della narrazione con tutto il bagaglio interdisciplinare delle sue conoscenze, attingendo alla psicologia, alla scienza della comunicazione, alle neuroscienze e alla letteratura per raccontarci fino a che punto le storie siano in grado di influenzare il nostro cervello e le nostre vite. E non sempre per il meglio. La narrazione ha agito nel corso della storia come collante delle società, certo, ma è anche la forza principale che disgrega le comunità: è il metodo più efficace che abbiamo per manipolare il prossimo eludendo il pensiero razionale. Dietro i più grandi mali della civiltà – il disastro ambientale, la demagogia, il rifiuto irrazionale della scienza, le guerre – c'è sempre una storia che confonde le menti. Le nuove tecnologie amplificano gli effetti delle campagne di disinformazione, e le teorie del complotto e le fake news rendono quasi impossibile distinguere i fatti dalla finzione, per cui la domanda che dobbiamo porci urgentemente è: «come potremo salvare il mondo dalle storie?».

Genres: Nonfiction, Psychology, Politics, History, Science, Sociology, Philosophy

312 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 21, 2021

About the author

Jonathan Gottschall is an American literary scholar, the leading younger figure in literature and evolution. He teaches at Washington and Jefferson College in Pennsylvania. He completed graduate work in English at State University of New York at Binghamton, where he worked under David Sloan Wilson.

His work The Rape of Troy: Evolution, Violence and the World of Homer describes the Homeric epic poems Iliad and Odyssey in terms of evolutionary psychology, with the central violent conflicts in these works driven by the lack of young women to marry and the resulting evolutionary legacy, as opposed to the violent conflicts being driven by honor or wealth.

Literature, Science and a New Humanities advocates that the humanities, and literary studies in particular, need to avail themselves of quantitative and objective methods of inquiry as well as the traditional qualitative and subjective, if they are to produce cumulative, progressive knowledge, and provides a number of case studies that apply quantitative methods to fairy and folk tale around the world to answer questions about human universals and differences.

Gottschall was profiled by the New York Times and The Chronicle of Higher Education. His work was featured in an article in Science describing literature and evolution.

Reviews

[BlackOxford · Rating 1 out of 5]

The Essential Poison

Sugar-coating hemlock doesn’t reduce its toxicity but I’ll bet it would be a real boost to sales. Perhaps this is the theory behind Jonathan Gottschall’s book about language. He makes his concern explicit. “I think of storytelling as humanity’s ‘essential poison,’” he says. By describing the poison in terms of stories and claiming we can tell the difference between better and worse stories, Gottschall implies that certain species-death is avoidable if we read the instructions on the label. Socrates, I’m sure, would object to the pitch on moral as well as health grounds.

Oddly, Gottschall doesn’t think scientists and mathematicians tell stories. This is because he dissociates stories from language, so that he can later claim a sort of priority for science in checking prose stories. But the specialised languages of formulas and equations are as much stories as The Story Paradox itself, including all the messy conclusions of self-referentiality. It’s part of his programme to make the medicine go down easier I suppose.

Gottschall also would like us to think that stories only became problematic with the internet and social media. This is, of course, ridiculous as the history of religion and its varied myths, all of which he cites, demonstrates so obviously. In fact Gottschall has got the chronology wrong. Stories created the internet. Language is the fundamental technology. Gossip is the killer app that allowed the species Homo Sapiens to survive in a world of stronger, faster, and more quick-witted predators. Language creates the collective human mind which is the most predatory instrument on the planet, perhaps in the cosmos. As Gottschall notes correctly:

“Behind all the factors driving civilization’s greatest ills—political polarization, environmental destruction, runaway demagogues, warfare, and hatred—you’ll always find the same master factor: a mind-disordering story.’

Gottschall thinks we can escape what he calls the magic of stories by knowing that they’re stories. Such an escape however would require some sort of final story about stories, an ultimate story like say that of the Catholic Church in its doctrinal statements, or the Fundamentalist’s Bible or the much sought after Theory of Everything in Physics. But these ultimate stories are just more of the same, that is, hopeless attempts to evade the hideous necessity of language through yet more language. Nevertheless Gottschall wants us to have hope, to think that he and we can discern better from worse stories. According to him, the solution is at hand, “We need more reason in the world.”

Where is such reason to be found? Gottschall thinks he knows: “Above all, we need to double down on our commitment to science because science is for standing up to stories.” Has he never heard of epistemology, that centuries-old failed attempt to identify better and worse scientific stories? In other words, his buck-passing solution to what he calls “a pandemic of conspiratorial thinking” has no credibility whatsoever. There is no vaccine (or anti-venom) that can cure us. His book is just another catalogue of useless, largely pornographic, anecdotes about QAnon, Trump, Hitler, Stalin and the various other nutcases who have committed atrocities.

I take the publication of this book as helpful in only one respect - evidence that the the quality editorial staff at Basic Books has deteriorated markedly over recent years.

[Jaidee · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5"glib, over-reaching, yet still worthwhile" stars !!

Thank you to Netgalley, the author and Perseus books for an e-copy. This was released November 2021. I am providing my honest review.

I want to describe to you how this book went down for me. It is a wednesday evening and there is an alumni continuing ed lecture that you are sort of interested in attending but you already know how it will go down. The lecturer has accolades coming out of his ying yang and in the audience will be the semi intelligent left leaning liberals that are financially comfortable oooohing and aaaahing and nodding their heads in agreement while sipping their Chablis but only half listening as they are exhausted from their mid management careers and would rather be Skyping with their extramarital affair. The audience is multicultural and very very woke but they are envious of their former classmates' larger homes and are distressed by the possibility of a mens' shelter being built two streets down.....do you get my drift...that is the narrative that came up for me during this read....

This is not an academic book but a presentation of strongly held beliefs held about the intersectionality of our human need for narrative, increasing isolation and the increasing influence of social media in our lives tied together by an entertaining array of soft science research, anecdotes and humor that only ladies with three glasses of wine would giggle at....


I am not saying that this did not open up ideas for me or I did not enjoy to a degree but the authorial voice and lack of organization led to this being a rather ho hum evening.

With a lot of work this could have been much more impactful and helpful...which I believe is what the author intended....

This is my story and I'm sticking to it....

[Nelson Zagalo · Rating 1 out of 5]

I cannot call a book something that is nothing but a jumble of ideas and phrases stuck together to manipulate whoever reads it. I can't even say that Jonathan Gottschall tells a story, because telling a story implies cohesion and discursive unity, and here we have anything but that. Gottschall grabs everything from everywhere - various scientific, technological and cultural areas - that can somehow support his premise, and sets up a house of cards to sell his ideas. He just forgot that rhetoric needs ethos to work, not just logic and emotion. It is almost painful to see Gottschall, someone who teaches in higher education, using research work by multiple colleagues, which are related to concrete issues, being cited distorted or summoning the results for what he is interested in, just to offer proof of authority to the discourse he constructs. This we call manipulative discourse, without any respect for the readers. If in his previous book, "The Storytelling Animal" (analysis VI), we already felt much of this, and which at the time I considered to be an "absolutist approach", in this new book, besides not adding anything, the approach slips into an attempt to inculcate fear and panic, hoping with this to attract the lights to sell more books.

--------------------------------------

Não posso chamar livro a algo que não passa de um emaranhado de ideias e frases coladas juntas para manipular quem lê "The Story Paradox" (2021). Nem sequer posso dizer que Jonathan Gottschall conte uma história, porque contar uma história implica coesão e unidade discursiva, e aqui temos tudo menos isso. Gottschall agarra em tudo de todo o lado — diversas áreas científicas, tecnológicas e culturais — que possam de algum modo suportar as suas premissas, e monta um castelo de cartas para vender as sua ideias. Só esqueceu que a retórica para funcionar precisa de Ethos, não chega lógica e emoção. É quase doloroso ver Gottschall, alguém que ensina no ensino superior, usar trabalhos de múltiplos colegas, que estão relacionados com questões concretas, que ele cita distorcendo ou convocando os resultados para o que lhe interessa, apenas para oferecer prova de autoridade ao discurso que constrói. A isto chamamos discurso manipulativo, sem qualquer respeito pelos leitores. Se no seu livro anterior, "The Storytelling Animal" (análise VI), já se sentia muito disto, e que na altura considerei como "abordagem absolutista", neste novo livro além de não vir acrescentar nada, a abordagem resvala para a tentativa de inculcar o medo e o pânico esperando com isso atrair as luzes para a venda de mais livro.

Comentário completo em português no Virtual Illusion:
https://virtual-illusion.blogspot.com...

[Rossdavidh · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I was finishing my review of Jonathan Gottschall's last book ("The Storytelling Animal", see here), I lamented that, after having convinced the reader (well, this reader anyway) that storytelling is one of the most fundamental things about humanity, he didn't take on the topic of whether or not our storytelling impulse might be a source of trouble now, given the many changes in how we tell each other stories (media used, reach, etc.). In his newest book, Gottschall takes on the topic of the dangers of storytelling. I awaited the delivery of it with some excitement, and cracked the cover with a bit of mental preparation to have my mind blown.

Of course, I had overdone it. There is still, I think, too much we don't really know about how story works on the human mind, and Gottschall is forced to admit as much:

"Early in my research for this book, I spent a morning in the lounge of the college psychology department, eagerly perusing the tables of contents and indexes of about twenty recent textbooks from different subfields of psychology. I was scanning for references to any variant of the word 'story' or 'narrative'. I had my notebook out to scribble down ideas, concepts, and references to journal articles to run down. When I finished the notebook paper remained pristine. I got zero hits.

The science of story exists, and this book couldn't have been written without it. But it's still a very young science, where the known is dwarfed by the unknown. And far from moving toward its rightful place near the heart of the human sciences, story science hasn't even penetrated the textbooks...Excuse me while I whisper in the ears of ambitious young researchers: The tree of story science is heavy with toothsome, low-hanging fruit. Go feast yourself and grow fat in reputation."

So, while Gottschall does not have the fruits of that young science yet to present to us, he does have what I call the One Big Idea of his book, which is an idea about what 'story' is, and what it tells us about what language is. Language is not, primarily, used to communicate. Not really, not most of the time. We do, yes, occasionally say, "could you hand me the salt, please" or "turn left here", but the vast majority of our use of language is not for the purpose of communicating information. Instead, it's for the purposes of manipulating each other. We talk, to sway how other people think, rather than to merely convey some information. What is the term we use, to distinguish between something that merely conveys information, and something that instead (or in addition) sways our emotions, stirs our hearts, perhaps even calls us to action?

The term is "story". It's what's normally lacking in a textbook, and it's why they're mostly dull (and ironically as a result uninformative). It's what _is_ there in an excellent piece of popular science writing, and of course, fiction (which in most cases achieves the manipulation without even bothering with any information about anything real at all). Story is, therefore, both profoundly powerful and, as a result, profoundly dangerous. All the more so because it is so poorly understood.

There was a moment in the mid-20th century, when America (and perhaps other nations as well) had a bit of a legislative freak-out about the dangers of subliminal advertising. The fear was that our minds could be controlled by seeing or hearing advertisements too dim to be consciously perceived. It turns out that this is almost entirely bogus, but there is a similar problem in front of us, now and forever, so much more dangerous not only because it actually works, but also because we would greatly resent any effort to protect us from it. The difference is that, in nearly all cases now, the only covert message that the storyteller (movie director, script writer for a TV series, best-selling author, news journalist, politician) is actually trying to slip into our minds is:

"Pay attention to me".

Now, it is questionable whether the propaganda of previous ages, which certainly wanted people's attention but wanted it for some other purpose, was actually any less dangerous. Still there is most decidedly something chilling about comparing our own storytelling input to that of, say, a medieval peasant. They spent most of the day doing manual labor, mostly without saying anything, perhaps sometimes singing a work song but not ingesting story after story. For any century prior to the 20th, storytelling (and storylistening) had to wait until the end of the day, or the depths of the winter. In 2020, while Gottschall was writing his book, Americans (in part due to the pandemic) for the first time spent more time watching TV than working: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/atus.... It ought to horrify us how much of our lives we spend watching fictional depictions of somebody else's life, instead of living our own.

Unfortunately, while Gottschall is able to tell a pretty decent story himself, he doesn't really have as much information in this book as I was hoping for, either. In some ways, this is not his fault; he's trying to convince us that storytelling is worth serious scientific study, not tell us what the discoveries and conclusions of such study might be. But I did find it a bit of a letdown.

But then there were moments like this, when he turns his attention to Facebook:

"[Facebook] hasn't thrived because it discovered a new way of capturing attention. In large part, its algorithm just independently discovered the oldest way of capturing attention - the universal grammar of storytelling - and figured out how to distribute it on a colossal scale. The intelligence behind the algorithm may be artificial, but the narrative psychology it exploits is entirely natural. To wish the negative externalities of Facebook away is a near thing to wishing away the universal grammar of storytelling. It's to fantasize that social media companies are creating demand for dark, divisive, and morally provocative material rather than responding to it. It's therefore to fantasize that a different algorithm serving as a router for narratives of truth, goodness, and positivity could perform almost as well. But no matter the business model (free, subscription, or whatever), social media platforms will naturally conform to the built-in regularities of narrative psychology, whereby the darker the narrative, the more it crackles with moralistic energy, the more likely it will win out in story wars."

That, is something you will not get by reading books from lesser minds. While I have little sympathy for Facebook, it is undoubtedly the case that much of our dissatisfaction with them, is much like our dissatisfaction with Congress being too partisan to get stuff done, or our dissatisfaction with fast food for not being nutritious: it is really our dissatisfaction with ourselves. It isn't ethical to cater to our darkest desires, but it is still a product primarily of our darkest desires, not Facebook's (or Congress', or fast food's). If we primarily paid attention to thoughtful, dispassionate, considerate, long essays, then the social media of our day would be serving them up to us. They don't want us to binge on anger and derision for others, any more than they want us to binge on pictures of cats. But they do want us to pay attention, as much as possible, and what works for that, is the nasty side of storytelling.

So, while Gottschall's book was not all that I hoped for, it was worth the reading, and if it is unable to illuminate a dark corner of the human mind, it is at least able to convey forcefully that it exists, and why we do desperately need it illuminated. I don't know if any of the "ambitious young researchers" that Gottschall refers to will read his book and accept the challenge, but I can only hope so.

[Andrea McDowell · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short, effective book describing the upsides and downsides of the power of narrative on human beings and human society. As Gottschall points out: both the best and worst parts of our histories have been motivated by and founded on stories, whether good or bad, and we need to grapple with story's potential for harm as well as good. He also goes into how and why "bad" stories are often more compelling and shareable than "good" stories, given that there's no need for consistency with boring non-narrative facts and they can easily hijack very contagious elements like anger, outrage, and fear. Any number of covid conspiracy stories come to mind as examples.

[Kressel Housman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sometimes, while reading a book, I think, “This is pretty good, but not fabulous. 4 stars.” Then I reach the ending, and it blows my mind. It casts everything that came before it in a brand new light. That’s how a book can earn a fifth star on the very last page.

This book was the opposite. All throughout, I was thinking, “Wow. This author is telling it like it is. 5 stars.” Then I reached the conclusion, and with a single word, the book lost me. That word was “hate.”

The author is a literature professor whose previous work has been on my to-read list for a while. It’s called The Storytelling Animal, and its thesis is that the human mind is constructed to process the world through stories. The current book revisits that thesis, but now that we’re living in a post-truth era where conspiracy theories abound, it’s clear why the author was motivated to explore the negative side of stories. Specifically, he pinpoints the need for a villain. Villainy is at the core of any conspiracy story. Psychologically, people need someone to scapegoat for the mess they find themselves in.

The thesis resonated with me for many reasons. First, as a Jew, I know all about being cast as the villain in someone else’s picture of the world. Early on in the book, the author recounts the events of the shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh. The perpetrator genuinely believed he was acting the role of the hero by ridding the world of some elderly Jews, as though we really are “the Elders of Zion” corrupting the world. It was similar for the young man who showed up at that DC pizza shop to liberate kids from pedophiles. He believed in a story he read online, and since nobody else was acting on it, he assumed the role of the hero vigilante. He went armed and prepared to kill the bad guys in his rescue of innocent kids. In his mind, it was a supremely moral act.

It’s easy to write these people off as gullible dupes, but consider how deeply stories affect you personally. I, for one, have a lifelong phobia based on some imagery I saw on TV at the age of four or five. Stories also inspired the games my sister and I used to play with our friends: Charlie’s Angels, Little House on the Prairie, Gilligan’s Island. I think that was the beginning of my hobby of writing fanfic, and I know I’m not the only one who “lives” in these stories. I’ve heard it said that Roger Stone is cosplaying the “wise guys” in mafia movies, and of course, a persona from reality TV made it all the way to the most powerful office in the world. Presumably, he bought his own act – perhaps not entirely, but enough to convince himself that he’s a patriot who’s been wronged. We’re all the heroes of our own stories. It’s our cognitive bias. We’re just wired that way.

So can we be heroes without having villains to fight? Professor Gottschall cites the movie “Babel” as an example of a villain-less story, but it’s the exception. People want happy endings, and above all, that means seeing that justice is served. It’s true even in love stories. Sure, we’re happy that Cinderella marries Prince Charming, but the ending is incomplete without the humiliation of the evil stepsisters. In the Grimms’ version, it’s pretty grisly. In order to fit into the glass slipper, one sister cuts off her toes and the other her heels. This kind of schadenfreude is baked into our sense of a good story.

As a writer, I’m having trouble with this myself. It’s probably one of the main reasons I took the book so much to heart. For over two years now, I’ve been working on a Beauty and the Beast (Rumbelle) fanfic. The basic Beauty and the Beast plot might be what Professor Gottschall would call “empathy for the devil.” My story includes a whole meta-narrative about it. One character is in a quarrel with the Brothers Grimm about villainy. (It’s seen most clearly in Chapter 20, if anyone’s curious.)

Workshopping the story has taught me a lot about people’s inner processes, and their reactions correlate with Professor Gottschall’s observations. The Beast is a hidden hero. He has to have a good side for Belle to be right about him. But when I make him too kind, people say I’m straying from the original. Then I give him an antagonist to punish, and readers hate him. . . except for the fans of the TV show. They love the Beast/Rumpelstiltskin no matter what. They want to see the antagonists suffer more. They’ve said it about Belle’s non-love interest Gaston, and they say it about the Grimms. One of the story’s intended messages is that revenge isn’t justice, but it doesn’t seem to be landing. I am caught in the story paradox.

It’s because this book addressed issues that I care so deeply about that reading the word “hate” in the conclusion was such a turn-off. Professor Gottschall states that while we shouldn’t hate storytellers, and that we must pity the people who fall for them, we should hate stories. I’m sorry, but I just can’t get on board with that. Yes, we should question and deconstruct stories, especially when they demonize someone else, but hate? If stories are so intrinsic to how our minds work, then story-hatred is no different than self-hatred. That’s not a recipe to rebuild a better society. It seems to me that in advocating story-hate, Professor Gottschall fell into the villainy trap. He, too, got caught in the story paradox.

[Ietrio · Rating 1 out of 5]

There is no paradox here, only a weak story: the story of a entitled man who thumps his feet in a tantrum because the world doesn't heel to his ideal world whim.

[Asad Asgari · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gottschall explores the origins of storytelling in his literary journey, unraveling its evolution from our primate ancestors' communication through gestures and sounds to the complex narratives shaping our world today.
The book posits that storytelling is a double-edged sword, with the potential for both positive and negative impacts. While the author warns about its potential for manipulation and discord, personally, I find myself disagreeing with the negative aspect. In contrast to the writer's perspective, I believe in the positive power of storytelling to promote empathy, understanding, and cooperation. It is in harnessing this affirmative potential that I align my views on the influential role of stories. Through reading stories, individuals can forget their pain and experience a new world they might never encounter in their lives.
In a world that often appears more tumultuous and bewildering, narratives provide a source of solace, understanding, and direction. They serve as poignant reminders of our collective humanity, showcasing our ability to empathize, express compassion, and aspire to greatness. Regardless of the strides made in technology, storytelling remains an enduring and formidable influence in the fabric of human existence.

[Sebastian Gebski · Rating 3 out of 5]

Moderately interesting "easy reading".

I couldn't help the feeling that the author does what he can to prove me that even when he speaks about stories, he can do that by building another story. It all felt ... byzantine.
Obviously, there are some valuable lessons in that:
- he shows how some great successes are built upon nothing else than stories
- he claims that the story is the best way to catch someone's attention, convince someone or even sell something

Still, at some point (75%) I just felt bored and I literally couldn't wait until the book is over.
Slight disappointment, keeping in my all the recommendations and mentions it got e.g. on Quillette.

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

'I thought if you told people facts, they’d draw their conclusions, and because the facts were true, the conclusions mostly would be too. But we don’t run on facts. We run on stories about things. About people.'
- James S.A. Corey, Babylon's Ashes

Suppose you have a cat that needs medication. Your cat will not take her medication. Your cat does not like her medication. Your cat is plotting to smother you in your sleep because you keep trying to get her to take this horrible medication. What can you do? You mix what she needs (her medication) with what she enjoys (her food). This is the traditional function of story as this book outlines it. It is trying to impart something to you in a way that power point purveyors simply cannot. A parable is an example of this concept. However, the author notes that story can also have a dark side. You have a vermin problem. For some unfathomable reason they are loathe to ingest poison. What can you do? You mix what they eschew (the poison) with what they will willingly receive (their food). Indeed, medicine and poison are in one sense the same thing: a foreign substance being introduced into your body. What differentiates them is their effect on you. One makes you better and the other makes you worse. Story can work like this by embedding ideas in your mind. It's basically the same idea as memes and memeplexes. While that terminology might be relatively new, the thought that it is conveying isn't. It has always been the case that the immaterial realm of ideas and information has required a physical medium to travel about in: squishy bundles of neurons, stone tablets, flash drives, interconnected computer networks. As the author describes it:

'It may help to think of the sway-making power of stories as the closest real-life equivalent to the force in Star Wars. Like the force, story is an all-pervasive field of dark and light energy that influences all of our actions. On the radio, on the news, on TV, on podcasts, on social media, in advertising, and in face-to-face yarning—we’re forever swimming through a turbulent sea of narratives, with rival stories churning against each other and buffeting us around.'

The contention of this book is that the original way of imparting ideas and information in order to change minds is still the best way because it does an end run around any barriers you might have in place to resist a particular idea or information cluster. Arguably the less overt they are, the more potent they are; people who recognize they are being manipulated usually respond by putting up a wall. The power of story isn't necessarily a bad thing but it is certainly more covert than overt in method. To use a word that is much in vogue in current online culture, stories are influencers.

Suppose you have some cause, crisis, or crusade you are amped up about and want to make people aware of. You might make a documentary that lists facts, figures, and have a voiceover by that one actor whose voice you recognize but can't put a name to. (You know the one I mean, right? Yeah, that guy.) The facts and figures approach is a more abstract approach. It might work or it might make people flick to the next channel. You could also pick a person integral to that cause, crisis, or crusade, craft the documentary around them and work all of the other stuff in along the way. Now people have a story. This is a more concrete approach. Another example. Suppose you wanted to demonstrate that people corrupt institutions and institutions corrupt people in a perpetual and seemingly never ending cycle, an overt way to do that would be to have a person stand at the front of a room and drone through a power point presentation filled with pie charts and bar graphs and historical records. A covert way would be to have them sit down and watch the HBO series The Wire from start to finish. Of the two, I know which would be more likely to make a lasting impression on me (Hint: It's not the power point presentation). To be fair, I will note a trade off here. The fictional narrative makes the point and underlines it. It gets your attention. However, the presentation (assuming no malevolent intent or ignorance of the facts on the part of the speaker) will be more accurate. It not only checks the veridicality of the narrative, it fills in all of the details. The advantages of story as summarized by the author:

'Storytellers enjoy a number of scientifically validated advantages over other types of messengers. First, and most basically, unlike some other forms of messaging, we love stories and the people who deliver them. Second, story is sticky (we process narrative much faster than other forms of communication and remember the information much better). Third, stories rivet attention like nothing else (think about how little your mind wanders during your favorite TV show or a novel you can’t put down). Fourth, good stories demand to be retold (think how hard it is not to spread that top-secret gossip or give away a spoiler), which means the messages in stories spread virally through social networks. And all of these advantages are driven by the fifth and most important advantage stories have over other forms of communication: they generate powerful emotion.'

Another point he makes is that everyone uses story to one degree or another to understand the world and themselves. That voice in our heads telling us about our past (where we have been), our present (where we are), and our future (where we are going) is much more than a clinical record of life events. We aren't cameras recording information to a hard drive. Your consciousness is providing a commentary track on all of this input. I don't think there are any exemptions to this narrative commentary, though perhaps there may be people not self-reflective enough to see they are not exemptions. In saying this, I am not saying that there is no such thing as truth, that no one can know anything about anything at all, that all knowledge is some kind of social construction, that any possible take on every possible issue is equally valid and worthy of consideration, or any of the other forms of applied postmodernism that are currently de rigueur . Are there any humans (myself included) that out of all humans have reached peak objectivity and are thus capable of placing themself outside of any possible framework that structures their existence and a set of moral values that is at least somewhat concomittant with it? It could be a fully articulated worldview or it might be some vague notions about – to co-opt Douglas Adams – Life, the Universe, and Everything but there isn't anybody that doesn't have a framework; there are just people that have a framework that is tacit and unarticulated and those that don't. Something being unexamined does not mean it isn't influencing your actions and behaviour, it just means the influence - like the framework itself - is invisible to you. It's kind of like culture. Culture is 'just the way things are.' Tacit frameworks are 'just the way I am.'

This book also tackles the hyperpoliticization of absolutely every facet of western culture and notes that while the problem may at times be a problem of facts, it is most definitely a problem of narratives:

Going from the pre-Guttenberg age in which formal storytelling was overwhelmingly consumed communally in smallish groups, to the mass audiences of the broadcast age, to the new age of story “narrowcasting” represents a sea change in human life. It amounts to a dangerous social experiment that seems to be going awry. Story has gone from being the great uniter, as James Poniewozik puts it, to the great divider. Story used to drag us all to the middle and make us more alike. Now we’re all in our own little storyverses, and instead of making us more alike, story makes us into more extreme versions of ourselves. It allows us to live in story worlds that reinforce our biases rather than challenge them. The end result is that everything consumed in our storylands just makes me more me, and you more you. It also makes “us” into more extreme versions of “us,” and “them” into more extreme versions of “them.” The sharp balkanization of American liberals and conservatives—with all the dire consequences for civic harmony and national cohesion—is largely a result of each side’s ability to live entirely inside the storyverses of the Left or the Right.

I am not sure if there is a solution to this problem. He talks about authoritarian nations imposing a top down approved narrative for the population. Gotta say – not a fan. In fact, I'm going to file that one away under solutions that are worse than the problems they are addressing. Diverging storyverses could be mitigated to some extent by using an aggregator. Social media and its daily dosage of outrage porn also discourages any sort of in-depth analysis. When our emotions are triggered at the expense of our reason it's kind of an uphill battle. Another part of the problem is whether one is inclined to approach narrative in terms of instrumentality or ontology. Should the best narrative win or should the truest narrative win? Should the end pummel the means into submission? Is the noble lie good because it is noble or bad because it is a lie?

All told, story is subversive, story is instructive, story is persuasive, and story is potentially divisive.

'To summarize, telling just gives us the meaning. Showing forces us to figure out the meaning for ourselves, and when we do this, we take ownership of that meaning. In this way, great storytellers play the psychological equivalent of the cuckoo bird’s trick: they make us feel that the notions they’ve laid like eggs in our minds are actually our own.'

While I don't think (most) people writing stories are actively deceptive as the bird in the analogy above is, he does have a point. Inasmuch as we are inclined to get anything more out of a story than escapism, I suppose we have to do the hard work ourselves: step back from the story, reflect on the story, and perhaps extract some general and abstract statements we feel it might be making from the story. And then, of course, decide if we agree. A quote attributed by some to Aristotle:

'It is the mark of an educated mind to entertain an idea without accepting an idea.'

Something our increasingly censorious culture could certainly take to heart.

[Dora Okeyo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Now more than ever, we find ourselves consuming and being bombarded by stories from ever angle-and reading this book reminded me of the power of narrative.
In social media today it's more about the power of a hashtag or trend- and once everyone is talking about it, it's difficult to take time to sieve through the truth from the lies. This book looks at the story, the oldest form of communication of human beings, takes us back to history and historical events to best understand how the one thing we love and are good at can ultimately destroy us.
As a Reader and Writer, this book is a great conversation to have. The author does not immediately say "watch what you say" or "sieve what you hear," he takes you through the journey of stories and story telling and misconceptions of them as well.
Thanks Netgalley for the eARC.

[Thomas Edmund · Rating 5 out of 5]

So, the first few chapters of Story Paradox were 100% write up my alley - an exploration of what stories mean to us socially, neurologically, and for society as a whole.

The next few chapters focussed on kinda the usual suspects for this sort of non-fiction, Socrates and Plato, there were quite a few insights and I enjoyed the strange balance between stream of consciousness of in depth analysis. The effect was kind of a paragraph to a few pages of a topic in quite specific detail but then an almost non-sequitur leap to a new topic. Not in a terrible way just in a sometimes surprising or hard to grasp the overall picture way.

As the book continued I did feel this flighty approach start to wear, its felt less like a powerful thesis and more like a philosophical riff on the subject. Still fun to read and overall pretty fine, perhaps just less than my hopes as I started this book.

[Rob · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting concept, and I'm happy to see a literature PhD doing work relevant to our present moment, but he overreaches, makes mistakes, seems to endorse PRC's governance system and, perhaps worst of all, approvingly quotes Sam Harris. That said, I did appreciate his message about our present polarization being driven by the need for stories, and the need for stories to have a villain.

[Jesse Field · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a slightly maddening book, a taste of a field that has tremendous promise, but too general, and with too little presentation and analysis of evidence, to quite sink its case. Also, it diagnoses a problem but declines to imagine any significant solutions, concluding instead with mere anodynes. 

A story is a set of words that holds sway. The "sway," gives individual stories competitive roles in what makes for "a free market of story." Liberal thought might have hoped that rational individuals in the market would cause more humane and truer stories to proliferate over inhumane and false ones. But sadly, too often, it's the other way around. "In truth, bad information—so long as it makes a good story—tends to outcompete a dull story packed with high-quality information." Realizing this gives us the same sense of concern that Plato presents in the Socrates of The Republic, wary that with story comes demagoguery, but hopeful that the right king could direct the power of story to the good. 

This is an intriguing argument, ornamented with anecdotes worth reflecting on. One chapter has the longest consideration of the flat earth movement I have ever seen, arguing that 'conspiracism' is an ego-gratifying quest, and that is its draw. "Show, don't tell:" allow the audience to put together clues. 

Such quests always feature a negativity bias. They are moralistic, defining bad guys and swaying our minds toward hate. Consider this great quip cited in Northrop Frye's work: "In the melodrama of the brutal thriller we come as close as it’s normally possible for art to come to the pure self-righteousness of the lynching mob.” We can see the very real effects of this if we analyze historical cases like the Holocaust, or the Rwandan massacres, Hutus slaughtering Tutsis. 

Another anecdote has us watching a 1944 animation involving a small set of simple shapes. The effect of this animation, which you should watch yourself on YouTube (just search "Heider-Simmel film") is striking, but Gottschall hardly begins the work of proving his claim that "what I call the Heider–Simmel effect—our tendency to all watch the same film and see different stories—explains everything about the roiling anger and confusion of modern life." He turns to the events of January 6, 2020 in Washington, DC as another case of story audiences brought different interpretations to. It's all about how we separate patterns from noise in messy data. How a person interprets can be traced to genetic propensity and environment, and very little to their own agency -- which bodes ill for the range of free will, if that even exists. And the clincher is: when we each watch videos alone every night, we become embedded in in our own little storyverses, and prone to alienation. A great storyteller, like Donald Trump, makes use of our vulnerability to conflict promotion. That technique alone got him to the presidency, and the only reason he lost was that reality re-asserted itself in the form of COVID-19. 

Whew. This is a wide-ranging, if breezy analysis of the situation. And a proposed solution? This comes in just a few pages: we are called to a new adventure, a quest to control our impulses. If the agonistic structure is as powerful and volatile as Gottschall argues, and "the question is, Can we learn to control it?" Then it behooved Gottschall to outline the positive case for better controlling our impulses. As it is, we are left with that a better future might look a bit like China, or Plato's Republic, but perhaps with control left up to democratic governments operating within reason. 

It's quite a disappointment. There are so many avenues left unexplored here. At one point, Gottschall describes work by DARPA, that storied corner of the US military, implying that they are building a "panopticon" to "sweep a story consumer for data." Searching among his sources, I there is indeed a proposal for "narrative disruptors and inductors" proposed (and funded by the Department of the Interior, strangely enough) that would use data from fMRI scans of brain response to stories, and for a specific purpose: "to provide important insights into the emergence or support of political violence and help clarify the role of strategic communication in mitigating it." It might have behooved Gottschalk to further investigate what is known of strategic communication, for his solution section. In fact, not doing so lumps researchers funded by the US government with China, as "bad guys" -- precisely the effect Gottschall warns against. 

There is no concrete analysis of stories. Frye, above, is quoted using the term "melodrama," and Trump is associated with the "reality show." A sense of spectacle in our lowest forms of narrative seems often implied. Why not try to define the best kinds of stories? The clear implication from what Gottschall says makes stories dangerous is that key ingredients might include the common substance of human life, like the relations within the family, and romantic love. We could also bolster the literary scholar's propensity to rank the best art by certain traits, like say, that it projects fully-realized characters who mix the heroic and quotidian, or else characters who serve as villains we can empathize with. For a literary scholar, Gottschall's vision of the "storyverse" seems flat, lacking in diversity or pattern.

But neither is his treatment of the science here satisfactory. In chapter 1, science is identified as a character in competition with the humanities. And winning. That's an odd rhetorical strategy for a prophet issuing dire warnings about our propensity to impose patterns of good guys and bad guys on messy reality. Are not scientists also story tellers? Even the most abstract papers of cosmologists and mathematicians relate a narrative vision. When Gottschall cites the biologist Robert Sapolsky, he correctly grasps that Sapolsky sees reduced likelihood of free will, given our animal natures. But Gottschall totally misses Sapolsky's optimistic thesis: we actually have the power to foster increased cooperation and reduced enmity, chiefly by making sure people feel safe, and have worthwhile occupations. Behavioral economics also offers a specifically paternalist vision of a society that works better because its default settings are configured optimally -- another point Gottschall never seems to have gotten to, despite citing work of Cass Sunstein, who writes well on this topic in the book Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness.

One missing scientific citation is particularly glaring to me: The Selfish Gene, by Richard Dawkins. I think much or all of Gottschalk's observations can be subsumed in the larger theory of the meme, which formed the last chapter of Dawkins' work in the 1973 edition. Stories are likely composed of memes, and it is the operation of the meme by the principles of Darwinian selection that describe, not only the agonistic story structure, but the push and pull of stories by the swarm, copying themselves and propagating through every reachable media. The success and failure of memes corresponds to their ability to stick and be re-told. The Darwinian leap here is that it's not the organism which is the key agent here, but the meme, which is a selfish unit, an immaterial impression analogous to the gene. The meme effectively rides in the organism as in a vessel, and effectively has the goal of hitching a ride to the next organism. (This is a much better analogy, to my thinking, than the image of the marketplace, which anyway should be applied to the economy of attention. It's attention that has value, not stories, per se.)

Critical thinking alone is no complete answer to the problem of invasive and malignant ideas. If that were true, the Enlightenment would have worked. It's not about just coming up with ways to overcome our tendencies. Gottschalk sounds like a Puritan talking to a homosexual when he concludes his book this way, forgetting everything he read in Sapolsky and the other biologists specializing in social and anti-social behavior. The closest he gets to clarity is when he reminds himself that "virtue is a luxury," when he should have taken the next step in reasoning to say, "But it need not be a luxury. The world has overcome slavery, mostly. Economic development has raised many people out of dollar-a-day poverty, with corresponding better health outcomes. So it makes sense that working to make people materially happier could help. A lot." He might remember that many conspiracists are not just ego-tripping, but desperate, socially, economically, and mentally. There are policy solutions in the wings for all of these matters. And the longer we don't take them, the worse off our storyverse is likely to get. It's not as much a mystery as the storyteller wants us to believe.

[metempsicoso · Rating 3 out of 5]

In questa smania che ho di migliorarmi come lettore - che tanto fallisco miseramente, perché la mia capacità di concentrarmi sta regredendo in maniera spaventosa - mi sono appuntato un po' di titoli di narratologia e psicologia della narrazione.
Tra questi, schivati almeno per un po' i manuali di scrittura che mi interessano pochissimo, Il lato oscuro delle storie aveva le premesse più intriganti.
Come hanno influenzato in negativo la Storia dell'umanità le storie che per secoli ci siamo raccontati (tenendo presente che, appunto, la Storia stessa è una cosa che ci siamo inventati per nostra comodità)?
Nella trattazione di Gottschall non mancano riflessioni rivelatrici, né esempi fascinosi.
Purtroppo, ciò in cui è carente è tutto il resto, ovvero lo scheletro di un buon saggio: coesione, coerenza e concisione. Magari anche un pizzico di imparzialità.
L'autore non ha il rigore del saggista affidabile: divaga su e giù per la tematica quasi procedesse senza una scaletta, straborda con gli esempi, si incaponisce su tre o quattro punti che ripete fino alla noia, s'impunta sul ribadire la propria opinione e cede a un'emotività da sceneggiatore di film demenziali. Che gran peccato.
Riscritto l'indice, individuati dei nuclei tematici principali - così com'è io ci ho trovato solo un caos informe che viene assalito più volte da diverse prospettive ricalcando le stesse argomentazioni -, espunte le convinzioni politiche - da me condivise, eh, ma un saggio sul potere manipolatorio delle storie che ci raccontiamo non mi sembra il luogo giusto per inserirle - e strizzato il panno umido dello sbrodolamento, questo potrebbe essere un saggio brillante.
Così com'è, una manciata di spunti sospesi nella gelatina di un brodo annacquato sbattuto in frigorifero, no.
Però carino dai, buono per passare qualche sera. Non sempre a cena si può andare al ristorante, a volte devi ingollare e basta la minestra venuta male.

[Emily McDonald · Rating 2 out of 5]

Gottschall writes like a man who enjoys hearing himself talk. That being said, the topics of this novel are right up my alley. I find a lot of his well researched points to be interesting and thought provoking. However, as he makes his points he is often too grandiose and becomes the very thing he writes to warn us about.

This book instills a sense of fear and discomfort, not through researched rationality, but through his over zealous prose. He makes a lot of claims I would like to question, and I’d always have to stop and ask myself if I doubt what he says because of what he is saying, or is it because of how he is saying it. While I fully buy into narrative psychology’s claim of humans as storytelling animals and “the storyteller rules the world,” I also think there is a significant lack of honest consideration of the rational world paradigm, eduction, and the ways in which humans process and think about the stories we tell and are told.

This book tries to break humans down into their basic instincts and explain how it is clear that these instincts are leading society down a dangerous path without bothering to look at the whole picture. We are more than our base narrative instincts. For a man who claims in his novel that he does not speak on moral philosophy or free will, he sure makes a lot of claims on human morality based solely on the dark side of stories. Definitely a lot to unpack here.

[bye_katchata · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Story Paradox (Jonathan Gottschall) | ★★★

The Story Paradox เป็นหนังสือว่าด้วยเรื่องของเรื่องราวอันเป็นพิษสารพัดรูปแบบในโลกใบนี้ไม่ว่าจะเป็นนวนิยาย ภาพยนตร์ การ์ตูน ข่าวสารหน้าหนังสือพิมพ์ บนโลกอินเทอร์เน็ตไปจนถึงสารพัดเรื่องราวที่มารูปแบบข่าวปลอมและทฤษฎีสมคบคิดทว่าผู้เขียนไม่ได้แจกแจงมันในรูปแบบของคำตอบแต่เป็นการชำแหละสื่อพวกนี้ด้วยทัศนคติของตนเองและสื่อที่ยกตัวอย่างมาก็ดาดดื่นเมื่อเทียบกับความเก๋าของการยกตัวอย่างวรรณกรรมกับสื่ออื่นเราคิดว่าเขายกตัวอย่างสื่อที่จะเทียบเคียงผิดประเภทผิดฝาผิดตัวผิดที่ผิดทางไปหมด
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ก่อนไปพูดคุยสัพเพเหระขอพูดถึงโครงสร้างของหนังสือเล่มนี้ก่อน หนังสือเล่มนี้ถูกแบ่งออกเป็นหกบทใหญ่ โดยสามบทแรกเป็นการพูดถึงเรื่องเล่าอันเป็นพิษและผลกระทบของเรื่องเล่าที่เป็นพิษพวกนั้นว่าส่งผลอย่างไรกับโลกเราซึ่งที่แกใช้เวลาเล่าไปถึง 145 หน้า คือมันเป็นการวนเวียนพูดเรื่องทฤษฎีสมคบคิดบ้างข่าวปลอมบ้างอาการของผู้คนที่หวาดระแวงหลังชมภาพยนตร์ในสามบทแรก ซึ่งเรามองว่ามันยืดเยื้อมากคือรวบรัดตัดตอนคนก็เข้าใจนะว่าเรื่องเล่ามันเป็นพิษยังไง แต่นั่นก็ไม่ว่ากันเราคาดหวังคำตอบในบทถัดไปซึ่งมันน่าจะอยู่ในบทที่สี่และห้าอันเป็นบทที่มีชื่อว่าไวยากรณ์สากลและสิ่งต่างๆ พังทลาย
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แต่พออ่านไปก็ยังมีความน้ำเยอะมีการพูดถึงสื่อภาพยนตร์บ่อยครั้งและทฤษฎีสมคบคิดที่แกก็ไม่ยอมปล่อยวางมันเสียทีการระถักทอเรื่องราวเป็นพิษให้เราฟังจนเราตั้งคำถามต่อว่าแล้วมันยังไงต่อ? คือพี่จะเอายังไงต่อ? พี่จะจัดการมันเลยไหม? และสุดท้ายพี่ก็จัดการมันด้วยการพูดถึงนวนิยายของเจมส์ จอยซ์ เล่มหนาตามด้วยการบอกว่าเรื่องเล่าส่วนใหญ่มักพาตัวละครไปเจอกับโชคร้าย 90% ส่วน 10% สุดท้ายนั้นเป็นเรื่องดีนั่นคือการหลอกลวงรูปแบบหนึ่งซึ่งอันนี้ผมก็ไม่เถียงแต่หนังที่พี่หยิบมาเทียบเคียงกับนิยายเจมส์ จอยซ์แม่งคือ A Quiet Place (2018) 🥲 คือพี่ต้องแยกหนังช่อมะกอก หนังกล่องธรรมดากับหนังที่เป็นหนังจั่วหัวเทศกาลหนังขยะให้ได้ก่อน คือพี่จะเทียบเคียงวรรณกรรมกับภาพยนตร์ผมว่าได้แต่พี่เลือกคู่ต่อสู้ที่แบบโคตรจะไม่สมน้ำสมเนื้อ(รีวิวเวอริตี้ผมแม่งกระจอกไปเลยพอเจอพี่เทียบ Finnegans Wake กับ A Quiet Place)
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ตอนอ่านเล่มนี้ได้ 100 หน้าก็ยังรู้สึกไม่เข้าใจว่าทำไมมันไม่เข้าเรื่องเข้าราวสักที จนเราไปเปิด Goodreads ดูคอมเม้นต์ก็เลยถึงบางอ้อ ถ้าคุณลองดูคอมเม้นต์คุณจะเห็นชัดเจนว่าคำรีวิวหนังสือเล่มนี้ส่วนใหญ่คนที่ให้คะแนนมันหนึ่งถึงสองดาวใช้ถ้อยคำที่ดูรุนแรง ซึ่งเราก็ไม่เข้าใจหรอกในตอนแรกแต่พออ่านมาได้ประมาณ 180+ หน้า เราจึงจับน้ำเสียงของคนเขียนถูกก็ตามที่คอมเม้นต์อื่นเขียนเอาไว้คือเค้าเหมือนงัดทัศนคติของตัวเองเป็นที่ตั้งแล้วก็ใช้ทัศนคติดิสเครดิตสิ่งอื่นที่ดูเหมือนจะไม่ถูกใจเขาแต่มันก็ไม่ได้มีหลักการหรือกลเม็ดอะไรประกอบ จะมีอย่างมากก็แค่สถิติที่ยกออกมาครั้งหรือสองครั้งเนี่ยแหละตลอดทั้งเล่มเลยแตกต่างจากเล่ม The Science of Storytelling (Will Storr) ที่พูดในเรื่องที่มันวิทยศาสตร์มากแถมเค้ายังเจาะจงในเทคนิคของการเล่าเรื่องไม่ใช่การบอกว่าเรื่องเล่าแม่งเป็นพิษแต่บอกว่ากลเม็ดและเทคนิคชั้นเชิงการเขียนหรือเทคนิคการตัดต่อภาพยนตร์มันทำให้เกิด effect บางประการต่อเรื่องเล่า
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(คือจุดนี้เราอยากให้ทุกคนแยกให้ได้ก่อนว่าเรื่องเล่าที่ทรงพลังมันทรงพลังเพราะตัวเรื่องเล่าหรือมั���ทรงพลังเพราะเทคนิคการเล่า(และตัวช่วยเล่า)), เราถูกสอนให้แยก Film From กับ Style เสมอ Film From หรือ Narrative คือองค์ในการเล่าเรื่อง, โครงสร้างของบทเป็นการเล่าเรื่องด้วยเนื้อในคล้ายนิยาย แต่ Film Style คือทุกอย่างที่เกี่ยวกับเทคนิคตั้งแต่การกำกับไปจนถึงการเลือกใช้ภาพและตัดต่อ มันคือส่วนเสริมในการเล่าเรื่องที่ทำให้ภาพยนต์แตกต่างจากวรรณกรรมเพราะมันมีองค์ประกอบภาพ(Mise en Scene แปลง่ายๆ คือทุกสิ่งที่ตาเห็นในภาพยนตร์)
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ภาพยนตร์ก็เล่าเรื่องด้วยภาพมันเป็นเรื่องที่แน่นอนอยู่แล้วแต่การที่ผู้เขียนยกตัวอย่างภาพยนตร์สยองขวัญที่ทำให้เกิดความกลัวและความกังวลใจในการลงไปเล่นน้ำ(Jaws) ลงไปแช่อ่างน้ำหรือนอนหลับ(A Nightmare on Elm Street) มันเลยเป็นเรื่องเทคนิคสำหรับเรา เพราะผลพวงมันจากจาก Editing ทั้งสิ้น มันทรงพลังเพราะเทคนิคไม่ใช่เพียงเรื่องเล่า แน่นอนว่าน่าเสียดายที��คนเขียนเขียนจั่วหัวมาแค่นี้ไม่ได้อธิบายกลเม็ดอะไรเลยมันก็เลยเป็นการจั่วหัวที่หลักลอยไม่มีอะไรรองรับเหมือนนึกจะด่าก็ยกมาด่าแล้วจากไป(ซึ่งคำถามของเราหลังจากนั้นคือแล้วมันยังไงต่อ แล้วพี่จะจะทำยังไงกับมันมันต่อ ซึ่งพี่เค้าก็ไม่ได้ตอบอะไรแค่เปลี่ยนคุยเรื่องอื่นแทน)
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แตกต่างจาก The Science of Storytelling ที่กางโครงสร้างแบบ 5 องค์และทฤษฎีการตัดต่อยุคโบราณของเซอไก ไอเซนสไตล์ให้เราสัมผัสถึงความเป็นวิทยาศาสตร์ความเป็นหลักการสากลจริงๆ เหมือนที่ Olivier Assayas ทิ้งข้อความไว้ในภาพยนตร์ของเขาว่า “Cinema is not magic. it is a technique and a science, a technique born from science and put in service of a will the will of workers to liberate themselves.”
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แต่ก็ต้องให้ความเป็นธรรมในแง่ที่มันทำงานกับเรื่องเล่าที่เป็นตำนานเป็นเรื่องประวัติศาสตร์ที่ถูกบิดเบือนฉบับปากต่อปากหรือเรื่องราวเล็กน้อยที่ผู้คนพากันซุบซิบจนกลายเป็นเรื่องจริงขึ้นมา(มีหลายเรื่องที่เป็นแบบนั้นทั้งในแง่ของเรื่องเล่าตามศาสนา อารยธรรมชนเผ่ายุคราณนิคม หรือแม้กระทั่งเรื่องสั้นจิ๋วของ Hemingway อันนี้เราชอบและไม่เถียงเลย) ส่วนพาร์ททฤษฎีสมภพคิดเนี่ยก็ต้องบอกว่าอ่านได้แต่ผู้เขียนใช้ทัศนคติเชิงลบมากมายมหาศาลชนิดพิเศษใส่ไข่ ถ้าเราได้อ่านหนังสือเมื่อบันไดหัก: มองสังคมเหลื่อมล้ำผ่านแว่นจิตวิทยา(Keith Payne) ผู้เขียนที่เป็นนักเศรษฐศาสตร์จะอธิบายไว้อย่างชัดเจนว่าทำไมทฤษฎีสมคบคิดถึงทำงานโดยเฉพาะกับกลุ่มชนชั้นรากหญ้าซึ่งมันมีเรื่องของความเหลื่อมล้ำเข้ามาไม่ใช่ด้วยอำนาจของเรื่องเล่าหรือเรื่องหลอกลวงเพียงอย่างเดียว
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สุดท้ายแล้วว่ามันเหมาะกับการเป็นหนังสือเริ่มต้นของคนที่สนใจในเรื่องเล่าแต่ถ้าจะให้บอกว่ามันถูกต้องไหมกับทัศนคติแบบนี้เราว่าเราไม่เห็นด้วยเท่าไหร่ถ้ามันถูกแต่จะพูดว่ามันผิดก็คงไม่มีทางเพราะฉะนั้นใครอยากอ่านเราก็เชิญชวนให้อ่านเพราะมันก็มีแง่มุมที่เป็นข้อเท็จจริงอยู่เพียงแต่แค่ทัศนคติและหลักฐานทางวิชาการในสื่ออื่นที่ไม่ใช่วรรณกรรมของผู้เขียนมันน้อยมากจริงๆ / อ้อ เล่มนี้ออกแบบปกสวยมากแบบสวยมากๆเราให้คะแนนคนทำปกและรูปเล่มไปเลยสองดาวส่วนอีกดาวเป็นกำลังใจให้สำนักพิมพ์แปลหนังสือเกี่ยวกับการเล่าเรื่องออกมาอีกเยอะๆ เพราะมันมีน้อยมากในไทย ไม่ว่ามันจะดีหรือไม่ดีก็ตามในทัศนะของคนอ่านแต่เราว่ามันดี ดีมากที่มันจะมีหนังสือแบบนี้ถูกแปลมาเป็นภาษาไทย

[Ryan Mizzen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is such an important and highly recommended book for the times we live in. It’s an accessible, well-researched, easy-to-read exploration of the power, and danger of stories, and one of my standout books of the year. It’s also one of the most important books I’ve read on storytelling.

I enjoyed Gottschall’s previous book, The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human, which is about the power of stories and how we’re wired for story (homo fictus). The Story Paradox follows on from that, asking us to think about the fact that if stories can be used to change the world for the better, could they not also change the world for the worse? “Story science reveals that everything good about storytelling is the same as everything bad. Everything that makes storytelling wholesome is precisely what makes it dangerous.”

It’s because of this that Gottschall says, “The most urgent question we can ask ourselves now isn’t the hackneyed one: “How can we change the world through stories?” It’s “How can we save the world from stories?””

Gottschall approaches the topic unflinchingly, diving into everything from religion, political polarisation, and social media to a certain former American president. Gottschall argues that we tell stories to sway and shape the world more towards the way we want it to be. But due to an information and media overload, the stories we’re consuming are making each of us less tolerant and more set in our own ways. “Story used to drag us all to the middle and make us more alike. Now we’re all in our own little storyverses, and instead of making us more alike, story makes us into more extreme versions of ourselves.”

Our isolated technological bubbles of story are becoming narrower, more-defined and less accepting. This matters, because truth and facts matter. But stories supersede facts. This is why, for example, conspiracy theories hold so much sway over us.

When it comes to pressing issues such as COVID-19 and the climate crisis, this can have detrimental effects. From vaccine hesitancy to climate denialism, stories can be damaging for humanity. Take the climate crisis. Public awareness largely began after Dr James Hansen’s Senate Testimony in 1988. Yet 33 years later, and 26 COP climate summits later, and we still haven’t meaningfully addressed the issue with the urgency it requires. “The problem with messaging climate change isn’t that it makes an inherently bad story so much as an inherently deactivating one… In contrast to the abstractions of science, conspiracy stories about climate change can be highly activating because the good guys and bad guys are sharply drawn, and the problem is so much smaller.”

Working out where to go from here is a challenge, especially for authors. We clearly have a responsibility when telling stories, and not only that, but we’re seemingly up against a tidal wave of disinformation which shows no sign of dissipating. Stories have unified humanity in the past and also torn it apart. Now stories are threatening our ability to address civilisation-threatening issues. Our collective task is to work out how to get out of this mess. Perhaps the first step on that road is reading this highly informative book and then looking at what we’re putting out there and how it might be affecting society.

[Daniele Scaglione · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mai fidarsi di uno che racconta storie

Sentiamo un gruppo di persone promuovere il terrapiattismo e pensiamo "che banda di ignoranti!". Ma è un po' più complicata di così. Questa idea - e cioè che per credere che la Terra sia piatta non è indispensabile essere degli zoticoni - mi girava in testa già da qualche tempo. In particolare, dal prendere atto che persone più colte di me o, almeno, con un curriculum di studi decisamente superiore al mio, negavano recisamente l'esistenza della crisi climatica.

Nel 2012 Jonathan Gottschall pubblicò L'istinto di narrare. Come le storie ci hanno reso umani, un libro per me davvero importante, che mi ha aiutato a capire l'importanza della narrazione in modo concreto e preciso. Il lato oscuro delle storie credo si possa definire una sorta di seconda puntata, però un po' inquietante.

Non c'è partita

Detta in sintesi: se persone più colte di me credono che il cambiamento climatico sia una fandonia, non è perché loro hanno ragione: sia chiaro, sarebbe bello avessero ragione loro, ma non è così. La spiegazione è che le storie che hanno coinvolto queste persone sono state forti, fortissime, invincibili.

Tra una buona storia e una spiegazione razionale non c'è partita, vince la prima. Viviamo Immersi nelle storie, per citare un terzo libro, scritto da Frank Rose.

Storie che possono sostenere valori, unità, anche diritti. Contro lo stigma verso l'AIDS ha fatto più Philadelphia, il film del 1993, o la divulgazione medico scientifica? Contro il razzismo hanno fatto di più Mississipi Burning, Radici o le conferenze? Si potrebbe dire che, contro il razzismo, molto hanno fatto anche le vite di Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Rosa Parks e Nelson Mandela. Ma i racconti delle loro vite, non sono storie anche quelle?

Post verità

Gottschall spiega che la connessione tra la storia e la verità è ben poco influente, sul successo della storia. Le storie possono essere al servizio della battaglia contro le discriminazioni delle donne (che esistono davvero) o promuovere le rivendicazioni dei suprematisti bianchi (rivendicazioni che si basano su menzogne). Poco cambia, per il successo della storia, anzi: a decidere cos'è verita e cosa non lo è, sono le storie stesse.

Il momento è cruciale, perché i social network hanno amplificato la possibilità di costruire storie, il che potrebbe essere un bene ma non lo è perché la fruizione delle storie stesse è diventato qualcosa di individuale. Così, se un tempo le storie avevano la possibilità di costruire un sentire comune, adesso hanno l'effetto di costruire storie che lottano l'una contro l'altra.

Trump è bugiardo incallito pericolo per la democrazia oppure è un eroe che si schiera senza timore a difesa della democrazia stessa? Sono due narrazioni molto ben costruite e sarebbe davvero troppo semplice dire che alla prima credono le persone informate e dotate di buon senso, alla seconda degli sprovveduti disposti a sfasciare tutto. È un po' più complicata di così ma, in ogni caso, Facebook e simili non costruiscono ponti, li distruggono.

Libero arbitrio?

Le conclusioni di Gottschall non le riporto. Non c'è pericolo di fare spoiler, ma il libro propone un percorso che, secondo me, va seguito con ordine. Chiudo con un paio di cose che non mi hanno convinto del tutto.

Gottschall riporta alcuni studi secondo cui ciascuno di noi si comporta come si comporta in conseguenza ai propri geni e al condizionamento culturale. Lo spazio per fare delle scelte consapevoli, in altre parole, sarebbe estremamente ridotto. Il che non è del tutto un male: questa consapevolezza dovrebbe aiutarci a essere maggiormente indulgenti verso chi non la pensa come noi.

Può darsi, però è difficile pensare che chi sceglie di torturare o uccidere deliberatamente dei bambini lo faccia esclusivamente perché costretto dai geni o dal condizionamento culturale. Difficile pensare che non ci sia spazio per la scelta, quando ci si comporta in modo da far soffrire altre persone.

Certo, si potrebbe obiettare che pensiamo al torturare e all'uccidere bambini come cose orribili perché hanno vinto le narrazioni che le ritengono tali, quindi si torna al punto di partenza. Però, boh: mi piace pensare che scegliere di non fare del male sia una scelta possibile e che alle spalle di questa convizione ci sia un percorso storico che non va buttato a mare.

Che ce ne facciamo della cultura?

Gottschall mette in luce un problema del mondo accademico, a cui lui appartiene, e cioè il fatto che sia fortemente sbilanciato a sinistra. Nelle università e negli spazi della ricerca, la grande maggioranza delle persone è progressista. L'autore parla degli USA ma credo sia così anche in Europa.

Secondo lui è un problema: tra le persone non accademiche c'è molto più equilibrio, tra destra e sinistra, e questo fa sì che tra chi si schiera a destra ci sia sempre meno fiducia verso il mondo dell'istruzione superiore.

Mi pare però che Gottschall eviti di chiedersi perché siamo in questa situazione. Perché le persone che lavorano nelle università e nella ricerca sono di solito più progressiste che conservatrici? Non ho la risposta, sia chiaro, ma qualche idea la si potrebbe avere. Banalmente potrebbe essere perché storicamente le forze di sinistra hanno - almeno in Occidente - investito di più in cultura e istruzione superiore di quello che hanno fatto quelle di destra. Non lo so, ripeto, ma il dubbio rimane e Gottschall non lo affronta.

Grammatica universale

Le storie, in ogni tempo e in ogni angolo del mondo, rispondono ad almeno due criteri. Primo, parlano di persone in situazioni difficili che cercano di risolvere i propri problemi. Secondo, hanno una profonda dimensione morale. Ci saranno anche storie che sfuggono a questa grammatica universale e magari incantano pure i critici e i letterati, ma non fanno molta strada. È questo un dato interessante e, mi sembra, anche parecchio inquietante.

[John Kaufmann · Rating 3 out of 5]

A follow-up to his excellent The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human. Gottschall's fundamental premise is that humans tell stories, to themselves and to others, as a way of finding and making meaning out of life's events -- stories are intended to "sway" or influence other's to one's way of thinking, to find common ground as a social species. Stories, he says, are a much more effective means of persuasion than logic and facts -- stories tap into a more natural, subconscious way of thinking that humans have evolved.

By stories, Gottschall doesn't just mean fiction or literature. Stories include narratives we tell ourselves and others about history, politics, relationships, news., etc. They are all more effective if presented using the structure and elements of a good story. Gottschall covers some of these elements, as he did in his first book.

While stories are generally used for good, they can also be used to manipulate people to more nefarious ends -- the dream of totalitarian regimes is to monopolize and control the information (i.e., stories) that are told and spread by the media. That, nominally, is how this book differs from his earlier book -- a matter of emphasis on some of the more negative apsects of stories.

However, Gottschall needed to lay the groundwork first, so the book repeated a lot of what he included in The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human. In addition, I think what triggered this book was the rise of rival stories we are telling ourselves as a society -- how they are used manipulate us and divide us. While this comes up a few times in the book, the author seems to sideskirt this more political discussion and returns to the more general description of the role and mechanics of storytelling.

A good book, and interesting book -- but largely repetitive of his first book, and in my mind he doesn't hit the main point of his book head-on.

[Tom Walsh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gottschall throws down the gauntlet.

This is an important book.

The author touches on a vitally important reality we must face every day in our time: The significance, power, and danger of The Narrative. The Story is the most powerful thread that binds us as a Family, Tribe, Community, Country, and World.

From the earliest moments when Humans came together they created Stories to explain the World in which they found themselves. Whether through tales of hunts, battles, disasters, or celebrations, they found ways of communicating the importance of these events to members of the Group. These stories survive today as Holy Books, Founding Documents, Anthems, Myths, and Legends forming and reinforcing the common bonds we feel between ourselves and our fellow Humans.

Gottschall explores the universality of this Human need for Narrative and the positive impact it has had in building Societies, but he also traces the dangers of stories manipulated over the centuries to create division and chaos. His book is filled with examples of the destruction caused by false stories that create enemies of minorities, neighboring countries or tribes

This is the danger we face today and it is only made worse by evolving technologies that make it harder and harder to distinguish Truth from Lies. Unfortunately, while accurately depicting the possibilities of evil manipulation of events, he fails to offer any realistic tools to help us meet this challenge. Telling the reader to be careful in hearing and believing stories told by others and even ourselves is sound advice, but I don’t think that it is sufficient when faced with a QAnon believing mob.

Still, stressing the importance of the Human history, attraction, and need for Narrative is a worth-while service and The Story Paradox performs it well. Four Stars. ****

[Brooke Lorelei ♡ · Rating 5 out of 5]

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 5
LONG VERSION:
This is a book I’ve stayed up thinking about. It has presented me with concepts I haven’t pondered deeply on, mostly out of my own fear, but also ideas that were new.

A story about stories and all of the impact they have on our minds. How deeply and easily influenced we are by our surroundings, and how much space stories take up in the perceptions we build and the narratives we hold. I haven’t truly considered how prominent stories are within our own lives, but to have the veil lifted that they are so influential to our impressionable selves makes so much sense.

Stories can be marvelous. Marvelous for the better, or for the worse. Ultimately, we need to proceed in caution for how we receive and share stories. We also need to remain aware of the biases we hold and the impact a story may have on who we are.

Ultimately, this book is a must read. To attempt to go into detail and describe its complexities wouldn’t provide Gottschall’s book with justice. Challenge yourself. Take in what this book has to offer… and ironically don’t take it with a grain of salt. After all, it is a story about the potentially intimidating impact stories can have. Decide how this book impacts you.

SHORT VERSION:
read this book 🫶🏻

[Fiona]

If you can make it past the introduction, you're a more dedicated reader than I. Any non-fiction book that begins with author in a bar doubting thier ability to write said book is a red-flag imo. (And seeing the reviews of this book reinforces that I made the right call.)

[Tony61 · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.9/5 stars.

Ok, I had to read the book. Steven Pinker had linked to a review of a review of Jonathan Gottschall’s The Story Paradox. Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny, wrote a scathing review of Gottschall’s book in the NYT and Dennis Junk defended Gottschall. Pathos in the ivory tower! How could I resist the hub-bub?

Jonathan Gottschall is a research fellow in literary studies and his book The Story Paradox delves into the structure and power of story in society. He explains how all cultures have used story to cohere the group and promote good fortune. A good story will change one’s neurochemistry and promote empathy. Storytellers who can do this are held in high regard, whether in African tribes or Hollywood.

Successful stories tend to have a “universal grammar” and a structure that follows a protagonist through various tribulations with resolution at the end. Gottschall admits this is an oversimplification but gives examples in the Bible, literature, ancient history and modern journalism. Honestly, most of this information could be gleaned from any guide to screenwriting and scholars have pursued this pretty well, regardless of what Gottscchall claims as a “new look” at “story.”

Gottschall finds a correlation between the rise of popular fiction available to the masses and the abolition of slavery and increase in human rights. Famously, Dickens’ novels have been credited with influencing British society to enact poor laws and limiting child labor, among other things. Again, nothing new here, but interesting.

Gottschall presents the case that Plato had predicted many of the weird twists the use of story has taken in molding societies into the image desired by the leaders. He uses China as a case that closely fits Plato’s idea of a philosopher-king who creates a narrative by which all citizens must live. Truthfulness of the narrative is of secondary importance.

Story can bring societies together into a healthy group that is able to overcome hardship or invasion because of their shared view of reality. The important converse, however– the Paradox, if you will– is that once tightly-woven communities can be torn apart if their versions of the truth diverge; if they cannot agree on their story. Think of modern America and the factionalism springing from various narratives about truth. China doesn’t have that problem because the narrative on the internet is controlled top-down by their philosopher king Xi. The potential other problem, of course, is when the philosopher-king is just plain wrong: something which Plato never really considers.

Yes, Gottschall goes there. He talks about Trump. Although he never uses his name, Gottschall uses Potus 45 as an example of someone who knows the value of story. He may have been a lousy president but he could spin a good yarn: almost always about himself, his tribulations, his success over adversity, his victimization, his strength of character…. but never his weaknesses. We just don’t appreciate that Donald is a good storyteller– Gottschall goes so far as to say Trump is the BEST storyteller EVER. How else could he have gotten elected POTUS with no qualification whatsoever?

Another important part of the book is the discussion of the internet and how algorithms keep individuals safely in their little tribal cocoon where participants reinforce the same, comfortable narrative amongst themselves. We are isolated from opposing viewpoints and barraged with opinion and story that contains increasing heat but decreasing light on a given issue.

For some reason Snyder went off on Gottschall, and Dennis Junk conjectures that it’s because Gottschall sorta criticized the study of history, Snyder’s area of expertise. Maybe so. Gottschall made the point that Churchill and many others have maintained that history is written by the winners and therefore is always a reflection of how present day individuals are relating past events, which may not be totally accurate. Gottschall made it sound like historians just make sh*t up, but he didn’t really say that. Or maybe Snyder was having a bad day.

The Story Paradox is a quick read (thank g-d for editors), and has some useful information and entertaining stories. While story can have positive effects on an individual's brain chemistry and on society in general, dangers emerge when the narratives diverge. One failing of this book is that Gottschall fails to advise how to forestall this social denouement. He never really gives any advice on how to resolve the paradox, how to save our society from untruthful narratives. Now that would make a good story!

Overall, Gottschall's book contains some useful information and entertaining vignettes. Much of Snyder's peevishness is uncalled for, but Snyder does have a point that the information here is not really new. Snyder seems to agree with Gottschall's appraisal of social media as a source of social division, maybe even elevating this to an existential threat to our society. It's too bad that Gottschall, a bone fide ivory tower thinkologist, doesn't offer any remedy.

[Paolo Piccolo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Una riflessione scomoda su come si articola il modo in cui viviamo e percepiamo il mondo. Da leggere

[Ben · Rating 2 out of 5]

Author unable to extricate himself from America as 'good guy' narrative.

[Bobbzy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A desperate attempt to describe the Trump phenomenon. All the things that scared Gottschall and his social class, is that they lost the dominant narrative!

[Kayle · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book does a really good job explaining the negative potency of stories and a really bad job providing viable suggestions on how to address that power and the divisions in the U.S. The closest Gottschall gets is imploring more empathy by not treating storytellers with different views as villains. This ignores that for many marginalized people opponent storytellers are advocating for stories that want to erase their existence, if not their ability to live their lives fully and as safely as possible. Miss me with that.

[Hans Sandberg · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excellent follow-up to his previous book on the subject, The Storytelling Animal. It can be read as a manual for capturing the attention of an audience, whether for good or bad. I have a few quibbles on some issues, but overall, it's a very good book that also gives us a thorough understanding of why Trump was so effective in attention grabbing and poisoning the minds of a large chunk of the American public.

[Yupa · Rating 2 out of 5]

Libro che ha molto da farsi perdonare, che a un certo punto sembra riuscire a farselo perdonare, ma poi svacca clamorosamente nelle conclusioni.
Sicuramente ha da farsi perdonare una certa tendenza retorica: l'autore scrive bene ma spesso tende a lasciarsi prendere la mano e infiorettare la sostanza con la forma, cosa discutibile in un saggio, per quanto divulgativo; poi ci sono le costanti ripetizioni, il ribattere a lungo e in varie salse sul nodo centrale del libro ma senza approfondire troppo, libro che così sembra persino troppo lungo per le sue trecento pagine scarse molte delle quali occupate da note e bibliografia; infine c'è la scarsa sistematicità, quasi un certo disordine, per cui più che portare avanti un ragionamento l'autore sembra allinea le idee così come gli vengono in mente e su cui torna e ritorna.
Questo per quanto riguarda la forma.
Poi ci sono i contenuti. E qui l'autore sa portare alla luce ed evidenziare qualcosa che ancora fanno in troppo pochi e di cui c'è sempre bisogno, specie in questi tempi. Il problema al cuore del libro l'auotre lo riconduce in toto alla tendenza radicata nell'uomo a produrre e consumare storie; questo può essere discutibile (e lo porta anche, come vedremo, a conclusioni etiche ancor più discutibili), visto che più che una questione di narrativa quello dell'autore è, forse inconsapevolmente, un semplice discorso su determinate tendenze della psicologia umana (di cui la tendenza a raccontare è un sintomo e non una causa) e su cosa queste tendenze innescano quando gli umani si riuniscono in gruppi.
Detto semplicemente, l'autore sa cogliere e illustrare il problema profondo dell'adesione dell'individuo a un gruppo, ovvero l'ambiguità dell'empatia, virtù celebrata ma scivolosa per la tendenza ad applicarla soprattutto alla propria fazione e scarsamente a quelle avversarie.
La questione esige una certa attenzione per essere colta in tutte le sue implicazioni, perché radicata in maniera invisibile nella psicologia dei gruppi. Il punto è che l'umanità non si divide, come vorrebbe una psicologia ingenua (quello entro cui quasi tutti gli esseri umani agiscono), tra, da una parte, esseri umani buoni, empatici, solidali, corretti e, dall'altra, esseri umani cattivi, insensibili, individualisti e sleali, coi primi che devono assumersi il compito di impedire ai secondi (magari con ogni mezzo) di rovinare tutto; più sofisticamente, tutti i gruppi umani (che possono essere gruppi etnici, ma anche fazioni politiche o insieme creati in base ad altre divisioni tipo genere o orientamento sessuale, età, religione, ecc.) percepiscono il proprio gruppo come virtuoso e corretto e quindi degno di empatia e solidarietà e il gruppo avversario come corrotto e sleale, se non dannoso e pericoloso, contro cui quindi si legittimano politiche di controllo, esclusione e, nei casi estremi, di cui la Storia è tuttavia piena, eliminazione.
In sostanza nella stragrande maggioranza dei casi i "cattivi" della Storia non sono dei mostri privi di empatia verso l'umanità tutta desiderosi di compiere il Male, bensì dei comuni esseri umani benintenzionati che attivano la propria empatia in maniera selettiva e parrocchiale e che giustificano questa selettività perché si sentono minacciati proprio dai "mostri" appena nominati, quasi sempre immaginarî (visto che anche i gruppi avversarî agiscono in base agli stessi meccanismi). Quindi di rado ci sono buoni contro cattivi, ma solo gruppi diversi che si accusano a vicenda di essere i "veri cattivi".
Che questo meccanismo sia pervasivo nella mente e nella società umane e davvero difficile da evitare lo dimostra persino l'autore stesso in un lungo capitolo in cui randella simpaticamente Trump in quanto principale responsabile della caduta a spirale della democrazia USA. Lo randella, ma poi si corregge: era una delle prime parti che ha scritto del libro e solo in seguito s'è reso conto che, erigendo Trump a figura quasi caricaturale di cattivo, ha operato lungo lo stesso meccanismo di polarizzazione "noi buoni vs. loro cattivi" che il libro stesso avrebbe voluto smontare e criticare. Di seguito, inoltre, l'autore dedica numerosi paragrafi a quanto avviene dall'altra parte della barricata politica, ovvero alla progressiva radicalizzazione della sinistra nelle università USA, anch'essa sempre più prigioniera di logiche tribali, identitarie e fanatiche, anch'essa in fondo complice (per quanto involontaria) dell'ascesa di una figura come Trump, con tutto quel che ne è seguito (e che purtroppo non è ancora finito).
Ma dopotutto questo discorso, lucido e ficcante, c'è davvero da rimanere stupiti quando l'autore arriva alle conclusioni in cui va a proporre dei rimedî per la tendenza distruttiva a pensare in termini tribali e polarizzati. Il primo rimedio, quello di star maggiormente attenti a non pensare in maniera semplicistica e manichea, lascia il tempo che trova; più che un rimedio è un consiglio di buon senso, ma se bastassero i buoni consigli la Storia non sarebbe il bagno di sangue che è. Poi c'è la richiesta di un maggior controllo statale (quindi coercitivo) su quello che si può scrivere sui social media, cui l'autore fa risalire in toto il problema dell'attuale polarizzazione; cosa discutibile, visto che c'è un ancora un gran dibattito in merito, con studî dai risultati contrastanti, se siano davvero Facebook o Twitter o Instagram da averci "resi cattivi" e considerando anche quanto sia facile ottenere consensi attaccando ogni novità tecnologica (succede almeno dall'invenzione della scrittura) incolpandola di veri o presunti fenomeni di degrado. Ma soprattutto, in alcuni agghiaccianti paragrafi finali l'autore si lancia in un elogio del sistema cinese(!) che, a suo dire, grazie al controllo tecnologico starebbe riuscendo a mantenere unita la propria società mentre i paesi occidentali, per la loro eccessiva libertà, vanno sprofondando in una conflittualità pericolosa e senza rimedio. Be', non so se quella dell'autore sia una provocazione, ma se posso dire la mia preferisco di gran lunga vivere in una democrazia anche estremamente litigiosa e fragile piuttosto che sotto un Grande Fratello dagli occhi a mandorla che mantiene una società unita solo grazie a uno spionaggio onnipervasivo sui suoi cittadini, in cui anche solo una parola sbagliata può significare la fine della propria vita sociale (o della propria vita tout court).
Ma forse non c'è da stupirsi troppo delle conclusioni dell'autore, perché è uno sbocco tipico per chi sostiene che siano parole e idee il motore primo di eventi storici e sociali, e allora se si ritiene che parole e idee siano così efficaci, o addirittura che siano il solo motore efficace da cui tutto discende, il naturale passo successivo è individuare quelle che si ritiene siano dannose e pericolose, e ancora di seguito scatta la tentazione di volere che queste ultime siano controllate, represse, eliminate, cancellate. E allora si capisce come mai un regime come quello cinese, basato sostanzialmente su repressione e censura capillari, possa essere visto come una soluzione o anche solo d'ispirazione.