I’m still early in thinking about culture, and only recently thought to ask about the relative importance of different cultural forces, and how that might have changed over time.
I think this confuses categories. Status/honor changes depending on what one finds sacred. The idea that people in the past did not seek status/honor seems insane; one of the main plot points in the Iliad (Achilles' refusal to continue fighting) resolved around status/honor. Money, in turn, often confers prestige/status/honor.
I understand that these categories are separate, but often everything simply flows together. What is honorable also often pays well; norms and custom dictate what is honorable.
Further, in the economist's narrow sense, “incentives” usually means monetary incentives: wages, bonuses, promotions, fines, formal rewards, penalties, etc.
But in a broader sense, status is an incentive, sacred reward/punishment (heaven/hell, honor/shame) is an incentive, norm enforcement (gossip, ostracism, praise) is an incentive. If we talk in that broad sense, incentives have always been enormous, because that is how life works.
Maybe the structure of motivation--people wanting survival, status/honor, money, approval, etc.--is pretty stable. What earns those things, and what language we use to describe them, changes.
Why would an LLM or an X poll be able to tell you anything about these top-level categories, particularly for 1700? I'm struggling to get the methodology here.
I had no alternative vision, I just doubt those are any use given the time frame and the the nebulous nature of the terms. For instance, do X poll respondents agree on what the terms mean? Maybe a little, likely not entirely.
I guess I would suggest sources that are not easily available. A panel of historians to define the terms and give ratings for instance.
"As we economists focus overwhelming on incentives, it is striking to me to see them rated here as greatly outclassed by other cultural forces." Hanson -- incentives are not greatly outclassed by other cultural forces (except for LLMs in 1700). According to polls, Incentives are the third strongest force. According to LLMs, incentives are the strongest force in 2025.
I don’t see how incentives in general can be placed in contrast with specific incentives. I can see a hypothesis that the others aren’t incentives at all but if so we need to spell out how what they are differs. Proliferating terms which can’t be contrasted is ideology, not epistemology, but one can turn epistemology on ideology and see what happens.
Perhaps I am just speaking my bias, but I find the worst take of all the LLMs ranking incentives last in 1700.
Of course, it could partly be a definitional thing, as most - though probably not all - of the other forces you list in fact have a strong incentive component to them.
Post-industrial economy showed a decline in agricultural work. So when the charismatic movement depends on routinization, as per Max Weber, a stark contrast proceeds as capitalism does little to resolve extremes in the distribution of income compared to socialism. It isn't human nature to numerically rationalize valued social relationships, yet Kelley's attribution theory key terms are augmentation of the part of the self-identified narrative validating sense of self and discounting the part that suggests you don't make sense. 1950s sociology studies showed increased racist violence when prices of corn and cotton were depressed, and socioeconomic fear increased. So then, is it in the social behavior model functions as a fear response, that as people want to decrease anxiety watching the numerically rationalized economic news items suggesting to them a sense of loss of control in their social economics seeing Elon get a 1 trillion dollar pay contract following his devotion in the 2024 elections, and they don't like to feel that they're not making sense which means aversion to terms in their narrative speaking that would allude to "the sacred" or something intangible yet powerfully defining to their lives? It is not authentically a loss of "the sacred" internally, but it will show up in a survey or on a word usage evaluation of behaviors as avoidance of anything that is "crazy" sounding, undercutting their modern sense of self as knowledgeable about all the news on numerically rationalized facts of what is happening and why they voted as they did. If this is the cause of the word behavior pattern detected, then the raw data does not forecast future behavior choices as if they really changed in the way they think about terms like "the sacred" but it does mean they feel aversion to using those terms before the social presence around them given this current social behavior model norm presenting in so many ways in this society at this time. The raw data in terms of predicting the social choices of their social behavior model is not predictive. They retain the capacity to see what they may understand in meanings as sacred, even while the incentive to show this awareness isn't present in their current social and economic environment under this leadership now. That is a workable hypothesis in social behavior presently.
Regarding the rise of status as a cultural force, Alain de Botton discusses this in Status Anxiety. In the old world status was largely based on immutable hierarchies (race, title, economic class, gender, landowning status, family, etc.). In the modern world that's nearly all out the window which pits everyone against everyone – relatively little in the way of status can be taken as given now. One consequence (so the story goes) is that people have become more conscious of status, and indeed anxious about it.
People being people, I wonder if all of the other forces on your list are essentially proxies for social status. At one time a lot of status was attached to one's being perceived as religiously devout, for example.
Turns out we're just a bunch of hairless apes wrangling for the best mates in more and more complicated ways.
I wonder what the status landscape was like in early human bands.
Geoffrey Miller in The Mating Mind makes the case that many of our mental capabilities like art and music and "abstract thought" must have evolved because of sexual choice – that they don't confer enough direct survival benefit to have evolved that way.
If that's the case then a lot of what makes us human is tantamount to the elaborate tail of a peacock. Perhaps for men a good singing voice and sense of humor were sources of status (= mate choice) just as much as physical strength and leadership.
I am a big fan of the author of the Mating Mind; Miller also wrote the amazing book 'Spent' about consumerism. But, regarding this claim of Miller's:
art and music and "abstract thought" must have evolved because of sexual choice – that they don't confer enough direct survival benefit to have evolved that way.
There is the idea that "abstract thought" evolved to serve cooperation and alliances, including deciding when to cooperate vs. when to be Machiavellian. Machiavellianism was even one of the original ideas for what drove frontal lobe evolution, back after 'man the tool maker' was set aside; called 'Machiavellian intelligence'; by, I think, Whiten and others.
More recently, Joseph Henrich, in 'Secret of our Success' promoted the need to cooperate as the main driver of analytical intelligence. I do agree these abilities were also then available for mate selection; music and art may have been more about sexual selection, although also serving status enhancement in general; you attract a crowd of admirers and that then has reproductive payoff because people like accomplished mates. But having the abstract thought to bring in a whole reef of fish...
Status was important once people owned land and property. But is the point that in 1700 people couldn't do much to **seek status**; they had to accept and cope with those immutable hierarchies.
Yes, exactly. An Earl in Britain knew his status precisely relative to other nobles, and any competition for status was only within a small set of near-equals. For the vast majority of social interactions the status hierarchy was immutable and unquestioned by all.
Within these systems the peasants don't necessarily think of themselves as downtrodden, because they compare themselves to the other peasants. Ironically it was the lack of social mobility that allowed people to be less anxious about social status.
I think this confuses categories. Status/honor changes depending on what one finds sacred. The idea that people in the past did not seek status/honor seems insane; one of the main plot points in the Iliad (Achilles' refusal to continue fighting) resolved around status/honor. Money, in turn, often confers prestige/status/honor.
I understand that these categories are separate, but often everything simply flows together. What is honorable also often pays well; norms and custom dictate what is honorable.
Further, in the economist's narrow sense, “incentives” usually means monetary incentives: wages, bonuses, promotions, fines, formal rewards, penalties, etc.
But in a broader sense, status is an incentive, sacred reward/punishment (heaven/hell, honor/shame) is an incentive, norm enforcement (gossip, ostracism, praise) is an incentive. If we talk in that broad sense, incentives have always been enormous, because that is how life works.
Maybe the structure of motivation--people wanting survival, status/honor, money, approval, etc.--is pretty stable. What earns those things, and what language we use to describe them, changes.
Yep. They are heavily overlapping categories. Totally confusing actually.
Why do you agree with the polls over LLMs on incentives?
Polls are not a good way of measuring this. Those results seem insane to me.
Polls claim custom is 1.2/100? Yet everyone wears the same culturally expected clothing. Try getting on a bus naked or wearing a clown suit.
You are an economist. You know that what people say and they way they act are almost uncorrelated.
Why would an LLM or an X poll be able to tell you anything about these top-level categories, particularly for 1700? I'm struggling to get the methodology here.
They are easily available sources. What else do you suggest?
I had no alternative vision, I just doubt those are any use given the time frame and the the nebulous nature of the terms. For instance, do X poll respondents agree on what the terms mean? Maybe a little, likely not entirely.
I guess I would suggest sources that are not easily available. A panel of historians to define the terms and give ratings for instance.
"As we economists focus overwhelming on incentives, it is striking to me to see them rated here as greatly outclassed by other cultural forces." Hanson -- incentives are not greatly outclassed by other cultural forces (except for LLMs in 1700). According to polls, Incentives are the third strongest force. According to LLMs, incentives are the strongest force in 2025.
I don’t see how incentives in general can be placed in contrast with specific incentives. I can see a hypothesis that the others aren’t incentives at all but if so we need to spell out how what they are differs. Proliferating terms which can’t be contrasted is ideology, not epistemology, but one can turn epistemology on ideology and see what happens.
Perhaps I am just speaking my bias, but I find the worst take of all the LLMs ranking incentives last in 1700.
Of course, it could partly be a definitional thing, as most - though probably not all - of the other forces you list in fact have a strong incentive component to them.
Post-industrial economy showed a decline in agricultural work. So when the charismatic movement depends on routinization, as per Max Weber, a stark contrast proceeds as capitalism does little to resolve extremes in the distribution of income compared to socialism. It isn't human nature to numerically rationalize valued social relationships, yet Kelley's attribution theory key terms are augmentation of the part of the self-identified narrative validating sense of self and discounting the part that suggests you don't make sense. 1950s sociology studies showed increased racist violence when prices of corn and cotton were depressed, and socioeconomic fear increased. So then, is it in the social behavior model functions as a fear response, that as people want to decrease anxiety watching the numerically rationalized economic news items suggesting to them a sense of loss of control in their social economics seeing Elon get a 1 trillion dollar pay contract following his devotion in the 2024 elections, and they don't like to feel that they're not making sense which means aversion to terms in their narrative speaking that would allude to "the sacred" or something intangible yet powerfully defining to their lives? It is not authentically a loss of "the sacred" internally, but it will show up in a survey or on a word usage evaluation of behaviors as avoidance of anything that is "crazy" sounding, undercutting their modern sense of self as knowledgeable about all the news on numerically rationalized facts of what is happening and why they voted as they did. If this is the cause of the word behavior pattern detected, then the raw data does not forecast future behavior choices as if they really changed in the way they think about terms like "the sacred" but it does mean they feel aversion to using those terms before the social presence around them given this current social behavior model norm presenting in so many ways in this society at this time. The raw data in terms of predicting the social choices of their social behavior model is not predictive. They retain the capacity to see what they may understand in meanings as sacred, even while the incentive to show this awareness isn't present in their current social and economic environment under this leadership now. That is a workable hypothesis in social behavior presently.
Regarding the rise of status as a cultural force, Alain de Botton discusses this in Status Anxiety. In the old world status was largely based on immutable hierarchies (race, title, economic class, gender, landowning status, family, etc.). In the modern world that's nearly all out the window which pits everyone against everyone – relatively little in the way of status can be taken as given now. One consequence (so the story goes) is that people have become more conscious of status, and indeed anxious about it.
People being people, I wonder if all of the other forces on your list are essentially proxies for social status. At one time a lot of status was attached to one's being perceived as religiously devout, for example.
Turns out we're just a bunch of hairless apes wrangling for the best mates in more and more complicated ways.
But the earliest hairless apes (early Homo sapiens) lived with relatively minor status differences. The excess young male problem didn't exist.
I wonder what the status landscape was like in early human bands.
Geoffrey Miller in The Mating Mind makes the case that many of our mental capabilities like art and music and "abstract thought" must have evolved because of sexual choice – that they don't confer enough direct survival benefit to have evolved that way.
If that's the case then a lot of what makes us human is tantamount to the elaborate tail of a peacock. Perhaps for men a good singing voice and sense of humor were sources of status (= mate choice) just as much as physical strength and leadership.
I am a big fan of the author of the Mating Mind; Miller also wrote the amazing book 'Spent' about consumerism. But, regarding this claim of Miller's:
art and music and "abstract thought" must have evolved because of sexual choice – that they don't confer enough direct survival benefit to have evolved that way.
There is the idea that "abstract thought" evolved to serve cooperation and alliances, including deciding when to cooperate vs. when to be Machiavellian. Machiavellianism was even one of the original ideas for what drove frontal lobe evolution, back after 'man the tool maker' was set aside; called 'Machiavellian intelligence'; by, I think, Whiten and others.
More recently, Joseph Henrich, in 'Secret of our Success' promoted the need to cooperate as the main driver of analytical intelligence. I do agree these abilities were also then available for mate selection; music and art may have been more about sexual selection, although also serving status enhancement in general; you attract a crowd of admirers and that then has reproductive payoff because people like accomplished mates. But having the abstract thought to bring in a whole reef of fish...
Status was important once people owned land and property. But is the point that in 1700 people couldn't do much to **seek status**; they had to accept and cope with those immutable hierarchies.
Yes, exactly. An Earl in Britain knew his status precisely relative to other nobles, and any competition for status was only within a small set of near-equals. For the vast majority of social interactions the status hierarchy was immutable and unquestioned by all.
Within these systems the peasants don't necessarily think of themselves as downtrodden, because they compare themselves to the other peasants. Ironically it was the lack of social mobility that allowed people to be less anxious about social status.