Shufflebrain

Yet Arrowhead was a one-eyed, puny little guy who would have had a tough time in a fight with most females, let alone any of the other alphas. Eaton even found lower blood levels of male sex hormone in Arrowhead than among some of his subordinates. Nor was he aggressive; didn't strut around displaying his penis; didn't beat up on other monkeys to show everybody else who was in charge. The troop didn't respect Arrowhead's primacy because of a machismo he really didn't have but because of a highly complex interplay of social behaviors and group learning! And the circumstantial evidence suggested that his position in the troop was an outcome of the females' dominance order. The play of baby monkeys often turns into furious if diminutive combat. Now mother monkey is highly protective. Howls for help from two small disputants usually bring two angry females head-to-head. Of course, the weaker mother usually takes her little brat by the arm and scrams, leaving the field to the stronger female and her infant. Monkeys with weak mothers grow up learning to run away. Of course, the male monkey with the dominant mother grows up expecting others to yield to his wishes, which they tend to do.

Maternalism doesn't end as the male monkey matures. Eaton described Red Witch, who help establish her grown son as the second-ranking member of the troop. The son had challenged the second-ranking male who was the tougher the two. But when her son cried out for help, Red Witch came running. She jumped into the fight and together they established sonny as number two monkey.

Curiously, Red Witch didn't make her son the Boss. Scrawny Arrowhead was no match for her. The study didn't really answer the question. But the prospects challenging Arrowhead seemed like one of those critical taboos that, violated in a human society, often leads to downfall of the community.

Look at it like this. The job of the Boss is to lead the troop from imminent danger. He must know the direction from which a hungry leopard may suddenly appear and the quickest possible escape route. Should a threat come, the Boss must direct an orderly and efficient retreat: mothers and infants first, he and his hefty lieutenants last, to put up a fight and, if necessary, die to save the troop (and their gene pool). Somewhere in the intricate behavior of the group, even Red Witch leaned not to mess with the Boss of her troop.

***

Jane Goodfield is an historian who has raised insightful questions about science and scientific ideas. "Why, with very few exceptions," she once wrote, "have these themes or these people never stimulated great works of literature or art?"[34] She went on to observe, "somehow sciences manages to extract the warmth and beauty from the world."[35]

June Goodfield's words make me feel guilty, and I wish I could deny her contention. But I can't. And I used to wonder if hologramic theory would so perfect our understanding of mind-brain as to let no place in the human psyche for art. Has science finally claimed the last major mystery in Nature? Is mind now fated to become perfected and boring -- and dehumanized?

I'm not really sure. But I began to phrase the question in terms of what hologramic theory suggests about intelligence. The result was the final two chapters of this book.

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chapter eleven

Intelligent Holograms

"CIVILIZATION, LIKE LIFE," wrote Durant, "is perpetual struggle with death."[1] The powerful urge to survive against the worst possible odds is one of the birthmark of intelligence, even intelligence in its most primitive form. A block of granite is far better able to survive than the mightiest among us. Yet when the shadow of a sledge hammer cuts across its surface, the stone is utterly helpless in the face of the impending blow. The granite block plays no active role in its own destiny. But even a micro-intelligence can perceive danger while the peril is still abstract. Even a lowly mind cares about its fate and can amalgamate its past memories with its present percepts before the ideal future becomes the present reality.

What do we actually mean by intelligence? I think we could defend the notion that civilization is one manifestation of it. We might point to poetry and pinochle as other examples. But a crisp definition requires something more than simply pointing toward examples.