Hypocognition

This is the sixth post in the series “Linguistics and Cognitive Science in the Pursuit of Civil Discourse.” Lakoff writes,”When you think you just lack words, what you really lack are ideas. Ideas come in the form of frames. When the frames are there, the words come readily. There’s a way you can tell that you lack the right frames. There’s a phenomenon you have probably noticed. A conservative on TV uses two words, like “tax relief.” And the progressive has to go into a paragraph-long discussion of his own view. The conservative can appeal to an established frame, that taxation is a burden, which allows for the two-word phrase “tax relief.” But there is no established frame on the other side. You can talk about it, but it takes some doing because there is no established frame, no fixed idea already out there.”

The name for this in cognitive science is hypocognition—the lack of ideas you need. The lack of a relatively simple fixed frame that can be evoked by a word or two. The idea of hypocognition came from the late anthropologist Bob Levy who was doing a study in Tahiti. He was also a therapist who addressed the question of why there were so many suicides in Tahiti. He discovered that Tahitians did not have a concept of grief. They felt grief. They experienced it, but they did not have a concept for it or a name for it. They did not see it as a normal emotion. There were no rituals around it, no grief counseling, nothing like it. Since they lacked a concept they needed, they wound up committing suicide all too often.

Lakoff writes that progressives are suffering from massive hypocognition. Conservatives had very few of the concepts that they have today when Goldwater lost in 1964.. In the intervening fifty years conservative have filled in their conceptual gaps, but the conceptual gaps of progressives are still there. Tax relief was provided as an example in the second post in this series.

Lakoff provides the following suggestions for progressives:

First, note what conservatives have done right and where progressives have missed the boat.

Second, remember “Don’t think like an elephant.” If this suggestion does not make sense to you, go back and read or reread the first post in this series.

Third, the truth alone will not set you free.

Fourth, you need to speak from your moral perspective at all times.

Fifth, understand where conservatives are coming from.

Sixth, think strategically, across issue areas.

Seventh, think about the consequences of proposals.
Eighth, remember that voters vote their identity and their values, which need not coincide with their self-interest.

Ninth, unite! And cooperate.

Tenth, be proactive, not reactive.

Eleventh, speak to the progressive base in or to activate the nurturant model of biconceptual voters.

Tags: biconceptual, Bob Levy, Don't ThinkLike an Elephant, Lakoff, Tahiti