Fact Checking Scott Alexander’s Review of Julian Jaynes’s Theory on “Slate Star Codex” – Part 1

[Moderator]

By Brian J. McVeigh

Scott Alexander begins his review of Jaynes’s The Origin of Consciousness with an odd opening. He describes it as “brilliant” and writes that it only has “two minor flaws”: It purports to explain the origin of consciousness and it “posits a breakdown of the bicameral mind.” Given that these two issues are the work’s major arguments, I’m not sure why Alexander characterizes them as “minor.”

In any case, after critiquing Jaynes’s theories, Alexander contends that Jaynes should have written a different book in which “consciousness” would be replaced by “theory of mind.” In other words, for Alexander the ancients were conscious, but like children, they simply lacked a theory of mind. However, it stretches credulity to believe that for centuries, in every place in which we have records, people could not figure out how to express themselves. Surely a better explanation is called for, and I think Jaynes provides it. In what follows I deal with other problems and misinterpretations in Alexander’s evaluation of The Origin of Consciousness.

Like other critics, Alexander’s reading of The Origin of Consciousness is truncated, i.e., he ignores Jaynes’s comprehensive account of mentality that theoretically threads together numerous psychological anomalous behaviors — hypnosis, spirit possession, hallucinations, glossolalia, imaginary playmates, and felt presence (the striking lack of psychological vocabularies in ancient texts before the first millennium BCE is but one item on the Jaynesian agenda). It’s as if only certain chapters of Jaynes’s book were read so that the work’s actual import is missed.

Also, like other critics, Alexander neglects to incorporate in his appraisal research bolstering a Jaynesian psychology. Such scholarship is accessible in about a dozen books as well as numerous articles (refer to the Julian Jaynes Society website)...

Read the full post on the JJS blog:
https://www.julianjaynes.org/blog/fact- ... der-part1/