Rising up and Sinking down in psychosocial systems

Transcending One-eyed Global Modelling Perspectives (Part #6)

The key to any attribution of psychosocial currents to the psychosocial globe so depicted would be suggestive insight into functions appropriately analogous to "heat" and "salinity" in thermohaline circulation. Other clues to any mapping are given by the sense in which the surface-currents tend to be driven by the wind -- usefully associated mnemonically with movements of opinion, as in any "wind of change".

By contrast, with respect to the deeper currents, the predominant driving force is differences in density, caused by salinity and temperature (the more saline the denser, and the colder the denser). Mnemonically again, although "salacious" does not share a common etymology, its connotation of "lustful" (perhaps in some senses of "salty") is consistent with many theological perspectives regarding the "baser" human values. Denser could also be associated with a sense of "weightiness" or "gravitas" -- in contrast with the "light weight" readily associated with any kind of superficiality.

In other words the question is what causes a current to:

"rise up": Rising up is a common metaphor for responding to the attraction of light -- rising "into the light" -- perhaps to be understood as a response to the more enlightened values of global society. It is by such light that people are variously warmed -- as in warm relationships.
"sink down": Sinking down is a metaphor commonly understood with reference to any association with "baser" or "lower" values. There is then a sinking "into darkness" associated with a characteristic "heaviness". It could be understood as "endarkenment".

The surface-currents and under-currents can maintain their identity even though they coexist -- positioning themselves one above or below the other according to their density (as determined by temperature and salinity). This corresponds to the common experience of many of being able to function in one overt mode whilst at the same time pursuing a possibly contrary covert agenda -- as the cables of WikiLeaks have so neatly confirmed with respect to the foreign policy of one country. However the experience is most readily recognized by individuals -- perhaps obliged by circumstances to do one thing and pretend another.

Of particular interest in the psychosocial sense are any particular circumstances of upwelling or sinking. An example is perhaps offered by surprise, whether with respect to larger strategic matters (as is typical of military or business engagements) or to personal dealings. In the latter case the experience of a confidence trick is insightful. Having proceeded, perhaps gullibly, on the basis of one easy assumption -- facilitated by the agreeability of the encounter -- one is suddenly confronted by the recognition of the baseness of the other and the manner in which one has been "conned", perhaps disastrously. There is then recognition of the other's ability to function at both levels and being dragged down by that encounter. Whether the surprise is agreeable or disagreeable, its impact may well be transformative (Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Black Swan: the impact of the highly improbable, 2007; Karen A.Cerulo, Never Saw It Coming: cultural challenges to envisioning the worst, 2006). The impact of the embassy cables could be considered in that light -- both for those ensconced in the legitimacy of their secretive reality and those surprised by unsuspected truths.

The transition between levels might also be usefully recognized in processes through which people "rise to prominence" (as with celebrity media exposure) or experience a dramatic "downfall" -- perhaps resulting in incarceration or some other form of institutionalization isolated from the warmth of friends and family.

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Rising up and Sinking down in psychosocial systems