[tpallarino]

Wow. So if I'm understanding the article correctly, it says that tribalism occurs both naturally and in simulations. However, even though this is the case, we should despise tribalism for some reason that is frankly not exactly clear.

does the depth of cultural self-loathing know no bound?

[jameslk]

Sex is a natural desire, but it's probably a good thing we have laws against those who force their way onto others whenever they're horny. Just because it's natural doesn't necessarily mean it's best.

[micheljones]

You are positing a false dichotomy here. Equivalent conclusion would be that 'sex is a natural malfunction and needs to be removed'.

[crispinb]

> does the depth of cultural self-loathing know no bound

I'm puzzled by this (possibly rhetorical?) question. Which culture is supposed to be loathing itself here?

[raverbashing]

Something that would be called "western/christian/european" civilization

[gt_]

>So if I'm understanding the article correctly, it says that tribalism occurs both naturally and in simulations.

My take was that the article does not quite make these claims, but uses the simulations to model implications of them.

>we should despise tribalism for some reason that is frankly not exactly clear

We should move beyond tribalism because of it's inherence of prejudice.

[PeterisP]

It does seem that the article makes these claims - it describes a particular experiment where they unexpectedly discovered that tribalism emerged as the dominant (most successful) strategy in a competitive game they simulated.

[duckingtest]

What these simulations show is that tribalism is a winning strategy. Which means not following it leads to death.

>We should move beyond tribalism because of it's inherence of prejudice.

Considering an inherent property of a winning strategy evil means your code is non-optimal and is inevitably going to disappear.

[benfle]

Other things that occur both naturally and in simulations: revenge, jealousy, violence, territoriality, oligarchy, thumb sucking...

[jamesrcole]

Tribalism tends to mean an "us vs them" attitude with emotive, knee-jerk dislike and demonising of "them", plus a disdain for constructive criticism of "us". I think history provides plenty of evidence of this and of how toxic it is.

[golemotron]

The irony is that the people who complain loudest about tribalism (nationalism, xenophobia) in contemporary political culture display exactly those attitudes toward people they disagree with.

Anyone who thinks tribalism can be eliminated lacks self awareness or a least a mirror.