Shame

Another thing we talked about at LessWrong on Tuesday (this is many Tuesday's ago, as I've been extremely busy and haven't been able to put time in here) was the difference between shamae and guilt.  As I recall we couldn't quite reach consensus - at least one person thought there was no real distinction, some thought shame and guilt were feelings for processing the transgression group norms vs. self-norms.

Youtube blogger Typhon Blue has an interesting treatment of shame as part of her "Threat Narratives" series.  I'll paraphrase her:  Shame is a way of dealing with group norms.  When an individual is in some way violating these norms, the group will say something like:  "We value you intrinsically, but this behaviour is toxic and unacceptable.  Please go off and deal with your shit, and come back when you feel you can start to work for the good of the group again."

At the meeting, some of us agreed that shame or guilt was characterized by a slightly uncomfortable feeling in your stomach or gut.  And you can see above the metaphors for toxicity, vomiting and evacuation - a person is expelled (vomited) from the group, so they can work out whatever is causing their bad behaviour - which will also involve some kind of expulsion in the psychological sense.

As moral psychologists (that is, psychologists who study morality, not psychologists who are moral) like Jonathan Haidt have pointed out, this metaphor of toxicity and expulsion is suspiciously prevalent when we discuss issues of group norms - for example, objects can become "contaminated" by the moral actions of people who owned or handled them - this is, I suspect, is why so many people who aren't Neo-Nazis collect Nazi memorabilia.  It's also why I wouldn't show up to work sporting a tiny moustache (the only time I've seen such a moustache on a man, it was on a member of the punk band the Murder Junkies, and he was *obviously* being provocative).

Evolution uses existing adaptations for multiple purposes when it can, and I suspect this is what's going on here.  Shame and morality have appeared just recently, and I think they have co-opted our existing adaptations that deal with illness, or rotten or contaminated food, to deal with behaviours which violate group norms, or are in some sense maladaptive.

(Edit - I just came across this, from blogger Ricky Raw of therawness.com:  "If a guilty person did something wrong and no one else knew, they would still feel bad, because even though their image is still intact, it’s their actions and the content of their character that matters to them. If a shame-prone person did something wrong and no one else knew, they would not feel bad because as long as their image is fine, everything else is fine, regardless of whether their actions are morally right or wrong. To a shame-prone person, actions are only “right” or “wrong” to the extent that they damage his or her reputation or image, regardless of the actual intent and impact of the actions. To a shame-prone person, actions only matter when they damage the image, cause feelings of exposure and embarrassment, and reveal that they are flawed to their core, making them feel like frauds.")