Sandpit of Life

Sometimes in my research for other things I am doing with my time and life, I run across ideas for these inspirational musings.  Occasionally, it even feels like a eureka moment---I found it!  And in these moments, I am not always sure what I think or where it is going to take me.  But I know the process of thinking about it and letting it ferment in my brain and heart will bring me to some knowledge, insight and maybe some wisdom.  The process is significant.

I am working on another book.  At least the ones I write require some wide reading and research.  I have opinions, but my books need to be more than something I thought about over breakfast and then shared.  And so I found myself reading a piece about primates!  Don’t ask how that relates to anything else I am doing.  I came across a fascinating account of a British anthropologist and psychologist person named Robin Dunbar.  I had never heard of him.

Dunbar’s research “was trying to solve the problem of why primates devote so much time and effort to grooming.”  This is surely an interesting question, but I never thought about it until I read about Robin Dunbar.  As usual, what he found out not only began to answer this question, but also was suggestive for other areas of knowledge. 

I read on to discover that the Machiavellian Intelligence Hypothesis (now known as the Social Brain Hypothesis) had just been introduced into anthropological and primatology discourse.”  This hypothesis “held that primates have large brains because they live in socially complex societies: the larger the group, the larger the brain.”  As a human being, I was beginning to feel implicated!  My mind began to race ahead and I’m sure I was making similar guesses about what I expected that Dunbar had been guessing at the time.

I could not have put the best answer in his terms, but I understood it.  Dunbar concluded: “Thus, from the size of an animal’s neocortex, the frontal lobe in particular, you could theoretically predict the group size for that animal.”  Naturally, Dunbar jumped to see if this information worked for humans, too.  Apparently there is some good correlation.  

One conclusive hypothesis Dunbar asserts is “judging from the size of an average human brain, the number of people the average person could have in her social group was a hundred and fifty.”  That number---which has become known as the Dunbar 150---is basically the optimal size group of folks we can call casual friends.  If our group is bigger than this, we can’t manage it very well.  When I thought about myself, this made some sense.  It fits.

I realized I had “learned” years ago.  In my work with churches, I found that churches could grow to about 150 or maybe 200 maximum and maintain a nice sense of community.  Often churches try to grow bigger than that and it simply does not work.  I figured out the church has to change its model of membership and sense of community if it grows beyond these numbers.  It can, but it demands a different way of thinking.  And I knew it was not easy.

That is the first place I saw the relevancy of his research for my own interests in religion.  The second place I was intrigued has to do with where our technological revolution will take it.  Essentially, the question is: will the stuff of today change who humans are?  Dunbar also is interested in this same question.  For eons the humanization of humans happened in real, live groups---homes, schools, friends and acquaintances.  Will our technology develop humans differently?

Dunbar knows that “We aren’t born with full social awareness,” and Dunbar fears, “too much virtual interaction may subvert that education.”  He illustrates this when he says, “In the sandpit of life, when somebody kicks sand in your face, you can’t get out of the sandpit. You have to deal with it, learn, compromise.”  I really liked that phrase, “sandpit of life.”  My sandpit of life has been a particular family, specific schools and wonderful, but not perfect, churches.  My sandpit got much bigger with travel.  I found folks from England, Germany, Brazil, India and other places in my sandpit.  I am sure going online to those places is not the same.

Dunbar puts it effectively when he says, “On the internet, you can pull the plug and walk away. There’s no forcing mechanism that makes us have to learn.”  That is a powerful observation.  He is concerned that too many virtual friends might replace our real, social friends.  It is something to think much more about and exercise care how we proceed.

For the moment, however, I become even more thankful for all my friends in my sandpit of life.  I resolve to spend more time telling them I appreciate them and ask them to help me even more to form the spiritual life in community that I desire.