{"id":28368,"date":"2022-03-11T08:46:57","date_gmt":"2022-03-11T16:46:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=28368"},"modified":"2022-03-11T08:46:57","modified_gmt":"2022-03-11T16:46:57","slug":"tribal-epistemology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/tribal-epistemology\/","title":{"rendered":"Tribal Epistemology"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pragya Agarwal, the author of <\/span>Sway<\/span><\/i>, is a freelance writer, behavioral and data scientist, and the founder of a research think-tank, The 50 Percent Project. She focuses on women\u2019s rights around the world, and she writes widely on the subjects of bias and prejudice, motherhood, gender, racial inequality, and mental health. This book, <\/span>Sway,<\/span><\/i> categorized under behavioral and mental psychology, is divided into four sections to discover the science behind unintentional biases embedded in everyone. She uses real stories, scientific theories, and research data to explore and present \u201cthe brain and behavior, and finding synergies between society and psychology to try and understand why we act the way we do, how we think, learn, and connect, and process information.\u201d<\/span>[1]<\/span><\/p>\n

Pragya\u2019s valuable research discussions were very helpful in gaining a greater understanding of the science and human behavior in unintentional biases that influence our interactions. In chapter five, she mentions a phenomenon called \u201c<\/span>homophily<\/span><\/i> \u2013 the tendency of individuals to associate and bond with similar others, as in the proverb \u2018birds of a feather flock together.\u201d<\/span>[2]<\/span> And she connected this unconscious tendency of human behavior to a newly emerging phenomenon called identity politics \u2013 which has \u201cgiven rise to the recent phenomenon of fake news. Anything that doesn\u2019t conform to your tribe\u2019s views is shunned and labeled as fake news.\u201d<\/span>[3]<\/span> I also noticed the spread of this new emergence of cognitive bias that Jonathan Freeland called Tribal Epistemology. Depending on which region you are from, the ethnic background you have, and surrounding close friends from social media influence our decision-making greatly. Many will dangerously mix fake news and inherent cognitive bias to make irrational decisions over facts, truth, and evidence. In recent days, in order to belong to a certain tribe of your skin color, geographic location, and gender, every individual is sort of pushed into taking a certain side, share its political view, and embrace the feelings of the tribe.<\/span><\/p>\n

Last week, I reflected on the parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10 while the Russia-Ukraine conflict is covered all over the media. The US media created a catchy phrase to call this conflict \u2018War between two men.\u2019 The book reminded me that the unintentional bias in a person will be driven to take a side, root for a man they like, and be an entertained spectator to see how this story ends up because it is just a \u2018War between two men.\u2019 But is it really just a \u2018War between two men\u2019? It shouldn\u2019t be for Christians.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pragya urges the readers to understand and filter out the crucial bubbles from the social media channels and echo chambers because \u201cour implicit biases shape the way information is now being shared, what information we trust, and how the way we create content and spread it reinforces the systemic biases that are entrenched in our society.\u201d<\/span>[4]<\/span> The true message in Luke 10 is not just to be a good and merciful Samaritan and don\u2019t be like the priest and the Levite who looked away because of their intentional bias. Jesus tells the parable of a good Samaritan to teach us to look into the depth of where our unconscious biases are formed \u2013 the brain and the heart. The understanding of our God of mercy means to look at our every neighbor both locally and globally beyond their color, ethnicity, gender, social status, power and authority, and political views. It is to practice mitigating and countering our unconscious biases with an intent to be the merciful hand in places of injustice for the kingdom of God. I have found one practical way to mitigate and counter negative unconscious biases within me. It is to walk the path of spiritual formation \u2013 \u201cour continuing response to the reality of God\u2019s grace shaping us into the likeness of Jesus Christ, through the work of the Holy Spirit, in the community of faith, for the sake of the world\u201d<\/span>[5]<\/span> And of course, never to walk alone, but to walk with friends that God brings along the path of formation.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[1]<\/span> Pragya Agarwal, <\/span>Sway: Unravelling Unconscious Bias<\/span><\/i> (Bloomsbury Sigma, 2021), 16.<\/span><\/p>\n

[2]<\/span> Agarwal, <\/span>Sway<\/span><\/i>, 152.<\/span><\/p>\n

[3]<\/span> Agarwal, <\/span>Sway<\/span><\/i>, 157.<\/span><\/p>\n

[4]<\/span> Agarwal, <\/span>Sway<\/span><\/i>, 407.<\/span><\/p>\n

[5]<\/span> Jeffrey Greenman and George Kalantzis, <\/span>Life in the Spirit: Spiritual Formation in Theological Perspective<\/span><\/i> (Downers Grove, Ill: IVP Academic, 2010), 24.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pragya Agarwal, the author of Sway, is a freelance writer, behavioral and data scientist, and the founder of a research think-tank, The 50 Percent Project. She focuses on women\u2019s rights around the world, and she writes widely on the subjects of bias and prejudice, motherhood, gender, racial inequality, and mental health. This book, Sway, categorized […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":145,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2244],"class_list":["post-28368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-agarwal","cohort-lgp11"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/145"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28368"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28368\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28369,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28368\/revisions\/28369"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}