Have Any of You Questioned Whether Spiral Dynamics Are Actually Truthful?

[Entrepreneur]

All over this site, I see numerous members referring to the Spiral Dynamics model of human and societal development as being taken for granted truth about how humans and societies work.

What if the model you are basing your thinking around isn't even accurate?

What if you have your ladder leaning against the wrong wall and you keep climbing it anyway?

Have you ever carefully thought about it, scrutinized it, and questioned whether or not the theory is even based in truth?   Or did you just accept it and run with it because other people have done so, and it is easier to just agree with them?

Here are some things to ponder:

1 - Humans are 99.9% identical in DNA, whether they live in a first-world country with all the technological advances it has, or if they live in some tribe in a jungle or desert halfway across the world.

2 - Fundamentally, humans, regardless of where they are located in the globe, are driven in life by the exact same underlying forces of human nature.   You and the Pygmy are no different in this regard.   Compare yourself to any of the many evil dictators the world has seen throughout history.   You and he are no different in terms of your human nature.  Your personalities might be different.  Your priorities in life might be different.  Your beliefs might be different.   But, at your core, your human nature is no different.   They were also driven to acquire safety, basic resources, love, belonging, self-esteem, etc.

3 - Whether a group of people (call it a country, community, or whatever) decides it wants to exist as economic equals or not has nothing to do with whether that community is "more evolved" than any other community anywhere in the globe.    The same is true whether a group of people is more concerned about the well-being of every single member of the community or less concerned.  That decision that each of us makes on our own has more to do with individual personality traits and the programmed belief system that we get programmed with starting in our youth.  It has nothing to do with being "more evolved."

The reason I mention this is because I see so many decisions and opinions on this forum shaped and based under the assumption that their model of how the world works is accurate.   I suggest that this Spiral Dynamics model isn't accurate in the sense that it claims one color as being more "evolved" than another.   Using the word "evolved" suggests that communities, states, countries, whatever, will eventually reach Green, Yellow, or Turquoise as they evolve.   It also makes the "unstated assumption" that a community based on principles that would make it Green, Yellow, or Turquoise is superior in some way to all the so-called "lesser evolved" societies.   I would suggest that this idea is nothing more than the authors who think themselves to be "morally superior" to the rest of the world trying to convince you to conform to their belief system.   I suggest they are not evolutionarily superior to anyone else.  They just think very highly of themselves and want all of humanity to adopt the same mental paradigms and belief systems that they hold.

Is the Spiral Dynamics model truly accurate?

 

[Michal__]

Was Jesus sd blue? Haha.

[Hojo]

We are too infinite for spiral dynamics.

[Eskilon]

@Entrepreneur Oh boy, you are attacking the forum's bible, you might need to dodge a pitchfork or two

Lot's of people who are spiritually developed here are really arrogant underneath, that sneaky ego.

Spiral dynamics just feed their ego of their supposed superiority over everyone else.

You need to question everyone on this forum even if they are spiritually or cognitively developed, theres still huge ego and distortion and this model helps with that for sure. 

Edited 5 hours ago by Eskilon

[Miguel1]

The Spiral Dynamics model is not perfect, as no model is. But it is the best we have got to use.

[Entrepreneur]

4 minutes ago, Eskilon said:

@Entrepreneur Oh boy, you are attacking the forum's bible, you might need to dodge a pitchfork or two

Lot's of people who are spiritually developed here are really arrogant underneath, that sneaky ego.

Spiral dynamics just feed their ego of their supposed superiority over everyone else.

You need to question everyone on this forum even if they are spiritually or cognitively developed, theres still huge ego and distortion and this model helps with that for sure. 

Thanks for the heads up! 

I am a truth seeker, as many on this forum have stated they are.  I seek truths about how the world works and how life works, so I can adapt and adjust accordingly to live a fulfilling, meaningful, and happy life.

The more I research Spiral Dynamics, the more flaws I find with it.   It seems glaringly inaccurate and biased to me.  So I find it very surprising that so many people who are "seeking truth" have bought into it as being anything remotely close to accurate.

I am genuinely curious how so many people have bought into it as being "true".    Have they honestly questioned it at all or pondered it to any great extent?   I am trying to approach it objectively.

[Artsy]

I believe the claim & value with Spiral Dynamics is in anecdotal experience ~ how can you actually use it, in real life, to inform your sense-making & decisions. 

One example for me: 

Never start a start-up with stage orange & below again expecting them to match or care about Green values.

[Talinn]

It was plainly explained that it was a model.

Plus when you see people in real life, they are obviously not green or red or blue.

I like the philosophy of language a lot more than anything these days, so I didn't struggle this with so much.

[NewKidOnTheBlock]

It is indeed, a significantly kindergartenish view of the world and reality in my opinion. Also kind of posits that progressive narratives (as they'd be defined nowadays) are fundamentally correct and superior and the more conservative narratives would be ranked lower on the spiral, in the lesser stages. But when the rubber actually meets the road and these narratives escape the world of theory, we see a lot of problems.

Imo the more confused you get and the less you think you know, the more accurate your perspective is, cause you're holding all these perspectives and all of their errors in your head, and the more you're aware of the more you feel like a moron

[Entrepreneur]

9 minutes ago, Miguel1 said:

The Spiral Dynamics model is not perfect, as no model is. But it is the best we have got to use.

Is it?

If you study theories of human motivation like Abraham Maslow's and Clayton Alderfer's they explain how all humans, regardless of where they are born and live on the globe, are driven to acquire certain "needs" such as physiological needs, love, belonging, self-esteem, etc.

Many of those needs apply to every human, such as the need for food, water, shelter, safety, etc.   Those needs are considered higher priority because you won't care about "getting married" very much if you are homeless and struggling to feed yourself.   If you are easily satisfying those common needs that every human must satisfy, then you begin pondering what else you can do with your life.   So you might set other goals for yourself such as getting an education, starting a career, exploring your spirituality, finding a mate, starting a family, acquiring material goods, traveling, etc.   Each of us gets to decide that for ourselves.  Our options and decisions are largely shaped by the circumstances we are born into, our upbringing and the things that our parents, family members, friends, and other mentors teach us when we are very young and maturing.

If you also understand how the human brain works on a superficial level, and the personality differences between humans using something similar to a Myers-Briggs explanation, you can easily understand how one person can come to make certain choices in their life and prioritize different goals in life compared to others.

I don't see any choice of goals as being "more evolved" than others.   Humans are just doing what humans do.  We are just doing what other humans do.   The things that separate us are the circumstances of our youth, plus all of the ideas we get exposed to throughout life, which then affect the decisions each of us makes moment to moment.   It also affects the major decisions we make in life, like what career should I pursue, should I go to college, should I marry this person, etc.

We form communities by choosing to live among others that share our same values, or perhaps we just adjust our values to match those we live among so that we fit in with them.   The reason for doing so would go back to human motivational needs that Abraham Maslow explained many decades ago.

Sometimes communities are forced upon us by conquest.   Think of the spread of Christianity at the tip of the sword.   All of this is rooted in human nature.   You and I are driven by the same forces that those Christian Knights were driven by at the human level.   We are no more or less evolved than they were.   They were exposed to different circumstances in life, experiences in life, and shaped by different beliefs when they were young.   They adapted as best they could to the options available to them in their era of existence just as you and I do today.  We are the same.

Communities, countries, political systems, etc, are shaped by their forefathers and also by other civilizations that have conquered them.   There is no "higher evolved" versions of any of them on the human level.   There are technological evolutions that have drastically changed civilizations.   Yet the fundamental human experience of being human and being driven by the same human needs has been in place for as far back in humanity as we can track it.

[Consept]

1 hour ago, Entrepreneur said:

I suggest that this Spiral Dynamics model isn't accurate in the sense that it claims one color as being more "evolved" than another. 

I dont think it claims this, one stage is not superior to the other its just that the higher stage includes and transcends the previous stage, it doesnt replace it or is not necessarily at odds with it. If you think about it this is how knowledge and development tend to work, if you learn basic maths its not then replaced by more complex mathematical ideas. This would only be threatening if you made an identity out of knowing basic maths and thinking thats the only maths that should exist. 

If you dont have an identity around your 'stage', however you want to label it, you wouldnt think there is a problem with different stages. 

1 hour ago, Entrepreneur said:

Using the word "evolved" suggests that communities, states, countries, whatever, will eventually reach Green, Yellow, or Turquoise as they evolve.

Not necessarily, there could very easily be countries or states at the same level for however long. The model shows that countries have evolved however, as humans there are very few that are purple and not many western countries are majority red. This shows that there has been a change from the past and spiral dynamics is a way to map that. 

1 hour ago, Entrepreneur said:

It also makes the "unstated assumption" that a community based on principles that would make it Green, Yellow, or Turquoise is superior in some way to all the so-called "lesser evolved" societies.

This is a value judgement you might put on it but its not stating its better. Better just depends on what you value, so for example red and blue might be more ethnocentric, meaning they only care about their ethnic group, whereas green would be more worldcentric where there care about humans across the world and animals, purple will only care about their tribe. To all these groups what they value is the most important to them, you may see that and think 'oh because green is worldcentric they think theyre better than everyone else' but the truth is so do the other stages. Spiral dynamics again just maps all this out. Its very clear that even through an individuals life you go through these stages, first you may just care about yourself, then family, tribe, ethnic group, country etc. 

 

1 hour ago, Entrepreneur said:

 I would suggest that this idea is nothing more than the authors who think themselves to be "morally superior" to the rest of the world trying to convince you to conform to their belief system.   I suggest they are not evolutionarily superior to anyone else.  They just think very highly of themselves and want all of humanity to adopt the same mental paradigms and belief systems that they hold.

No humanity is free to hold whatever paradigms they wish, the whole point of spiral dynamics is that we can know or at least have an idea of what makes each paradigm or stage tick, that way we can have a more clear idea of how to work with each other. Otherwise it will just lead to conflict which it has done in the past as everyones confused as to why others act so seemingly unreasonably. 

So finally its not about spiral dynamics being right or wrong its just if its useful in mapping human consciousness. If it is even roughly then its just a tool to use, of course be aware of its limitations as well, but i think overall it is very useful. 

[Entrepreneur]

10 minutes ago, NewKidOnTheBlock said:

It is indeed, a significantly kindergartenish view of the world and reality in my opinion. Also kind of posits that progressive narratives (as they'd be defined nowadays) are fundamentally correct and superior and the more conservative narratives would be ranked lower on the spiral, in the lesser stages. But when the rubber actually meets the road and these narratives escape the world of theory, we see a lot of problems.

Yes.  We are thinking along similar lines.

It is a tactic that could be used to intentionally manipulate people into believing something that simply isn't true.  I don't know if that is what it really is or not.   But it might be.   

I don't see a single way that the authors of Spiral Dynamics have improved on what earlier teachers of "human theory" offered us decades beforehand.  It looks more like a bastardization of fundamental truths intentionally shaped into something someone wants you to believe because they have an agenda to persuade you to buy into it as being true.   

[Entrepreneur]

6 minutes ago, Consept said:

I dont think it claims this, one stage is not superior to the other its just that the higher stage includes and transcends the previous stage, it doesnt replace it or is not necessarily at odds with it. If you think about it this is how knowledge and development tend to work, if you learn basic maths its not then replaced by more complex mathematical ideas. This would only be threatening if you made an identity out of knowing basic maths and thinking thats the only maths that should exist. 

Wow, you put great effort into this. Thank you.

Saying that there are "higher" stages by itself suggests they are not equal and that one is superior to the other.

Saying that a higher stage includes and transcends the previous stage suggests they are not equal and that higher stages are superior.

Using the word "previous" to describe another stage also suggests that the stages do in fact have a hierarchy with Turquoise being the "most evolved" stage I believe.   There is nothing that comes "after" Turquoise, is there?

Also, if you just look at how it is used here on this forum, every single time I see it being used here, it is obviously implied that higher stages are "superior" to the others.   Just look through a few threads on here.   Everyone using it is making it look like all lower stages are "inferior" to the one above it.

[Entrepreneur]

17 minutes ago, Consept said:

If you dont have an identity around your 'stage', however you want to label it, you wouldnt think there is a problem with different stages. 

In order for you to have a stage you have to first buy into the idea that there are stages and that this is an accurate model.  I don't.

I think every human is on the same stage- there is only one.  We are all driven by the same fundamental forces of nature.  We turn out different and make difference choices and develop different beliefs for many various reasons.   But you don't go from one stage to another as is suggested by the Spiral Dynamics model.   Not in my opinion anyway.  Perhaps I am wrong.

[Vali2003]

I agree, it’s sometimes used in a way that implies superiority.

I don’t think being on a ‘higher’ developmental stage says one is superior to another. It depends, though, what you mean by that exactly. Could someone on a higher stage be ‘superior’ in terms of moral development for example? Sure. Just like a high-school-kid has superior maths than a primary-school-kid. But is a primary-school-kid by itself inferior to the high-school-kid?

Do you see a baby as inferior to a ten-year old?

You can go into specific skills, sure, but do you get what I mean?

Also, it’s an error to think all perspectives must be of equal value or maturity (for example progressivism vs. conservatism).

 

 

 

Edited 3 hours ago by Vali2003

[Consept]

2 minutes ago, Entrepreneur said:

Wow, you put great effort into this. Thank you.

No problem, always good to have a discussion and sharpen ideas. 

3 minutes ago, Entrepreneur said:

Saying that there are "higher" stages by itself suggests they are not equal and that one is superior to the other.

Saying that a higher stage includes and transcends the previous stage suggests they are not equal and that higher stages are superior.

Using the word "previous" to describe another stage also suggests that the stages do in fact have a hierarchy with Turquoise being the "most evolved" stage I believe.   There is nothing that comes "after" Turquoise, is there?

All these are true but again its a value judgement you're putting on it. You would have to use the word higher or previous or evolved, I couldnt think of other words to use personally. As i said if you think of school, if you're in a 'higher' grade you're not necessarily superior to someone in a 'lower' grade but you have learnt what the people in the lower grade have learnt and now you're learning whatever you're learning in your grade. This is just how knowledge works, you include and transcend. If we take it to spiral dynamics, someone who is it yellow has most likely gone through stages of blue, orange or green, but then someone whos orange hasnt been through green thats why its harder for them to understand it or give it value. 

8 minutes ago, Entrepreneur said:

Also, if you just look at how it is used here on this forum, every single time I see it being used here, it is obviously implied that higher stages are "superior" to the others.   Just look through a few threads on here.   Everyone using it is making it look like all lower stages are "inferior" to the one above it.

People may use it in egoic ways but i think the central point is that someone who is at say tier 2 does have an understanding of tier 1 but tier 1 doesnt really have an understanding of tier 2. So essentially its like saying someone who is a professor of higher maths has a very good understanding of basic maths but knows that thats not all there is, someone who only knows basic maths may not even be aware of whats involved in higher maths. The professor could think hes superior but that would just be an ego thing as in reality hes just further along in the journey. 

[Vali2003]

Also, when you develop along the stages, it gets quite obvious which ‘reality’ — I’m referring to the stages — the creators of the model tried to map. It’s pretty useful. 

[Entrepreneur]

25 minutes ago, Consept said:

No humanity is free to hold whatever paradigms they wish, the whole point of spiral dynamics is that we can know or at least have an idea of what makes each paradigm or stage tick, that way we can have a more clear idea of how to work with each other. Otherwise it will just lead to conflict which it has done in the past as everyones confused as to why others act so seemingly unreasonably. 

So finally its not about spiral dynamics being right or wrong its just if its useful in mapping human consciousness. If it is even roughly then its just a tool to use, of course be aware of its limitations as well, but i think overall it is very useful. 

Obviously people find it useful and have bought into its accuracy.  It wouldn't be used if they didn't.  I am suggesting it is based on untruths.

 I just find it funny that some PhDs arrived at this model when their predecessors had already provided much better explanations for how humans operate and in doing so, indirectly explained how societies end up adopting whatever beliefs, traditions, goals, politics, etc. that they do.

This theory smells of lousy academics to me.    This is what made me wonder if anyone here has actually questioned it thoughtfully.

[Consept]

7 minutes ago, Entrepreneur said:

In order for you to have a stage you have to first buy into the idea that there are stages and that this is an accurate model.  I don't.

I think every human is on the same stage- there is only one.  We are all driven by the same fundamental forces of nature.  We turn out different and make difference choices and develop different beliefs for many various reasons.   But you don't go from one stage to another as is suggested by the Spiral Dynamics model.   Not in my opinion anyway.  Perhaps I am wrong.

OK but i would counter this by saying in your life you would've gone through different stages, from child to adult your worldview has expanded and evolved and that is just in one human, this is also the case on the macro level as well. So really think about your own lived experience, I know with mine initially i only cared about myself and then family, society and so on. 

We can also track how society has developed, 500 years ago my country the UK looked very different, it was run by kings basically authoritarian rule which would be classed as red and they would kill anyone who disagreed with them. Now we have a more democratic setup which would be orange/green in sprial dynamics terms, that evolution is very clear to see. So in that sense i dont how at least some tracking of this evolution wouldnt make sense you dont have to use the spiral dynamics model but evidently theres been some change. I do agree that if you took a human born 500 years ago and have him grow up in our time he would of course adapt to our time. 

[WillCameron]

Spiral Dynamics is a good training wheels model for understanding development, but it has real limitations. Understand that there is an entire body of research with competing theories and perspectives within and outside academia. If you collapse all of developmental theory to just Spiral Dynamics then you're going to be missing much higher quality perspectives. It can get you oriented, but you have to move beyond it as quickly as possible.

I highly recommend Hanzi Freinacht's The Listening Society and then Brendan Graham Dempsey's The Evolution of Meaning Vol1 and Vol2. These can help make a good distinction between psychological and cultural development, and then between deep structural psychological development and surface features psychological development. Deep structure is the hierarchical complexity of cognition, whereas surface features is how that deep structure appears given the cultural and systemic context. Freinacht makes the point that a paradigmatic genius such as Thomas Aquinas can't readily be called "Stage Blue" despite the fact that he lived in a Stage Blue culture. Stage Blue cognition is abstract, and obviously Aquinas was far beyond that.