• for: SONEC - Dunbar number

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  • SONECs are based on Dunbar number of 150 people to maintain group intimacy

Continuing on the analogy between addresses for zettels/index cards and for people, the differing contexts for cards and ideas is similar to the multiple different publics in which people operate (home, work, school, church, etc.)

Having these multiple publics creates a variety of cross links within various networks for people which makes their internal knowledge and relationships more valuable.

As societies grow the number of potential interconnections grows as well. Compounding things the society doesn't grow as a homogeneous whole but smaller sub-groups appear creating new and different publics for each member of the society. This is sure to create a much larger and much more complex system. Perhaps it's part of the beneficial piece of the human limit of memory of inter-personal connections (the Dunbar number) means that instead of spending time linearly with those physically closest to us, we travel further out into other spheres and by doing so, we dramatically increase the complexity of our societies.

Does this level of complexity change for oral societies in pre-agrarian contexts?

What would this look like mathematically and combinatorially? How does this effect the size and complexity of the system?

How can we connect this to Stuart Kauffman's ideas on complexity? (Picking up a single thread creates a network by itself...)

Relationships aren't just one to one, or one to many, but many to many.

West, B. J., G. F. Massari, G. Culbreth, R. Failla, M. Bologna, R. I. M. Dunbar, and P. Grigolini. ‘Relating Size and Functionality in Human Social Networks through Complexity’. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117, no. 31 (4 August 2020): 18355–58. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2006875117.

Dr. Maxwell John Dunbar, mentioned later in the text as the author of Environment and Common Sense which was published in 1971, began his “lifelong involvement with the Arctic” in August 1935 during an expedition to map the western Greenland coast (Grainger 1995, 306). Dunbar was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, attended the Merchiston Preparatory School followed by the Dalhousie Castle School, and finally, Fettes College. In 1933, Dunbar began attending the Trinity College in Oxford, England to study zoology where he met ecologist Charles Elton. After meeting Elton, Dunbar was introduced to the Oxford University Exploration Club. Through this club, Dunbar was invited to join the expedition in Greenland. He received a B.A. in 1937 and subsequently attended Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut on a Henry Fellowship (for more information on the Henry Fellowship see Yale University’s webpage https://yale.communityforce.com/Funds/FundDetails.aspx?4438534B376C50326C63483341496C39582F4435696B6F6554694364593150486764566B344156473663736768494B34585863553574432B646D5868384E6275). While studying at Yale University, Dunbar was able to take a trip to explore the glaciers of Alaska. He returned to Oxford, England, when Elton offered him the opportunity to join the 1939 eastern Canadian Arctic patrol. After accepting Elton’s offer, Dunbar enrolled at McGill University in Montreal, Canada as a graduate student. During his time at McGill University, Dunbar experienced the Canadian arctic for the first time by joining the R.M.S Nascopie. Dunbar began serving as the consular representative of the Canadian consulate in Greenland in 1942, and again in 1946. After leaving Greenland, Dunbar was employed by McGill University in the Department of Zoology. After beginning research for the Fisheries Research Board of Canada, he designed the first Canadian arctic research vessel Calanus. In 1947, Dunbar founded the Eastern Arctic Investigations laboratory at McGill University. His active involvement with McGill University continued until he retired and was appointed Professor Emeritus in 1982. He continued his quest for knowledge after “retiring” and published at least 32 articles after 1982 (Grainger 1995, 306-307).

References

Grainger, E. H. "Maxwell John Dunbar (1914-1995)." Arctic 48, no. 3 (1995): 306-07. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40511670.