steven0461 comments on Summer vs Winter Strategies - Less Wrong

-3 Post author: whpearson 20 May 2010 12:31AM

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Comment author: steven0461 20 May 2010 12:45:24AM *  1 point [-]

Is there any evidence that traits and behaviors like introversion/extraversion, near/far, etc. actually change across seasons? ETA: or is that not implied by what you're saying?

Comment author: cupholder 20 May 2010 01:29:38AM 2 points [-]

I think 'summer' and 'winter' are names chosen for being evocative, catchy, and 'value neutral' - I didn't read whpearson as meaning them to be taken literally.

Comment author: [deleted] 20 May 2010 01:37:53AM *  2 points [-]

I'm not so sure about that. Note that the section on winter strategies begins with:

This was selected for by things like the coming of normal winters in northern climates and ice ages that pushed people out of land. It is person vs nature, rather than person vs person.

This seems to suggest that whpearson did intend for the names to have meaning.

Comment author: cupholder 20 May 2010 01:54:55AM *  1 point [-]

I tried to clarify a potential ambiguity and ended up making an ambiguous post myself - I should've been more careful :-)

When I read steven0461's post I thought he was asking whpearson if the overall winteriness/summeriness of people literally changed from season to season as time passed, and I replied with that in mind. Although whpearson's post does associate literal climates with the personality clusters he suggests, I didn't think he was meaning to imply that people's personalities undergo a seasonal winter-summer cycle, which is the point I meant to make.

But I think you and Airedale are right that whpearson meant to draw other literal connections between seasons and personality clusters - just not one about seasonal cycles - and I could've been clearer on that.

Comment author: Airedale 20 May 2010 01:37:03AM 2 points [-]

Perhaps not completely literally, but all the discussion of climate suggests that that there is some intended connection to the seasons.

Comment author: whpearson 20 May 2010 08:41:52AM *  0 points [-]

It is more that places with distinct seasons favour different strategies than places with less distinct (e.g the equator). It is more resource variance than the actual amount of resources, as the human population will expand or contract to fit the niche. But when there are regular shocks to the amount of resources (bad winters) that cause change in population levels different strategies might be more evolutionarily adaptive.