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Viliam_Bur comments on How to not be a fatalist? Need help from people who care about true beliefs. - Less Wrong
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A ceremony is a machine that uses emotions to change people.
For some people this may be a sufficient reason to hate ceremonies. Because they are typically designed by someone else, and may support goals we don't agree with. Or the idea of some process predictably changing my mind feels repulsive.
The problem is, "changing my mind using emotions" is what happens all the time. No ceremonies, not even other people are required. The mere fact that I feel hungry, or tired, or lonely, or angry, is enough to change my mind. If these influences happen all the time randomly, usually without providing me any benefit, what's wrong about using the same process deliberately to bring me something that I want?
My emotions are subject to thousand biases. I may believe that something is important, and yet not feel strongly about it; I may even forget it quickly. I may believe something is harmful, and yet not feel repelled by it. Modifying my emotions to fit my beliefs could be very helpful. (Also risky, if my beliefs are wrong. But that does not mean that having random emotions is safe.) I would like to have a machine to give me the emotions I want to have. (Similar to the "remoralization" spell in Night Watch.)
You talk about it as if it were ovious/well known.
Is there actually any theory which does apply technical theories like particel dynamics, thermodynamics and/or process optimization theories to human social behavior patterns thus actually exploiting this analogy of ritual=machine?
Psychohistory :-D
I know that one :-) I especially liked the part where the student discovered that the predictions were met better than 'possible' (probably by some convergence speed theorems).
But no. I thought more about something along the lines of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_Economics (actually mentioned on your link).
Some theory which doesn't try to predict aggregate outcomes of human actions (that wouldn't work for longer time spans for the same reasons whether cannot be forcast precisely - chaos theory). I thought about some theory which models smaller structures like transactions, rituals, customs, ceremonies and measures and predicts their frequency and 'success'.
This is a great little phrase. And, in the church, I think ceremony is a useful or harmful machine in the ways you mention. And I think the potential for emotion-alteration is greater in a ceremony than just regular life. Not only at weddings, but in all kinds of formalized ceremonies -- funerals, baptisms, worship services, etc.
Generally, it seems to me that adherents of religion enjoy the experience. It is meaningful and sometimes even euphoric. And it "gives them the emotions they want to have." It's a win for them in every sense...apart from having to accept nonsense. But they don't seem bother with that aspect from my experience. (In that way, it all functions like an anti-fatalist mechanism for the believer...)
Which is exactly why I'd love to have the ceremonies without the nonsense. To feel rational, strongly and reliably. (Well, more reliably than using other methods.)