Deference

Speaker A: 00:00:00

Hello and welcome to the Cognitive Engineering Podcast produced by me, Fraser McGruer for Aleph Insights. In this series of podcasts we take a look at interesting topics and discuss what we think they tell us about analysis and decision making. I am here with Chris Wragg, Nick Hare and Jordan Fermanis of Aleph Insights and this week we're discussing bending the knee. Now listeners you can't see this but I'm sure you already knew this. I'm on the carpet. Please impart your wisdom to us please and why would we want to talk about bending the knee? Well I know you're not much of a newshound Fraser so I probably need to update you a bit but you remember the Queen? Yeah I remember. She's died so we've now got what they call a King. King Charles III is now the monarch and in a weird twist the same has happened to Jordan who's an Australian. They've got a new king now as well, same guy actually. So it's various other countries similar changeover at the same time. The interesting thing was obviously lots of ceremonial stuff going on with the funeral. This is a week or two after all this happened. Yeah and all the stuff that happened there but also there's a ceremony called the accession which is not the coronation that happens. It's a big organised thing which takes ages to arrange. The accession is effectively when Parliament says yes you can be the new king but there's a lot of deference. A lot of kind of you know your highness here and people scurrying around trying to get him a new pen and you know treating him like a king. Yeah. Which he is so fair enough or is it? Yeah. What is deference all about? Do kings and stuff do they deserve that level of deference? Who does deserve it if anyone? Is it an anachronism? Lots of questions to do with deference really. Yeah and also you know I wonder about hierarchy as well. Does everyone need it? Everyone gets a bit of deference. Well it's the same. Is deference, do you need a deference for a hierarchy? All these questions we will fail to answer. See what we can do. Yeah. Okay so as you say lots of questions there. Well how do we go about this? How do we start this? Who wants to kick us off? We could still go with you Nick or who wants to

Speaker B: 00:02:46

jump in? Chris. Yeah I think it's interesting because you know there's obviously a requirement to define what deference is, how it works and I know Nick was going to sort of talk about that a little bit but I think you know regardless of how you categorise it, in my mind it is sort of some way of demonstrating subordination or submission or respect of some source of authority that is in a person really I think and what I think is interesting is that it seems to be all around us. So people think institutional type shows of deference like with a monarch but actually it's everywhere in all sorts of different setups so you know we clearly need it for the functioning of things. You know you look at religious leaders get deference, political leaders get deference, people, leaders of all kinds are shown deference in the business world and you know in other places. What's the difference do you think between deference and respect? I think deference is and respect is not something that is so obviously demonstrated. Deference is about showing that you have respect for somebody and that you submit to their power effectively but I think it's part of it is an externalisation of all of that power hierarchy. Exactly I think you're right

Speaker A: 00:04:33

because also you mentioned submission and then you said power hierarchy. I think in respect you could two people on the same level and both you know could each you know it could be mutual respect for example whereas deference is something about you're more important than me maybe or you before

Speaker B: 00:04:45

me. And it's demonstrating that so that both parties understand it clearly by some set of rules that's. And yeah both parties and everyone else as well. So yeah you think so when I think of like examples of deference it's like the judge walks into the court people stand up you know and same with a head teacher coming into a you know there's sort of kowtowing or bowing or doing some obvious service for someone that demonstrates that. This feels like there's lots

Speaker A: 00:05:23

of anthropological stuff going on here but also it reminds me I once got into trouble for not standing up when the judge came in. Why is standing up a sign of deference? Normally you try to make yourself lower. Sorry Nick you were trampling all over my mini-anecdote there what did you say? Yeah I just don't understand why standing up is it's an odd display of deference

Speaker B: 00:05:42

isn't it? I think it's because you're seated and you're relaxed and you're in no way you're comfortable and then somebody comes in who you're to show deference to and so you inconvenience yourself symbolically you show yourself isn't it why not why could it then just as well easily have

Speaker A: 00:06:02

been hitting yourself in the face? Yes right but if you're so anti it why do you make the rest of us do it when you stand when you come in the room? Well indeed yeah but now I know why is to make me really uncomfortable. Exactly I want to come to Jordan you want to say before you do I'm just really interested makes me think about why because often we like to just to show deference and I want to come on to that because that's something we saw a bit in the in recent weeks. Jordan sorry

Speaker C: 00:06:25

I just think on that difference between respect and deference I think also another thing is that respect is generally seen to you need to earn respect whereas I think there's something about deference where it's just it's given without necessarily that person deserving it or seemingly doing anything to deserve it it's just it's expected whereas I feel like with respect yeah there's a certain amount of oh I respect that person because of what they've done or what

Speaker A: 00:06:54

they've achieved or yeah with deference it feels more like it's a bit more static and a bit more

Speaker B: 00:06:58

status as well. Yeah well yeah and I also think there's an element of deference which is not related to the person or their capabilities but related to the role and the function you give you give deference to a position whereas you give respect to a person. Nice I like that. Okay so

Speaker A: 00:07:20

I don't know if I feel like there's some there's a there is a sort of yeah okay take a position that regardless of the thing that is if someone's a king they're going to be a king the whole time right what I was thinking was that you can have deference on a case-by-case basis so for example if I was you know if my piano tuner turned up started tuning the piano and then said and I said oh can I help and he said yeah tweak that thing there and bang that there I'd do what he said because I would be that would be deaf I'd be deferential to him in the at in the tuning of a piano. That's not really deference. But I think it is like what is deference ultimately than saying that you'll do what someone asks you to do like that's what being deferential ultimately what does it mean in practice right it means that that what they say no it doesn't well what does it mean I think because I think actually Chris hit upon it as well okay define it just ask me I'm answering behaviorally don't define it in terms of attitude no no listen okay you've asked I want to answer yeah and which is I know how you're going to answer and I'm stopping you from doing it I've got a bit I've got why bloody ask the question I'm just telling you not to answer it in the way that I know you're going to well I'm going to surprise you all right go on then so the answer my brain's on the answer is are you ready yeah I can talk yeah yeah so the answer is is that demonstration okay it's the the showingness of it okay so with a piano tuner it's just you and the piano tuner there okay and in one sense you're submitting but what's absent is presuming it's just the two of you there is that there's not a whole load of other people watching okay or to witness that you are um submitting to him so I therefore I don't think that counts as as as but you're talking about displays of deference well I know no you're saying that I think no no no I think it is though I think an element of of deference is that public display yeah

Speaker B: 00:09:16

absolutely I think I think there's also another bit did I answer it in a way you expected although

Speaker A: 00:09:21

even if you disagree yeah okay all right there you go but it seems obviously wrong okay uh the

Speaker B: 00:09:27

thing I was gonna know gonna add was um that um if you sort of submit to the chat the piano tuners every win opinion because they're expert in the thing they're expert in and but if they said to you um you know pick the piano up and drop it on your foot you wouldn't do right but I think with deference there's well if the queen told me to do that I wouldn't do it no I know you wouldn't but if it was a 500 years ago you'd blow you would have for sure but I think there's an element with deference which is that um it's an apart from the fact the piano wouldn't have existed it's an unquestioning loyalty as opposed to so yes if somebody said to you now go but but in you know I mean in in extreme terms you know you look at all those biblical stories about the things you know people um effectively submit to the will of god and and in order to display their deference might do all sorts of self-destructive stuff I'll do whatever you say up to a point uh whereas in the other example you're sort of saying okay you know about this at this stage it's in my interests to follow what you do yeah and I think also connected to

Speaker A: 00:10:43

my brilliant point earlier on which was really Chris's is that I think there's an element of hierarchy in society and saying this is where you fit in and I'm acknowledging that that's where you fit in and also where I fit in and although and I guess sort of secondary to that is um although I'm deferring to you I guess you know we get into like John Cleese Ronnie Barker kind of thing and um middle class upperclass all that business but I still want to talk about at some point why we might like that there's something people like to to to show deference but anyway

Speaker C: 00:11:14

Jordan I would say that the next example of the piano tuner it's not deference because there's not a status imbalance between you and the piano tuner I think there has to be a you that would be just taking the advice of an expert yeah it's just a skills imbalance and that's not this yeah deference is that societal level that status hierarchy I think that needs to be it is less

Speaker B: 00:11:35

bounded I suppose so the piano tuner you'd go okay right I'll do what you asked me to do on the on the piano front but when you display deference you're like you've more or less got carte blanche to tell me what to do and I'm sort of saying that I will respect your authority on a broad level now I get your point Nick about actually there's a sort of you can have compartmentalized deference but I think there's an element of deference which is that it shouldn't be yeah it's not true

Speaker A: 00:12:04

deference well I just think that's a you're doing a yeah you're just it's a sort of if by whiskey type argument you know what if you don't know what if you don't know what that is I can't be but the point is that yeah you're you're obfuscating because you just lost that argument there isn't even an argument look I'm just saying that you're using a definition of deference which I think is just way too narrow and is based on displays and kind of edge cases like kings I think you're missing that deference literally means just doing what someone tells you like what else well I suppose in a sense it means you defer to right that's what so so let's start there I mean and then then you can say okay well there's a particularly narrow kind of deference where you'll do literally what anyone tells you but even in the case of the queen and the piano example um I guess that's not true on a point of pedantry you might have just on the issue of god if god's telling you to do it well fair enough I mean he doesn't literally know everything yeah right so in that circumstance it makes sense if you've got like a god type figure who knows everything then presumably you know it does make sense to defer to them but actually it's what you're gonna do tell god he's wrong but actually what we are do want to talk about is what we all really understand by deference you know that's how we led this in with the queen and bending the knee we all know that we're talking about an actual observable thing okay fair I think at its root what it is is doing what someone tells you to do right now now then you say okay well how does do you so do you need now in my under that definition very broad definition you can't have a hierarchy without deference it's literally the same thing a hierarchy a power hierarchy where someone says okay here's what you need to do and you do it is the same as deference they're the same thing but but if you mean sort of bowing and scraping if you mean sort of displays of deference then that's different then I think there is a difference you know you can have you can have a power hierarchy without bowing and scraping so leading on from there maybe this is what you're saying well it's well I can understand why you might defer to a pianist you know because he knows what he's doing so why would you defer in in a monarchy I think there are some perhaps clear answers but we're getting more to this displays thing Chris yeah well I was just gonna I was

Speaker B: 00:14:32

just gonna say I think you know one one place where a lot of where you see power hierarchies in action is in in nature in you know with pack animals or domestic dogs obviously display deference and so on and tribes of primates and so and pecking orders you know so so they they do seem to abound in nature but interestingly I think deference and shows of deference are sort of bound up with one another because if nobody knows what the pecking order is it's difficult for the pecking order to exist and and the reason why you know what deference I think is about in this in this context is you know you have three animals you know which are relatively you know one is relatively stronger than all of them ones in the middle and ones at the bottom right now how do they know that right well because maybe they've had a fight at some stage and they've established that but they don't need to keep on having that fight right they can recognize hey I know you're bigger than me and so you get first choice of the of the you know the banana or something by demonstrating that and letting them go go first or by you know as animals do show showing deference to one another by bowing and and scraping so I think what the what the shows of deference are about is about signaling the existence of the power hierarchy without having to demonstrate it based on whatever the capability is all the time I think that was nicely said I

Speaker A: 00:16:11

agree and that gives you stability and security for everybody yeah and that sort of explains why uh there's a different scene you might think that with someone who's superior to you as power of you that the sorts of displays you'd see would be fear related like self-protection but they're more about showing vulnerability aren't they like lowering your head rolling on your back exactly lying prostate prostrate and uh and you know so yeah so that sort of explains it really it's like saying okay I'm just going to go straight in and say I've lost this fight and I'm going to be in a position where you can you can uh kill me if you want to yeah like I'm not posing a threat and therefore that makes you feel safe and then yeah and then therefore you know you but I'll take a banana

Speaker C: 00:16:53

please but you go first nice and I think that's kind of how it links into respect is because when a high status member of the group uh gives respect to a low status member that sort of that sort of dignity of being seen as reasonable keeps that low status member involved in the um in the group so it's like the deference is what kind of ties the kind of yeah together everyone's

Speaker B: 00:17:21

got something to win in that yeah and I think I so I think there's there's there's sort of two elements to to deference is this sort of social practical one right which is that we accept the the natural order of things and sometimes we might collectively demonstrate that to one another so for example in that court setting I was talking about you know we all stand up when the judge comes in because we're all saying we're we're going to be deferential to the judgment that comes out of this court and that means we don't need to argue about things we we're all accepting the law and showing that so there's that sort of practical element of society functions better when you've when you've got certain acceptance of authority or perhaps hierarchical systems and so so there's that element but I also think which kind of touches on what you were talking about um Fraser there's a psychological element to deference right which is uh you know people get pleasure out of receiving deference or and giving deference and uh there's something there about why we might want to to give deference and I think there's an element which is actually um phew that's off our shoulders we we don't have to like you know we accept this authority they're in charge thank goodness for that I don't have to carry the the weight of the world upon my my shoulders and and there's actually um there's a study I came across which I think sort of slightly backs that up which was about savannah baboons um and uh they were looking at the stress hormones

Speaker A: 00:19:01

well that's Robert Sapolsky the the the stress hormone in baboons quite a long name for baboon

Speaker B: 00:19:07

but anyway precisely and um so he was he was sort of uh looking at this idea that you know the baboons at the at the top of the hierarchy um have you know more sort of um stress hormones heavy as the crown heavy as the crown exactly um the ones at the bottom also don't have a great life and have a more you know um more stress hormones the middle guys are the are the happiest guys because they get a reasonable deal and they um and they they don't have to shoulder the responsibility of perhaps you know another greyback turning up or that's gorillas but uh you know another another dominant male turning up and and clobbering you over the head

Speaker A: 00:19:53

gins of deference by anderson: 2012

Speaker C: 00:24:17

I was just going to add that um yeah these the this idea of deference feels like it was formed when society was perhaps more collectivist or there was more of a um a group kind of mentality but now that we're in a more individualistic society perhaps I wonder if deference is as relevant or holds the same kind of power as it once did right because you can see you need

Speaker A: 00:24:42

in a troop of 50 chimpanzees do you need it in you know in in a globalized world and and I yeah I

Speaker B: 00:24:51

don't know yeah I mean I I think I think you you need the ceremony and the ritual I would I would argue almost more because in the past the legitimacy of the monarchy was less questioned by the um you know by the population uh whereas now you you you have rightly got people you know the idea of a monarch is democratically indefensible right and um but what you what you do what what's something like a coronation is all about and there's a very good scene in um the tv series the crown uh that shows the the coronation of um of queen elizabeth ii but what it really gets across is the idea of transforming this person somebody from a person to an institution and and and uh and you know the ceremony involves all sorts of magical mysticism of objects and screens and um and and effectively that's what you're trying to do you're trying to elevate this person from just somebody like us to somebody who we can collectively be deferential to

Speaker A: 00:26:08

for our um collective collective benefits and I can see why as you say the why the ceremony and ritual is crucial to that I feel which actually brings me on to that made me think this is could be a nice point to finish off on um anything anyone got anything urgent they want to

Speaker C: 00:26:25

say uh go on jordan kind of just on that last point that chris I just wonder if the pageantry and the ceremony is what creates the deference rather than is a product of it is it both maybe though maybe but I wonder if we feel deferential because we see like all the you know we have jubilees and we have ceremonies and pageantry and definitely an element of that and that creates this sense of like over oring and it must be the case yeah you know those you always hear

Speaker A: 00:26:56

about these don't you the nordic royals who go who go work in the post office and what's the point uh yeah why would you feel different yeah but I don't think you would no I think you'd feel comfortable having a chat with them yeah you know whereas what you want is what you want is someone who you you know you're worried you might get the wrong form of address or pick up the wrong spoon why dream I bet I bet Norwegians don't dream about dropping off the post with you know the princess whereas Brits are famously of course we dream about having tea with the queen um it's it's it's the number one ambition for all British people yeah absolutely of course now it will be forever a dream because we'll have to do it with the king instead nicely cup of tea with the king tea with the king still I would go for that um look to finish off um I think we should you know the elephant in the room um we need to talk a little bit about you know when you're talking about ceremony and ritual you talked about one end of it there which is the coronation are you happy to talk should we talk about the funeral briefly okay yeah go on um and what your thoughts were and I guess you know chuck them out chuck it out there what your I presume you watched it I think we need to go I think we should start off with uh Chris and then I want to hear the colonial point of view um and Chris Jordan as representative for all Australians and New Zealanders yeah and in fact the whole commonwealth yeah the whole commonwealth um Chris yeah I think

Speaker B: 00:28:19

so my my personal sense was uh that um that I felt there was an incredible amount of national hysteria about it right um uh and and and in fact I was on a whatsapp group where people were sending around amusing examples of respect so like um you know the kids tv character bing no but yes he's a big sort of rabbit furry rabbit thing and there was this ride you know the ride you put 20p in yeah kids go on when they're about two right somebody had slapped a a sign on that saying in in a pub corner of a pub somewhere saying in respect of the of the queen's death this ride will be temporarily suspended so there were all sorts of examples like that which I felt were very miscalculated but I nevertheless felt a sense of the history of of the change of monarch you know and and actually a sense of like well crikey they kept her going right until the end she was doing stuff that's that's a pretty decent feat of public service right so I was like you know that so so I felt personally moved on two respects one is this is a bit too much and another which is well you know actually she did deserve some respect the ceremony itself or lots of the ceremonial stuff around it I just loved it absolutely you know watching people in archaic uniforms marching up and down is pretty fascinating and um yeah and there's always that

Speaker A: 00:30:04

thing where you get a picture of somewhere near Whitehall yeah in the background someone goes and then and then suddenly drums start yeah it's very cool and so I think similar for me I think my sort of reaction and what I was kind of looking forward to and I felt a little bit guilty going I'm quite looking forward to this funeral it's gonna be a cork at this one um is is that ritual the ceremony um especially all the soldiers marching up and down and actually I think a nice element actually and I think they commented on it was you know when it's going past all these places you see when you're going about London but also when you've seen the queen the royal family in those places whether it be Bucking Palace where it be the cenotaph etc but you're seeing in a different context that kind of rounds it all up but um yeah just all those soldiers in the marching and all that business I loved it um but also uh yeah and also I was moved as well but also an element of pride no country is perfect um but I do think there's something quite sort of unique I would suggest um that the UK can do that and I was looking on every single news site as well not every bit around the world and it was blanket coverage on your news wall yes but blanket coverage around the on the front line of every single news thing in the whole globe which I think is quite remarkable um and um there was one other thing I was going to say that I've forgotten um bear with me oh yeah and also the sense of history because you can't just it's a bit like um you might buy Middlesbrough Football Club and pump loads of money into it but and that might be okay for a bit but it's not really sustainable it's not really a real thing you can't just magic this stuff all that ceremony all those different um elements is literally built up over a thousand years you know and you can't just replicate that so I thought it was quite special that's my sort

Speaker C: 00:31:48

of yeah so uh Jordan thoughts yeah I think um as you were just saying it felt very British it felt very it felt very much like something that the British do quite well the pageantry thing and I think from a colonial Commonwealth perspective it probably threw up some questions as to you know like there wasn't much about the Commonwealth I mean there were people I thought there was loads but I'm not I'm not from I don't know it just I felt like they wouldn't shut up about the Australians yeah and yeah but also had all those Mounties leading the whole blood yeah yeah no that's true actually you did but it just um I think it threw up questions of like why is someone from another country our head of state perhaps because it just feels like very much it is a British institution although there is the Commonwealth aspect there is something uniquely it seems like it stands

Speaker A: 00:32:35

for Britain I know take I know technically Australia is independent but it's not is it

Speaker C: 00:32:43

we all know it's basically British um basically basically well for the moment even technically

Speaker A: 00:32:50

yeah um Nick yeah like like everyone else I'd really enjoyed the ceremony um I'm a monarchist I suppose because I'm a sort of empirical conservative in the sense that I think keeping things the same um is generally better than trying to change them and um I I am slightly baffled by all these people who are sort of you know uh oh let's get rid of the monarchy King Charles is stupid they're all the same people who've been going on about how stupid President Trump is for example I mean that's what you'd get if you didn't have you know uh uh if we didn't have an unelected head of state we'd have an elected one and that's not going to be any better is it and yeah so no one I don't think even most monarchists think that King Charles or Queen Elizabeth for that matter has earned their status no one thinks that no one thinks if we started from scratch and voted for a king it will be him that we go for that's not the point right the point is that all of this stuff is there really just to cement that bit of the constitution and to say right well we've got this institution which is technically the head of state isn't really doesn't do anything but you know it's technically there and it has this thousand plus year years of history behind it and um you know that sense of like well this is stable we're in a country where it hasn't doesn't really we don't have radical shake-ups a lot we can all sleep a bit easier in our beds knowing that you know we probably in 100 or 500 years you know maybe it'll be pretty similar they'll still be doing similar things and that's nice people like that so I you know I'm a fan um and actually I'm more of a fan I think of King Charles than most people seem to be everyone he's still got this reputation for being a bit sort of you know a bit of a kind of plonker um which I think has come out of the press coverage of his statements from the 80s and 90s I think that perception has is still around that he's a kind of well what what were those zany things about sustainable development environmentalism you know all these oh yeah totally weird things I mean if I was his spin doctors I would be saying look this is what we go for he's a visionary he's a thinking visionary guy who saw the writing on the wall and saw these problems years before everyone else um and in fact the press was wrong and we were all wrong to accuse him yeah yeah and you're starting to see something we can't go on about this too much but you're starting to see some of that in unlikely places like The Guardian um making the kind of points that you're making there as well good even The Guardian but I've also got a good example of a of a uh respectful um a respectful cancellation which was the Godalming the Godalming duck race oh really yeah I was having to be walking through Godalming uh about a week before the funeral and going where the hell are all the ducks yeah the there's a duck race in rubber ducks oh okay not real ducks um anyway someone had scribbled on it in felt tip cancelled r.i.p. e2r all over the poster with the rubber duck on did you take a photo uh did yeah good yeah I'll show you later nice nice nice yeah I just Charles I think he's got a chance here I got I think he's got a shot becoming a Gandalf like figure you know that's what I reckon oh interesting yeah because you know wise sage but actually got to be quite tacit as well now um so yeah tacit or taciturn tacit oh well it depends what you mean of course that's the way words work big or small yeah and we'll leave it on that mystery there um all right thank you as always thank you as always for listening to the Cognitive Engineering Podcast I'm Fraser McGruer being here with Jordan Fermanis, Chris Wragg and Nick Hare of Aleph Insights until next time goodbye