Last night, I started reading about how feedback loops work. The simplest explanation of the whole thing is that you have a system, and the system has inputs (things that go in) and outputs (things that come out). A feedback loop is what you have when you connect the output back to the input. So that means that what is flowing out of the system is pumped back in again.

This can have two main effects on the system. Say you have positively charged inputs to that system, but you have negative outputs. This means, that when fed back into the system, some of your inputs will now become negative. Negative feedback is the term used to describe this. Generally, it describes such a system where the systemic processes are either slowing down or else remaining stable. Homeostasis, stabilizing the system, is one of the main functions of negative feedback.

Positive feedback, on the other hand, is when your system accelerates. Your input is positive, and your output is positive. So when the output is fed back in, it effectively boosts your positive inputs. If left unchecked, the main function of positive feedback is to explode the system. However, it also frequently serves to take the system up to a higher level - evolution - at which point negative feedback will kick back in, and a new higher equilibrium can be achieved.

This feels very closely related to what I was describing yesterday with fundamentalism and syncretism. If you look at a story as a system with some kind of feedback loop, fundamentalism corresponds somehow to a negative feedback loop. The story-system is homeostatically maintained at its current level. Syncretism, on the other hand is more like a positive feedback loop. New elements are fed into the system, and the overall energy in the system is boosted. Either a new syncretic religion will be formed (ie, Santeria), or perhaps the system will be destroyed altogether. I also might relate this to what I was saying about why certain people seem to seek out cognitive dissonance, and why some avoid it. I would guess it has to do with that different people play out different roles in the feedback loop of our culture, so that it stays relatively stable, but that it also can evolve to higher levels of equilibrium.