That tallies with the fable of a Jewish man stranded on an uninhabited island: when the rescuers find him years later, he has built not one but two synagogues. Obviously, "one I go to, and the other I shun".
One problem with not being interested in "how and why things happen" is that those things might take an interest in you.
That the American variety of "English" tolerate the Amish is actually rather historically unusual, contrast what happened to the Amish who stayed in Europe.
Yes; I have a soft spot for the Amish, but they're fundamentally parasitic on their host societies. They're not a particularly *virulent* parasite, but it's pretty clear to me they'd die outside of their host.
This is why headlines like "the Amish / haredim will inherit the Earth" (yes, I am calling out Robin Hanson) are such nonsense; they can only grow quickly inside their sheltered cocoon.
Why? If all the 'English' were to die out (not in a cataclysm but over time through low birthrates) couldn't the Amish just keep farming, now with more available land and less use of modern technology (which would require a larger world to make), but then that's fine since they wouldn't be competing against other people with the new stuff?
It only takes a weakening of the centraliswd state for a violent militia to crush the Amish and take their land. The American state provides active protection, not just a passive envelope.
If only the American 'English' die out, the Amish would be left at the mercy of other groups who would either not tolerate them, or see them as victims to be exploited.
Also, even without any outsiders they'd still run into problems with any children who reject their absolute pacifism.
“You don’t even need to share the ‘no’ if you share enough of the ‘yes’” is a good hypothesis, but I'm not sure it's supported by the evidence you've provided here from the Amish.
Things that are not predictive of high community retention rates:
- Yes or no to mechanization
- Yes or no to farming and unified household work
- Yes or no to teenage liberties
- Yes or no to living near other settlements in the community
Things that are predictive of high community retention rates:
- No to self, yes to community: Gelassenheit
- No to individual conscience, conviction, and relationship with God
- No to homeschooling and family culture
- No to interacting with anyone who commits excommunicable offenses
- No to Openness (in the Big Five sense)
- Yes to their particular community regardless of whatever its Ordnung or member list might be at the moment
Also, it provides a surprising amount of support for the often-denied hypothesis that you can have a strong community that's directly and explicitly optimizing for having a strong community rather than as a side effect of some other shared goal (like religion maybe?).
If you are Haidt-pilled, you might recall, though, that costly signaling still seems to work better, somehow, within religious communities than secular ones:
“The anthropologist Richard Sosis…found one master variable: the number of costly sacrifices that each commune demanded from its members. It was things like giving up alcohol and tobacco, fasting for days at a time, conforming to a communal dress code or hairstyle, or cutting ties with outsiders. For religious communes, the effect was perfectly linear: the more sacrifice a commune demanded, the longer it lasted. But Sosis was surprised to discover that demands for sacrifice did not help secular communes.” https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/12/list-of-the-passages-i-highlighted-in-my-copy-of-jonathan-haidts-the-righteous-mind/
As I recall, the Amish, like the Hutterites, were originally urban craftsmen, and farming was just a way to maintain their communities after they left Germany.
I'm curious if there is a notable difference in retention between boys and girls. Anecdotally, the Orthodox Jewish community has a higher retention rate for girls than for boys.
The authors never mention it, and a quick Google search doesn’t find a breakdown. They do talk a little more about unmarried women than unmarried men, though.
There is an Orthodox Jewish phenomenon of unmarried women, more than unmarried men. Proposed causes include demographics (boys traditionally began dating at about 23, while girls traditionally began dating at about 20; with a growing population, this leads to more girls of dating age than boys; this theory has led to calls (occasionally heeded) for boys to begin dating at younger ages) and the higher dropout rates in boys’ high schools (generally blamed on a more intense academic status system).
I wonder whether the Amish are dealing with something like issue #2.
The Amish all leave school after 8th grade and go to work, so they’re well-positioned economically to marry as soon as they’re baptized (usually early 20s). They tend to marry people about their own age. My guess is that the authors talked more about women because the traditional Amish woman’s role is so heavily wife-based that an unmarried Amish woman’s life differs much more from a married one than the equivalent for men.
Sounds plausible. The greater visibility hypothesis was popular at one point in the Orthodox community, essentially a denial of the imbalance, but it's fallen out of favor, and the imbalance has come to be the accepted narrative. Hard data is hard to come by, but I think there were some surveys that helped to settle the narrative, although it was ultimately settled, at least as a matter of communal discussion, by various Rabbis insisting it was settled.
I have no idea if there's good data, or where to find it if it exists.
Frankly if there is an imbalance I assume it’s mostly because women are less likely than men to make *any* kind of big dramatic risky change in their lives. I bet UMC secular liberalism has higher retention among women too.
My understanding is that the Amish retention rate is slightly higher with women rather than men, generating persistent small surpluses of unmatchable women. I'm not aware of any convincing analysis as to why this is the case but it is easy to generate plausible theories.
My understanding is that young Amish people who opt not to be baptized into the church are not shunned, but they do have to leave the community. Since they have only 8th grade educations, their employment options in "the world" would be quite limited - but if they are boys who have either learned a trade or done enough barn-raisings to be able to work construction, they can probably still earn a living. It would be a lot harder for girls to support themselves; they'd be limited to the sort of minimum-wage jobs that don't require high school diplomas.
I also am inclined to think that the separation from family, friends and community is probably more of an issue for girls than for boys. (I'm basing this idea on the fact that my young adult daughters call, text and visit me frequently, but my friends with young adult sons report that they barely hear from them once they leave home; and I always have to remind my husband to call his mother occasionally.)
" A social world built around eschewing a particular technology just won’t hang together unless you have a shared vision of the good thing you’re trying to preserve or create by not using it, and your own personal use or non-use becomes far more sustainable when it’s part of your community membership."
This resonates deeply. Far too few of us enjoy a positive vision for the use of our technology, the depth of our relationships and the purpose of family life. A world built around saying no is a bubble that will certainly pop.
"My local mom list features regular posts by nice secular Haidt-pilled ladies looking for low- or zero-tech schools for their kids, but they always go away dejected and wondering why all the schools are Christian. Well, that’s why. "
I, uh, feel specifically called out, also by the education bit later. I'm only not more suspicious because I'm not American!
While furniture is not where I come across the Amish, they are highly recommended around here for construction projects. They did my neighbor's deck (fully in Trex) and it's still gorgeous years later. Moreover, I have found that the only place to get a proper leather belt, that is solid, real leather through and through, is via Amish workshop. Thankfully, they sell on Etsy.
Thank you for this! I live very close to an Amish area and so I have a mezzanine-level seat to all this. We have vacationed there in an Amish-owned AirBnB and the owner admitted that the cell phone that made this possible was strictly off-the-record. I really don't think they could have decorated the place without Pinterest either. So, is this truly sustainable? For their sake, I hope so. The Amish are really nice as people, although one could take issue with some of their practices (as many of their neighbors do).
Interesting article. I would note that according to a book I read (Rumspringa by Tom Schachtman) the move from farming to wage labor is not forced by a scarcity of land, but chosen by folks who realize that farming is just really laborious.
Sad that even unbaptized Amish girls don’t get to own cars. All the supposed freedom of rumspring, and you’re still stuck waiting for a brother or boyfriend to drive you
They drive, install electricity, and use computers and phones, so they’re “one step up” from the most liberal Amish group, the New Order Christian Fellowship, who are one step up from the regular New Order. The Amish don’t think they’re Amish (at least in Holmes County), largely because of the cars.
Footnote 5 reminds me of the last two Jews in Afghanistan, who each had their own synagogue because they refused to speak to each other.
That tallies with the fable of a Jewish man stranded on an uninhabited island: when the rescuers find him years later, he has built not one but two synagogues. Obviously, "one I go to, and the other I shun".
Good job fighting back against "teloi".
As the Strugatsky Brothers wrote:
“The most important thing’s not to bother anyone, then no one will bother you, eh?”
Rumata shook his head. “Oh, no,” he said. “The ones who don’t bother anyone get slaughtered first.”
This was brilliant.
One problem with not being interested in "how and why things happen" is that those things might take an interest in you.
That the American variety of "English" tolerate the Amish is actually rather historically unusual, contrast what happened to the Amish who stayed in Europe.
Yes; I have a soft spot for the Amish, but they're fundamentally parasitic on their host societies. They're not a particularly *virulent* parasite, but it's pretty clear to me they'd die outside of their host.
This is why headlines like "the Amish / haredim will inherit the Earth" (yes, I am calling out Robin Hanson) are such nonsense; they can only grow quickly inside their sheltered cocoon.
Why? If all the 'English' were to die out (not in a cataclysm but over time through low birthrates) couldn't the Amish just keep farming, now with more available land and less use of modern technology (which would require a larger world to make), but then that's fine since they wouldn't be competing against other people with the new stuff?
It only takes a weakening of the centraliswd state for a violent militia to crush the Amish and take their land. The American state provides active protection, not just a passive envelope.
If only the American 'English' die out, the Amish would be left at the mercy of other groups who would either not tolerate them, or see them as victims to be exploited.
Also, even without any outsiders they'd still run into problems with any children who reject their absolute pacifism.
“You don’t even need to share the ‘no’ if you share enough of the ‘yes’” is a good hypothesis, but I'm not sure it's supported by the evidence you've provided here from the Amish.
Things that are not predictive of high community retention rates:
- Yes or no to mechanization
- Yes or no to farming and unified household work
- Yes or no to teenage liberties
- Yes or no to living near other settlements in the community
Things that are predictive of high community retention rates:
- No to self, yes to community: Gelassenheit
- No to individual conscience, conviction, and relationship with God
- No to homeschooling and family culture
- No to interacting with anyone who commits excommunicable offenses
- No to Openness (in the Big Five sense)
- Yes to their particular community regardless of whatever its Ordnung or member list might be at the moment
This seems like a better but still not comprehensive fit with Scott Alexander’s hypothesis about how costly signaling assists community cohesion: https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/12/17/the-toxoplasma-of-rage/
Here's another example of how costly signaling can maintain the boundaries of backscratchers clubs: https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/lifeboat-games-and-backscratchers
Also, it provides a surprising amount of support for the often-denied hypothesis that you can have a strong community that's directly and explicitly optimizing for having a strong community rather than as a side effect of some other shared goal (like religion maybe?).
If you are Haidt-pilled, you might recall, though, that costly signaling still seems to work better, somehow, within religious communities than secular ones:
“The anthropologist Richard Sosis…found one master variable: the number of costly sacrifices that each commune demanded from its members. It was things like giving up alcohol and tobacco, fasting for days at a time, conforming to a communal dress code or hairstyle, or cutting ties with outsiders. For religious communes, the effect was perfectly linear: the more sacrifice a commune demanded, the longer it lasted. But Sosis was surprised to discover that demands for sacrifice did not help secular communes.” https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/12/list-of-the-passages-i-highlighted-in-my-copy-of-jonathan-haidts-the-righteous-mind/
As I recall, the Amish, like the Hutterites, were originally urban craftsmen, and farming was just a way to maintain their communities after they left Germany.
I'm curious if there is a notable difference in retention between boys and girls. Anecdotally, the Orthodox Jewish community has a higher retention rate for girls than for boys.
The authors never mention it, and a quick Google search doesn’t find a breakdown. They do talk a little more about unmarried women than unmarried men, though.
There is an Orthodox Jewish phenomenon of unmarried women, more than unmarried men. Proposed causes include demographics (boys traditionally began dating at about 23, while girls traditionally began dating at about 20; with a growing population, this leads to more girls of dating age than boys; this theory has led to calls (occasionally heeded) for boys to begin dating at younger ages) and the higher dropout rates in boys’ high schools (generally blamed on a more intense academic status system).
I wonder whether the Amish are dealing with something like issue #2.
The Amish all leave school after 8th grade and go to work, so they’re well-positioned economically to marry as soon as they’re baptized (usually early 20s). They tend to marry people about their own age. My guess is that the authors talked more about women because the traditional Amish woman’s role is so heavily wife-based that an unmarried Amish woman’s life differs much more from a married one than the equivalent for men.
Sounds plausible. The greater visibility hypothesis was popular at one point in the Orthodox community, essentially a denial of the imbalance, but it's fallen out of favor, and the imbalance has come to be the accepted narrative. Hard data is hard to come by, but I think there were some surveys that helped to settle the narrative, although it was ultimately settled, at least as a matter of communal discussion, by various Rabbis insisting it was settled.
I have no idea if there's good data, or where to find it if it exists.
Frankly if there is an imbalance I assume it’s mostly because women are less likely than men to make *any* kind of big dramatic risky change in their lives. I bet UMC secular liberalism has higher retention among women too.
> Anecdotally, the Orthodox Jewish community has a higher retention rate for girls than for boys.
Almost all religions have that, perhaps all.
Mormons have it really bad.
My understanding is that the Amish retention rate is slightly higher with women rather than men, generating persistent small surpluses of unmatchable women. I'm not aware of any convincing analysis as to why this is the case but it is easy to generate plausible theories.
My understanding is that young Amish people who opt not to be baptized into the church are not shunned, but they do have to leave the community. Since they have only 8th grade educations, their employment options in "the world" would be quite limited - but if they are boys who have either learned a trade or done enough barn-raisings to be able to work construction, they can probably still earn a living. It would be a lot harder for girls to support themselves; they'd be limited to the sort of minimum-wage jobs that don't require high school diplomas.
I also am inclined to think that the separation from family, friends and community is probably more of an issue for girls than for boys. (I'm basing this idea on the fact that my young adult daughters call, text and visit me frequently, but my friends with young adult sons report that they barely hear from them once they leave home; and I always have to remind my husband to call his mother occasionally.)
" A social world built around eschewing a particular technology just won’t hang together unless you have a shared vision of the good thing you’re trying to preserve or create by not using it, and your own personal use or non-use becomes far more sustainable when it’s part of your community membership."
This resonates deeply. Far too few of us enjoy a positive vision for the use of our technology, the depth of our relationships and the purpose of family life. A world built around saying no is a bubble that will certainly pop.
"My local mom list features regular posts by nice secular Haidt-pilled ladies looking for low- or zero-tech schools for their kids, but they always go away dejected and wondering why all the schools are Christian. Well, that’s why. "
I, uh, feel specifically called out, also by the education bit later. I'm only not more suspicious because I'm not American!
While furniture is not where I come across the Amish, they are highly recommended around here for construction projects. They did my neighbor's deck (fully in Trex) and it's still gorgeous years later. Moreover, I have found that the only place to get a proper leather belt, that is solid, real leather through and through, is via Amish workshop. Thankfully, they sell on Etsy.
Thank you for this! I live very close to an Amish area and so I have a mezzanine-level seat to all this. We have vacationed there in an Amish-owned AirBnB and the owner admitted that the cell phone that made this possible was strictly off-the-record. I really don't think they could have decorated the place without Pinterest either. So, is this truly sustainable? For their sake, I hope so. The Amish are really nice as people, although one could take issue with some of their practices (as many of their neighbors do).
Interesting article. I would note that according to a book I read (Rumspringa by Tom Schachtman) the move from farming to wage labor is not forced by a scarcity of land, but chosen by folks who realize that farming is just really laborious.
Sad that even unbaptized Amish girls don’t get to own cars. All the supposed freedom of rumspring, and you’re still stuck waiting for a brother or boyfriend to drive you
They do occasionally, but much less often than the boys, yes.
What about the Beachy Amish? Where do they fit in this picture? What is the nature of their relationship with other Amish groups?
They drive, install electricity, and use computers and phones, so they’re “one step up” from the most liberal Amish group, the New Order Christian Fellowship, who are one step up from the regular New Order. The Amish don’t think they’re Amish (at least in Holmes County), largely because of the cars.
Very informative. Thank you!
This podcast about change in Amish culture was interesting
https://open.substack.com/pub/jasonmanning/p/episode-1-secrets-of-the-amish