ABSTRACT
For conceptual clarity, it is essential to distinguish between two aspects of kama muta. The psychological mechanism that responds to sudden intensification of communal sharing is the “psype.” It is attuned to the cultural implementations of communal sharing that are important, to the signs of intensification, and to the effective and culturally appropriate manner of enacting devotion and commitment to communal sharing. The psype generates a brief emotional moment – a “mote.” The mote is the kama muta experience on a given occasion. The psype is a natural kind; it is definitely delineated, both with respect to its universal features and its culturally particular realizations. The mote is also a natural kind, although always culturally informed and oriented. For certain analytic purposes, however, one could focus research more narrowly on the psype or motes in the context of a particular practice, institution, or culture: for example, in Krishna worship, or in reunions. Like other social emotions, the function of kama muta is to mediate changes in social relationships, motivating adaptive responses to new relational problems and opportunities. Thus the motivating force of kama muta is an immediate psychological proxy for the fitness benefits of good communal sharing relationships. A great many cultural institutions and practices culturally evolve as adaptations to the kama muta psype: the psype is a niche and selective force to which cultural practices adapt. In these practices and institutions people may ‘ritually’ perform kama muta motes, and such ritual performances often afford phenomenological motes. Practices and institutions that have culturally evolved to evoke kama muta are “drivers.” Drivers are culturally adapted to the psype.
