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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: jbe who wrote (4656)	2/5/2001 4:03:13 AM
From: Dayuhan	Respond to of 82486

What about Kropotkin's argument that cooperation plays at least a big a role as competition? I suspect that cooperation plays a larger role within packs, while competition plays a larger role among them. I also believe that the history of human social progress is paralleled, and largely generated, by a steady progression in the size of the group that we consider "us". Clans banded to form communities, communities to form city-states, city-states to form nations. Very slowly, very gradually, we are reaching the point where a few of us are actually willing to accept the idea of the entire species being "us". At the same time, the notion of expedience has grown to embrace a much larger scope and a much larger time horizon. We see the "us and them" mentality and the focus on short term expedience in their rawest forms among tribal peoples. They remain influential in more sophisticated cultures, but the consensus on what constitutes "us" and what "them", and on what course is most expedient, begins to break down as some individuals, and later whole cultures, begin expanding their horizons. This accounts for the individuals that act to prevent members of other tribes from being abused. They are still acting for "us" and for reasons of expedience, they simply have a larger definition of "us" and a broader definition of expedience than their benighted fellows. In my opinion, of course, and I confess that it's a bit of a spur-of-the-moment theory. Why is it easier for people [in this case, you] to believe in the innateness of "bad" qualities (e.g., cruelty, clannishness) than in the innateness of "good" ones (e.g., kindness, empathy)? I don't believe that either bad or good qualities are innate. I believe that the basic drives that generate those qualities are innate. Are clannishness and cruelty "bad" qualities? Or are they merely qualities that were once needed for survival, but have outlived their usefulness and become liabilities?