Kindness May Be Our Best Survival Mechanism
Have we got the idea of natural selection all wrong?
It is in the nature of humans to be social. This is an important point to take in before we go any further.
“Man is by nature a social animal; an individual who is unsocial naturally and not accidentally is either beneath our notice or more than human. Society is something that precedes the individual. Anyone who either cannot lead the common life or is so self-sufficient as not to need to, and therefore does not partake of society, is either a beast or a god. ” — Aristotle
Being part of a group is a prerequisite to being human — rather than the consequence of it. Similarly, a bird doesn’t grow wings because it is a bird; it is a bird because it has wings.
The order in which facts stem from one another is crucial.
When we start seeing our humanity as resulting from living in a group, then we can also ask more adequate questions about our nature and culture. We may be able to notice that what serves us best on both individual and global level is in our nature already — and therefore doesn’t need to be forcefully imposed, buy merely discovered.
What if we wouldn’t have to reinforce rules by executing the law in courts to maintain social order? What if it was…