SOCIETY: Stages of Social Evolution 7/4/21
OVERVIEW
The confusion, conflict and violence in modern human societies are behaviors that reflect the instincts that helped our ancient ancestors' survival over billions of years. There was a long time when adults were in lethal competition with each other and everything else to survive. At the end of that time our ancient ancestors were a small population. They were slow and weak in comparison to their predators. Their primary defense seems to have been climbing in trees.
Sometime in the last million years, our ancient ancestors started to cooperate with each other rather than just competing. This began the development of human societies that continues today and dominates the planet.
By focusing on the extent of that cooperation, we can follow our ancient ancestors' social development over time. That development can be separated into eight ideal stages. Each successive stage improved the survival chances of individuals and of our species. None of the stages existed in a pure form. There is always going to be a hopefully compatible mix of behaviors prior and subsequent to the primary stage. There are always going to be those not ready to embrace the primary stage behaviors as well as those anticipating later stage behaviors.
Here is a brief summary of those eight ideal stages.
PRIMARY STAGES OF SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
INDIVIDUAL (Pre-Social): Solitary, self-serving adults with no sustained cooperation. The first, Individual stage is based on allegiance to self-reliance. This matches the majority of life on our planet: solitary adults in lethal competition with everything to survive. Since there is no sustained cooperation between adults, this is a pre-social stage that likely extends back in time to the beginning of life on the planet, four billion years ago.
Survival benefits of the Individual stage include selection of the most physically robust genes and acceleration of that evolution through competition and predation.
The Individual stage represents the base line of survival behavior: find food, avoid danger, reproduce.
FAMILY: Pairs of cooperating adults. The second, Family stage involved allegiance between two adults as partners. This is the first example of sustained cooperation between adults. This stage is also shared by a number of other species that mate for life. Families would compete with each other.
Survival benefits of the Family stage include: sharing food and protection between the adults and the rest of the family; training the children in the combined family traditions of both parents.
TRIBAL: Groups of cooperating families. As the second stage consists of cooperating individuals in Families, the next stage consists of families cooperating in Tribes. Tribes compete with each other. Although the members of a tribe support and protect each other, their primary allegiance is to the culture of the tribe, particularly the traditions. Tribes seem to have appeared about 500,000 years ago.
Survival benefits of the Tribe stage include: extended cooperation among families; tribal traditions based on the best of all the family traditions; larger groups are better defended; diversity and hostility between tribes spurred social evolution.
NATION: Groups of cooperating tribes. The fourth stage consists of tribes cooperating with each other in Nations. Nations compete with each other economically but in order to compete violently, national behavior has to regress to the Tribe stage of behavior.
Nation stage behavior is a very significant change from the first three stages which were based on instinctive behavior. From the National stage on, behavior is based on training, education and conscious choice. Most of the instincts of the first three stages are in conflict with later stage behavior and goals. The rise of abundant food from agricultural settlements replacing hunting and gathering made this stage possible.
Survival benefits of the National stage include: extended cooperation among tribes; acceptance of diversity within the nation inspires innovation; a larger cooperating population allows for more specialization which supports more innovation; a larger cooperating population reduces internecine fatalities; less aggressive behavior provides for greater economic cooperation among nations.
GLOBE: All nations cooperating. The fifth stage consists of all nations relaxing their individual identities to cooperate in a global society. This also accomplishes global peace among humanity.
Survival benefits of the Global stage include; elimination of war; elimination of bigotry; elimination of genocide; global economies; global innovations; global perspectives.
LIFE: Humanity respecting all life. The sixth stage prioritizes respect for all Life on the planet as humanity steps away from the role of predator to the role of steward. In this stage, sustainability and responsible behavior become paramount as we protect not only our species but all life on the planet as much as we can.
Survival benefits of the Life stage include: sustainable biosphere; maintenance of diversity; minimization of extinction; robust ecology.
PLANET: Humanity respecting the planet and all its resources. The seventh stage adds respect for our entire planet as humanity adjusts behavior from irresponsible consumption to sustainable cooperation with the resources of the planet.
Survival benefits of the Planet stage include: sustainable natural planetary resources; assurance of the full term existence of humanity and life on Earth.
UNIVERSE: Humanity respecting the universe and all its resources. The eighth stage extends the seventh stage as we leave the planet to explore the Universe.
Survival benefits of the Universe stage include: sustainable universal resources; assurance of the full term existence of humanity and life in the universe.
ORIGINS
The behavior of cooperation likely began with mothers raising babies in the Individual stage. Plants release many seeds to reproduce without any conscious protection. Fungi release spores. Some animal species lay eggs and abandon them. Some animal species protect eggs and some protect the brood. Mammals carry fertile eggs and embryos within the mother's body. This puts the mother at risk as she needs to eat more, is less agile and slower when pregnant. Then she has to share food with her children which is unique in the Individual stage. This does not help her survive. Young born of mammals tend to be weak and awkward. They need to be fed and protected by the mother while they develop physically. They make easy prey. None of this seems to contribute to the survival of their species. What benefit could offset all of these liabilities? The young follow their mother and learn what she knows from imitation if nothing else. The young may lethally bully each other or they may learn to cooperate. They do learn to cooperate with their mother or they do not get fed or protected.
The benefits from live birth are very powerful and the inception of sharing, cooperation and knowledge retained across generations. These benefits seem to have powered our weak, slow and feeble ancestors into the species that currently dominates the planet. In the Individual stage the relationship between mother and live born progeny established the basic behaviors of society.
TRANSITIONS
The bridge from Individual to Family stages probably started when a male chose to stay with the female he just impregnated instead of wandering off in search of food and more females. Perhaps he made a kill shortly after mating and let her have some of the food. In cooperating with the female he increased his chances of survival, her chances of survival and his genes chances of survival. They shared food, protected each other and the children. The shared traditions from their individual families. Cooperative pairs out survived solitary individuals. This would lead to a dominance of Family behavior and the initial stage of society.
Families that cooperated in hunting and killing larger game would have a better chance of surviving than those who lived by themselves. The cooperating families would need to combine their family traditions adopting the best from each. This could have been the roots of Tribe stage behavior as bonding through tradition supplemented the commitment between individuals of the Family stage.
Tribes that traded with each other rather than fighting would establish bridges leading toward the Nation stage. Tribes that formed alliances for defense or aggression also established bridges. More likely, the earliest cooperation among tribes was the result of a conqueror enforcing peace on an empire. Allowing constituent tribes to continue violently squabbling with each other reduced the supply of farmers, food and taxes as well as maintaining a potential threat to the reign of a conqueror. Involuntary cooperation was likely the first attempt at the Nation stage. As nations matured from military might to economic might they find themselves trading, visiting and sharing populations with other nations. This blending of nations is a difficult task but taken slowly enough the bridge to the Global stage of society can be nurtured.
In the Globe stage food, shelter and survival are no longer dominant priorities and the society can begin to appreciate the balance of nature as well as the imbalance inflicted by the consumption of the global society. Extending respect and cooperation to the balance of all living things is the path to the Life stage of society and the preservation of life on the planet
With the wider awareness and extent of cooperation in the Globe stage of society, there is the chance to recognize that consuming the planet is not a sustainable option. Extending respect and cooperation with the inanimate resources of the planet provides the path to perpetual sustainability and the Planet stage of society.
The wisdom and awareness to protect the planet easily extends to extra terrestrial migrations and carries humanity to the Universe stage of social evolution.
REGRESSIONS 7/4/21
Evolving stages of society took a lot of time. Devolving them is relatively easy and quick. As the Rule of Opposites explores, nature provides progressive influences and simultaneously provides regressive influences. For each of the bridges to progress a society, there are individuals, groups and situations waiting to regress it, to recycle it. This is all part of Decomposition.
Death is the only devolution path from the Individual stage.
A family can devolve into the Individual stage if one of the adults dies or if the couple is clearing failing to survive from predators, lack of food or shelter.
A tribe can devolve into the component families if the tribe loses faith in the defining traditions, if the tribe is devastated in battle or if the families lose trust in each other. If the failure of the tribe is painful enough, it may devolve, at least in part, to the Individual stage.
Young nations are just alliances of hostile tribes awaiting the chance to resume hostilities and devolve back to the Tribe stage. If conflicts within a nation cause a split to civil war, the warring components are each at the Tribe stage again. If the failure of leaders of a nation to lead is extreme enough and there is no practical provision for their recall, the disparate tribes may withdraw from the Nation. If the population perceives betrayal by the leaders, by the government or by a portion of the population, the nation may devolve. If the flaws in a nation are extreme enough and abrupt enough, the population may devolve across all the regressed stages.
By analogy, a societies more advanced than the Nation stage would devolve into regressed stages if the primary failed or appeared to fail, if the population lost trust in the primary stage.
SUBORDINATE STAGE BEHAVIOR
There are likely no pure stages of societies. Groups with greater commitment to lesser stage behavior than their primary stage are generally outlaws or at least agents of decomposition. The are also agents of diversity serving to ease a catastrophic regression since they are ready to lead the behavior at less progressed stages.
Subordinate stage behavior are those behaviors associated with lesser stages of social evolution pursued within a respect for a primary commitment to the primary stage. People committed to the Nation stage can benefit all by taking time to themselves in individual, limited competition or any solitary activity. We all have alone time, family time, tribe time and subordinate nation time as well as a primary commitment to Nation behavior.
If people pursue solitary activity or activity with their family they are enjoying the associated subordinate stage behaviors. If people gather for a shared belief it would be as a subordinate tribe. If people gather for an organization within the Nation that has a constitution or other social contract it would be as a subordinate nation.
All of these levels of activity support the richness of the nation so long as the primary commitment is to the primary national social contract.
SURVIVAL MODES 8/31/19
A lot of people are familiar with the fight or flight survival reflexes. They are part of the Individual stage and extend life by selecting the strongest and fleetest. In this stage the survival of individuals directly support the survival of the species.
In the Family stage, we see that parents will risk their lives to protect their family. This family level of survival reflex is stronger than the individual survival reflex. The survival benefits of protecting the family directly support the survival of the species. Survival of the individual is secondary.
In the Tribe stage we see families willing to sacrifice themselves to protect the tribe. This level of survival reflex is even stronger than the family survival reflex because the survival of the tribe better supports the survival of the species. Survival of the family and the individual are secondary.
By the rational stages instincts no longer necessarily rule our behavior. In a functioning rational society conflicts are resolved without violence before survival reflexes take over. When survival reflexes are triggered in a rational society, people regress to Tribe, Family or even Individual stage behaviors and instincts.
RETAINED KNOWLEDGE 8/31/19
Retention of knowledge has had an extremely important impact on human development from an insignificant mammal population to dominating the planet.
In advanced forms of the INDIVIDUAL stage, mothers tend their children until they are mature enough to survive on their own. In doing so she passes on the knowledge of her ancestral mothers as well as her own . Parents tending their children represent the seeds of cooperation which will flourish among adults in later stages. This retaining of knowledge represents the foundation of tradition which later be the keel of the TRIBE stage. This also illuminates why childhood experiences tend to last a lifetime.
In the FAMILY stage, two parents tend the children and pass on the knowledge of both the father and mother family lines. The children benefit from both. The parents benefit from sharing each other's retained knowledge. This retained knowledge becomes the new family's traditions.
In the TRIBE stage, the retained knowledge from all the member families is shared and prioritized to create the traditions and belief systems that define the society. It is the combination of the power of families cooperating and the combined retained intelligence that catapulted our ancestors from a barely surviving species to a rapidly expanding one.
As nations formed, retained knowledge became the aggregate of all the tribes' traditions. Children were schooled in the lessons and discoveries of past generations and other tribes. As knowledge was shared across the nation, the economic and technical power grew exponentially. Specialization only increased the growth until it became the primary source.
A major source of conflict arises with the NATION stage. The retained knowledge of traditions largely suppress innovation and guide populations to avoid repeating past mistakes. The NATION stage opens the way to accelerating innovation. This pits the ever increasing change of technology against the instinctive fear of change that dates back billions of years.