We want what we want, when we want it

[coberst]

It appears to me that our human instincts are to dominate or to serve. I would like to suggest that we concentrate our critical skills upon seeking to focus attention upon synthesis.

When I read history I see primarily a dual human need exerting itself—we seem to have a two class social system; we have the few who dominate the vast subservient majority. The subservient take this roll both because humans crave order and stability and because such a roll is the path to power. Humans crave dominance and they crave order and stability. Is their a third way?

When we are dominating objects we are united in a common goal. Our unified goal is to dominate objects as much as possible and we have proven to be very good at it. When we try to serve both a roll as dominant and as subversive we appear to create a society that is constantly at war with it self.

Power is the siren song we all hear. We all want power and we get it by dominating or we get it by being subservient to power. Our newspapers abound with such stories daily of the struggle for power, i.e. power is the means to get what we want when we want it.

Acquisition of power is a human imperative. We can acquire and use power either rationally or irrationally. One of the primary motivating forces behind irrational behavior is considered to be human egocentrism, which is “to view everything within the world in relationship to oneself, to be self-centered”.

To be rational in one’s desires is to use intellectual standards of thinking and to be irrational in one’s desires is to use egocentric standards to determine what to accept or what to reject as true.

[CapelDodger]

It appears to me that our human instincts are to dominate or to serve. I would like to suggest that we concentrate our critical skills upon seeking to focus attention upon synthesis.
Human instincts are honed to a hierarchical society, which is a synthesis of dominance and subservience. You see much the same in a chimpanzee troop.

When I read history I see primarily a dual human need exerting itself—we seem to have a two class social system; we have the few who dominate the vast subservient majority.
If you zoom in on particular bits of history you start to see the many layers that exist. The few can only exercise their power through larger and larger sub-layers, and at each interface calculations are being made. There's no absolute power, ever. Arbitrary rule is a threat to everyone it depends on.

The subservient take this roll both because humans crave order and stability and because such a roll is the path to power. Humans crave dominance and they crave order and stability.
Most human experience has been of the ever-present threat of war or banditry devastating their lives. If a powerful lord can protect you and yours from that, a heavy price is worth paying. Amongst a lord's serfs was a hierarchy just as important to them as the lord's was in his sphere.

Is their a third way?
Communal provision for security by institutions overseen by a representative body. Democracy.

[coberst]

Human instincts are honed to a hierarchical society, which is a synthesis of dominance and subservience. You see much the same in a chimpanzee troop.


If you zoom in on particular bits of history you start to see the many layers that exist. The few can only exercise their power through larger and larger sub-layers, and at each interface calculations are being made. There's no absolute power, ever. Arbitrary rule is a threat to everyone it depends on.


Most human experience has been of the ever-present threat of war or banditry devastating their lives. If a powerful lord can protect you and yours from that, a heavy price is worth paying. Amongst a lord's serfs was a hierarchy just as important to them as the lord's was in his sphere.


Communal provision for security by institutions overseen by a representative body. Democracy.


As is evident in America, democracy is not doing a very good job of mitigating the urge for power; our problem is we have the few who dominate the vast subservient majority.

It seems to me that this urge is somewhat in our genes, as you have pointed out “You see much the same in a chimpanzee troop.” Is it not something that we can use our great rational abilities to mitigate?

As you say there are multiple layers of dominant/subservient behaviors. Each of us is dominant in some circumstance and subservient in others. Likewise such structure is necessary and productive in some circumstances but is destructive in others.

Our innate tendency is to view the world from our own self-serving perspective, i.e. egocentrically. The ego has its agenda and our degree of intellectual sophistication determines which side wins, the ego or the desire for reasonableness. It is never a total victory for either side but our general welfare is dependent upon the degree of success our reasonableness scores.

We have many ways of fooling our self into believing we are reasonable. We constantly seek validation and thus our ego is constantly furnishing us with justification. For example “I know I have a short fuse, but I can’t help it. I lose my temper just like my father did.” Internal validation brings comfort. We can often see a person quite comfortable with their constant lousy decisions because their ego tells them they are correct. The most despicable tyrant often sleeps quite easily.

[CapelDodger]

As is evident in America, democracy is not doing a very good job of mitigating the urge for power; our problem is we have the few who dominate the vast subservient majority.
Democracy in the US is a many-layered, fractal beast. At the Federal level it seems to be in deep trouble, but that's not the case at all State or County or City or School Board levels. The US Constitutional model of democracy is creaking, showing signs of age, but it's been a wonderful and illuminating experiment. It says a lot for the drafters that it has survived so well for so long.