Humans have never been equal; for individuality to exist, differences must exist, and those differences create advantages or disadvantages depending on context. Equality could only exist in a world with no meaningful variation at all.
Once you accept that the atomic unit of society is the tribe,
Brother, while I agree with a lot of what you've said, I must point out that these two statements are mutually exclusive, and you undermine, rather than support, the latter with the former.
The smallest unit of society MUST be the individual, specifically BECAUSE people are unequal. Tribes are formed when enough people, who are all unequal, willingly set aside enough of their differences to form a tribe. If there exists one or more contentious concepts on which only some individuals are willing to agree upon while others are not, multiple tribes are formed, and begin to compete.
The tribe is the smallest molecule of society, certainly, but not the atomic unit.
If you, hypothetically, had three men alone on an island, and each of the three had wildly competing ideas, they would end up in an arrangement that, from the outside, looked like the worlds smallest diorama of tribal conflict. You'd see disagreements, alliances, betrayals, trade, and everything else.
Brother, I see the point you're making with the three-men-on-an-island example, but I think it actually supports rather than undermines the tribal view.
In reality, those three men would almost certainly die fairly quickly. As soon as any one of them is unable to provide food for himself for even a couple of weeks (injury, illness, bad luck hunting/gathering), he is at a massive disadvantage. In a tropical environment where food might seem plentiful, infections run rampant; the first time one cuts his foot badly, he will likely die of infection without group support for care, sharing, or protection.
Individuals on their own die alone and have no reproductive future. As a result, they actively seek out people of like mind or values and join forces with them, or they adapt their values and behaviors to fit the tribe in order to survive. For roughly four hundred thousand years of human history, shunning or exile was effectively a death sentence.
This doesn't deny that individuals are unequal or that they bring different strengths and weaknesses. Quite the opposite: it is precisely because people are unequal that they form tribes, allying with others who complement their weaknesses and amplify their strengths in the face of a harsh world.
Think of individuals as sub-atomic particles. They exist, they have unique properties, and they can interact; but they are far too unstable and vulnerable on their own to form the basic building blocks of a functioning, long-term society. The tribe is the atom; the smallest stable unit that can actually survive, reproduce, and compete in the real world. The tribe isn't just a "molecule" that emerges optionally from individuals; it has been the essential survival unit for our species across almost our entire evolutionary history.
Brother, while I agree with a lot of what you've said, I must point out that these two statements are mutually exclusive, and you undermine, rather than support, the latter with the former.
The smallest unit of society MUST be the individual, specifically BECAUSE people are unequal. Tribes are formed when enough people, who are all unequal, willingly set aside enough of their differences to form a tribe. If there exists one or more contentious concepts on which only some individuals are willing to agree upon while others are not, multiple tribes are formed, and begin to compete.
The tribe is the smallest molecule of society, certainly, but not the atomic unit.
If you, hypothetically, had three men alone on an island, and each of the three had wildly competing ideas, they would end up in an arrangement that, from the outside, looked like the worlds smallest diorama of tribal conflict. You'd see disagreements, alliances, betrayals, trade, and everything else.
Brother, I see the point you're making with the three-men-on-an-island example, but I think it actually supports rather than undermines the tribal view.
In reality, those three men would almost certainly die fairly quickly. As soon as any one of them is unable to provide food for himself for even a couple of weeks (injury, illness, bad luck hunting/gathering), he is at a massive disadvantage. In a tropical environment where food might seem plentiful, infections run rampant; the first time one cuts his foot badly, he will likely die of infection without group support for care, sharing, or protection.
Individuals on their own die alone and have no reproductive future. As a result, they actively seek out people of like mind or values and join forces with them, or they adapt their values and behaviors to fit the tribe in order to survive. For roughly four hundred thousand years of human history, shunning or exile was effectively a death sentence.
This doesn't deny that individuals are unequal or that they bring different strengths and weaknesses. Quite the opposite: it is precisely because people are unequal that they form tribes, allying with others who complement their weaknesses and amplify their strengths in the face of a harsh world.
Think of individuals as sub-atomic particles. They exist, they have unique properties, and they can interact; but they are far too unstable and vulnerable on their own to form the basic building blocks of a functioning, long-term society. The tribe is the atom; the smallest stable unit that can actually survive, reproduce, and compete in the real world. The tribe isn't just a "molecule" that emerges optionally from individuals; it has been the essential survival unit for our species across almost our entire evolutionary history.