It has been on my mind now for some time to write an "article" that was to end up on my Man's Nature blog, the title of which was to be "A Society of One." This is that article.
I chose the name advisedly, in that I came to the conclusion a sterling place to start in an attempt to understand the nature of humanity was in the consideration of its "base unit."
I'm pretty sure I am far from the first to approach life from this perspective and it's entirely possible that I will bring absolutely nothing new to the discussion. Nonetheless, since I see the benefit in doing nothing more or less than adding my name to the "list" of folks taking a particular perspective, I will go ahead and continue on my little exercise with the hope that I will potentially express something new—or at least in a way that makes it more understandable to the reader.
As you might expect by the title of this piece. The exercise with which I intend to begin, is by looking at a single individual, a "society of one" as it were in terms of his or her life.
We begin with the "one" in question magically coming into existence. It is necessary to do this because—in general—the young of just about every kind of critter (humans included) require "tending" up to an age where they're able to look after themselves.
2. Meeting Needs
2.1 Food and Water
So start with our magically grown human. Our human is not a part of a more general society for whatever reason, even though he or she has been trained up to a degree to understand his or her need for food, water, clothing—to whatever degree he or she really requires it—and shelter.
Since our human has no contact with any other part of humanity, the first thing on his or her agenda, is the acquisition of food and water. Our person must have these things to survive and they are his or her most pressing needs.
As such, our person—we'll make it a "him" and for the purpose of expedience, we'll call him Adam—must make his first order of business to seek out sources of food and water.
Adam scouts out his immediate area and as luck would have it, quite close by is a lovely fresh water stream. For water—at least for the moment—Adam's need is met.
Knowing that he must take care in what he eats (since not all things are palatable and more importantly, many things are actually harmful to him), Adam carefully scouts out his environs for something that is both edible and life-sustaining. He finds a variety of fruits, vegetables and grains about him that are both edible and prove to aid in his general health and well being. Our society of one has now met his most basic of needs.
2.2 Shelter
Adam now has the most basic of all needs—asssuming we account the atmosphere whence comes the oxygen his body has as the most basic necessity (and a thing he really doesn't much control short of suffocating himself) as not being something he must seek—met. He has food, he has water.
The next thing he must do is seek a way to keep from dying of exposure. This he can do fairly easily by staying under the canopy of the local forest by day. So for the basic shelter needed to keep him alive, Adam is also "set."
2.3 Clothing
Though substantially less important, Adam periodically finds himself in situations where he is exposed to the cold, sun and wind for enough long enough periods of time to make it worthwhile for him to consider covering up against the elements.
Adam decides he will weave things from the various grasses and fibers that he finds about—initially taking the most expedient materials as his choices for clothing "manufacture." Having covered himself with things that will at least aid in keeping him alive while he is out and about seeking his other "needs," Adam is now "covered" (pardon the pun) where his needs are concerned.
3. Needs Met, Now What?
I think pretty much everybody will agree that our Society of One has met his needs. He has water, he has food, he has shelter, and he has clothing after some fashion. To be fair, some would argue—and I think rightfully so—that Adam had met his general needs pretty well by the point at which he hit shelter, since the ability to hide from both weather and predators is typically sufficient. I have gone (as you can see) a step further and allow for clothing to be considered in his necessities as well. This step I take for the sake of quelling any unnessary arguments about what qualifies as necessity. Without what our man has sought and found, it is arguable he will potentially have died. It is on this basis that I specify "need." I'm quite sure others will argue he has other needs and it may even be possible to specify something that really is a need for basic survival that is not considered here (I know of no such thing, still, it is possible).
But assume for a moment that Adam has met his basic needs. What now?
I suppose it depends on the character of our Society of One what happens how and when. The one thing that is highly likely is that Adam will NOT be satisfied with what he has. He will want a nicer shelter, better clothes, a wider variety of foods, better tools for hunting and building, more readily available food, and a host of other things he sees as significant.
3.1 Better Shelter
Since Adam values his protection from the elements, he decides to design and build a better shelter. He figures out what building materials he wants, what the physical structure of the shelter ought to be and so forth. He builds—some things work, some do not—and rebuilds until he is happy with his new "home." Now Adam has fulfilled one of his wants. It's important to make a "crossover distinction" here between a need and a want. Were Adam's shelter to come tumbling down, he would be able to construct a rudimentary structure—or even live in amongst the trees, or in a cave or find some other kind of natural shelter.
Adam doesn't need his new shelter, but he does want it; that's why he builds it.
3.2 Food
Our "solo flyer" decides he wants to make food more readily available so he's not constantly having to hunt for his sustenance. He finds that certain plants can be grown nearer and even "cultivated" to make them produce better fruits.
He also learns how to capture animals and "breed" them. In the course of doing this, he figures out that the further the animals get from being "in the wild," at least in some cases, the "tamer" they become. This means he can "pen" the animals so that he has a ready source of meat. He also learns in general what things (animal and vegetable) he likes the tastes of. He might even learn that you can cook animal flesh and vegetables.
3.3 Other things
We're now coming to a point of "civilization." Adam has figured out a great deal. He knows about tools and fire. He has a shelter and penned animals. He's growing crops and doing a host of other things (like making clothing for himself in some simple sense).
3.4 From Needs to Wants
It doesn't take a genius to see that our "loner" has gone from things he needs to things he needs and things he wants. That having been said, it's time we introduced "others" into the equation.
4. The Outsiders
Up to very recently, Adam has been living alone, with no supplies or "fixed address." He has been finding shelter where he is able and getting food and water when he has immediate need. As we see in section three however, our society of one has started to both simplify and complicate his life with wants. He now "stores food" (even to the point of knowing he can do certain things to make the fruits of his labor stay around after they are no longer living).
Things are getting good for Adam! Not only can he make much of what he wants, he can live at greater ease as a result of his skills.
4.1 Enter the "Thieves"
One day, upon walking to his "animal storage," Adam realizes one of his critters is missing—or at least mostly so. There are "signs of struggle" and bits of fur, blood and bone on the ground. What could have happened? Adam knows full well what has occurred, he has been hunted himself (as well as watching other animals be hunted). He knows fully, there are other animals "out there" that—having found "trapped" prey—would have no problem with the idea of "taking advantage."
What to do, what to do? Our hero considers capturing or killing whatever is taking the provisions he has "set by in store" for himself. The more he thinks about it though, the more he realizes there will just be more to take their place. So he decides to "build up" his "folds." He decides to make it more work than it's worth to get at the animals he has in his "storage."
After some work, Adam has been able to make it difficult at best for the predators to get at his livestock. In the end, he ends up making sure his penned critters get food and water for the "trade off" of making it less possible for them to do so because of his need for security.
5. What's Mine is Mine!
In the process of doing all this work, our man has come to a basic conclusion. He looks at his work and realizes that certain things would not be naturally—and even if they would, he has taken the time to make them be and to "keep them up." Adam makes a simple decision, "When I'm out hunting or gathering what I have not planted, I will account any loss as 'natural.'" He says. "But when I make something with my own hands or acquire something through my labor, that thing is mine. The only way I will 'let it go' is if I have no use for it anymore, and I will defend it from whatever may try to take it from me."
In Adam's world, these statements not only make sense, but they're not something Adam alone has adopted as a perspective. Consider a lioness in the wild, she makes the kill and she eats. Anything that gets between her and her food (with notable exceptions) may end up being part of the lunch unless it's bigger and stronger than she is.
6. Conclusions
A great deal can be taken from our little exercise, but for the moment, I really have two "lessons" in mind:
- After our "Adam" got what he needed, he moved on to what he wanted. Unless you live in a cave, clad in fig leaves and eat and drink what you can get your hands on right his minute. I suggest to you that you do the same. You don't stop at what you need. Rather you go on to what you want. The point is that any political system that talks about needs as the "ultimate" is missing it. People don't just "get what they need." When they have satisfied their needs, they tend to move on to wants. This is even true for the local drug and/or alcohol abuser. Where one could argue drugs and/or alcohol are now a need for them, it was not always the case. At some point, they were a "want" (even if only from a perspective of being willing to try them).
Life is not just about needs, it is also about wants, this cannot be ignored in any philosophy, even in stoic societies, people generally had places to live that were not caves or forest canopies, and clothes to wear that were not skins from critters they had killed and skinned. - If I eat something and begin the digestion process, it's darned hard for somebody else to take it from me without at least pumping my stomach. If I find something in the context of the society of one, and choose to take it, unless some critter other than me chooses to contest my doing so, it can be argued that the thing belongs to me. If I take the time to create things that did not exist prior to my creating them, in general—yet again, in the context of the society of one—it is pretty much reasonable to assume that the thing created is mine.
Any society or political system that attempts to usurp the concept of ownership at its basest level is errant. If I work to create or earn something, my coming to own it is a pretty basic thing.
It is obvious that things become more complicated when more folks are introduced into our heretofore isolated little world. That will be the subject of another "essay." The intent of this work is to "lay some basic ground rules." The rules change somewhat when the society becomes more complex or there is more than one society, but this is a solid baseline in my mind.
