Re:China's ancient water pipe networks
by Sprocklem on Friday September 08, 2023 @10:25AM
(#37433910)
Additionally, humans are unique in their ability to create complex social constructs and realities, which is a reasonable prerequisite for a potential to create novel methods of social organization.
This is a truism. Of course we could create social organizations that are totally unconstrained, but they will fail catastrophically.
We are (and will always be) constrained and as soon as we prefer one goal to another we want to bring that hierarchy to reality. To do that we necessarily need to adjust the rewards for working towards that goal, thereby creating a social hierarchy.
Re:China's ancient water pipe networks
by komali2 on Saturday September 09, 2023 @03:58AM
(#37443201)
Even if that were the case, the "lobster arguments for social hierarchy" usually lean far more rigid and totalitarian than human history indicates. For every Roman empire you show me I can find you five cultures with fluid or nearly flat hierarchies.
I don't see what's so unbelievable about our massively unique cognitive ability vs instinct ratio leading us to also have different forms of social organization, or that this could lead to our social organization being detached from instinct almost entirely.
I feel like this whenever people try to do that Lobster argument. "right, but we aren't lobsters."