Humans are weak.
I mean, relative to the broader animal kingdom, if we were left alone with another animal and had nothing but our naked body as defense, we’d probably die.
We’re not the largest animal. We’re not the fastest animal. We’re not the strongest animal. We don’t have claws, or talons, or antlers, or horns, or hooves, or large teeth. We don’t have a tough skin or an exoskeleton. We can’t fly. We can’t swim very fast. Our young require care for several years.
So on our own, we wouldn’t be able to survive very long.
And yet we have survived. For hundreds of thousands of years (millions, even, depending on your definition of “human”).
What was it that has allowed us to survive all this time? In my opinion, it comes down to one word.
Community.
Humans are, by nature, a communal people. We’ve evolved as such. Working together as communities has allowed us to survive scenarios we wouldn’t otherwise be able to survive individually.
We can protect each other. We can care for each other. We can harvest food for each other. We can teach each other. We can create with each other.
That communal aspect to our nature is what has allowed us to survive for so long, despite being a vulnerable species. I believe that this is what makes us, well, human.
I mean, certainly there are other species who live communally, and even share knowledge with each other. Humans do it in a completely different way though. We can use our knowledge in collective ways to allow us to adapt to our surroundings and to attain even more knowledge.
It would be cool if we lived in an economic system that reflected our human nature, rather than in one that seems to be antithetical to it.
