Submission or destruction

Competition and cooperation are contradictory. Competition means there are winners and losers, whereas in cooperating everyone gains, or shares the loss when things go wrong. It seems that existence on Earth is partly a struggle for life between predators and preys and, more generally, a vast cooperative shared among species and between species. An amusing example is the African bird (greater honeyguide) that leads humans to a bees’ nest because it is very fond of the honeycombs they leave after eating the honey. Resources are a cause of competition, and many predators have a territory they defend against members of the same and/or other species. And the whole food chain is about eating and being eaten, from the microscopic to the gigantic. Early humans would also have been food for the larger carnivores. But, as they learnt to make ever more effective weapons, they reached a stage where their only serious competitors were other humans. Having submitted nature sufficiently to provide their needs, agricultural and pastoral societies went on to submit one another.

Prehistoric Stone Age societies probably resembled those found by European conquerors in the Americas, Australia and the remoter parts of Africa and Asia, from the primitive Bushmen and Aboriginal hunter-gatherers to the sophisticated Aztec and Inca empires. At some point one group began to dominate those around it, taking tribute, sacrificial victims and slaves. The Aztec warriors were continually at war to provide captives for their gory rituals. Humanity’s rule over other forms of life led to its dominion over those of its own kind who happened to be a little different. The Bronze Age concentrated power in the hands of those who controlled the sources of copper and tin. Helmets, shields, body-armour and sharp spears and swords made them as invincible as Achilles. They organised trade and tribute, and invented accountancy and writing. Then, towards the end of the second millennium BCE, they were swept into oblivion by invaders from the north armed with iron. Dominion was technological from the start.

From the end of the 15^th century, Europeans went about conquering the world. But why the Europeans and not the Arabs, Indians or Chinese, who were just as developed if not more so? Going back a bit, Western Europe had not been subjected to the devastation of Mongol invasions in the 13^th century that had ravaged the Middle and Far East. Also the Latin alphabet applied itself easily to movable-type printing. Finally, perhaps, the Reformation and the reaction it provoked transformed the general perception of religion and hierarchy. By the 17^th century, Europeans were turning to scientific observations for a coherent understanding of the universe. This did not happen elsewhere, as religious orthodoxy prevailed. The quest for laws regulating the material world became exclusively European. The result was technological advantage and world dominion.

Since prehistoric times human groups have accumulated wealth and power at the expense of others. Weaker nations were subjected to tribute, or plunder and slavery. Six European nations practiced this on a global scale, and divided the planet to their convenience. However, the technology that made this possible began to circulate and the hold was broken. The first to break away were the European colonials in North and South America. Their cultural background made this easier. But it took two world wars and the destruction of Europe’s (and Japan’s) wealth and status, along with a new balance of power between Soviet Russia and the United States, before the other nations of the planet were able to try to govern their destinies. For some it was a long and bloody struggle, and few managed to escape the controlling forces of Western technology and finance. They obtained seats at the United Nations General Assembly, but their leaders were the vassals of Washington or Moscow.

Life on Earth evolved in such a way (was there any other?) that the strong preyed on the weak all the way down the food chain. Herbivorous species preyed on the vegetable kingdom and carnivores preyed on them, while omnivorous animals had the best of both worlds. Humans belonged to this latter group and could digest meat as well as fruits and nuts. And, as cooking techniques developed, they added grains and tubers to their diet. The stock of food determines the population of those who eat it. If the stock is over-harvested, its supply will diminish. And so the population of predators will grow until it is forced to contract by a shrinking supply of food. And some food sources are cyclical. Chestnuts and acorns can be plentiful one year and practically inexistent the following year or two. Reliance on specific food sources kept populations within a sustainable range. But those natural constraints were progressively pushed aside by human technology. Fire, weapons and clothing allowed a wide variety of food and habitat, raw and cooked, hot and cold. Population could expand (“increase and multiply”, Genesis IX, 7) indefinitely by occupying new territories in different latitudes and longitudes.

Humans learnt to dominate, shape and domesticate their natural surroundings by mediating them with tools and weapons. And they applied the same rules to their own kind, reducing them to vassalage or chattel. Agriculture meant staying put, accumulating wealth and defending it against raiders. These raiders were pastoral nomads, who sometimes stayed and replaced the previous rule with their own. And, as agriculture urbanised, cities would make war on one another. All this violence had little to do with survival. It was essentially driven by the acquisition of wealth and power. Hereditary, elected or self-proclaimed war-lords competed for dominion over their own and other nations. And so it has been ever since. Kings and consuls, princes and presidents, leaders of all kinds making war and taking plunder, with complete disregard for those who die or starve, or lose their limbs or their livelihoods. Dominion over nature led to totalitarian dominion over everything, a wild hubris that offers a choice between submission and destruction. But nature is not submissive – were it so it would have ended long ago – and it is being destroyed at an accelerating rate. And that imminent ruin will not bypass humanity. From the beginning the submissions of nature and humans were associated, and the looming extinction of nature will take humanity with it. Competition for wealth and power (celebrity?) is a struggle of all against all that produces violence and destruction. An improbable turnaround to cooperation might still be able to save the planet, but time is running out.