Claim: All societies emerge as groups of individuals that have the property of destructive equality.
Definition: destructive equality: a group of individuals has the property of destructive equality if and only if any member of the group can destroy value faster than any other member can produce something of equivalent value.
A society is therefore a mutually-beneficial association held together by the persisting threat of destruction as a means of punishment for violating the society’s rules.
Examples:
- Intelligent animals such as elephants or chimpanzes aren’t part of modern human society because they’re no threat to humans.
- Slaves are not proper members of their master’s society. However, once slaves become threats to their masters, possibly through gaining education, they’re freed i.e. they’re made members of the same society as their masters.
Consequences:
- Society rules exist to prevent threats of mutual destruction from realizing.
- In general, large wealth inequalities are still possible within the same society.
- As a consequence of mutual threats, a split in society cannot occur without the isolation of sub-populations. Conversely, the increase of communication between nations that were once considered separate societies results in the merging of those societies.
- There’s a limit to how much value a society member can control. Multibillionaires are merely tolerated by other society members. If they were to abuse their power, others would organize to stop it by enforcing or creating new laws.
- Societies organized in multiple tiers or castes with different birth privileges tend to become more uniform as all members acquire the same education and means of revolt.
Martin Jambon, December 10, 2022