Surely it's way more complex than that. We are, after all, a highly social animal, and that means that we also
have a strong instinct to trust and rely on others for support and succour.
Sure, but those instincts are generally reserved for our family, clan, tribe, country, etc. Depending on the circumstances, anything/anyone outside of those spheres --- especially anyone perceived as a threat --- is still the enemy.
Yes, we also compete for scarce resources, as all animals do, but we humans discovered a very long time ago that we do that much better working together.
We did discover that a long time ago, then we forgot.
The social construct of our hunter/gatherer forebears was indeed based on cooperation--- the individual's main concern was the provision for, defense of, and continuation of the tribe --- , but the sub-structure of Civilization is based on competition ---- the accumulation of personal wealth and power. For the most part, we're right back to where we were before we left the forest: the strong still eat the weak here.
After all, we are not only competing against other humans, or other human groups, but against other animals, insects and even funghi that want what we want.
Yes, but until recently none of that could be viewed as any sort of cooperative effort by the species as a whole. For most of our history, advances in technology and agriculture were mostly a byproduct of interaction based on trade.
We were, no doubt, once very tribal, very small tribal groups that competed with other tribal groups. But then, those groups learned how to cooperate, and became small communities, eventually towns, cities, even nations.
IMO, it isn't so much that they learned to do any of this as it is that they were either forced or manipulated into it by a self-appointed elite.
How many examples of fantastic cooperation among complex groups would you need? History, after all, is replete with them. How about such simple examples as Medecins Sans Frontieres, or perhaps the elimination of smallpox?
(will have to google that.
) but as far as small pox, sure interaction by the global sceniticifc community has been responsible for adnces that never would have been possible otherwise,
Then again, it was only a couple of generations before Salk's vaccine the the US military was purposely distributing smallpox infected blankets to Native Americans (who they weren't at war with).
To be familiar with our instincts -- on both sides, because you forgot our instinct for cooperation,
Nope, didn't forget it. Just acknowledging that it doesn't negate our other instincts.
at least locally -- simply means that we can then include that familiarity in how we reason.
Hopefully.
