It’s time to update Darwin’s theory of Natural Selection with the far better theory of Natural Connection. Natural Selection, and its corollary, Survival of the Fittest, has too long been used to rationalize selfish behavior. We need a new theoretical lens.
The theory of Natural Connection posits that the engine of evolution is not the selfish drive to survive, but rather the innate impulse to connect— the impulse to be part of something bigger than ourselves. It’s a far better explanation for evolution since everything that exists must figure out how to stay in balanced relationship with the greater whole of which it is a part.
It also has a couple of interesting implications.
- First, it explains why our greatest fear is not the loss of life, but the loss of meaning, which is a loss of connection. If loss of life were fear #1, we would not have suicides.
- Second, it allows us to at least entertain the idea that survival is not a basic human drive—there are just too many examples of people giving up their lives for a perceived greater good. Rather, survival may be better understood as an emergent property of the species, the result of our collective impulse to connect (just as water is an emergent property of hydrogen and oxygen, and not found in either element alone.)
- Third, it transcends the perceived “natural” tension between the interests of the individual and the interests of the community. Under the theory of Natural Connection, they are one and the same—one single web. Which means that any perceived self-interest I may have that is counter to the interests of the community is simply a misperception of what my self-interest really is. Likewise, anything regarded as “good” for the community that is not good for the individual is similarly off base.
- Finally, and most importantly, while “survival” as a concept can be used to justify violence. the drive to “connect” cannot.
All of these implications point us toward a very different course of action when conflict occurs. It says, do not withdraw from the relationship and prepare for battle, but enter further into relationship, and discover how to deepen and expand our sense of connection to the point where our interests align and the conflict is resolved.
It is a course of action now more urgent than ever.
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“everything that exists must figure out how to stay in balanced relationship with the greater whole of which it is a part.” False! Homoeostasis in whatever greater whole and drives towards cooperative behavior, are only another product of natural adaptation via survival of the fitter for both individuals and groups or species. The real question is how features that are incidental if not actually disadvantageous, may also be accentuated along with those of superior survival. Answers include assortive matching, being the factors of attraction pairing different individuals to accentuate characteristics in off spring, competition within any given species even beyond coping with the environment alone, and the manner in which the survival selection of any one gene tends to promote every other gene, incidental or even detrimental, by happenstance sharing the same chromosome. Now, those are mechanistic causal explanations. In the alternative, by what mechanism would cause the drive you propose ever to arise and function, and by what mechanism would said drive actually influence heredity? Magic? Your notion is not even half baked!