We're going to have a good time discussing this, Vince, I can tell : - )
Compartmentalization is not the right way to view this, but let's use it nevertheless as the starting point. Each compartment is independent, self-based. Each can reach the top but none can be all by him/her/itself. We ourselves as human beings are specific in some respects and we are like everyone in other respects.
The brain understands this because it is an abstraction about reality that is not that hard to get.
Mathematically, we have the square of 1 and the square of 2 in juxtaposition. With 1 we encompass the whole of the four compartments and see them as 1. The brains of the 4 different people all contain the idea of being 1 somehow with the others. There are two levels within ourselves.
In the 16th Century, Etienne de la Boetie said that the power of the king was nothing but the power others gave him. The king did not have any powers of himself other than that of a single man. It is people that built that second layer above themselves. While not real, it can be made real if enough people support the idea or if enough power can get generated to successfully defend that idea.
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We are preprogrammed to unify around ideas, forces, because we have learned that each human being benefits tremendously from working together.
You and I both know that that is not where the story ends, and we do not even need to mention all the negative things humans can do as well, especially collectively to individuals and smaller groups not part of the stronger group.
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The universe is a collection, and not an entity itself. The brain likes to think all is connected. Yet it is more logical to state that the Milky Way is the largest setting in which we ourselves are somehow connected through matter, motion and gravity. We do not have an umbilical cord to the universe that birthed us; at most we have one dangling to the Milky Way.
So what remains when we take everything abstract out of the picture is self-based matter that expresses itself in a number of conflicting ways.
There is no single person male, female, young and old at the same time.
Fire, water, air, and earth shows collaborations but also destructive forces when combined in certain manners.
DNA is nothing but four distinct parts that cooperate, but notice how A pairs with T, and C pairs with G. Not sure if any other pairing would work all that well. Water and fire don't mix, but both are needed to drive that locomotive.
The ancients already had their pyramids, the square of 2 and the square of 1. I've been told that the word pyramid means 'one that comes forth from height', meaning that 1 is not found on the ground but only after carefully building up all stones and then have someone take in that top position.
As long as the top knows it is solidly based on the bottom, we are going to be okay. But when we do not control all our artificial mechanisms like money, rules and regulations, and establish an open ended game, then the top can get disconnected from the bottom of the pyramid like the eye on a one-dollar bill, representing the elite instead of the wise.
Anytime that happens, the bottom is going to be upset. Revolutions only happen when the disconnect is recognized as dangerous by a large group of influential people at the top, or something to achieve by larger segments throughout society when the top is simply not connected any longer to the reality that everyone else is firmly connected to.
In the US, the disconnect is enormous. In Sweden, the disconnect is a whole lot smaller. But in a globalizing world, the system that is strongest ends up penetrating the other systems. I am really curious what will happen now with Brexit completed and the only two-party nation is now on the outside of the EU. It may turn mainland's clock back to when it was more social-democratic instead of neo-liberal and free-market minded.
The French did not get it right. It isn't liberté, egalité, humanité (fraternité). It is humanité, then egalité, and then liberté follows all by itself. If we start out with liberté, then the bigger assholes run straight to be first in line, and no matter what follows next, the bigger assholes already won and dominate the games.
Shake a box of stones up and down, and the bigger stones automatically drift to the top with every shake. A democracy that only shakes delivers the most to the elite. A democracy that shakes and turn, that's the one that has everyone emancipated and connected to the whole of society.
Cheers, Vince.
