Page 468 - Cultures and Organizations

The Evolution of Cultures 433

A Time-Machine Journey Through History

What follows is a time-machine view of human evolution. The time machine

will start five million years ago. It will slow down as it approaches the pres-
ent, but as it does, the speed of change will pick up, so that the view keeps
changing fast. Over the last million years, survival of fi t tribes or societies

has gained importance compared with survival of fit individuals. This is
what Charles Darwin, the nineteenth-century English pioneer of evolution
by means of natural selection, expresses in the quote with which this chap-
ter opened. Humans have become nicer to one another, and to more others
too. American evolutionist David Sloan Wilson puts it as follows:

When between-group selection dominates within-group selection, a major
evolutionary transition occurs and the group becomes a new, higher-
level organism with elaborate specialization and immensely complex
interdependencies. 3

This transition is now happening to humans, and it is causing the extraor-
dinary acceleration of evolution of which we are a part. Chimps, bonobos,
and orangutans can learn to use symbols if exposed to them, and they are
surprisingly clever. But they cannot organize in massive anonymous soci-
eties. Humanity’s biggest evolutionary leap since our days as just another
ape has been social.
During the time-machine ride, the history of the moral circle will be a
point of concern. Until very recently, the chief threats to survival were nat-
ural. Cold, heat, and predators had to be kept at bay through clever, coordi-
nated action and often through migration. Scarcity was another enemy to
survival, to be countered by finding food and drink, which again required

intelligence and collaboration. Reproductive units that were too small were

dangerous, because they would lead to genetic inbreeding and loss of resil-
ience. This threat, no doubt, has been a strong driver for enlargement of
human reproductive units, since those who isolated themselves tended to
die out. Quite recently, as the earth became more densely populated with
humans, the danger took on a different form: contagious disease, depletion
of resources, and economic or military warfare are now our main human-
caused threats. In conclusion, the main challenges to human groups have