Quote:
Originally Posted by spence
It sounds like you agree with me.
-spence
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I don't know if I'm agreeing with you or not. I was responding to you're "the vast majority of all success comes on the backs of others.
Nobody does it alone . . ."
I was making a distinction between "on the backs of others" being the key to success, and the "backs of others" merely being a metaphor (an overblown and slanted one) for the connection that makes a society. A society is by definition a group with common culture, goals, and interdependence.
How that interdependence works depends on whether a society is primarily collectivist in nature, or is one of distinct individuals. Either requires a common glue. But the criteria of success is emphasized by collective accomplishment in one form of society, and by individual accomplishment in the other. The collectivist emphasizes the glue, the individualist emphasizes the freedom to act personally.
The collectivist makes paramount the cooperative aspect of society to cement the glue, the individualist requires freedom to act on his own without directives to make the glue stronger by sharing his accomplishment with other individuals in free association. His sharing and doing is self-motivated. The collectivist dampens personal aspiration in favor of the needs of the group.
So a society that is built on individual freedom is a society of individuals who freely act and cooperate and accomplish, or "do by themselves" by choosing to act or not, to do or not. And the individual doing is the strength of such a society. It can be messy, and bumptious, and stressful in its relationships and cooperations. But in such a society innovation, progress, and achievements are far more likely than in a collectivist society (in my opinion).
To point out that individuals need society to achieve success also must recognize that society needs individuals who succeed. That is, if it's a human society. Other species thrive in hives and herds. But humans who don't like the hurly burly of conflicting individual freedoms and doings, tend to gravitate toward the more efficient methods of insects.
So, I don't know if we agree or not.