The Benefits of Inequality

New submitter MutualFun sends this article from Science News: Which would you prefer: egalitarianism or totalitarianism? When it comes down to it, the choice you make may not be as obvious as you think. New research suggests that in the distant past, groups of hunter-gatherers may have recognized and accepted the benefits of living in hierarchical societies, even if they themselves weren't counted among the well-off. This model could help explain why bands of humans moved from largely egalitarian groups to hierarchical cultures in which social inequality was rife.

Comments

Math loves to be Anthromorphized!

[Prien715]

Terrible summary and title.

From TFA:
Our model predicts that the transition to larger despotic groups will then occur when: (i) surplus resources lead to demographic expansion of groups, removing the viability of an acephalous niche in the same area and so locking individuals into hierarchy; (ii) high dispersal costs limit followers' ability to escape a despot. Empirical evidence suggests that these conditions were probably met, for the first time, during the subsistence intensification of the Neolithic.

So availability of resources to a minority and the inability to escape cause large despotisms, much like CO2 and Greenhouse gases cause global warming. Climate science should be renamed "The Benefits of Global Warming". Or after a man's parachute fails to open he "realizes the benefits of gravity in assisting his painless disassembly".

I know it would be odd to ask for editors to, uh, you know, edit.

Re:Why would this surprise?

[digsbo]

When did I say they were idiots? I didn't. I said people refuse to think for themselves. I'm talking about people who have said, "I don't want to think about it, that's what government is for." Verbatim, and many other near variants, when I challenge the status quo on everything from the drug laws to the banking system. I actually had a guy recently say to me, after I was critical of the banking system, "Well, it's what we have, and it works." And he's a fairly intelligent guy. He just doesn't want to think about that question, because it's emotionally painful to realize how screwed up things are.