“One Nation, Indivisible” features excerpts from The Sun’s archives that speak to the current political moment.

— Ed.

 

We call it “human nature,” but really it’s animal nature. Just like a mockingbird has a mockingbird nature and a gray squirrel has a gray-squirrel nature, we have a nature that served us well when we lived in little groups and survived only if we were quick to spot an outsider and dispatch him. Cooperation was an important part of our evolution, but cooperation within strict limits. Altruism was also part of our evolution, but, again, it was a very constrained altruism that would benefit our own descendants and nobody else’s. That’s the wiring we’ve inherited. And on this razor-thin leading edge of history, we’ve developed a civilization in which we generally acknowledge the benefits of cooperation beyond our immediate group. So we have charitable organizations and adoptions and nonprofits, and also international trade and NAFTA. But our nature is still pulling us back.