Chapter 12
Man and Order
Anyone who observes fish in a coral reef will note a definite
regularity to their movements. Instead of moving to and fro at random they
observe property rights and exhibit quite rigidly determined behavioral
patterns. Many species live in particular areas and defend them vigorously
against encroaching rivals; others have specialized in methods of food
acquisition of which they alone are capable. Only a limited number of fish
can practice one such method in any one reef. If similar or different species
encounter one another, their reactions are so uniform that one can often
predict the course of events in advance. Again, if one compares the pattern
of existence prevailing in one reef with that which prevails in another,
similarities also become apparent. Here as there, a similar balance of
power arises from innate behavioral patterns and a similar environmental
situation.
Our hypothetical visitor from another planet would note
similar phenomena if he looked down on a metropolitan city. He would see
that individual human beings follow dissimilar forms of existence by reason
of special behavioral patterns and with the aid of artificial organs. As
in the coral reef, individual groups dominate specific areas which they
vigorously defend. Here again, each area can only sustain so many individuals
who follow the same occupation. Here, as there, a balance of power
prevails which is typical of the area in question and
which may
(original book page 133)
take a form very similar to that which prevails in areas
of similar structure.
One major difference is that a very complex division
of labor prevails in the world of man, and that certain forms of behavior
are prohibited. For instance, the individual is constrained from physically
harming his fellowmen, appropriating their artificial organs, or forcibly
converting them into artificial organs. What behavior is permitted and
what is not are set down somewhere in the form of community formulas, and
additional institutions such as the police and judiciary are given the
responsibility to implement them. Thus, what is involved here is not just
a form of order that can be explained as a natural state of equilibrium
in society. In the world of man, some activities are promoted by a division
of labor and others are barred – a process which results in a deliberately
created social order.
How did these orders – which are peculiar to man – come
into being? Where are their formulas, and how are they controlled? Has
something entirely new to the animal kingdom supervened in evolution, or
are there evolutionary links between the accomplishments of animals and
the products of human organizing ability?
In Naberera, a remote district of Tanganyika, we visited
a prehistoric watering place to which the neighboring Masai still drive
their cattle as they have for centuries. The water lies at the bottom of
several deep cavities reached by ravinelike paths. At the end of these
paths, troughlike indentations have been hollowed out of the rock. The
Masai scoop up the water with their leather bags which they empty into
the troughs. We set up our camera in a commanding position and left it
running.
The resulting film shows how a Masai drives his herd
down the gorge, climbs into the hole, and starts to draw water. He is naked,
and his leather bag – a very primitive form of artificial organ-seems to
be a living extension of his hands. Speeded up, the film demonstrates the
extraordinary regularity of his scooping motions. This is an acquired coordination
which has been handed down by imitation and is perfectly performed. Its
deliberate rationalization distinguishes it from similar acquired coordinations
present in animals. Man could never succeed in
(original book page 134)
performing a motor pattern with such economy of effort
if he were incapable of self-observation.
A second Masai comes down the path, lays his spear aside,
and joins his companion in the hole. The two men proceed to draw water
together. One stoops and fills the pouch; the other takes it and empties
it into the trough. The pouch travels up and down without the slightest
interruption, the movements of both men being so perfectly coordinated
that they might be muscles on the same arm. Three basic principles of increased
human efficiency are manifest here: First, a purposive procedure is broken
down into parts which can be performed by different individuals; second,
the individual specializes in his share of the work and does his best to
rationalize it as far as possible; and third, the various part-actions
are so regulated as to produce a performance flow which transcends the
individual.
Animals have innate forms of recognition which, in turn,
activate innate motor coordinations. Similarly, the ability to recognize
particular stimulus situations can also be acquired in animals, and key
stimuli of this type can bring about the activation of acquired motor sequences.
The extremely simple form of collaboration practiced by the two water drawers
might be explained in terms of the same principle. To the first man, the
handing down of the empty pouch is the stimulus situation which prompts
him to take, fill, and hoist it; and that, in turn, is a signal to the
second man to take the pouch, empty it into the trough, and hand it back.
These two basic working procedures have always been inherent throughout
the entire range of human collaboration, however complicated it may be
in detail. Man has to acquire two abilities in order to engage in such
collaboration. First, he must learn how to carry out particular motor sequences,
which entails the formation of appropriate control formulas in his brain.
And second, he must learn to recognize when, where, and in relation to
what extraneous stimuli the procedures in question should be put into effect.
These basic accomplishments are thus a further development of behavior
which is also practicable to animals. Man's peculiarity consists solely
in grasping the expediency of collaboration-an intellectual feat of which
we shall have more to say later.
The water drawers illustrate yet another important principle.
(original book page 135)
The artificial organ they employ-a leather pouch-does
not actually belong to either of them from the functional point of view.
Like the two men themselves, it has become part of a productive process.
As human collaboration gains in complexity, so this phenomenon emerges
more clearly. The human participants and their various artificial organs
become components of a totality which transcends the individual, parts
of an invisible body which we term organization. Like tools, machines,
and other means of production used in such a worksharing system, man does
no more than fulfill a function and perform a task. The larger modern factories
demonstrate
how true this is. If one unit ceases to operate, a substitute has to be
devised – and many functions can be fulfilled by either a man or a machine.
It is the performance of a functional component which matters, not its
structure. For as long as human beings collaborate within the framework
of such an organized body, they cease to be individuals proper and become
organs themselves.
The motor formula necessary to any such collaboration
is the actual order of the productive system. Initially, this may still
be rooted in the brains of the participants, as in the case of the water
drawers. Once collaboration gains in scope and complexity, however, this
function detaches itself from those who perform it and becomes a unit in
its own right, a special organ which henceforward assumes control. In a
large factory the individual production formulas are the fruit of mental
exertion by hundreds of people; laid down in plans, drawings, and directives,
they forsake the human brain and themselves become artificially created
functional units. The control function likewise is divorced and is taken
over by specialized units – directors, foremen, and so on. Today even this
task devolves partly or wholly upon artificially created functional units,
namely, computers.
The relationship between bodies of human collaboration
and animal and vegetable bodies becomes plain when viewed from this angle.
Each of these bodies is characterized by a particular order which is, and
must be, tailored to a very particular task. This order originates quite
differently in organisms than in human organizations, yet the required
appearance of the order
(original book page 136)
in question is little affected thereby. All that really
matters in each case is that the order be expedient, in other words, that
it should facilitate the task to be performed. If an animal or vegetable
body or a body of human collaboration performs the task for which it is
equipped, it is "in order." If it fails to do so, it is not. The same applies
to each separate unit which helps to constitute that body – to each of
its organs, in fact.
Of course a distinction must be drawn between temporal
and spatial order. So far we have referred exclusively to the coordination
of motor procedures, that is, to orders governed by the passage of time.
But these, again, are made possible only by a spatial order, by the juxtaposition
and interposition of individual functional units. A spatial order of this
type is equally important-indeed, essential – to every organism, whether
animal or vegetable, and to every human organization. Only if heart, bones,
blood vessels, etc., bear a very particular relationship to all the other
units in the system will the body be capable of an orderly motor procedure
occurring in the dimension "time" (i.e., of the behavior appropriate to
it). Precisely the same conditions exist in every factory. Only an appropriate
spatial arrangement of bays, personnel, machines, and so on renders the
productive process possible.
There is, however, one form of spatial order which made
its appearance only with man: the "keeping in order" – of material objects.
This form of order has to do with our artificial organs and is a concomitant
of the fact that they are not an integral part of our bodies. We lay them
aside and must take note of their exact location so as to have them available
when required. The more numerous they are, the greater the problem. Keeping
in order (together with the provision of necessary safeguards) thus represents
another mortgage with which these useful structures are encumbered. Where
our natural organs are concerned, only memory storage presents a comparable
problem. We have yet to discover how the brain manages to make memories
available when needed. We stow away our artificial organs (if small) in
boxes, pigeonholes, and drawers. We' label many with letters and numbers;
we record others in inventories.
The forms of order so far discussed (apart from the keeping
in order of material objects) are peculiar to man only to
(original book page 137)
the extent that he created them deliberately, whereas
they took shape – quite passively – in animals and plants by way of a gradual
selective process. The order most truly characteristic of man – yet another
variety – arises from the fact that individual purposive procedures have
a tendency to impinge. Until now we have referred solely to methods of
increasing efficiency which man has evolved by creating superindividual
organizations. The resulting productive systems do, however, tend to conflict-that
is to say, one order obstructs another. This becomes clear when two people
wish to cross a footbridge too narrow to accommodate both of them. One
of the two must wait, interrupting the flow of purposive movement. Which
one has to give way?
In the coral reef a natural equilibrium grows up among
the creatures living there, based on the relative strength of the individual
species. In human society, man uses specialization and collaboration to
form productive bodies which are no less diverse in structure and behavior
than animals and plants. They too compete, and here too there is an adjustment
of relative strength quite similar to the natural (ecological) equilibrium
governing animals and plants in nature. It is man's peculiarity to have
created orders which intervene in this trial of strength and control it.
Man thus created an order of orders: the state. In this
particularly broad form of organization, human beings and all the productive
bodies created by them are subject to certain rules and restrictions, or
laws. The extent to which individual freedom of action is curtailed differs
widely according to the nature of a particular order.
These exceptionally highly integrated orders, which the
life process succeeded in imposing on man, became disseminated throughout
the globe. Their structure, too, is necessarily similar to that of organisms.
They, too, consist of organs which must fulfill appropriate functions within
the total work-sharing system. Their behavioral formulas, too, have become
separate units known as constitutions. These huge living bodies, too, are
in competition and conflict with one another. The creation of a universal
order which embraced all of them would be an even higher –
on this planet, the supreme – stage of integration.
(original book page 138)
However, still other forms of orders have played their
part in human evolution. They have contributed less to increased efficiency
than to the fulfillment of other human aspirations which stem partly from
innate and instinctive behavior.
First, there are the ranking orders of human society.
As we have already mentioned, animals which live in communities evolve
similar arrangements, which lay down power relationships and determine,
for instance, which individual takes precedence at feeding places or in
the satisfaction of sexual urges. Such orders have been closely studied
in the cases of chickens and monkeys. Where man is concerned, the nature
of his organizations has inevitably led to the growth of hierarchically
constructed chains of command; moreover, the individual's degree of seniority
is of great importance in social life. What substantially contributes to
this is our strongly developed impulse to dominate others or be dominated
by them. Each impulse brings its own satisfaction. To obey a person whom
we respect can be as satisfying as to – lead others. Apart from that, the
human urge to dominate-in conjunction with the sexual and brood-tending
urges – prompts us to aspire to positions of eminence and esteem. Although
these tendencies are not dissimilar to those observable in animals, it
is an additional human peculiarity that in our case differences of rank
are often associated with legal prerogatives, and that such prerogatives
have become hereditary by way of tradition and law. Thanks to the prerogatives
of privileged classes, therefore, the universally necessary principle of
order was rendered more complicated and difficult by legislation.
Other interesting orders are those which we call custom
and usage. They represent communal practices which have been crystallized
by upbringing and education. These rules for living differ widely in different
parts of the world and are mainly concerned with birth, mating, brood tending,
and death. Beyond that, they concern the way in which we eat, live, and
treat other people, our modes of greeting and speech, how we behave in
a given situation, and what we should abstain from. Some of the appropriate
guidance formulas are written down, but most are transmitted from one brain
to the next verbally and by demonstration. When such rules are infringed,
the
(original book page 139)
community itself functions as judge, and social sanctions
serve as punishment. As with every pattern of behavior which has become
habitual, these communal habits are associated with corresponding appetencies.
The community clings to them stubbornly and becomes restive if prevented
from indulging them by some outside agency. As the world became increasingly
organized, these patterns overlapped more and more; many of them reduced
others to absurdity, and new ones of wider scope took shape. The modern
preference is for dismantling anything conducive to restriction, while
retaining anything connected with sensual pleasure and, if possible, reinforcing
it still further.
The most durable – and at the same time, mysterious-forms
of order man has evolved are his religions. The very fact that such large
numbers of these sprang up indicates that man had a need for them. Being
rooted in supersensual ideas – of which more will be said later – they
are not susceptible of practical examination. This, presumably, is one
reason why man clings to them with such peculiar obstinacy.
Does man have an innate impulse toward order?
Keeping in order did not become established with man
until he started to use artificial organs in considerable numbers, or barely
10,000 years ago. A form of instinctive behavior cannot be expected to
have adapted itself to our changed requirements in what is, from the biological
aspect, a short period of time. On the other hand an impulse toward coordinated
movement-in other words, toward the development of formulas for purposive
motor procedures - can be observed in any child. This, after all, is what
children aspire to when they play with constructional toys, and this is
what rewards them with feelings of joy and triumph at the creation of each
successful motor pattern. The same clearly perceptible impulse persists
in the adult. All constructive work and everything creative in humankind
is an endeavor to carry out purposive movements and create purposive spatial
structures. This is the source of those feelings of happiness and contentment
which are associated with every successful piece of work. Coordinated movement
also holds an appeal for us, as witness the impression the sight of a ballet
company or a body of men marching with perfect precision makes on us. We
are similarly attracted by spatial coordination,
(original book page 140)
which is why we are delighted by the symmetry and harmony
of architecture. All this suggests that the recognition of and striving
for coordinated spatiotemporal complexes is hereditarily anchored in man,
either as a genuine instinct (closely associated, perhaps, with that of
curiosity) or as an innate learning disposition.
Order – the essential formula for every form of achievement
– links our highest human achievements with every successful development
of the life process – yes, even with its earliest beginnings. The first
living molecules were in themselves a spatial order which brought about
a very specific process, i.e., a temporal order. In the course of time,
as the most primitive surviving organisms clearly show, a division of labor
arose between individual components: Functional units were developed. There
also came into being guidance formulas which enabled organisms to multiply,
or construct additional identical orders. The cohesion of such life units,
or cells, led to the formation of more highly integrated collaborative
units. Although the formula for the development of these multicellular
bodies continued to be the same units as before, i.e., the hereditary formula,
a new specialized unit – the central nervous system-was developed for the
control of movement. There were now two alternatives: Either the behavior
of a living creature was controlled by innate norms of action and reaction,
or the individual had first to build up such norms in the course A its
personal battle with environment. Creatures controlled by instinct were
better equipped to become specialists, but learners were more adaptable.
As a learner, man succeeded because A various favorable prerequisites in
overcoming the limitations A his natural organs: He extended his power
through artificial functional units. Although divorced from his body, these
required control – and the appropriate formulas at first remained in his
brain. When several people worked together, these formulas became distributed
among the brains involved, and artificial organs lost their clear connection
with the individual. In the course of further development, the control
formula in such organizations detached itself from the individual brain
in the guise of written or diagrammatic instructions whose implementation
became the concern of still more specialized units.
(original book page 141)
As a result, superindividual productive bodies developed
which displayed fundamental differences from animals and plants: Their
parts were not conjoined, they consisted largely of quite different materials,
and they came into being quite differently. Nevertheless, they embodied
a continuation of the same principle. Their order followed from the task
to be performed.
No reference has been made in this chapter to the motive
power which has led to this vast development – the will to power in the
Nietzschean sense. But whatever its true nature, only orders made the growth
of efficiency possible.