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Oh, an excellent list, indeed. In all of these there is some kind of imbalance in the distribution of attention to the different spheres of life -- the individual, family, town, state, species and so on. Usually a lot of #1 at the expense of balance and well being in the others. It may well be born in greed, but it requires as well a certain careful blindness, an unwillingness to view what one is actually doing. Without deliberate ignoral as a mechanism, if one were required rto see plainly what the ramifications of each step he takes are, we would see a more conscientious and less aggressive series of interactions.

The usual excuse is that the center feels threated, and this "it's me or them" attitude -- with the necessary dividing line being drawn -- is often used as justification for taking the "Other" down, or out. Curious how ready we are to withdraw and subdivide ourselves from our societies and species.

I think this "divide, separate and differentiate" impulse is interesting and one of the essential pieces of human stupidness.

McGrath: my reason for using the term "Western stupidity" is because the West is so successful at so many other areas of endeavour that it is obvious our gaffes and blunders are not due to pure dull-wittedness. It may be more common to the Norhtern than the Western hemisphere, as you say, but the expression is in common circulation.

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