Chapter Eight -- Human Society

Human society is nothing more than the concerted action of individuals. It sprang into being as man developed the faculty of reason and recognized that the division of labor and social cooperation produce benefits for everyone involved. Were it not for the increased productivity made possible by the division of labor and man's innate rationality -- which enables him to recognize the benefits of cooperation -- there would be no society and humanity would still be mired in primitive barbarism. Individual greed -- each man's desire to remove uneasiness to the greatest possible extent -- is the engine that created and continually sustains human civilization.

Collectivist thinkers of every stripe claim that society exists independently of the individuals of which it is composed. They say that society is more important than the individual; that it has a higher purpose; and that the insignificant individual cannot be allowed to pursue his own ends, but must be shaped and molded (by them!) into conformity with the Higher Purpose which only they can comprehend. They are wrong.

(more to come ...)

Chapter Nine -- The Role of Ideas

Chapter Ten -- Exchange Within Society