Akop P. Nazaretyan

Throughout human history, in-group solidarity has been achieved at the price of confrontation with out-group individuals ("them vs. us" mental scheme); this has been guaranteed by religious or quasi-religious ideologies. However, in compli­ance with some basic evolutionary patterns, the traditional mechanism of social aggression-regulation is actually becoming counter-productive and threatens to destroy planetary civilization during the next decades. The author argues that the perspectives of global viability essentially depend on whether or not the human mind develops new mechanisms of strategic meaning-construction and solidarity regardless of large-group (confessional, national or class) mythologies.

Rough calculations demonstrate that while demographic densities and the technical capacity for mutual destruction have increased throughout the millennia, the violent death rate – the average number of deliberate killings per capita per time unit – has been decreasing. The resulting downward trend appears highly nonlinear and mediated by man-made crises and catastrophes, but still, in the long term, consecutive. Meanwhile, there is no direct evidence of falling aggressiveness of the humans in the course of history – natural aggressive impulses were rather growing up with population concentration. Obviously, some perfecting cultural and psychological mechanisms of aggression-retention have compensated for technological and demographic growth. This issue is explored using the pattern of techno-humanitarian balance.

Data about the victims of social violence in different cultures and historical epochs are provided by wars, political repressions, and everyday violence. Rough calculations demonstrate that while demographic densities and the technical capacity for mutual destruction have increased throughout the millennia, the violent death rate - the quantity of deliberate killings per capita per time unit - has been decreasing. The resulting downward trend appears highly non-linear, dramatic, and mediated by man-made catastrophes, but still, in the long term, progressive. Obviously, some perfecting mechanism of cultural aggression-retention has compensated for technological developments; among those mechanisms was economic development. This issue is explored using the pattern of techno-humanitarian balance.