‘It takes two to tango’ so the old and truthful saying goes, and it goes a lot farther then I ever dreamed it would. Funny, when I was young, I thought the saying went ‘It takes two to tangle’ as it seemed to be used only when explaining the causes of a physical altercation, in the sense of two persons in a combative ‘tangle’.

But it does indeed take two persons to dance the tango, just as it takes two teams to have a National League Division Series playoff game, students and teachers to have a class, man and woman to have a human race, employers and employees to have a workplace, fat in order that we can refer to skinny, the color black that there may be white, and individual and society in order to have a human mind. In all of these examples, you cannot have one without the other; they are interdependent. Individual and society are of course the subject of this post. But before I go on about individual and society, it would be beneficial to explain a few concepts.

Opposites are in most cases, as the word implies, ‘opposed’ to each other. While these opposites, such as the opposing baseball teams in a playoff game, do indeed oppose each other, they are at the same time dependent on each other. You cannot have a game with one team.

The color black, the opposite of the color white, does not exist without its opposite. White exists because there is black. These are the basics of a science and philosophy called dialectics (not to be confused with “Dianetics”) in which interdependent opposites make individual things what they are and more importantly, describe how they change.

Dialectics, or the dialectic, however, is not supposed to be some overarching force in the universe that controls it all. It is simply one of the best ways that our human mind can understand the phenomena of life and the physical universe. Still, it seems like many things in nature do take this pattern of opposing forces. Take an atom, of which all matter is made. A molecule is composed of positively charged protons (and yes, neutral neutrons) and negatively charged electrons. The atom, and then the molecules that make our elements, the foundation of all chemistry, is impossible without an interdependence of opposites. A very good presentation of dialectics can be seen in the highly underrated and not-well-known film Half-Nelson, starring Ryan Gosling. A great drama as well, this film is highly recommended.

Now I want to present two opposites that go on to make up the human mind and allow it to interact with other human minds because human beings are social animals in a majorly sophisticated way. The opposites are individual and society. I want to make the case first of all that society as an entity does indeed exist. If not ‘society’ as a single entity, then certainly social forces are real. Margaret Thatcher, the Tory Prime Minister, is an example of a person that denies that there is no such thing as society, only an amalgamation of individuals. This position is wrong-headed. If it was true society does not exist, then where did the mind of Margaret Thatcher come from? She did not become who she is all by herself, obviously. Something was done to the individual named Margaret Thatcher; that something can be called ‘society’ or, social forces. All the human interactions appropriate to her at her schools, such as lectures, discipline, friends, activities, ect., at that point in history are the result of social forces. At her schools, not only was the knowledge transmitted from the past but also it was the product of social institutions that have a life beyond that of any one individual or group of individuals. True that the social institution of education is not a solid thing—aside from the buildings where people are educated anyway—that you can go up and kick as you would your tires, but no one would deny that educational institutions of various kinds, at all levels, exist.

Education is just the beginning; we have the culturally bound institution of the family, the neighborhood, your friends and enemies, the workplace, your own place in your social system that is indeed a hierarchy. Your place in the social class hierarchy influences your psyche. These social influences not only make us what they are but neither do they stop at any given point. They are influencing and changing us now. Not all of these forces are nurturing. Some are detrimental, but they all go in to making us what we become. In fact, an American sociologist or philosopher, I do not remember who, said that from the very day we are born, from our mother’s first glance, to our first steps, the disapproving or suspicious looks from an adult, and again on to our family and social life and the world of work, we as individuals are being developed by others aside from ourselves. And we need this to be the case; it’s how the human mind works.

We know what happens to individuals (mammals, anyway) who are isolated from others: the mind simply does not work or they go crazy. Think of the prison punishment of solitary confinement. Think of Genie (b. 1957), who is considered a “feral child” (Wikipedia) and never developed into normal adulthood. Think of plain old loneliness. Most mentally ill people, I have read, describe themselves as lonely. The fact of the matter is is that we simply don’t work (function) unless our own mind has other minds to interact with. Culture is ingrained into us and goes on changing us. Therefore, our own healthy mind is dependent on other minds not only for its development but also for its continued function and sanity. Our self is nothing without others or, in more expanded form, social forces or what many simply refer to as society. We do not function without others. We can also go on to describe our economic reliance on others. In a past post, I described how much we are connected to others economically, how many persons are involved in order for your breakfast foods to be brought to you, etc. Perhaps under capitalism following your individual interest and pursuing your own gain makes the world go ‘round, but others still need to exist in order for the goal of social welfare and economic development to be accomplished, a social goal of capitalism, according to its advocates.

What I have been attempting to describe in a very simple way is what makes us human and that individual and society—an interdependence of opposites—is the best way to describe what we are. It is a conceptual description. Much of how I described us is psychological and sociological; I know far more about the former than the latter, but there is some overlap. Heck, social psychology is even its own separate discipline.

Others, or society, influence and make the individual what it is, but what is the place of the individual? Unique, individual personalities exist, obviously. Now I had been discussing a unity of opposites and that these opposites both depend on, and compete with, each other. Since the individual starts out as an infant, it is society that begins to make it what it is to become. The individual assimilates the social forces according to their own make-up determined by genetics, one’s temperament, intelligence, and unique situation, such as their environment, or wealth of the country into which they are born. Different people go on to respond to social forces in different ways and voila!, we have unique individuals, although because of culture and authoritative forces of social control, similarities among individuals abound. As the individual matures, they in turn go on to directly or indirectly, consciously and unconsciously, influence others. The individual does this whether they are looking out for their own hide or cooperating with others.

When you as an individual, say as a teacher, you are a good or bad influence on individuals, you are in fact a social force (an other) that influences the individual minds in your classroom. Impact of the individual on others can of course be large or small, depending on the audience. At my job, for example, I may try to influence good conduct on younger members of the public, say, by prompting a ‘thank you’ after rendering service. These things can stick in a person (or they might resent it). Even little interactions (e.g., a disapproving look) go into the accumulating wealth of the individual psyche, or single personality, making a mind into what it is and what is becoming. All human interaction among individuals, groups, or institutions form a very complicated web indeed. Sure, we can all recall individuals in our lives that were influential (e.g., a sibling), but we can never recall all the (millions?) of social interactions we’ve experienced.

Interdependence: that is why social forces influence us and we, as individual agents, influence it right back. This is why our society can become so complex, so much so beyond other social animals, such as birds; individual birds are not dramatically influential to the flock. We can pass on our past learning, our ways of doing things, e.g., such as language or arts, and our civilized way of life depends on the fact that we have this ability. We know this as culture and it is our way of adapting to the environment and surviving as a species is dependent upon it. Culture, is a result of human intelligence and the individual/social interdependence. You cannot have one without the other. This combination of individual/society in the human mind is extremely powerful. Along with our big brains, it is our strength. On a larger scale, our species has dominated the globe, for better and for worse. Our ingenuity knows no bounds, except when the laws of physics and human nature are violated. We are one and both at the same time. I am operating as an individual right now, although as you can see, the influence of other minds is obvious. Yet my mind is on what I want to write. But again, when I stand back and analyze my actions, all of what I have written so far is true. My mind is a product of my culture and my genetic make-up. It takes two to tango.

So we need both individual and society, or social forces, to be who we are. In an ironic way, it is others who create the individual. Again, as the individual matures, she goes to be an influential force on others, and so the cycle goes on.

In the next post I will argue that some form of socialism would be a better system, and perhaps an inevitable one, for human beings, because capitalism has us neglect the social aspect of our nature, has us under-appreciate it, or even demeans the role of others or society. The trick, which has so far proved difficult, is to develop the right kind of socialism, which of course might vary from culture to culture.