Human vs Humans

I have many arguments with people who base their approach on the idea of an "individual."

In a Liberal Democratic Capitalist System it seems obvious that humans are discrete separate individuals each with choice, freedom and the ability to own things. What could be simpler.

But I usually end up asking who does language belong to? Who created it, who owns it?

It's an odd question because if there was only one person ever then why would they need language? Language only happens when there is more than 1 person so that they can communicate. And who ever "invented" language didn't invent anything until other people started to use it. It has to be a collaborative effort. And then it gets passed on to children generation after generation so that each new generation ends up with someone else's language.

Now we might think "so what"? That is just individuals talking.

But that thought itself is expressed in someone else's language. So if we believe in a discrete individual where are they in this thought of "so what?." Is an "individual" thinking that given that we only think things in the context of a communication that requires two people. It's like a game of football: when someone passes the ball and someone receives it which "individual" is responsible for that? We might say it was a bad pass so the receiver did well and takes the majority of the credit, or it was a good pass and the receiver just about executed the receipt but badly so the pass gets the majority credit but the thing itself requires both people and you can't run a knife between them.

Returning to thinking, remember that there is no pointing thinking things for "our self" cos surely we already know what we think. If we talk to ourselves--either out loud or silently "in our heads"--who are we talking to? and what are we telling this person they don't already know?

Why do we need use someone else's language to think or talk to our self anyway? Those words were given to us, so, like Lego blocks, thinking is just messing around with someone else's Lego. And we do that because eventually we hope to display our new Lego creation to other people. In fact I only have a vague sense of wanting to write this here, I write blog entries as I think, they are one process and what I am typing now is just playing around with Lego blocks exactly as it looks. Nothing hidden. I don't know what I am going to say until it is on this page. So in fact the Lego creation being made here is as visible to myself as anyone else. Looking at these words is looking at my thoughts. I'm not playing around with words "in my head" and then exporting them "into the world." These words here ARE MY THOUGHTS. They are made of "Lego blocks" that I borrowed and am sticking together as I write and these blocks are what we call words, in this case text rather than spoken sentences.

Now I say all that to continue this question "where is the individual here?"

Well I'm like a snail leaving a trail of thoughts and words but I am not those thoughts and words. If a snail was its trail of slime it would not be able to move. If a car was attached to the road it too would not ne able to move. It must be different. 

Now the problem with being an "individual" is that in many cases people think an individual is a thing.

But that is like the snail thinking it is the trail. We are not the thoughts, we are the thinking.

So Descartes says "I think, therefore I am." He means that while thinking that thought, he exists. If he did not exist then he could not think that thought, so while thinking it he must exist. That in fact is very nearly correct. It should be "I think, therefore there is existence." If there was no existence then there would be no thoughts. The self is the existence not the existent.

So this is just rehashing recent blogs on existence.

But this blog entry was actually inspired by the earlier post on evolution.

In a battle we don't just think of the surviving warriors we understand that the entire force was important to the victory. When the Spartan group of 300 held up the advance of Xerxes Persian army in 478BC although they were all killed, but that sacrifice led directly to the later Greeks victory. SO which individual won this war?

The whole of human existence is like this. We enjoy the benefits of all the losers in human history.

It all points to Capitalism and individual ownership making no sense.