Is violence/aggression an inevitable human need?
The answer to your headline question, is aggression inevitable, is NO. Aggression is a human instinct. That is why you find it present in so many societies and cultures. But what distinguishes us humans from other animals is that we have values; and those values can make us over-ride our instincts. it can even make us happy to over-ride our instincts. It is possible for a group of like minded people who have rejected vilence under all circumstances to keep to that ideal. On the other hand, this group would be very vulnerable to attack from the outside. Even if isolated, there would be a great temptation for one of its members to revoke his non-violence and take over. I suggest it is unstable. In answer to your specific question about the ten men. I would say that it would be impossible if they had lived their whole lives with no understanding of the outside world. Violence is not like an endemic disease that comes from outside. it comes from within. It is rather the opposite case. It i
It is not a “need” in the sense of “inevitable.” It becomes a need when it is seen as the only defense left. But it is seen as the only defense left, only when the logic is faulty. No defense can ever be justified with the initiation of force, but only as a response to force. The initiation of force is a wrong choice if it has been analyzed with logic, first; sometimes it is no choice at all except not to think; and sometimes it is the result of blind rage. It may be true that no civilization never fought a war. But it must be true that some civilizations never initiated the first force.
