Sublime

If mutual aid, social co-operation, civic activism, hospitality or simply caring for others are the kind of things that really go to make civilizations, then this true history of civilization is only just starting to be written.

If make-believe play is the purest expression of human freedom, make-believe work imposed by others is the purest expression of lack of freedom.

The ultimate question of human history, as we’ll see, is not our equal access to material resources (land, calories,

Equality here is a direct extension of freedom;

A wage-labor contract is, ostensibly, a free contract between equals—but an agreement between equals in which both agree that once one of them punches the time clock, they won’t be equals any more.

perhaps, Ötzi suiting Pinker’s argument.

“The freedom to abandon one’s

What I want to emphasize, though, is the degree to which what we consider our core tradition of moral and political theory today springs from this question: What does it mean to pay one’s debts?