[bjyikyvq] People and the hierarchy of needs

Hypothesize that the only people you can truly care about are those who are essential in satisfying your basic needs: people who provide you food and shelter, people you want to have sex with.  And then a collection of people associated with propagating your DNA: your children directly, and various caregivers of your children.

This hypothesis seems at odds with a more famous hypothesis that the only people you can care about are those in your tribe (of maximum size 100).  It is also at odds with the popular conception that you can learn to care about someone else who is not in one of those roles listed above.

While a pessimistic hypothesis, this does offer a template for creating peace between conflicting groups: a social planner architects society so that members of opposing groups are in those relationship roles with each other.  It is important that a person in such a role to someone else not be "commodity": easily replaced with someone else who can perform the same role.