Over and over again we watch societies collapse in blood and fire because the ruling classes work to create a human community that resembles the structure and efficiency of a beehive. Sadly, it can never work. The reason it can never work is for the simple reason that bees and humans have evolved along very different paths; especially regarding the cornerstone of any community management strategy… reproduction.

Bees reproduce by the Small Egg Gambit, while humans use the Large Baby Gambit. The Small Egg Gambit is when parents use all of their energy and resources to lay thousands of tiny eggs and simply walk away; allowing statistics and chance to decide the outcome. The perfect example of this is the spider. The Large Baby Gambit is when parents have a small number of large babies, but then spend all of their energy and resources to protect and nurture them. Both strategies are effective, as they both end up producing the same number of successful adults. Problems arise, however, when we move forward from there.

A beehive is a community structure that has evolved from the Small Egg Gambit. A mother bee lays thousands of eggs while the rest of the hive serves to protect and nurture those eggs. (It is human arrogance that has us calling the mother bee a queen, and assumes the hive is serving her.) At some point in the past, there was an ancestor to today’s bees that reproduced exactly like a spider. Adaptations slowly created the worker and soldier bees and the roles they play in the hive. What allows this structure to work is that the worker bees do not reproduce themselves. Thus, they are free to serve the hive; creating an Industrial Structure.

Practitioners of the Large Baby Gambit have the peculiar trait of being hard wired to put their own children first. As a result, they could never maintain a community like a beehive. These individuals build much smaller communities with a Social Structure. A Social Structure is the result of a constant battle to give an advantage to their own children within the community.

What is confounding, is that we humans are the first and only species on this planet who have both a Social Structure and Industrial Structure. Thus, when we finally figure out what a sustainable community looks like for us, it will be completely different from anything else we might find in the environment. Judging from what we already see in our society, I would argue that it will look like an Inverted Beehive. There will be a class of emotionally potent people, who do not reproduce themselves, but whose job it will be to serve the children of those who do. They will be the leaders and policy makers. The parents will be workers and thinkers, allowed to acquire wealth and luxury, but not allowed to have any power or authority.