About genes, history, and the possibilities of change

Daniel Kortus from the Prague University of Chemistry and Technology belongs to scientists who do not remain confined to the academic sphere but enter into social debate about the climate crisis. On the social media account Klimatomluva, he strives to make the topic of climate change part of broader civic responsibility. In the Czech environment, where academic engagement is still not a given, this is an activity worth supporting.

Security can be shaped in various ways: by accumulating property, but also by strengthening relationships, private reserves as well as shared institutions, a fence around the land, but also trust in neighbors.

And that is precisely why Kortus's recent statement in the Politalk program about the fact that the need to accumulate wealth is simply in us: “We need to somehow be modest, and at the same time, the essence of survival in our genes is that we have to accumulate, increase our wealth, increase our property, safety, and so on. Suddenly, we are supposed to go against our natural instincts. That’s incredibly, incredibly difficult.”

In the flow of speech, such a statement can easily be overlooked. It does not sound provocative or confrontational. But it is precisely in such small remarks that deeper assumptions about our thinking are often revealed. It is not a marginal detail but a symptom of a certain way of thinking about humans, society, and ultimately the limits of what we consider possible. That is why it makes sense to pause at this statement. Not to question Daniel Kortus's activities, but to support his engagement as a chemist through reflection on his statement. Reflection on the idea that the main obstacle to change is “our genes.”

At first glance, this simple shortcut explains why it is so difficult for a modern person to give up growth and accumulation, or why it is hard to think about alternatives. However, the problem is that this shortcut carries a cunning biologizing fatalism. It imposes the idea that the current economic and consumer regime is fundamentally okay and is merely a continuation of ancient evolutionary instincts. We are just like that. We accumulate because it’s in us. But from such thinking, not only a certain view of human nature but also a specific interpretation of human history follows. In this spirit, history turns into a long march from scarcity to abundance. As if there were no thousands of years of cultural experiments, social forms, or political conflicts between our ancestors and us.

A somewhat different history

This perspective has its tradition. It appears in various forms since the era of 19th-century social Darwinism. Its basic message, which also suited 19th-century capitalism, is that competition and selfishness are natural, and cooperation and solidarity are only occasional cultural veneers.

But what if a more attentive look at human history tells us something different? In the book Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution, anarchist and geographer Petr Kropotkin challenged the idea that the main driver of evolution is competition. Based on biological observations and historical examples, he showed that cooperation and mutual support are among the most effective survival strategies. Both in animals and in human history. He thus questioned biologizing interpretations of human behavior that turn egoism and accumulation into a natural fate. He did not write a romantic fairy tale about innate human goodness. Instead, he reminded us that evolution is not one-dimensional, as one might think based on the shortcut “struggle for life”: evolution favors different ways of existence—and cooperation has proven to be one of the most viable.

His views were not in conflict even with Darwin himself. In his later writings, Darwin repeatedly emphasized that human groups with a developed sense of belonging and loyalty have long-term advantages. Even in Charles Darwin’s conception, humans are not just isolated maximizers of their own benefit.

This perspective is further developed by contemporary anthropology and archaeology. The book Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Graeber and David Wengrow shows that humanity has constantly experimented with different forms of coexistence over the centuries. There have been egalitarian and hierarchical societies, nomadic and settled, property-owning and nearly propertyless. People have alternately lived under regimes of strict equality and significant inequality—even within the same culture.

And finally—openness of history is not only evident in ancient prehistory or non-European societies. German historian Annette Kehnel, in her book Wir konnten auch anders: Eine kurze Geschichte der Nachhaltigkeit (We Could Have Done Otherwise: A Short History of Sustainability), shows that even European history offers examples of management based on moderation, long-term stability, and resource sharing. Medieval towns, guilds, or communal estates, according to her, functioned as systems that took seriously the limitations of natural resources and responsibility toward future generations. Of course, these were not idyllic worlds without conflicts, but rational survival strategies under conditions of uncertainty.

Accumulation is not destiny

Accumulation is simply not a universal biological imperative but rather a historically specific strategy that simply prevailed under certain conditions and disappeared in others. Modern capitalism is not a necessary culmination of human nature but just one of many possible forms of social organization.

Why does this matter? Because the way we name the problem also determines what solutions are conceivable. If we claim that the inability to be modest is encoded in our genes, then ecological transformation appears as a fight against human nature. As a struggle with ourselves. Someone might therefore think it is a lost cause from the start.

But if we say that we have within us an equally deeply rooted capacity for cooperation, solidarity, and self-restraint, then the perspective fortunately changes. Change ceases to be a biological miracle and becomes a cultural and political task. That is, a matter of institutions, education, imagination, and other values.

Sure, people seek security and stability. But security can be shaped in various ways: by accumulating property, but also by strengthening relationships, private reserves as well as shared institutions, a fence around the land, but also trust in neighbors. It is precisely in this openness of possibilities that it becomes clear that it is not a biological destiny but a cultural and historical choice.

Kortus's argument does not need to be weakened by polemics but rather deepened with another type of support—historical experience. To show that ecological transformation is not a denial of humanity but a return to one of its possibilities: the ability to organize shared life based on mutual responsibility. Modesty is thus not ascetic heroism but one of the forms of civilizational maturity—the capacity to consciously choose ways of life that will stand not only today but also in the long run. Our problem is not what we have “in our genes” but what stories and histories we want to tell about ourselves.

The author is a historian.