Defending the West: Why Instinct is Not Enough
Chapter 4 - Why Instinct is Not Enough
“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”
– Jeremiah 17:9 (KJV)
While instincts influence human behavior, they cannot regulate themselves. The impulses that once protected small groups of hunter-gatherers—ambition, loyalty, and fairness—are still active today within modern societies, where their scale amplifies their effects. Our desire for recognition continues to fuel our ambition; our loyalty to allies still defines our sense of belonging; our resentment of perceived injustice still motivates revolt. None of these forces have faded as we’ve become more “civilized.” They have been passed down and are embedded within every institution we’ve built.
The issue isn’t that these instincts exist, but that they lack automatic checks against their excesses. Hierarchy can stabilize a group, but it doesn’t guarantee that its leaders will respect limits on their authority. Coalition loyalty can unite members toward a common goal, yet that same bond can justify corruption, exclusion, or aggression toward outsiders. The instinct for fairness punishes inequality, but it can’t determine what justice truly requires. Our anger flares when we feel wronged, but fades quickly when the same wrong benefits us. Instincts trigger our reactions, but those reactions depend on the circumstances.
If human nature includes drives for both empathy and dominance, as well as cooperation and rivalry, then a stable society cannot depend solely on our impulses. A society mainly driven by feelings will swing between outrage and apathy, crusade and complacency. We can already see this fluctuation today—each political or social group convinced of its virtue, each redefining fairness to fit their own interests.
What we see today is not new. When shared standards collapse, conflict worsens because there is no common framework to resolve competing claims. Thomas Hobbes, writing Leviathan in 1651 during the chaos of the English Civil War, described what happens when no common authority exists to control conflicting wills. In that situation, individuals pursue self-preservation and personal gain, until life itself becomes, as he described, “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” Hobbes did not claim that humanity is especially vicious; he argued that our individual desires, left unchecked by accepted rules, inevitably clash with those of others. Chaos is not an accident but the natural consequence of unchecked ambition.
When people judge their own causes, what begins as caution often ends in violence because there is no higher standard to decide who is right. Without a trusted referee, fear becomes rational, and raw power replaces principles as the basis of right and wrong. True peace, therefore, requires enforceable order—laws, customs, and an inner restraint strong enough to curb self-interest.
Without these standards, institutions reflect the desires of the loudest voices among them. Each faction defines justice in ways that support their cause; leaders change rules to keep their power; followers convince themselves that altering narratives still shows the truth. When appeals to emotion replace law, as we often see today, hierarchy becomes more rigid because nothing limits the power of those at the top.
Cultures endure only when our desires are guided by discipline—when moral growth restrains our appetites before they influence policy, commerce, or law. When that growth stalls, institutions start to mirror the psychology of their most aggressive members.
If instinct cannot reliably govern itself, then something beyond instinct must assume that role. The question isn’t whether such discipline is necessary but which form of it can endure—what truth, tradition, or law can restrict ambition without stifling its vitality. If civilization can only flourish when our instincts are restrained, then the manner in which we do so will determine whether it promotes liberty or destroys it.
Copyright © 2026 by Michael Lines. All rights reserved.
The outline of the book Defending the West is available, along with purchase options, at this link.