"Kept in check" via the same bloodthirsty violence we're seeing now, just under different management. Brilliant.

The same? I'd like to see the numbers of people dying under Saddam's rule, compared to how many people have died under the new government which replaced him.

No doubt, Saddam was a tyrant, but he also provided regional stability. Some heads had to roll to maintain that stability, but was it as many as are dying now?

>In the long run, if you strike out at others without cause, it will likely happen to you.

George Bush seems to be living a very nice and comfortable life. Kim Jong * have all lead comfortable lives of great power, with the older two dying of old age.

>Causing pain to others is bad because the response I get is likely to cause me discomfort.

Politicians and CEOs and lawyers and cops do it all the time and it seems to work out quite well for them.

>Money requires relationships.

No, it just requires a job. It's not that hard to get a crappy-to-mediocre-paying job without any personal relationships. Or, you can be like corporate executives or lawyers and just be really good at lying to people, so you have relationships but they're not actually genuine.

>So you can name dozens of people who don't live by caring about others. There are what? almost 8 billion people on the planet?

The dozens of people I can name are actually running the planet. It doesn't look like this system of yours is working all that well.

You're not going to be around that long for the long-term good of society to matter much to you.

>1) If I cause pain to others, or believe that this is justifiable, then others quite likely will treat me the same

Politicians and CEOs seem to get along just fine causing pain to others without suffering any negative repercussions. They just make sure to have some select cronies who assist them in fucking over everyone else.

>2) If everyone lived according to the ideals of "care about is your own personal survival and comfort, and nothing else.", society would collapse.

Yet we happily put people just like that into the highest positions of power over us.

>If everyone took that as an example and behaved that way, the whole mess would collapse. It's like the random jerks who use the HOV lane when driving alone...

The problem with this analogy is that the random jerks who use the HOV lanes alone aren't the ones in charge of running and policing the highways. What's more, the policitians are the ones preaching to us about how to live, when they themselves don't live by these words.

Maybe it'd be better if the whole mess did collapse. If we're so stupid we put people in charge who are like this, then why do we deserve a functioning society rather than starvation and anarchy?

>I do not grow my own vegetables, butcher my own meat, make my own circuit boards, generate my own electricity.

You don't need personal relationships for any of that, you only need money. You can get money from being employed, among other means.

>I require relationships with other people in my household, neighborhood and world to stay alive and thrive.

I can name dozens of politicians and CEOs who happily survive and thrive while not giving two shits about anyone else on the planet.

>We evolved in communities and had to be able to work together to thrive. It is "bad" for me to harm others because it upsets relationships necessary for my survival.

Somehow, this evolution totally failed since our entire society is run by people who have zero empathy for others.

This is a good point. The Koran also instructs people to murder each other many times, and these verses are the very basis of the Islamic religion.

Wouldn't an indoctrination by society of an expectation for others to follow the rules be a suitable enough reason for one to follow that same rule?

No, because what's good for society isn't necessarily good for you, the individual. Just look at all our politicians and business leaders; they don't work for the good of society at all, they work purely for their own personal gain. So why should the rest of us work for the good of society?

Other unrelated people are not your young, they could actually be competitors. There's a reason we humans are so warlike.