And while it is possible to coast on prior success, or find an isolated enough niche, and pretend that it is not fundamental to all life everywhere - that doesn’t make it less of a delusion.

Society uses, builds, and works to maintain delusions like this because it helps keep us all from a mad max future. It’s one of those ‘useful to believe’ things most of the time.

But don’t buy it so much you let someone use it against you as a weapon, instead of as a mutual agreement.