EUSOCIAL CODE

 Wilson refers to this phenomenon more broadly as the discovery of eusocial behavior. The word “eusocial” is a combination of the Greek prefix “eu,” which signifies “good/real” and the word “social.” Eusociality thus refers to the highest level of insect or animal social behavior, involving cooperation and collaboration. Following Wilson, I say humans “discovered” rather than “invented” eusocial behavior because it characterizes ants and other social insects as well as humans, and other social mammals, such as the naked mole rat. Wilson situates the date far earlier in human history than I do here. I choose 50,000 years because my focus is on the economy. It is clear that an epochal change in society occurred roughly 10,000 years BCE, when humans invented agriculture in six parts of the world simultaneously. The fact of this simultaneity directly suggests the advance of code represented by the invention of agriculture was part of a forward movement of code that started much earlier.