Is Divisiveness an Archaic Survival Mechanism?

What happens when a perfectly unified tribe takes the wrong course of action?

By JOHN LEAKE

We’ve all heard the saying, “'A house divided against itself cannot stand.” Under most circumstances, this seems to make perfect sense. However, lately I’ve begun to wonder if there are situations in which the opposite is true. Imagine a perfectly unified tribe in which every member gives his unquestioning allegiance to the tribe’s leader or leadership council. Now imagine that, in the face of an existential threat, the tribe’s leadership makes a fatal error of judgement. In this situation, one can imagine that a group of dissidents that take a different or even opposing course of action could ensure the tribe’s survival while the majority join together in going to their ruin.

Consider the case of the Nantucket Whaleship Essex, which, in 1820, was rammed and sunk by a bull sperm whale 2,000 nautical miles west of South America. This obliged the crew to set forth in their small whaling chase boats with limited provisions and water. The navigator estimated that the closest land was the Marquesas Islands, 1,200 miles to the west. With favorable winds and currents setting in that direction, the crew would likely reach the islands in less than two weeks. This was the course that Captain Pollard wished to take, though he expressed it as a recommendation, and not as an order.

In 1820 among Nantucket Quakers, the prevailing orthodoxy was that it was best to steer clear of the Marquesas because they were inhabited by aggressive cannibals. Because first mate Owen Chase and the other men were afraid being eaten, they decided it would be better to sail 1,000 miles south in order to catch the westerlies back east, over another 3,000 miles of open ocean to South America, for a total distance of 4,000 miles. For most of the men, this proved to be a fatal decision, and the fact that it was driven by fear of cannibalism proved to be the cruelest of ironies.

Dr. McCullough and I often wonder why, in recent years, we have—by instinct, discernment, and critical evaluation—viewed the world through such an unorthodox lens. Could it be that, under certain circumstances, the group that holds the heterodox view is the more likely to survive?

Years later, when he conducting research for Moby Dick, Herman Melville speculated that all of the men would have very likely survived if they’d sailed for Tahiti, where, in 1820, cannibalism was NOT being practiced on foreign sailors.

“Which way should we sail, mates? 4,000 miles to South America, or 1,000 miles to the Marquesas?”