ABSTRACT
The relationship of self to society, person to others, life to environment, defines the path of growth and survival. A flower blooming in the shade of other plants may be protected from the heat of the sun, or its growth may be stunted from lack of light. The wolf knows the joy of conquest when the pack pulls down a ton of moose to start a week-long winter feast. In other times, on other days, that same pack may turn inward on that wolf, now perhaps sick or injured, and make a feast of her as well. As humankind came of age as an expressly social animal, others became sources of resource and protection, symbiotically creating a social whole much greater than the sum of its parts. At the same time, others could turn, either individually or collectively, into the gravest of threats to the people near them. Personal security is never guaranteed by social relationships.
