ok. i don't think it's realistic to demand people read this whole book
so
as requested... my precis:
0) humans are, in darwinian terms weak (in the sense that animals like octopuses and albatrosses can survive alone without social conditions). we need to cultivate what adler calls "social feeling" because we need to work collaboratively to survive and thrive.
1) childhood shapes us as a result of (a) our physical robustness - which deficiency adler calls organ deficency - our physical disabilities (b) the care taken by our parents to raise us. the parents of someone born in poverty will not necessarily have access to the same levels of care. (fwiw he's a socialist - but quiet about it)
2) everyone has a "will to power" - which forms from our adaptation from being powerless children to adults (we can call this simply ego formation)
3) people with organ deficency or bad childhoods have a pathological "will-to-power"
4) an unhealthy "will-to-power" which i would qualify in terms of inflation and depression is characterised by behaviour which is lacking or bereft of "social feeling" - this is an argument about the pathogenic nature of bad behaviour ("we are all miserable sinners")
5) the best way to deal with our own and others distorted "will-to-power" is to understand human nature - to see how ours and other people's "will-to-power" can become deranged. basically we all need to understand psychology - and parents especially need to help their children to understand human nature.
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although it focuses exclusively on the ego it does so with, i think, a latent mysticism. this social order is, essentially, a divine emanation which we ignore at our peril. also lots of possible other ramifications with regards to diet and the ecology.
