When elements that are already differentiated or that press toward differentiation are forced into an embracing union, the outcome, more often than not, is an increased incompatibility, a more intense mutual repulsion. The large, embracing framework, which naturally requires differentiation, on the one hand, in order to exist at all, causes a friction of elements against one another, on the other hand, an actualization of antitheses that would not have come to pass except for this crowding. Unification into a great amalgam is the means—even if a transient one—to individualization and to its emergence in consciousness.

XREF: This evokes psychological individuation and dialectical processes — how friction within a larger whole drives self-definition. Connects to conflict-driven identity formation in group dynamics.

QUESTION: Does this imply that large-scale unifications (political, cultural, cognitive) paradoxically produce sharper differentiation than isolation would? Worth exploring how friction itself breeds individuality. XREF: Could connect to dialectical thinking — thesis/antithesis synthesis, and to Jung's individuation process referenced elsewhere.

Georg Simmel, on individuality and social…, loc. 660