I agree with the premise of your post: humans are humans, not machines, not some alchemical creation, and not computers. We are a specific and unique type of creature. In that vein, I’ve gravitated towards two conceptual ideas that seem to “fit” us: Robin Dunbar’s “number,” and Rene Girard’s take on mimetics, mimetic crisis, and scapegoating. At base we are tribal organisms, and it’s best to try to clean up the systems we create north and south of 150-500 grouped individuals.