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Conservatives usually point out that old institutions are salient and experimented solutions for society's coordination problems. But I'd add that this compromise with ancient traditions might also be a stable equilibrium solution to an intergenerational partial conflict. Promising to follow open-texture traditional principles allows a balance between aspirations from precedent and future generations.

A simple way to model this (stealed from K. Binmore's Game Theory: VSP, on the social contract that sustains intergenerational social security): at time t, there are two agents, the adult x and the child y; x has all the resources and can play Cooperate (sharing them) or Defect (consuming all for himself and condemning y to a childhood of need). At t+1, x is too old to produce new resources, but y grows up and produces them by herself; now, she has the choice between Cooperate or Defect. At t+2, y assumes x's role in t as the adult holding the resources, while x is dead and replaced by the new child x'; now, y has to choose between sharing resources with x' or not. And so on. If the first adult x has no memory of previous play, there's a Nash-equilibrium in each every player chooses Cooperate in her turn (for fear of "revenge" when he grows old and becomes dependent of the aid of the other player).

It's the same when we go from resources to values. If generation x currently holding power takes a revolutionary step by disregarding old values, the following generation y will be allowed to do it, too - and so on. Of course, for many reasons, it may be worth it; and there's a risk that some traditions become taboo, being followed despite no one wanting it. I'm only arguing for the conveniency of keeping ancient conventions, not for worshipping it; if an equilibrium-path of cooperation is already being followed, it might be tempting to keep it.