From: Hibbs, Philip (philip.hibbs@tnt.co.uk)
Date: Mon 01 Nov 1999 - 14:54:28 EET
Peter Metcalfe:
>I'm not certain that the vast majority of dwarves
>actually know why their processes work either.
That reminds me of a story about a group of monkeys that were sprayed with
water whenever one of them approached a banana up a set of steps. The
monkeys soon got the idea of stopping any other monkey from approaching the
banana. By stopping the water and replacing the monkeys one by one, the new
monkeys learned not to approach the steps, and cheerfully joined in the
punishment of any other new monkey that tried it. Eventually there were no
monkeys that had any knnowledge of the water spray, but none of them would
approach the steps. This is a powerful analogy, and is exhibited frequently
in human behaviour.
Philip Hibbs http://www.snark.freeserve.co.uk/
Opinions expressed may not even be my own, let
alone those of any organisations, nations, species,
or schools of thought to which I may be affiliated.
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