Peter Schiff's stuck on the island analogy...

[burritos]

So we've all heard the 5 Asians and 1 American stuck on the island analogy, where all the Asians work and the American eats all the fruits of labor and leaves the crumbs to the Asians. The assumption is that the Asians eventually will kick the American off the island and they will live off the fruit of their own labor. What would happen in this scenario if the 1 American had a gun and bullets, and the Asians who were starving before they got to this island now eat better(though piddly compared to the American) than they've eaten before in their lives?

Could the American convince Asian sheeple to keep working?

 

[IChooseLiberty]

So we've all heard the 5 Asians and 1 American stuck on the island analogy, where all the Asians work and the American eats all the fruits of labor and leaves the crumbs to the Asians. The assumption is that the Asians eventually will kick the American off the island and they will live off the fruit of their own labor. What would happen in this scenario if the 1 American had a gun and bullets, and the Asians who were starving before they got to this island now eat better(though piddly compared to the American) than they've eaten before in their lives?

Could the American convince Asian sheeple to keep working?

Perhaps, but I'd imagine the Asians would invest some of their lunch money into their own guns and bullets. Then they can easily convince the American consumers to eat less.

 

[Bruno]

So we've all heard the 5 Asians and 1 American stuck on the island analogy, where all the Asians work and the American eats all the fruits of labor and leaves the crumbs to the Asians. The assumption is that the Asians eventually will kick the American off the island and they will live off the fruit of their own labor. What would happen in this scenario if the 1 American had a gun and bullets, and the Asians who were starving before they got to this island now eat better(though piddly compared to the American) than they've eaten before in their lives?

Could the American convince Asian sheeple to keep working?

Yes, it would work until he goes to sleep.

 

[burritos]

Yes, it would work until he goes to sleep.

Queen bees and queen ants sleep, don't they?

 

[Bruno]

Queen bees and queen ants sleep, don't they?

I meant that the American could only keep the gun on them until he goes to sleep, at which point they would take the gun away.

Welcome to the RP forums!

 

[burritos]

I meant that the American could only keep the gun on them until he goes to sleep, at which point they would take the gun away.

Welcome to the RP forums!

Thanks for the welcome.

I understand that the American could lose the gun if the Chinese so wished to remove him from power. But maybe they will idolize hollywood/coca cola/kobe bryant/usa so much that they would just act like workers bees and ants. After all, worker bees and ants have been doing it even before we lived in caves and they don't seem to have a problem with it.

The middle east elites manage their main resource wisely(oil) and Chinese elites manage their resource(manpower) well. Perhaps disrupting the status quo(which is feeding the glutton(USA)) might not be in the best interest for the Chinese elites. It would be for the Chinese people as a whole, but it's not like Chinese individuals can stand up and protest the system. They certainly aren't a democracy and won't be any time soon.

 

[ARealConservative]

Thanks for the welcome.

I understand that the American could lose the gun if the Chinese so wished to remove him from power. But maybe they will idolize hollywood/coca cola/kobe bryant/usa so much that they would just act like workers bees and ants. After all, worker bees and ants have been doing it even before we lived in caves and they don't seem to have a problem with it.

The middle east elites manage their main resource wisely(oil) and Chinese elites manage their resource(manpower) well. Perhaps disrupting the status quo(which is feeding the glutton(USA)) might not be in the best interest for the Chinese elites. It would be for the Chinese people as a whole, but it's not like Chinese individuals can stand up and protest the system. They certainly aren't a democracy and won't be any time soon.

worker bees are genetically inferior.

I seriously hope that isn't your position.

 

[burritos]

worker bees are genetically inferior.

I seriously hope that isn't your position.

Considering that I'm Chinese (American), I would say no.

Are you saying that worker bees are genetically inferior to humans? or inferior to the queen bee?

 

[AoiMasamune]

This whole ant allegory is ridiculous to anyone who has studied ants in any detail.

A Queen ant holds no power in a colony. In fact, it's almost the other way around. The workers drag her around, by force, to wherever they feel she should be. The queen is just a breeding machine. All she does, every day, is lay eggs. Except for the times that she is resting, being fed, or hibernating, thats it.

Foraging for protein and nitrogen rich foods is prompted by the presence of hungry larva in the colony. Foraging for high sugar foods happens constantly regardless of the presence of a queen. The drive to expand the colony by tunneling is driven by the population of the colony. A colony doesn't react specifically to the queen being threatened, but by the colony as a whole being threatened, as they react in the same way regardless of the presence of a queen.

Despite popular belief, workers are not genetically inferior to the queen. They share the same genetic code (with the exception that the queen is using sperm from a seperate colony to fertilize the eggs). It is believed that hormones transfered from the workers to the larva during feeding and grooming prompt the larva to develop into gynes (Winged female reproductives).

Long story short, there is no power structure in an ant colony. None at all. If anyone could be said to have any control at all it would be the developing larva, as they have the ability to command the workers to fetch food.

Ant's have a form of group mind, where every individual acts like a single neuron in a very small brain. A single ant is absolutely retarded, but 5000 ants are brilliant.

I've often thought that a true free market economy would function in much the same way.


...
To address the original post, I believe it much depends on the amount of psychological control. For instance, the Asians could be brainwashed into believing that the American is a god, or god-like, and that their afterlife depended on their performance in his servitude. The American could even push it further and convince them that the gun was magical and prevent the Asians from learning how to make one.

Of course that doesn't apply well to the real world that we are trying to describe with this exercise, but perhaps they could be brainwashed into believing that the work is in some other way 'for their own good' like by preventing unemployment...