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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