«-Refreshing Our Thoughts-»
"The sheep - The wolves - The flock and The pack"
Ask anyone who actually keeps sheep. Sheep are weird. Sheep are evolved to have a very different intelligence than humans. But sheep are not stupid. Sheep are not obedient. And sheep are definitely not easily led.
Sheep are intensely selfish, intensely intelligent (but only in an other-regarding way) and intensely dogmatic, willing to pursue a myopic behavior even unto death.
"Zero Altruism And Overwhelming Selfishness"
The most popular misconception about sheep is that they are obedient followers. It’s true that they’re not leaders. It’s true that they are incredibly sensitive to other sheep. But it’s also true that they are the most selfish mammal that you could ever encounter.
They don’t lead other sheep or form leadership structures like a pack because they don’t care about other sheep. Every sheep lives in a universe of One, which makes them just about the most non-obedient creature around.
"It’s not what the crowd believes"
¡It’s what the crowd believes that the crowd believes!
«-It's fascinating indeed what happens when people's sense of what everyone else thinks shifts-»
A current world managed by high-functioning sociopaths. Shameless creatures of jealousy and schadenfreude, which is exactly the type of human most purely designed to succeed in the modern age.
In the same way that the modern story of what it means to be a sheep — docile, obedient, stupid — is totally wrong, so is the modern story of what it means to be a wolf.
We think of a wolf as the epitome of rapacious independence. But wolves, like all pack animals, are far less independent (and far less greedy) than your average sheep. Unlike sheep, wolves can act outside of their group because they’re not consumed by other-regarding behavior, but those actions are ultimately in service to the pack.