[navane]

Thank you. The best thing I've read this year, easily.

However, halfway the post instead of going all metaphysical and try to create a garden, isn't the logical conclusion that individual gains in the rat race trump any grand plan you might have? Is it about the balance between being the best rat and finding a community to create a garden? If you garden by yourself, isn't that just being a rat with extra steps?

[navane]

After some more thought, I think the detour that is required before this gets all grand strategy is looking more in depth at the ratting strategy.

All the examples quickly settle on a static state, skipping the inertia of the dynamic state that precedes it. And it is in that dynamic state that the rats manage to get their gains.

There are many steps between "Tim decides not to use the purifier in his fish farm" and "So many people don't use their purifiers so that Tim doesn't have any gains anymore". That takes s long time, and after that it's something else. Because it's not the purifier that sets Tim appart, but his attitude.

I think this is a general trap, where the static state makes something look obvious one way, but the trick is in the dynamics of inertias, and the time it takes to reach the static state.