[FRIAM] Ants and Bees, Oh My.

[Pamela McCorduck]

On Jul 8, 2007, at 7:31 PM, phil henshaw wrote:

> Good observation, about using young mend when they are most  
> maleable for making platoons and follow commands.    It's the  
> opportunity for emergent structure, as well as in this case, people  
> who wish to exploite it, that makes the difference.   I don't  
> generally buy the evolutionary value laden self interest of genes  
> idea for what makes systems powerful, but how the confluence of  
> diverse factors and a catalyst actually engage a developmental  
> process.  And it's often contradictions like the fact that these  
> are not the men most fit for the job, but the ones dumb enough for  
> the job, that raises the questions that reveal what's actually  
> going on.   Older men would think more.  Bad for armies!

I had no idea when I read this (a revelation to me at the time)  
whether it was empirical observation all senior officers in armies  
understood, or grounded  in biology.  Both, apparently, but for  
centuries, empirical observation served well enough.

As for your next two paragraphs, Phil, I do believe many in the  
military understand the situation completely--my 80-year-old cousin,  
who served as a member of the British SAS in WW II, yelled at me on  
the phone last night: "A field army can never fight a guerilla  
army."  It's no secret.  Whether the officers who understand it have-- 
or once had--the power to do anything about  it I don't know, but it  
seems unlikely.  Those who once balked have been replaced.  Our  
military is quite properly under the direction of civilians.  I hope  
it will always be so, even when the civilians fail as egregiously to  
understand things as they have failed  in this instance.






"One is often told that it is a very wrong thing to attack religion,  
because religion makes men virtuous.  So I am told; I have not  
noticed it."

				Bertrand Russell


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