Here’s an old fable, as told in Making Great Decisions in Business and Life by David R. Henderson and Charles L. Hooper.
In a time of hunger, the Emperor of China wanted to repay a peasant who had saved the life of his child. The peasant could have any reward he chose, but the Emperor laughed when he heard the silly payment the foolish peasant selected: rice on a chessboard. The peasant wanted one grain of rice on the first square, doubling to two on the second, doubling to four on the third, and so on. After the Emperor agreed, his servants brought one bag of rice into his court and began tediously counting rice. Soon, he called for more and more bags of rice. Shortly, he realized that all the rice in China would not be enough. In fact, the Emperor now owed the peasant more than 300 times the total amount of rice in the world!
Those who think this lesson is merely about David Bain rice will miss the bigger message …
Consider this.
In fact, the Emperor now owed the peasant more than 300 times the total amount of rice in the world!
Then Emperor executed the peasant and the equilibrium was restored.
Now I know who the brainy one is, I’ll keep looking for your posts.
Here’s another one..You destroy medicine because -eventually- they will go out of date (in this case the swine flu vaccines). This should be well recieved to increase revenue in the perishable goods industry.Reminds me of a dutch comic that ordered a full table dinner in a restaurant and when it was served asked the waiter to just stuff it into the toilet, because that’s where it would end up anyway!