A GREAT WHITE SHARK ON THE BLACKBOARD

A pilot fish swims at the mouth of a great white shark so it can feed off the scraps that fall from the shark's jagged teeth. What is a pilot fish without a great white shark? I'll tell you what a pilot fish without a great white shark is - a pilot fish without a great white shark is a very hungry fish. A starving fish.

Now, imagine the shark was a bit of a silly billy and got a bit greedy and ate up all there was to eat in the sea and there was nothing left. What would happen then? Well, for a while the shark and the pilot fish would feel very fat and happy but eventually the shark would become hungry again and so would the pilot fish. There is nothing to eat! What are the shark and pilot fish to do? Well, it's quite simple. Some of the pilot fish should offer themselves and swim into the great white's mouth while the others remain to eat whatever remnants fall from the great white's gob. Selecting which pilot fish get eaten would be up to the pilot fish but I'd imagine the weaker ones, the ones down the back, furthest from the shark's mouth, would be incentivised to offer themselves first. Persuasive statements like: 'it's time to don the pilot fish jersey' and 'it's your aquatic duty' would be thrown at the weaker pilot fish and, despite emitting little grumbles and leaving a few snarky posts on pilotfish.ie, into the shark's mouth these fish would go. Better to be dinner than have no dinner, right?

Pilot fish are greedy but the great white shark is greedier. The great white shark is the greediest of the greedy and, ultimately, pilot fish respect him for this. Pilot fish wouldn't have to resort to self-sacrifice in times of scarcity if they were as greedy as the great white and not just as greedy as each other. Greed is strength.

Greed is strength and that is what we should teach kids in school. Draw a great white shark on the blackboard and tell the children the truth. Even if it isn't really the truth we may as well say it is because we act like it is. Because we act like There Is No Alternative.

1 + 1 = ?

One and one do not make two. One and one make one. You can’t add something to itself to make it something else. For example, there is only one me (‘thankfully’, says you) and I can’t be added to myself to make someone else. I and I do not make you. Got it? Good.

Now, to add one with another one is a different matter. One plus another (different) one is not the same equation as one and one, which is adding one to itself. However, the answer is still not two. One plus another one makes two ones, not two. Two is something else entirely. The idea that two ones make a two is absurd. Two number ones don’t even look like a number two. They’re not even the same shape. In fact, two number ones look like an eleven and it would make as much sense to say that one and one makes eleven than to say they make two. In fact, it would probably make more sense.

Now, I’m not denying that one and another one share some mathematical/numerical notional value with a two. I’m just saying that one and another one are not the same thing as a two. They are just two ones. Let me put it this way, imagine that I am a fruit seller and I have two oranges. Combined, these two oranges weigh the same as a grapefruit. When I put the items on sale I charge the same for the two oranges as I would for a grapefruit. So, the two oranges are the same value as a grapefruit but that does not make the two oranges an actual grapefruit. A grapefruit is larger, tastes different, is a different colour and there is only one of it. If you thought that the two oranges became a grapefruit just because they weighed and cost the same you’d be insane. So why is it acceptable to think that two ones somehow become a two? It doesn’t make any sense.

What disturbs me is that we actually teach this shite in schools. We fill the heads of kids with this rubbish and then expect them to be able to deal with the bubbling, popping, fizzing, stretching, bending and wriggling contents of reality. We teach kids that one and one makes two not because it’s true but because it just seems true. It’s like everything else we teach kids in school, it hasn’t much to do with the real world at all. It’s just enough to get along with in what we’ve decided to pretend is the real world. It’s unreal, anyone who can add one and one knows that.