3 ms·
>I mean, we humans and nearly all other mammals certainly don't have a singular queen and a sterile caste of workers. Corporations can be seen as superorganism
by ineedasername 4y ago
>I mean, we humans and nearly all other mammals certainly don't have a singular queen and a sterile caste of workers.
Corporations can be seen as superorganisms of humans. I don't think I have to elaborate too much here for this to seem a minimally acceptable metaphor?
There's even a queen replacement equivalent. In some circumstances a new new corporate queen will be prepared by the hive, but its also not uncommon for the (out of scope for this metaphor) mechanism of society to simply transplant one from elsewhere.
"Sterile cast of workers" probably requires the least explanation of the metaphorical equivalents here.
Governments as super organisms also seems an apt metaphor.
- kaashif 4y ago> "Sterile cast of workers" probably requires the least explanation of the metaphorical equivalents here. I mean, I disagree. Can you explain? Human workers aren't sterile, even if fertility rates aren't all that high.
- atomicnumber3 4y agoI think he must mean in an economic or social capacity. An individual worker, alone, has essentially zero meaningful leverage compared to the CEO/queen. So sterility here means autonomy or agency or power.
- ineedasername 4y agoThey are sterile within the organization of a corporate superorganism. They cannot create more employees. The desire to obtain more employees for the superorganism is derived from a complex set of signals that propagates throughout the organization. Edit: Also unless employees are having sex and making the babies sort mail or fight off corporate raiders then the metaphorical aspects still hold.