Strength in Numbers

1. You always have a back-up with the small guysLet's suppose you have 1,000 average men, some fat, some skinny, some short, some tall, but all have no fighting experience. And on the other side of the battle field we see Chuck Norris (the real life one, not the internet one) and Bruce Lee. Who would win this battle? We're not sure, but I'd put my money on the 1,000 average men. They could sacrifice half of themselves to tire out the two great fighters, then the rest try to run away, even if Chuck Norris and Bruce Lee could defeat as well as out-run the rest, it would be very tiring as they have to run a long distance while still killing off these people. With these 1,000 men, there's always some backup left. However, if all of them concentrate on one fighter, then only one master is left to fight. The team of 1,000 men can substain little damage this way while efficiently defeating these two master fighters. Even if the master fighters only burn little calory defeating one person, over time 500 people is going to burn a load of calories, making the last fighters very difficult to fight off since the masters are so exhausted. 2. You can look like the big guy or even look biggerAs presented in the humorous picture in round 1, the big fish isn't sure whether or not to eat the small fish. Fish's sight are actually pretty bad, which is why fish swim in schools. [1] In fact, not only do they look bigger, they also look more confusing to predators (The big fish), as their crazy motions can greatly incapitate the big fish, as shown in a study. [2] Once again, if the 1,000 men panic and run around and crash randomly into the two great fighters, Chuck and Bruce will have a hard time concentrating on picking one person off at a time. 3. Better job at multi-taskingLet's assume you have to break into a maximum security prison. Of course, it would be good to hire somebody like Iron Man (version:evil) and burst in, kill the guards, get the keys, get everyone to escape, and fend off the cops while killing them off one by one. However, that would take a pretty long time. Iron Man would have to take his time and unlock every door, every handcuff, etc, etc. On the other hand if we even just have, say, 15 people who all only have red belt in karate and smart minds all around, they can watch out for one another and multitask better. As back to the fish example, source [3] and [4] all show that the fish can look around for predators everywhere, increasing vigilance, taking a much shorter time than just one big fish. The teaming up of so many fishes also has shown to allow more time for individual feeding. (also [3] and [4])4. Teaming up to defeat the one guyAs I stated in point 3; collaboration is the key to these small groups. Many examples in history show a big amount, although small beings, defeat a single large being. One good example is Gulliver, who, although an extremely large giant, was still taken down quite quickly by the Lilliputs. [5] Another good example is the book Swindle. Although the villain isn't exactly more powerful psysically, he was more powerful mentally and is easily smarter than any one of them, when compared to only one of them. However, he still got beaten by The Team, because The Team had 7 people who had multiple different skills and ideas that came together to ultimately break in and manage to steal the baseball card back. Even after a betrayal, the team still managed to hold sturdy and beat down the traitor. [6] Unlike fish, we are intelligent, so it makes sense that we can come up with many many different ideas. Diversity is key; it is hard for one person to come up with multiple creative ideas at a time, but it is not quite as difficult for multiple people to create multiple creative ideas at a time. As a famous Chinese quote translates to, "three cobblers with their wits can equal to Zhuge Liang", the latter whom was a mighty strategist managed to predict many weather patterns and won many battles without losing a single man. [7]Thus I have shown in many cases where loads and loads of little, ineffective beings can match up--and even be better than--one single huge/far-superior being.[1] http://en.wikipedia.org...[2] http://www.nature.com...[3] Lima, S. Back to the basics of anti-predatory vigilance: the group-size effect" Animal Behaviour 49:1. pp 11-20. 1995. [4] Roberts, G. Why individual vigilance declines as group size increases. Anim Behav. 51. pp 1077-1086. 1996. [5] http://www.web-books.com...[6] http://en.wikipedia.org...(novel)[7] http://v.gd...