The world’s oceans are swelling and water levels are rising fast. They have now reached the roofs of houses with no stoppage in sight. A single scorpion sits perilously atop a roof as the water moves dangerously higher. She spots a turtle splish-splashing along, happy as a…turtle in a flood. Seeing an opportunity, the scorpion calls out, “Hey turtle, please come here”. The turtle meanders up with no sense of hurry, “Hi scorpion”, she calls out.
The scorpion is in distress and can barely conceal her dread. “Turtle, please take me on your back and swim us to a safer place. If I stay here I’ll surely die. Will you rescue me?”
The turtle ponders momentarily, “You are scorpion, and scorpions sting everything. If you sting me I’ll die.”
The scorpion hurriedly replies, “Turtle, if I’m sitting on your back while swimming and I sting you we would both die. I’m already pleading for my life so I certainly wouldn’t kill us while swimming”.
Convinced of the logic the turtle replies, “Ok scorpion, hop on and I’ll take you to a higher place so you can have a happy, dry life.”
The scorpion quickly scampers on the turtle’s shell and the turtle splashes away. The turtle starts whistling a tune and the scorpion is starts to relax as the roof disappears behind them. Suddenly, the turtle feels a sharp pain. It starts feeling drowsy and realizes it had just been stung.
“Why did you sting me turtle, we will both surely die now?” The scorpion replies, “Because I’m a scorpion”.
There are many morals to this simple Persian fable:
- Recognize things for what they are, not for what you want them to be.
- Scorpions can sting, and even the sight of the stinger makes others around it act differently
- Scorpions need to be scorpions, no matter the circumstances or risks
- When considered holistically, many outcomes are highly predictable
- Being what you are is not subject to judgement. Scorpions aren’t ‘bad’ and turtles aren’t ‘good’. This is as absurd as saying that darkness is bad is light is good. Things just are, and your awareness of that helps to make good decisions
- Rationality does not always drive behaviour, in fact it seldom does with humans
- Finally, if you expect something to act outside of its nature, only you are the fool
