Solve this problem (with awesome mspaint by Xel!)

Xel

A group of fishermen go out to catch some fish so they can feed their family. They get out to the middle of the lake and discover several schools of fish of varying sizes. There are a lot of small schools, a large number of medium-sized schools, and one very large school. They decide they need to take enough fish home to feed their families, but they don't want to take so many out of each school that they might harm the future reproduction of those schools. They find the perfect amount to take from each school, and make a note of the percent they took from each school so they can do the same next time.



A few months later, they come back to the same spot ready to go home with another big haul. There's a problem though, they can't use the same formula they came up with last time because while they were gone, some of the fish from each school defected and joined the very large school.



So here's what you need to solve:

What should the fishermen do to take home enough to feed their families while maintaining the natural balance of the schools?

Dogtown

Go hunt deer.

NoSocialGroup

Only fish from the large school?

Flazer

just alter the amount of taking from the schools of fish that migrated to the big fish, by taking those shares from those schools to migrate into the big school of fish, causing a balance to the same function they found before, just altered to migrate with those same fish

LewsTherin

just alter the amount of taking from the schools of fish that migrated to the big fish, by taking those shares from those schools to migrate into the big school of fish, causing a balance to the same function they found before, just altered to migrate with those same fish

Xel

What grade level would you say this problem is? College? High School? Elementary School?

Dogtown

Elementary

Lynog_LFC_x2ndCx

who gives a shit

Warlord

The fisherman should write a new formula. I suggest they just use dynamite since the fish are doing whatever the fuck they want anyways. It won't kill them all.

Xel

What about if we change a few labels?

Dogtown

The smart fish will just live off the grid and sell hemp jewelry from their van on the side of road.

NoSocialGroup

The problem is that the big school of fish doesn't give a shit about the smaller schools of fish - for the most part. It is only a set of beings of higher intellect who understand future consequences - and that's not what the IRS is.


It's a pretty stupid practice itself to ask people who don't care about their fellow man now to give a shit about future generations - but I do like oversimplification of mental instructings like this to help idiots who are poor/middle class and still vote for tax cuts for the wealthy.

ZxBiohazardZx

there is no solution, as long as you take away fish and no new fish are added your fucked over

else dfish/dt = 0 gives you the solution

NoSocialGroup

The initial conditions implicitly implied repopulation. The pop imbalance (possibly partially, possibly completely) comes from redistribution of fish from smaller to bigger schools.

Tyrsis

Tax the rich as much as you want because they gain wealth off of their assets not income lol

Although at the same time if you tax them too much they won't be using their disposable income to buy goods from the smaller groups of fish so their businesses will falter.

Gotta have balance.

NoSocialGroup

It is really about the complications of the tax code and the omissions it contains. It'd be nice if there was a mandatory report of wealth of U.S. citizens invested in foreign accounts that gets taxed like a Roth IRA (taxed at the time of investment - making investment philosophy based more on projected growth rather than simply hiding money) between the foreign effective tax rate on that account up to a maximum of the 15% Capital Gains tax.

Zeality

I think they should give incentives for people above a certain threshold of networth to re-invest a portion of their money into the bottom level of society (ie. funding schools, supplying jobs in-country, that sort of thing). Make it worthwhile enough that people will do it, but not so much as you gain another massive chunk of debt.

I think making less people rely on welfare and all that crap would be better in the end, though I guess you'll never really stop crackheads from being crackheads.

Flazer

there is no solution, as long as you take away fish and no new fish are added your fucked over

else dfish/dt = 0 gives you the solution

uh... lol

Unreliable

economy was stable before IRS?

Scientology

More MS Paint plox

Pie

Wait, are you calling me a fish?

Marais

Well this is a nice one. Yet there are some uncleared data.
Is this a mathematic problem or a philosophical one?
If this is a mathematic problem replace the fish in the circles with numbers and i am up to it.
If this demands another approach i can only suggest that whatever they do in the end there will be only an enormous group of fish who will propably stop taking the bait!

ps. FUCK IRS

Darubian

Someone count those fish, the number 47 comes to mind here...

Scientology

It goes like this: You have to eat the fish to stay healthy. So you lure the fish along with a tasty bit of food, ya know? Some worms, a jig maybe even a few campaign promises. The problem is that it's all a lie. It's a lure into a false sense of security that they want you to feel. The truth is that the fish don't live in a democratic commune, they live in a vicious republic.

/dankmode

Dogtown

I still think my hippie fish idea stands valid.

Xel

It goes like this: You have to eat the fish to stay healthy. So you lure the fish along with a tasty bit of food, ya know? Some worms, a jig maybe even a few campaign promises. The problem is that it's all a lie. It's a lure into a false sense of security that they want you to feel. The truth is that the fish don't live in a democratic commune, they live in a vicious republic.

/dankmode

It's a damn good thing they don't, too. Schools of fish are not smart enough to directly vote on legislation.