Monday, January 7, 2013 7:20:16 AM
There are a lot of southern pacific islands like this. Backwards places like Vanuatu, Melanesia, PNG and Australia, where the locals will believe in anything set before them, such as the Australian Labour Party.
Saturday, January 5, 2013 8:03:25 AM
Richard Feynman wrote an excellent commencement address for his inauguration at CalTech in 1974, likening the approach some so-called scientists take to their work as being akin to these cargo cults. I see it in my work (software development) all the time too: people who see the behaviours of successful people/teams/companies, and who try to replicate their success by copying the superficial aspects of their behaviour, but with no deep understanding of why certain behaviours are pertinent in some circumstances but irrelevant and inapplicable in others. The results those people get are often about as successful as the 'airports` built by cargo cults are in attracting aircraft. And it`s just as big a mystery to them why they`re unsuccessful.