2988: Maslow's Pyramid

|< < Prev Comic #2988 (September 20, 2024) Next > >|

Maslow's Pyramid

Title text: The local police, building inspector, and fire marshal are all contesting my 'safety' assertion, or would be if they could reach me past all the traps.

Explanation

Maslow's hierarchy of needs is a psychological model initially proposed by Abraham Maslow in 1943. It posits that all humans have certain requirements for a healthy and fulfilled life, and that these can be prioritized by how fundamental and foundational they are. The most basic needs are physical, such as food, water, and shelter, as humans can't survive without them in the long term. Then come things like safety, which includes physical safety, but also protection from things like emotional and economic threats. Beyond these come less urgent needs, such as love and social belonging, with the top (at least in simplified versions) being "self-actualization" or something similar.

The idea is frequently represented by a segmented triangle diagram, with basic foundational needs near the bottom creating the stability to enable self-actualization at the top, at least in the 'simplified' version. This diagram has become so popular that it's commonly referred to as "Maslow's Pyramid", even though Maslow himself never actually used the term.

In this comic, Cueball has interpreted the concept of Maslow's Pyramid literally. He attempts to achieve true happiness by building an actual, physical pyramid that resembles the common representation of Maslow’s hierarchy. Cueball complains that the pyramid only fulfills one of the five needs listed on its side: physical safety, as it's "highly defensible". It can also potentially provide shelter, but that's only one of multiple physical needs.

The pyramid is useless for his social and emotional needs: everyone, like Megan and White Hat whom he shows his pyramid to and including Cueball himself, thinks the pyramid was a poor idea. Despite the impressive accomplishment of constructing such an edifice, Cueball apparently feels entirely unfulfilled, and is "honestly questioning [his] life choices".

The pyramid's size can be estimated thanks to Cueball standing close to it. A single tier appears to be roughly two Cueballs in height (meaning that with Cueball being 1.7m to 2.0m tall, the 5-tier pyramid would be 17-20m tall, equivalent to a building with about six or seven storeys) and the base appears roughly 16 Cueballs in length (meaning 27-32m wide, potentially covering an area of ~700-1200m²). Compared to famous Egyptian pyramids that is a rather modest monument but it would be comparable to the Louvre Pyramid in size.

The title text calls into question the notion that it provides even physical security. It apparently fails to comply with fire and building codes, which is potentially dangerous to both Cueball and his community. Moreover, he implies that inspectors can't even access the building, due to "all the traps". The notion of real-life pyramids (and other ancient structures) being filled with active booby-traps is commonly portrayed in fiction, and it seems that Cueball built such traps into his pyramid. Of course, in a modern structure, such traps would almost certainly be illegal on their own (particularly if they prevented authorities from accessing the property), and living in a pyramid full of traps would potentially be a danger to Cueball himself. Even if the structure provided physical safety, if it put him in legal jeopardy (and likely economic danger, considering how expensive it must have been to build), means that it doesn't even fulfill that need.

Transcript

[The scene is seen from far away with the characters dwarfed by a huge pyramid in the middle of the panel. To the left we see Cueball facing White Hat and Megan while he is pointing behind him to the giant pyramid. It has been segmented into five tiers of equal height. Each tier has a labeled written on the side facing out. The segment at the tip is so small that the text needs to be written on two lines. To the right of each segment there is either a red cross (four times) or a green check mark (level two from the bottom). Next to these marks there is a comment. From top to bottom the labels, marks and comments are:]

Self-actualization

X Honestly questioning my life choices here

Esteem

X People seem less impressed by it than I hoped

Belonging and love

X Friends are worried about me

Safety

✔ Highly defensible

Physiological needs

X Provides basic shelter but no food, water, heat, etc

[Caption below the panel:]

I built Maslow's pyramid thing, but it's a total ripoff - it's only providing 20% of my needs.

 add a comment! ⋅  add a topic (use sparingly)! ⋅  refresh comments!

Discussion

Oh wow, first post! RadiantRainwing (talk) 23:11, 20 September 2024 (UTC)

Congratulations on learning how to post! 172.68.245.228 03:40, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

1258: First. Heh. P?sych??otic?pot??at???o (talk) 16:00, 8 October 2024 (UTC)

The 20% figure is incorrect. The lower levels of the pyramid have more volume than the upper levels. By my arithmetic, the breakdown is (rounded) 1%, 6%, 15%, 30%, and 49%, so the "safety" level provides 30% of his needs. Jordan Brown (talk) 00:27, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Plus the bottom layer ought to get partial credit for supplying basic shelter. Jordan Brown (talk) 00:29, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

I question this Cueball's ability to get anything okay enough. -- 172.70.38.122 (talk) 03:32, 21 September 2024 (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Seems like he's judging each layer on a pass-fail basis, no partial credit. So the bottom layer fails because it only provides shelter, but no food or water. Like a crypt, which is what the Egyptian pyramids were for. Barmar (talk) 18:19, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Oh crud. What did I do that I think totally messed up the attributions? 172.68.245.228 172.68.245.228 03:53, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

I think you probably put some ~s in the wrong places? 162.158.41.181 19:01, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

But *how* did he build it? Was there some sort of internal ramp? Were extraterrestrials involved? 172.70.163.48 06:58, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Couldn't care less. Cueball, I AM impressed. If your friends aren't, you need new friends. 172.71.160.115 07:37, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

I assumed Cueball was trying to meet the needs, inside the pyramid.  :-) Robert Carnegie [email protected] 172.70.160.231 10:49, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

And a pyramid is a very safe building, except for emergency exits.  ;-) (Also traps, but no one asked you in.) But it's not going to fall over. Robert Carnegie [email protected] 172.69.194.227 10:53, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

If you’re going to sign with your full name and email address, why not just set up an account and have that as your automatic signature? 42.book.addict (talk) 01:30, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

It's harder to climb over an inverted pyramid, looking for weak-points. But then it has a weak-point insofar as having to be balanced upon its point, and one of those definitely might fall over... 162.158.33.237 17:29, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

No food or water? He was doing it wrong: Above ground there was a separate chamber for holding food and drink for use by the deceased person in the afterlife. 172.71.170.166 00:50, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

Plus I'm thinking that if he's going to the effort of building a pyramid, it wouldn't have taken too much extra to include a ground-source heat exchanger to keep the place comfortable - that just seems like poor design on his part.172.70.90.136 13:02, 23 September 2024 (UTC)