The Shepherd and The Banker A suited man, an investment banker, is striding along a road in the countryside and he comes across a shepherd and with his flock of sheep. Being a gambler, he tells the shepherd, 'I will bet you $100 against one of your sheep that I can tell you the exact number in this flock.' The shepherd thinks it over, it's a huge flock so he accepts the bet. The banker parks his car, whips out his Dell notebook computer, connects it to his cell phone, and surfs to a NASA page on the Internet, where he calls up a GPS satellite navigation system to get an exact fix on his location. From there he feeds the data to another NASA satellite that scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo. Within seconds he receives an email on his Smart phone that the image has been processed and the data stored. He then accesses a MS-SQL database through an ODBC connected Excel spreadsheet with email on his phone and, after a few minutes, receives a response. Finally, he prints out a full-color, 150-page report on his hi-tech, miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and finally turns to the shepherd and says, 'You have exactly 261 sheep'. The shepherd is astonished because the banker's figure is exactly correct. He says, 'OK, I'm a man of my word, take a sheep.' The investment banker selects one of the animals and begins to walk away. 'Wait,' yells the shepherd, 'Let me have a chance to get even. Double or nothing that I can guess your exact occupation.' The banker agrees readily. 'You are a government investment banker,' says the shepherd. 'Good grief!' splutters the banker, 'You are exactly right, tell me, how did you deduce that?' 'Easy,' says the shepherd, 'give me back my sheep dog, and I will tell you.' "No guessing required.' answered the shepherd. 'You showed up here even though nobody called you; you want to get paid for an answer I already knew, to a question I never asked. You tried to show me how much smarter than me you are; and you don't know a thing about sheep.