# paper tiger (untested)

*Ordinarily means:* something that looks threatening but has no real strength

A thing whose reach others read as wide while it is narrow, so its walls on them hold only until someone tests them.

- Computed level: L16 (depth in the emergence graph, not abstraction)
- Status: published  ·  Domain: agency

## Emergence
**Emerges from:** [reach](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-reach.action), [model](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-model.representation), [others](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-others.distinct-entities), [wide](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-wide.spatial), [narrow](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-narrow.spatial), [wall](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-wall.range-end), [test](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-test.assessment), [reputation](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-reputation.social-model), [power](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-power.over), [hold](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-hold.physical), [read](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-read.information), [someone](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-someone.person), [time](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-time.dimension)

**Through:** Others' models set walls on themselves out of a reach that is not there; the power is real exactly as long as no one acts to check it, and the first test ends it all at once.

**Novel properties:**
- power held entirely in others' models
- walls that last until tested
- an ending that arrives in one step

## Examples
- Mao used 'paper tiger' in 1946 for the United States and its atomic bomb: apparently overwhelming, ineffective against a determined opponent. *(politics)*

---
*Canonical: https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-paper-tiger.untested*  
*Structured data: https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-paper-tiger.untested.json*  
*Every definition provably resolves to space, time, energy and pattern.*