When Armand shares his disgust with the guests as they dine and calls them Lotus Eaters, he's quoting Tennyson's poem, The Lotus Eaters: "Hateful is the dark-blue sky, Vaulted o'er the dark-blue sea. Death is the end of life; ah, why Should life all labour be?"
At the end of the episode, Shane Patton is reading the book "Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking" by Malcolm Gladwell.