May 202013
 

Who is smarter – a group of people or one smart person?

Surowiecki uses a collection of research papers to show that a group of people is smarter 

BUT! there are conditions under which that is true.

The posting  2013-03-19  10th Anniversary of the Invasion of Iraq raised the question of how it was that a group of intelligent people could make such a bad decision as to drop bombs on Iraq.

Two lines stuck out:

–        lack of diversity and independence of thought in decision-making, and

–        “The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.”

Those statements reminded me of  The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki (2004).  Surowiecki’s work reinforces important principles of democracy learned through the ages, but which are now being forgotten (except by us, and we won’t let it happen!).

RELATED:

EXCERPTS from The Wisdom of Crowds:

“ . . . cognitive diversity is essential to good decision-making.  The positive case for diversity is that it expands a group’s set of possible solutions and allows the group to conceptualize problems in novel ways.

. . .  Homogenous groups, particularly small ones, are often victims of what the psychologist Irving Janis called “groupthink”.  After a detailed study of a series of American foreign-policy fiascos, including the Bay of Pigs invasion and the failure to anticipate Pearl Harbour, Janis argued that when the decision makers are too much alike – in worldview and mindset – they easily fall prey to groupthink.  Homogenous groups become cohesive more easily than diverse groups, and as they become more cohesive they also become more dependent on the group, more insulated from outside opinions, and therefore more convinced that the group’s judgment on important issues must be right.  These kinds of groups, Janis suggested, share an illusion of invulnerability, a willingness to rationalize away possible counterarguments to the group’s position, and a conviction that dissent is not useful.

“. . . Deliberation in a groupthink setting has the disturbing effect not of opening people’s minds but of closing them.  In that sense, Janis’ work suggests that the odds of a homogenous group of people reaching a good decision are slim at best.

 

“. . . Ultimately, diversity contributes not just by adding different perspectives to the group but also by making it easier for individuals to say what they really think.

(p 36 – 39)

 

“. . .  Instead of fostering the free exchange of conflicting views, consensus-driven groups – – especially when the members are familiar with each other –  tend to trade in the familiar and squelch provocative debate.  (p. 203)

 

(this last excerpt is related to bubbles in the financial markets, but is an elaboration of the point:

“. . . there were no differing attitudes.  Everyone thought the same because the group of people who were making decisions was too small and too prone to imitate each other.  It didn’t matter how individually intelligent the experts were.  By the end, they were too much alike to be smart.”

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