Submitted by Amateur_Validator t3_ycq9p8 in todayilearned
I mean that seems sensible.
If I'm in a strange situation, and everyone is doing X even though I don't really understand why yet.. I'll probably do X too, until I do. Frankly, if everyone is jumping off a bridge at the same time, there's probably something actually wrong with the bridge.
Yep. If our old hunter-gatherer ancestor is in unfamiliar territory, and sees that everyone seems to be going a long, inconvenient route that avoids a certain cave entrance, I’m probably better off avoiding it too even if it doesn’t make sense to me.
Usually the common sense, conventional wisdom is correct. But when it misfires, it’s easy for the misfire to perpetuate itself indefinitely.
They occasionally call this "Chesterton's Fence", after a passage from an essay by G.K. Chesterton.
Basically, if you don't see the point of a fence being in a location and want to take it down, that's not a good reason in itself. You need to know why the fence was put up in the first place. Someone had a reason to make the effort to put up the fence, and until you know why you don't know the consequences of taking it down.
That’s different. The concept I mentioned is “social proof” and about individuals instinctively copying the behavior of others. Chesterton’s fence is about not disrupting rules or systems without understanding where the rules came from.
(Ie, I learned about social proof in intro psych, and Chersterton’s fence in law school.)
Except a closer scenario to the test would involve everyone around you walking onto a bridge that is obviously unstable. And you can either think for yourself and act intelligently, or follow the mob
> And you can either think for yourself and act intelligently, or follow the mob
The one problem with "acting intelligently" is that it requires a lot of background information in the situation being considered. For usual situations, you can pick up the necessary background, but for unusual ones you probably don't have time.
"Crowdsourcing" the decision makes a bit of sense there- maybe someone has information and experience that's good and is acting on it, and people near them are following suit.
It's not perfect, of course, but it's not unreasonable.
Depends on the risk-reward. I'd probably still answer the same as the others, even knowing consciously I was conforming. It's because the risk of being 'wrong' is extremely low - I'm not in any danger for answering it wrong, unlike an unstable bridge. I would be really curious why everyone was answering as they did, but caution kind of means to just answer the same and then figure it out safely lately. Conversely, I might suspect some kind of 'individuality test' and then intentionally answer it contrarian, but then I don't really know what's being tested there. I think it's more complex than just 'hurr sheep follow'. If it's literally safer to be in the sheep herd, there's more to it.
Where were you when I was a kid and my mom asked me that?!
I prefer using my own senses to determine my next action. Whatever tho, sheep be sheep
Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments