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March 7, 2015
How older bureaucracies make worse decisions, and bigger mistakes, and make them faster and with greater confidence
Consensus is an evolutionary process.If a consensus is proposed and it is somewhat reasonable, only 20 out of a hundred [experts] have to be converted or ostracized to complete the consensus-manufacturing, the next thing that will happen is a new consensus. Then 16 out of the remaining 80 will have to be converted or ostracized, at the end of which you have a consensus that is only sufficiently reasonable that 64% of the original group found it agreeable. By the third stage, with similar ostracizing events and measuring the [reasonableness-versus-] risibility of the consensus-content this way, you’d be down to 51.2%, then at the next stage it goes to 41%. Keep in mind, all this time the ostracized members will be replaced by newcomers, but the newcomers won’t have a vote in the prior stages of this evolving consensus. And of course, when an opinion becomes obligatory, but it’s only sufficiently reasonable that barely 40% of reasonable free-thinkers would align themselves with it, it can be a very silly opinion — even if it IS obligatory. - - House of Eratosthenes
Posted by gerardvanderleun at March 7, 2015 10:40 AM. This is an entry on the sideblog of American Digest: Check it out.
Your Say
All of us down around my place agree and as soon as we find out what we're talking about we'll go along with that, too. For the most part. We won't make any waves or rub fur the wrong way. Or go against the grain either. A lot of us feel that way, more or less.
Posted by: chasmatic ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://americandigest.org/sidelines/nav-commenters.gif)
at March 7, 2015 11:31 AM
I'll bet you've ruffled a few feathers though. Specifically, bantam chicken feathers.
Posted by: BillH at March 7, 2015 1:06 PM
As a Conversative, I reject and hold my own opinions in disdain and those of others in disbelief.
This leaves me free to change my mind, requiring me only to lose my mind before changing it for another.
Flexibility and spinelessness in thought are not always different.
Posted by: Stug Guts at March 7, 2015 1:39 PM
Hell My degree is a Ps.D. Well and truly earned. For the curious, that is a Professional Shit Disturber. Try it great fun. Get in the groove, make them look like a thermometer, shoot the red to the top and ring the bell. They get hypertension and I get a good night's sleep. Fuk 'em.
Posted by: Vermont Woodchuck at March 7, 2015 5:19 PM
BillH: I dunno about the feathers; "Comme ci, comme ça", give or take, half and half, two outa three falls, sixty minute time limit.
My wife, she tells me I speak faster than I think.
Er, that's good, right?
Posted by: chasmatic at March 8, 2015 12:08 AM