5 ms·
What circumstances bring out the 'madness of crowds' as opposed to the 'wisdom of crowds'?
by roceasta 9y ago
What circumstances bring out the 'madness of crowds' as opposed to the 'wisdom of crowds'?
- 0xBA5ED 9y agoMaybe there are different subsets of "leader types" that step forward in different circumstances. When there is a sense that some action should be taken to correct some wrong, but there is nothing particularly productive the group can achieve at that time, a different sort becomes the most visibly confident and people follow.
- killjoywashere 9y agoProbably like a shockwave: when an actionable headline disperses faster than the speed that the whole mass of information can propagate. If you're not in serious business, research, or operations yet, then you probably haven't experienced the most common state of things: lots of people you're trying to convince want all the information before making a decision or even pushing the headline to anyone else.
- pamqzl 9y agoIs the madness of crowds a genuine phenomenon? I mean, obviously, large groups of people certainly sometimes come to bad decisions, but is there evidence that they tend to come to worse decisions than they'd reach on their own? I don't count in this category the tendency for group decision making to wind up settling on an ungainly compromise that's worse than any individual solution; that's not madness, it's just a rational solution to an interpersonal problem.