Posted on 08/04/2017 4:05:05 PM PDT by aquila48
How Europe will eat Halal — Why you don’t have to smoke in the smoking section — Your food choices on the fall of the Saudi king –How to prevent a friend from working too hard –Omar Sharif ‘s conversion — How to make a market collapse
The best example I know that gives insights into the functioning of a complex system is with the following situation. It suffices for an intransigent minority –a certain type of intransigent minorities –to reach a minutely small level, say three or four percent of the total population, for the entire population to have to submit to their preferences. Further, an optical illusion comes with the dominance of the minority: a naive observer would be under the impression that the choices and preferences are those of the majority. If it seems absurd, it is because our scientific intuitions aren’t calibrated for that (fughedabout scientific and academic intuitions and snap judgments; they don’t work and your standard intellectualization fails with complex systems, though not your grandmothers’ wisdom).
The main idea behind complex systems is that the ensemble behaves in way not predicted by the components. The interactions matter more than the nature of the units. Studying individual ants will never (one can safely say never for most such situations), never give us an idea on how the ant colony operates. For that, one needs to understand an ant colony as an ant colony, no less, no more, not a collection of ants. This is called an “emergent” property of the whole, by which parts and whole differ because what matters is the interactions between such parts.
The minority rule will show us how all it takes is a small number of intolerant virtuous people with skin in the game, in the form of courage, for society to function properly.
(Excerpt) Read more at medium.com ...
Bottom line - it pays to be intolerant or if you lie down and submit expect to be trampled on and for that you have no one to blame but yourself.
bkmk
I knew the author’s name looked familiar. Excellent article, thanks for posting it!
Thanks for posting. The author is a brilliant guy, I’ve always liked him.
So, being intransigent is the answer.
Well, let’s use the author’s example.
Religion.
Hitler was pretty clear about his plans for the Jews.
Some of the Jews saw this and fled Europe.
Many Jews remained intransigent and refused to try and escape even as they were being forced into the boxcars.
They perished by the millions and the population of Jews in Europe has never recovered.
He is trying to keep his models out of the real world. Hitler didn’t care about Jewish matrimonial rules.
The author is obviously brilliant, but his ideas need some further examination.
The Jews didn’t fight back. The Jews didn’t attempt to force all of Europe to keep kosher or otherwise adhere to Jewish beliefs. The Jews didn’t have an entire system of media and celebrities and change agents on their side.
Just the opposite. The haters were the small minority who turned the masses to their (the haters) purpose. There was no intransigence from more than a minute number of isolated individuals in a few different countries, who risked being punished for not complying with the original minorities demands and goals.
The middle is always up for grabs. The Muslims play victim, The Nazis used the jackboot. Our SJWs, elites and assorted globalists use shame, isolation and economic punishment to isolate those who do not go along with the takeover agenda.
The Jews in Nazi Germany were hardly intransigent or intolerant. They were a dominant part of the German society and when Hitler came into power most preferred to remain under the radar than cause a big stink. A lot of them even gained the moniker self-hating jews for submitting placidly to the nazis without a fight. In some cases even collaborating with them. The modern day equivalent is the self-hating whites that are very happy to condemn their own culture and race.
In the case of Nazi Germany the intolerant ones were the German majority not the minority Jews.
So where Taleb is a bit off is in putting the emphasis on “intolerant minorities”. An intolerant minority “with skin in the game” only wins if they’re up against a tolerant majority with little or no skin in the game.
But if you have a majority that is intolerant and has lots of skin in the game that an intolerant minority is trying to play, that minority will never win the game.
So the crucial point of this discussion is not the minority, but who is most intolerant, i.e. which group is more willing to fight for its interests.
So for example, it is quite obvious that Muslims are much more intolerant and much more willing to fight for their interests than the majority Christians, and as a result they’re winning.
If the Christian majority were to become as intolerant and as willing to fight for their beliefs, the Muslims wouldn’t stand a chance, like in the Crusades.
I think that the author is making the point that Moslems are gaining power because they are stubborn.
He is correct.
I believe that he is advocating that they be met with stubbornness.
He is correct.
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