Dynamic Political Ocean

Under the Wave off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai c. 1829–1833

I've been thinking about what I've been reading about the state of the world and I think I have an explanation for why things are so screwed up. It's not a very good explanation, it is not going to help us figure out how to make the world better, but it might alleviate some of the frustration that many people feel. If it does that, well, maybe it will help.

There are several factors in play here. The first is that people run on emotion. Even I, mister cool-in-the-face-danger (hah), am driven by emotion, when I am driven at all. Oh, I might be capable of dispassionate logical analysis of technical problems, but get me out in real world where I have to deal with people and all bets are off.

The second is that people often believe the first thing they hear about a subject. I try to be skeptical of new information, but if I don't have any previous knowledge about a subject I will accept this new information as gospel. Now whether that information sticks or not is another matter. I like to think that I will adjust my beliefs when new evidence comes to light. Some people will stick with their original belief no matter what else they subsequently encounter. This seems to be a feature of basic human psychology.

Much of the information we come across is of no practical day-to-day use, like polar bears live at the Arctic and penguins live in Antarctica, or outer space is full deadly radiation. That kind of information informs our world view, but it isn't going to have any effect on what we are going to have for dinner. If someone wants to believe that the world is flat, is it worth bothering to try and convince them otherwise?

The third is that most people are not very smart. I seem to be a bit smarter than the average bear and for some reason I tend to think everyone else is as smart as I am, but years of dealing with people has convinced me that is not the case.

The fourth factor is not so universal as it only applies to rich people, but it can have an amplifying effect. It is that rich people tend to think of themselves as smarter than other people. Being smart can help you become rich, but so can being lucky, not being too crazy, being a sociopath, or being obsessed. 

So what we have now is some people, driven by emotion, decide that something in the world needs to change, so they get up on their soap box and start declaiming their new found truth to anyone who will listen. Some people who do this are more determined, or have a more agreeable voice, or they hit a note that resonates with many other people and now you have a political movement that might become a force in the political arena.

Note that this 'new truth' does not have to be true or accurate or logical. All it requires is that people believe it, and given the right emotional conditions, people can be induced to believe anything.

Now we devolve in chaos theory, which isn't much of a theory at all, just that in the right circumstances small changes can result in big effects. You could say political movements are like hurricanes. They come out of nowhere, grow to enormous size and strength, wreak horrendous devastation on anything they encounter and eventually blow themselves out. Well, at least we can hope they eventually fade away.