The one versus the many.
First, a brief summary of a story some of you may know. Second, another question.
In the fall of 1906 British scientist Francis Galton visited a country fair. He was a statistician and scientist of some renown. He also advocated for a government run by a concentrated and highly educated group of people. You know, those non-elites can’t possibly know how to take care of themselves.
Anyways, at the fair there’s a livestock weight-guessing competition. For sixpence entrants would try to guess the total weight of a prize ox’s meat after it had been slaughtered. Prizes for the best guesses. Galton was excited for the opportunity to drive home his “elites know best” point.
Because the majority of entrants would be simple folk out for a nice day at the fair, Galton reasoned the guesses would be, as a group, way off the mark. Just as policy created by a government without the proper breeding (his term, not mine).
What he found probably bummed him out. The crowd, in aggregate, had guessed the ox would weigh 1,197 pounds post-slaughter and the actual weight turned out to be 1,198 pounds. Not bad for a bunch of idiots.
So, as economic aggregation websites rise (I’m thinking of Estimize), should we forsake individual analysis for groupthink?
