| Sample bias is a thing, sure. I'm alluding to something a bit more interesting, I hope. We don't have a way to test those hundreds of voices comprising the
supposed silent majority. I'm saying that when/(BIG if) one does - via
some hitherto undevised ingenious experiment which always yields truth
- we find that no... in fact everyone is at best ambivalent, but
mostly going along with what they think the majority view is. I'm sure there's a name/concept for this in group dynamics. Consensus mythology? (I'm just making that up) A hallmark is that interrogating the group yields one answer, but each
individual considered privately will give you a very different
answer. But it's not "group-think" I'm talking about, because that implies a
more overt pressure. Rather it emerges in the absence of coordination
amongst an implied majority when there exists a loud propaganda
message designating some other group a minority. I think this effect has important implications in the kind of 50:50 +
swing elections we've seen over the past few years. For example, in
Brexit, a mass of lethargic voters assumed "everyone will vote
against" and didn't verify the reality by asking lots of diverse
friends. It's not that people are trapped in actual bubbles so much as
bubbles of their own mind based on assumptions about those around
them. Sorry, that's probably a long and clumsy way of saying something
obvious. |