Strong Disunity

How do we get the most out of groups? Tap their collective wisdom? Soft-voiced consensus or robust disagreement? How do we avoid the reverse synergy in groups, when they are dumber than their members, instead of smarter?

Here are some findings of a book and a newpaper editorial ("The Wisdom of Crowds,” and David Brooks' "A House Divided, and Strong" recently in the NYT - see citations at the bottom of this.)

A sampling:

“How much would this ox weigh, net, once slaughtered and dressed for sale?” That was the contest at the 1906 West of England Fat Stock and Poultry Exhibition. 800 farmers, butchers, shopkeepers, and people of all sorts looked at the live ox standing in the ring, made their mental calculations, and placed their sixpence wager.

The mean of the guesses was 1,197 pounds. After slaughter and dressing, the “ox” weighed 1,198 pounds. None of the individual guesses – even those made by the butchers – came that close. The opinions of this diverse, decentralized group of independently minded people acting alone, when properly aggregated by the wager, made a virtually perfect decision.

Apparently a torpedo exploded in the United States Navy submarine Scorpion, and it sank before it could send a distress call in May, 1968. Submarines stay incommunicado much of the time, so no one knew where it was resting on the bottom, other than somewhere on the floor of the Atlantic. The Navy’s four top submarine experts could not find it. Then one officer, John Craven, took a different approach. He assembled a much larger group of mathematicians, salvage experts, submarine officers, navigators, and others…gave them the known facts about Scorpion’s sinking, and asked them to estimate where it was WITHOUT consulting with each other at all. Then he averaged the opinions of this diverse, decentralized group of independently minded people acting alone. Scorpion’s wreck was found 220 yards from the spot of the averaged estimates. But no one estimate of any of the experts was anywhere near that close.

When stumped, contestants on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” can have two of the four possible answers removed, or ask a highly-knowledgeable friend or relative, or poll the audience whose responses are then gathered and averaged by computer.

Over time, option two – the “expert” friend – was right 65 percent of the time. But polling and aggregating the diverse, completely independent audience of (presumably) “ordinary” people yielded the right answer 91 percent of the time.

The point: Good groups (diverse, independent, and well aggregated) are most often smarter – and make better decisions over time – than the smartest individuals in them, when asked to decide ascertainable outcomes. “The best collective decisions are the product of disagreement and contest, not consensus and compromise.”

New York Times writer David Brooks, surveying an entirely different subject, recently concluded that the reasons for the current wave of Republican Party success had nothing to so with some kind of conformity. "...Conservatives have thrived because they are split into feuding factions that squabble incessantly...In disunity there is strength."


For James Surowiecki’s “The Wisdom of Crowds”
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/results.asp?WRD=Wisdom%20of%20crowds&userid=vi5oAJ6BLM&cds2Pid=946

For David Brooks' "A House Divided, and Strong"
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/05/opinion/05brooks.html

Plunk your magic twanger, Froggie

In a meeting today, to plan a tornado drill, I asked, "Who is going to 'plunk the magic twanger?'" Meaning, I intended, "Who is going to actually pull the alarm, when the time comes to hold the drill?

Well, the chief executive got it, but most of the others in the room thought I'd said something obscene. They did not know about Froggie the Gremlin and Froggie's associate, Midnight the Cat!!

To help out, I asked Google about "Plunk your magic twanger, Froggie," and I got 125 websites to give my co-workers that discussed the "...mischievous, wise-cracking little frog puppet..." Since you asked, here are some excerpts from the best of the 125, with an artillery postscript at the close:


Froggie the Gremlin
http://www.tvacres.com/frogs_froggie.htm
"...Wide-eyed puppet frog on the children's program called "Smilin' Ed's Gang" (NBC/CBS/ABC/1951-55). Froggie (voice of Ed McConnell, Arch Presby & Frank Ferrin) was a mischievous, wise-cracking little frog puppet who dressed in a tuxedo jacket and bow-tie. He delighted and perplexed the show's host Ed McConnell and later Andy Devine on "Andy's Gang" (NBC/1955). He appeared each week in a puff of smoke saying "Hi ya kids, hi ya, hi ya, hi ya!" after Smilin' Ed said "Now Froggie, you better become visible. Plunk your magic twanger, Froggie." On the later spin-off series, host Andy Devine summoned Froggie by saying "North or south, east or west, wherever you are, Froggie the Gremlin, we want you to become visible. Plunk your magic twanger, Froggie!"


Radio Archives Presents
http://amazinggrace.org/radioarch.html
"...Every Saturday morning without fail I would sit in front of my Philco radio & listen to Smilin Ed You couldn't wait to hear him say "plunk your magic twanger froggie." The kids would laugh and scream and have a ball..."


Plunk Your Magic Twanger, Froggie!
http://resources.heinemann.com/social_studies_methods/plunk.asp
"...You may not remember the immortal Ghouldini of Parma, Ohio who introduced late-night monster movies on obscure tv channels...the Ghoul, a tasteless reprobate wearing a fright-wig and sun-glasses with only one glass, was plagued by a plastic frog that would leap out from behind him and mock him from time to time (plunking his magic twanger) during the show. Froggie screaming, "Hi ya, Kids, Hi ya, Hi ya, Hi ya!" and exposing the Ghouldini as a fool. Invariably, at show's end, Froggie found himself being blown up by a cherry bomb in a toilet bowl-a sad end to a great Frog..."

Old Time Radio Memories
http://atomicbride.com/bobradio.html
"...One of my favorite things was when Smilin' Ed would yell an order to Froggie , "Plunk your magic twanger, Froggie!" And Froggie would say, "Hi ya, Kids, Hi ya, Hi ya, Hi ya!" and Midnight the Cat would say, "Nice!"


Froggy Memories
http://michelesworld.net/dmm/frog/gremlin/memory.htm
"...What did I remember about Froggy the Gremlin and the Buster Brown Show from my childhood?...I remember the phrase, "Plunk your magic twanger, Froggy!" I guess I thought plunking his magic twanger referred to plunking on a guitar, because my children drew a picture of Froggy for me in the early 70's based upon what I told them about him, and their drawing was of a frog with a guitar..."


During my time as an Marine artilleryman, when the time came to fire the six-gun howitzer battery, we’d say “Plunk the magic twanger, Froggie” and the gunners would pull the lanyards and the big guns would speak. Then usually some smart-alecky Marine would come on the line and say,"Hi ya, Kids, Hi ya, Hi ya, Hi ya!" and another gunner would add, "Nice!"

Those were the golden days of very funny artillery.

Chicago Visit - No Gorges Here

Smedley and I just took our first couple of loops around Chicago...it seems brighter, more open, and cleaner than Manhattan. And all the miles and hours of riding in the Bronx and Queens made it easier to ride around Chicago and still enjoy the scenery.

The buildings here do not create those dark Manhattan canyons, and the buildings themselves seem to benefit from perhaps cleaner air and the bleaching effects of sun and wind; their stone is brighter, not as blackened. The street surface is in far better shape in general, and they seem cleaner. The central business district is easy to navigate on a motorcycle; this is the most important test of a great city, I think.

Chicago seems less congested because it is, in fact about twice as “uncongested.” New York City has about 8.5 million people living on about 309 square miles, for a density of 27,300 New Yorkers per square mile. Chicago has about 3.2 million people living on about 227 square miles, for a density of 14,000 people per square mile.

(Actually, NYC’s “canyons” should be called “gorges.” In the topographically sophisticated circles in which I usually run, an opening in the earth that is wider then deep is called a canyon, but one that is deeper than it is wide is called a gorge. But urban planners keep talking about avoiding NYC’s “canyon effect.” Maybe then should visit Arizona's Grand Gorge.)

Today I rode in on 290 (Congress), turned right on Michigan and rode south to 16th Street (near Soldier Field), then turned left (east) to Lake Shore Drive, then rode north to around Foster Avenue Beach, then headed west to Broadway, then rode south past Congress to the Museum of Science and Technology, then went back north on Lake Shore Drive to the Navy Pier – a circuit of about 12 miles I’d guess. Then I did it again.

(BTW, who ruined Soldiers Field? At least the architects and builders should have been under adult supervision. And the WWII German U-Boat is gone from in front of the Museum of Science and Technology. Someone told me that they have moved it to an underground exhibit hall…it’s now a “subterranean,” if true.)


Here is the urban density data I was using above:

Density#..City....Population....Sq.Mi....Pop/Sq.Mi.

1..New York........8,421,450...309...27,254
2..San Francisco.....832,600....47...17,715
3..Chicago.........3,201,600...227...14,104
4..Boston............660,100....48...13,752
5..Philadelphia.....1,823,900...135...13,510
6..Washington, DC.....698,050....61...11,443
7..Baltimore..........846,400....81...10,449
8..Los Angeles......4,007,750....469...8,545
9..Detroit..........1,182,200....139...8,505
10..Milwaukee..........722,200.....96...7,523


Source:
http://www.census.gov/population/www/documentation/twps0027.html

Sorry about the ragged columns; this blog engine will not let me line them up right. I added the .....s to make the information easier to read.

Happy Birthday Emmylou

This thanks to Scott Johnson, the Minneapolis attorney, on Powerline at http://www.powerlineblog.com/

"Today is the birthday of Emmylou Harris. To borrow a phrase from Neil Young's ode to his old car, long may she run. I'm a latecomer to the artistry of Emmylou; I came to her indirectly through my love for the music of the 1960's group the Byrds. The Byrds brought brilliant Beatles-inspired vocal harmonies and jangly 12-string electric guitar to the music of Bob Dylan and their own superb compositions.

"In one version of the group, country-rock flameout Gram Parsons briefly took center stage and hijacked their 1968 album, "Sweetheart of the Rodeo." Following that album Parsons and original Byrd Chris Hillman left the Byrds to found the Flying Burrito Brothers.

"Around the time Hillman and Parsons both departed the Flying Burrito Brothers to pursue other interests, Hillman found Emmylou performing in a Washington, D.C. area folk club and brought Parsons to see her. Parsons promptly recruited her to sing harmonies on his post-Burrito solo albums and died of a drug overdose at age 27 following the second of his two solo ablums.

"Emmylou must have fallen hard for him; she seems to pay tribute to him in one way or another in every one of her shows and on most of her albums, starting with the devastating "Boulder to Birmingham" on her debut album. Parsons dedicated himself to the union of country and rock that he dubbed Cosmic American Music. Emmylou seems to me to have tapped a deep vein of that music.

"Emmylou is perhaps most accomplished as an interpreter of others' songs. Take a listen, for example, to her version of "You Don't Know Me" on her "Cowgirl's Prayer" album. But she is also a formidable songwriter herself. Her haunting "Prayer in Open D" digs deep into the sense of desolation she conveys whenever she recalls Parsons:

There's a valley of sorrow in my soul
Where every night I hear the thunder roll
Like the sound of a distant gun
Over all the damage I have done
And the shadows filling up this land
Are the ones I built with my own hand
There is no comfort from the cold
Of this valley of sorrow in my soul.

"The song, however, ends on a powerful note of transcendence and redemption:

There's a highway risin' from my dreams
Deep in the heart I know it gleams
For I have seen it stretching wide
Clear across to the other side
Beyond the river and the flood
And the valley where for so long I've stood
With the rock of ages in my bones
Someday I know it will lead me home.

"Will somebody say "Amen"? "

Amen.

A Bright Red Sticker

I have a bright red sticker on the back of my yellow Jeep that says "United States Marines." It is not just a proud affinity; it is my way of conducting an experiment in stereotypes - how people judge a man by his window sticker – and even the kind of window itself.

It has become one of the best ways that I have discovered to tell who tends to make judgments – at least form strong first impressions – based on the car we drive and the stickers we put on them. One co-worker recently told me that she and I we were obviously from different “walks” because of my Jeep and her VW Bug. And that was before she noticed the Marine Corps sticker!

There must be more to this that I thought. The politicians and song writers have noticed this too.

A recent study by a political analyst found things like (1) the “…Jeep Grand Cherokee S.U.V. was more than half again as likely to be bought by a Republican than by a Democrat, at 46 percent to 28…”, and (2) “…Volvos were the most "Democratic" cars, by 44 to 32 percent, followed by Subarus and Hyundais…”, and (3) “…The Saab is a Democratic car…(who) were about twice as likely to be Democrats. It's an upscale car an affluent Democrat can drive without feeling guiltily ostentatious while also reveling in a different sort of status symbol…”, and (4) “…All surveys found that nothing is more Republican than a big pickup…The No. 1 vehicle bought by millionaires is the Ford F-Series pickup truck…" and finally (5) “…The most left-leaning models with at least a dozen sightings in Mr. MacMichael's project were the Honda Civic (80-20 left-leaning), Toyota Corolla (78-19) and Toyota Camry (74-26). The list of most right-leaning was led by another Toyota, but a midsize S.U.V., the Toyota 4Runner (86-14), followed by the Ford Expedition (76-24) and Ford F-150 (75-25)…”


The same study (see the URLs below)studied the connection of car brand and bumper stickers stuck to them. “…Volunteers counted more than 1,300 bumper stickers in a half dozen states from Sept. 20 to Oct. 31 and came up with results…”, and “…Saturn owners were also prone to put their Democratic loyalties on display…”

And then there is the Chely Wright song, "Bumper of My S.U.V." that opens with:

I've got a bright red sticker on the back of my car,
Says: "United States Marines."
An' yesterday a lady in a mini-van,
Held up her middle finger at me.
Does she think she knows what I stand for,
Or the things that I believe?
Just by looking at a sticker for the US Marines,
On the bumper of my S.U.V.

Then she adds:

I'm not Republican or Democrat.
But I've gone all around this crazy world,
Just to try to better understand.
An' yes, I do have questions:
I get to ask them because I'm free.
That's why I've got a sticker for the US Marines,
On the bumper of my S.U.V.

'Cause I've been to Hiroshima,
An' I've been to the DMZ.
I've walked on the sand in Baghdad,
Still don't have all of the answers I need.
But I guess I wanna know where she's been,
Before she judges and gestures to me,
'Cause she don't like my sticker for the US Marines,
On the bumper of my S.U.V.

And finishes:

So I hope that lady in her mini-van,
Turns on her radio and hears this from me.
As she picks up her kids,
From their private school,
An' drives home safely on our city streets.
Or to the building where her church group meets:
Yeah, that's why I've got a sticker for the US Marines,
On the bumper of my S.U.V.


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For the New York Times article (registration required):
Your Car: Politics on Wheels
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/01/automobiles/01red.html

For the bumper sticker study:
www.laze.net/bumpers

For the Chely Wright lyrics:
http://www.cowboylyrics.com/lyrics/wright-chely/bumper-of-my-suv-14691.html

---
Update - Sunday 10 April 2005:

Whew! Lots of reaction to this one!!
"What does Wright have against private schools!?!"
"Why all the divides in the society?!!"
Etc., Etc.

I cannot think of a time when American politics was NOT a foodfight. Right from the start our politics has been loud and messy.

That frustrates those who would prefer the calmer "can't we all get along" tone that we treasure in interpersonal and private relationships. But, IYHO, that foodfight has led to things like the rejection of the European caste system, an ebb and flow of power that avoids permanent political minorities, the end of slavery, liberation of women, the later civil rights movement, an open economy, more acceptance of gays, the right to burn the flag without going to jail, and generally a more liberal, prosperous society than we started out with. It is messy, loud, often a little nuts. But it allows the steam to blow off less destructively than other systems. Stalin's Russia was internally calm. Maybe it has something to do with "strong disunity." At least that is how it appears to me this Sunday morning in Chicago. JB