Most People

[caroljane]

Browsing good old Oonline, I came across the latest of many posts,there beginning I"Virtually everyone..." as others have started, with" nearly everybody", "people in general", ,, even our own MSK, discussing marketing i think, brings in Susie Secretary and George the boss and so on ...Joe Public, Most People. Them.

I don't and never have thought of the surrounding population like this, but as a collection of individuals belonging to various groups of shifting classification and fluid borders, all proceeding from the individuals' life and circumstances. And I'm a socialist!

If this Most People attitude by professed O-typesisn't collectivist, I don't know what is.

[Mikee]

"I don't know what is"...this.

"Most people" simply refers to consensus views objectivist's, for instance, don't share. Do you consider "most people are not objectivists" to be a collectivist statement? How about the simple statement of fact "most people believe in God", is that collectivst? An observation of fact? Marketing would be impossible if it were not possible to identify values "most people" share. Or at least large numbers of people.

[caroljane]

"I don't know what is"...this.

"Most people" simply refers to consensus views objectivist's, for instance, don't share. Do you consider "most people are not objectivists" to be a collectivist statement? How about the simple statement of fact "most people believe in God", is that collectivst? An observation of fact? Marketing would be impossible if it were not possible to identify values "most people" share. Or at least large numbers of people.

Yes, of course, I know.

I guess what I am musing on, is the Persecuted Truth Teller stage that young Objectivists seem to have to go through, and poor Wotan is an especially fine example of it.

He's at it again today, reiterating that most people are entirely, wilfully irrational. He personally has tried to argue with them, and although he was polite, well-meaning and of course correct, he has just got hated for his efforts to help them see the light.

[Mikee]

"I don't know what is"...this.

"Most people" simply refers to consensus views objectivist's, for instance, don't share. Do you consider "most people are not objectivists" to be a collectivist statement? How about the simple statement of fact "most people believe in God", is that collectivst? An observation of fact? Marketing would be impossible if it were not possible to identify values "most people" share. Or at least large numbers of people.

Yes, of course, I know.

I guess what I am musing on, is the Persecuted Truth Teller stage that young Objectivists seem to have to go through, and poor Wotan is an especially fine example of it.

He's at it again today, reiterating that most people are entirely, wilfully irrational. He personally has tried to argue with them, and although he was polite, well-meaning and of course correct, he has just got hated for his efforts to help them see the light.

I recall my own struggles with the discovery of the irrationality of "most people". My four years in the Navy was the first time in my life I lived and interacted closely with people other than my family. Of course I went to school growing up but had few close friends and didn't live with any of them. Anyway, shortly before going in the Navy I discovered Ayn Rand. I had read Atlas Shrugged and Anthem and the Fountainhead, while on my ship I read the non-fiction, particularly liking "Capitalism the Unknown Ideal" and VOS. I got in a number of discussions with my shipmates, some very heated. I mostly thought I did well. But there were the occasional times where I had some bizarre experiences. One I remember well. A fellow agreed to debate the draft with me. I prepared well, had four major points I believe. I argued them one at a time, at the end of each part I got agreement from this fellow. I mean, he agreed with my conclusions on the separate parts. At the end, the coup de grace, "Therefore, the military draft in the United States should be ended". Pushing his chair back and standing up my friend said "No! If I gotta go, they gotta go!" and walked away. I "knew" then, that is my conclusion was, that "most people are not rational". Now I believe (after 40+ years) things are a bit more complicated. People know from experience their knowledge is incomplete and they rely on intuition or authority to shape their viewpoints. The less self confident a person is the more he sticks to the ideas he has absorbed from his teachers. The more of an "expert" know it all you come across as the less likely you are to change his mind or question his beliefs. People rarely change their minds quickly. I've experienced having debates, arguments, with a person who disagreed with me strongly and would not be moved. Perhaps six months later overheard this person having the same argument with another person but adopting the view I had been arguing strongly before. He had changed his mind! But he required a period of time to mull it over, to make it HIS idea before he could argue for it. I became less cynical. I truly love mankind, the independent streak in people and their nobility. It comes out in little ways all the time if you only watch for it.

[caroljane]

"I don't know what is"...this.

"Most people" simply refers to consensus views objectivist's, for instance, don't share. Do you consider "most people are not objectivists" to be a collectivist statement? How about the simple statement of fact "most people believe in God", is that collectivst? An observation of fact? Marketing would be impossible if it were not possible to identify values "most people" share. Or at least large numbers of people.

Yes, of course, I know.

I guess what I am musing on, is the Persecuted Truth Teller stage that young Objectivists seem to have to go through, and poor Wotan is an especially fine example of it.

He's at it again today, reiterating that most people are entirely, wilfully irrational. He personally has tried to argue with them, and although he was polite, well-meaning and of course correct, he has just got hated for his efforts to help them see the light.

I recall my own struggles with the discovery of the irrationality of "most people". My four years in the Navy was the first time in my life I lived and interacted closely with people other than my family. Of course I went to school growing up but had few close friends and didn't live with any of them. Anyway, shortly before going in the Navy I discovered Ayn Rand. I had read Atlas Shrugged and Anthem and the Fountainhead, while on my ship I read the non-fiction, particularly liking "Capitalism the Unknown Ideal" and VOS. I got in a number of discussions with my shipmates, some very heated. I mostly thought I did well. But there were the occasional times where I had some bizarre experiences. One I remember well. A fellow agreed to debate the draft with me. I prepared well, had four major points I believe. I argued them one at a time, at the end of each part I got agreement from this fellow. I mean, he agreed with my conclusions on the separate parts. At the end, the coup de grace, "Therefore, the military draft in the United States should be ended". Pushing his chair back and standing up my friend said "No! If I gotta go, they gotta go!" and walked away. I "knew" then, that is my conclusion was, that "most people are not rational". Now I believe (after 40+ years) things are a bit more complicated. People know from experience their knowledge is incomplete and they rely on intuition or authority to shape their viewpoints. The less self confident a person is the more he sticks to the ideas he has absorbed from his teachers. The more of an "expert" know it all you come across as the less likely you are to change his mind or question his beliefs. People rarely change their minds quickly. I've experienced having debates, arguments, with a person who disagreed with me strongly and would not be moved. Perhaps six months later overheard this person having the same argument with another person but adopting the view I had been arguing strongly before. He had changed his mind! But he required a period of time to mull it over, to make it HIS idea before he could argue for it. I became less cynical. I truly love mankind, the independent streak in people and their nobility. It comes out in little ways all the time if you only watch for it.

What a great post. You have really come to the heart of things I think.

Two of my uncles joined the navy in WW2, at ages 19 and 17. AI loved them dearly but I doubt they joined up with a brain in their heads between them. Maybe this quality helped them survive, who knows.

Uncle Albert stayed in the navy after the war and for the rest of his life.If you ever met Aunt Shelagh you would understandy why.

Uncle Joey did not like the navy and quit after a few months and joined the Merchant Marine. If he had notified anybody it would have helped out his anxious family who had the Mounties camped on their door until 1945l waiting for the deserter while he was being torpedoed in the North Atlantic.

[Selene]

As Carol noted, excellent post Mikee:

Persuasion that lasts is generally a serious and slow process. I have, just last night, moved a very intelligent woman, who is a Doctor from voting for O'bama. It has taken almost three (3) months.

Now she is not going to vote for the right wing Republicans who are anti-woman, anti-clean air/ water, for letting people die in the streets and for accelerating global warming, but she is not going to vote for O'bama anymore.

One of the ways that I moved her over was to clearly articulate her positions on "global warming," health care and Wall Street Greed.

By being able to expertly articulate those positions, she actually understood that I understood her and her positions and I was not a knee jerk religious Republican.

Then began the slow process of her dropping her defenses, amongst other accoutrements, absorbing non-biased studies, or, being able to pick out the bias in a study and re-view it with a fresh and rational approach.

Now I will have to reinforce this conversion for the next ninety three [93] days, but it is a sure vote that will not be going into his column. Secondly, she will, as a gatekeeper, influence probably fifty (50) people in her circle. I will probably get another ten (10) non-O'bama votes out of that group.

Adam

[Mikee]

Thanks.

My purpose for arguing is to create "ripples". Not sure I have much success.

Poets are particularly difficult.

And family members.

I would have said a Doctor would be impossible...Congratulations.

[syrakusos]

First off, I assert that too often, we have no idea who "most people" are. Do "most people" believe in God? Apparently so. But too often we base the claims on informal observations. Also, we are subject to confirmation bias, when what we perceive matches what we expect. "Most people are irrational" or "most people are collectivist" are examples of that. They hinge on the definitions of irrational and collectivist. It is not that "most people are irrational" but that "many people can act irrationally in certain situations." But how many people? And under what circumstances? In the example from "Mikee versus the Swabbie" that other sailor probably does his job well and even if under direct fire might continue to act rationally rather than panic. He just did not like losing an argument.

And, before you can poll or sample, you must operationalize those terms. You need to find the salient elements of irrationality and collectivism and then poll or sample for them - and also for their contraries. (The Likert Scale (1 to 5) helps with some measurements.) If you look at a popular profiler, such as Myer-Briggs Keirsey you will see that they ask the same questions in different ways. To test for altruism, you must also test for selfishness. "Most people" accept some mixture of both.

The Pew Charitable Trust polls Americans on religion (and politics) and you can read them online. Of course, Gallup Polls are available online, also. The New York Times, CBS, and other media also publish polls. In a statistics class in college (2006), we looked at USA Today print edition polls because the little boxes always gave the sample size and confidence level and margin of error. You actually need 1054 samples to be 95% confident, plus or minus 3%.

Then, there are very formal databases such as the General Social Survey from Berkeley here and the Social Science Data Analysis Network from the University of Michigan here.

It is not necessarily true that "successful marketing" comes from knowing what "most people" want or think. Most people are not Jewish, but you can successfully market kosher foods. In fact, here in Austin, the stores that sell Hallal to Muslims, also sell Kosher to Jews... and other grocers serve both Pakistanis and Indians. I'm just saying that you might figure intutiively that "most Jews" would not shop at a store that caters to Muslims. Market realities are different.

In fact, my general observation is that mass marketing works not because "most people" think the same way but because enough people find their own reasons to be attracted. That is why Pepsi versus Coke versus Mountain Dew is always a matter of a few marginal points and why the most "successful" ads are the ones that we remember, but which failed to move the market such as Alka-Seltzer's "Spicy Meatball" (

.) "Most people" apparently thought that the ad was for spaghetti sauce. Many famous examples exist for agencies that won awards and lost accounts. Put variations of famous failed advertising campaigns in your search engines and read all day. If anyone actually knew what "most people" really want, these campaigns would not have failed.

And I bolded "really" for a reason. We also know from social science research that people (1) tell you what they think you want to hear or (2) refuse to divulge the unpleasant - thus homosexuals and atheists were unreported for decades and (3) often do not know themselves. That has two meanings. They lack "know thyself." And they think that they have one opinion, but actually have another motive entirely which they might identifiy if you asked the right question.

Finally, in security, we commonly accept that you only know yourself. Thus, we often ask "Are most people basically honest?" If you are, you think most people are, too. And granted, there was the retired policeman who said, "Mike, I know the right answer, but after my years on the force, you cannot tell me that most people are basically honest."

[caroljane]

MEM, that was an excellent post, which confirms my preexistent biases on this subject.

Many thanks!

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I agree that "most people" is used with promiscuous abandon by most people and they have no way of knowing if what they are saying is true.

Obviously, I use "most people" without this problem because I have superior knowledge.

But most people don't seem to know that. Most people just don't get it.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

As Carol noted, excellent post Mikee:

Persuasion that lasts is generally a serious and slow process. I have, just last night, moved a very intelligent woman, who is a Doctor from voting for O'bama. It has taken almost three (3) months.

Now she is not going to vote for the right wing Republicans who are anti-woman, anti-clean air/ water, for letting people die in the streets and for accelerating global warming, but she is not going to vote for O'bama anymore.

One of the ways that I moved her over was to clearly articulate her positions on "global warming," health care and Wall Street Greed.

By being able to expertly articulate those positions, she actually understood that I understood her and her positions and I was not a knee jerk religious Republican.

Then began the slow process of her dropping her defenses, amongst other accoutrements, absorbing non-biased studies, or, being able to pick out the bias in a study and re-view it with a fresh and rational approach.

Now I will have to reinforce this conversion for the next ninety three [93] days, but it is a sure vote that will not be going into his column. Secondly, she will, as a gatekeeper, influence probably fifty (50) people in her circle. I will probably get another ten (10) non-O'bama votes out of that group.

Adam

Jesus. Just volunteer to drive a bus of dem voters to the polls and lose your way--run out of gas. Whatever.

--Brant

[Selene]

As Carol noted, excellent post Mikee:

Persuasion that lasts is generally a serious and slow process. I have, just last night, moved a very intelligent woman, who is a Doctor from voting for O'bama. It has taken almost three (3) months.

Now she is not going to vote for the right wing Republicans who are anti-woman, anti-clean air/ water, for letting people die in the streets and for accelerating global warming, but she is not going to vote for O'bama anymore.

One of the ways that I moved her over was to clearly articulate her positions on "global warming," health care and Wall Street Greed.

By being able to expertly articulate those positions, she actually understood that I understood her and her positions and I was not a knee jerk religious Republican.

Then began the slow process of her dropping her defenses, amongst other accoutrements, absorbing non-biased studies, or, being able to pick out the bias in a study and re-view it with a fresh and rational approach.

Now I will have to reinforce this conversion for the next ninety three [93] days, but it is a sure vote that will not be going into his column. Secondly, she will, as a gatekeeper, influence probably fifty (50) people in her circle. I will probably get another ten (10) non-O'bama votes out of that group.

Adam

Jesus. Just volunteer to drive a bus of dem voters to the polls and lose your way--run out of gas. Whatever.

--Brant

Brant:

There was an additional agenda with the lady.

Adam