still continued...yeah it’s a long one...
A 24-hour news cycle that features sensational anecdotes, ill-informed opinions, and panel discussions among panelists who all think alike is designed to trigger availability cascades. While there is plenty of political bias in the news media, the controlling bias is viewership bias. If Sean Hannity, Rachel Maddow, and Don Lemon could attract higher ratings (and thus, more advertising revenue) by reporting accurately, they would. But instead, it’s more profitable to trigger availability cascades.
Think for yourself
Availability cascades can be harmful to the survival of a society because they choke off accurate information and thoughtful discussion. Constructive policies regarding race, arms, the environment, and law enforcement must be based on true information. Information can be brought forward by advocates and experts with diverse perspectives, each of them contributing to public dialogue.
Yet with availability cascades, all the information that most people see comes only from the extremists on one side. People who dare to dissent—or even to ask that certain claims be carefully examined rather than blindly accepted—are cancelled. Reputational cascades ensure that fewer and fewer people challenge the brand-new orthodoxies. More conformity leads to even more conformity—and to ever-lessening accuracy or depth in social understanding of real problems. Superficial conformity prevents honest discussion that can lead to effective solutions, and so the conformist society weakens itself in the long run, as the Soviet Union did. The result may be harmful, counterproductive policies adopted because “everyone” supposedly agrees.
One of the advantages of human society is that people can learn from the diverse experiences and knowledge of others. Two heads are better than one, and three hundred million heads are also better than one. Availability cascades replace the vast knowledge of many with the narrow agenda of the few. When availability entrepreneurs make everyone think like them—or at least pretend to think like them—it is guaranteed that society will be worse off than if we received diverse information and expressed diverse views. The trouble with conformity is that it can sometimes lead entire groups to their demise.
https://quillette.com/2020/10/26/how...-our-politics/
Vincent Harinam is a law enforcement consultant and PhD candidate at the University of Cambridge. You can follow him @vincentharinam.
David Kopel is the research director of the Independence Institute and an adjunct professor at University of Denver, Sturm College of Law. You can follow him @davekopel.