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Ezra Kliens new book why we are divided asserts that rationality is also an emergent phenomena, individuals post hoc justify even smart ones. then I am reminded of the nietsche quote about groups being mad and indivuals rational. both positions have good supporting evidence and show we need more specificity, and need to talk about a distribution not just an average.

I suspect there are pronounced peaks accross different group sizes where rationality is more emergent, and of course it depends on lot of factors: subject matter, groups homogeneity, expertise, connectivity probably this is a game theory field of study.

I think luskin's citizens assembly research showed that a few hundred people from a culture, without any prior training, could with the help of domain experts make seemingly excellent policy decisions about difficult moral and technical issues.



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