errantember

It seems to be common wisdom that a crowd is generally dumber than the sum of it's parts. In this fascinating expose on the power of group decision-making, James Surowiecki offers substantial evidence that the opposite is often true. Under the right conditions, aggregate results from group decisions are not only more accurate than the average of the group, but generally outperform even the group's smartest and most expert members. Surowiecki outlines and gives examples of the kinds of problems that lend themselves to group decision making, lays out the conditions necessary to harness the technique's power, and points out when and why things are likely to go wrong. He covers financial markets, political and statistical predictions, small groups, applications for business and why they aren't often tapped, and implications for democracy. From correctly guessing the weight of a bull to locating lost submarines to predicting (very accurately) the outcome of an election, we see how a disparate group of people can create not only a dead-on estimate, but often do so without anyone in the group actually having gotten the right answer. After this fascinating read you'll never look at the crowd on the subway the same way again.