Collective Intelligence

Ok, so I was reading the November issue of Fast Company magazine (the paper version -- that’s another subject in itself), and I was reading through their list of the 101 most provocative things that will change our lives in 2005. I come across number 64 which references James Surowiecki’s The Wisdom of Crowds, where he espouses the idea that groups of people can be smarter than the smartest individuals within them.

Certainly not a new idea, but think about his four criteria for crowd wisdom: 1) diversity of opinion to bring in a variety of info, 2) independence of members from one another to prevent the rise of a dominant leader, 3) decentralization to balance out mistakes, and 4) a good method of aggregating opinions.Assuming you accept his theory and the criteria above, which on the surface seems reasonable to me, why aren’t the most pressing problems of the world being solved by collaborations over the internet between large groups of smart, engaged people? What element of human nature would get in the way of the internet becoming an immensely powerful force that could generate solutions to our most pressing problems?

Maybe number 4, a good method of aggregating opinions, is the hard part. How do you get your ideas accepted, even heard in the cacophony of voices that the internet has now enabled, and how do these aggregate problem solvers achieve credibility? The obvious answer is through success. Like any business, you start small, tackling the moderate problems first, then work up to the big ones.

I have to believe that this is already happening, unless, and this is the big question, there is a basic flaw in Surowiecki’s concept. Does the old adage “two heads are better than one” break down when you get too many people involved? Does ego screw up the whole idea and cause the solutions to degrade into “designed by committee” type solutions? Do the smart ones in the crowd fade back when they don’t get recognition for their brilliance? Do the solutions dumb down to that which is easily achievable?

Interesting....