[HN Gopher] 'Tipping point' makes partisan polarization irrevers...
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'Tipping point' makes partisan polarization irreversible in
research model
Author : PaulHoule
Score : 35 points
Date : 2021-12-09 21:23 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (news.cornell.edu)
(TXT) w3m dump (news.cornell.edu)
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| From the original research:
|
| " In closing, our study should be viewed as a small, but
| important, first step. The sources of political and ideological
| polarization have been widely investigated, but relatively little
| attention has been directed to the possibility that the causal
| mechanisms are characterized by irreversible tipping points. The
| lack of attention does not reflect the low importance of the
| problem. The historical lesson from climate research may be
| instructive. As with incremental global warming (28), the
| dynamics of reversibility cannot be revealed with observational
| data tracking changes over time in the level of polarization.
| Instead, climatologists have relied on increasingly sophisticated
| and empirically calibrated computational models to show how the
| self-reinforcing dynamics of global warming can be reversed
| through the reduction of carbon and methane emissions only up to
| a critical threshold, beyond which civilization as we know it may
| be doomed. We extend the concern with an environmental tipping
| point to the study of polarization. The need for empirical
| calibration in our model calls for increased investment in the
| study of irreversible phase change, while our findings call for
| urgency in mobilizing remediation efforts before it is too late."
|
| https://www.pnas.org/content/118/50/e2102144118
| malfist wrote:
| How could it possible be irreversible? Is there any partisan
| polarization that's lasted a thousand years? How about even just
| a couple hundred?
|
| Even slavery was abolished in the US and that seemed like an
| irreversible polarization.
| mrkentutbabi wrote:
| I think as long as the big factors that influence the
| polarization stays, i.e, big tech, social media, etc, the
| polarization will stay here.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| They used Chekoslovakia as an example, as well as climate
| change.
| vaidhy wrote:
| Shia-Sunni, Turkey-Greek, Catholic-Reformation are a few that
| come to mind. Take a look at Middle East and you would see long
| standing polarization.. Anti-semitism is also another long
| standing polarization.
|
| Slavery was abolished, but you still have people flying
| confederate flags and arguing for slavery (in a more modern
| rendition)
| dwater wrote:
| Slavery was abolished unilaterally, not as a reversal of the
| political polarization, and it could be argued that although
| the explicit practice of slavery is no longer polarizing, Jim
| Crow laws and their modern antecedents such as The Southern
| Strategy have been continually polarizing in American politics
| ever since.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| Slavery took a civil war with 500,000 dead to end the
| polarization. Yeah, it ended, and that's good, but... is there
| a way where we can end that kind of polarization _without_
| 500,000 dead?
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| Dissolve the constitution and call for a new constitutional
| convention?
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| Maybe. _Maybe_. Or maybe that triggers the civil war.
|
| Look, it's possible. It could even be what we need. But for
| it to work, we'd need wisdom and honest compromise, not
| sound-bite driven trench-warfare politics. Under current
| conditions, I see a low probability that it would work.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| Or perhaps mandatory civil service?
|
| https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/10/31/us-democracy-
| mandatory-...
| jaywalk wrote:
| Sure. The civil war that would inevitably result from that
| almost certainly wouldn't result in 500,000 dead due to
| modern medicine. All of the people who died in the first
| civil war from things that we consider simple to treat now
| (like infections) would survive.
|
| But I have a feeling that's not what you meant.
| ynth7 wrote:
| Understanding logical fallacy has been shown to act as an
| "inoculant" against fake news.
|
| I don't think these things reverse (time doesn't go backwards)
| so much as settle as the last generation that held such beliefs
| dies off.
|
| >80% followed religion in the US in '99. Now it's <50%.
| Coincidentally about the same percent of support for
| conservative politics (not economics but the ephemeral civic
| life tradition or death type).
|
| It's how it goes; humans were the hard drives and CPUs of our
| economics until recently, and the costly in real terms old
| money network winds down with them. A lot of folks will feel
| disenfranchised, many rightly so, but also of lot rich folks
| today made it rich in an era of imploding pensions and gambling
| away others retirements, so if they get hosed, oh well.
|
| In the end all will be forgotten and implicitly I think we know
| that so we just keep going.
| tomlockwood wrote:
| It has honestly been pretty amazing, looking from Australia,
| seeing social distancing and mask wearing become partisan issues
| in the US. They must be some of the most innocuous actions people
| can take to prevent the spread of infection. Here, even vaccine
| rates are approaching 90% in most places.
| DFHippie wrote:
| You're from Australia? The funny thing is the chief culture war
| profiteer keeping this country on fire is _also_ Australian.
| Small world!
| jaywalk wrote:
| And looking at Australia from the US, I see things like:
|
| "From September 13, households living in the NSW government's
| LGAs of concern will be allowed to spend an additional hour of
| recreation outdoors, as long as all adults in the household are
| fully vaccinated. This is on top of the already-permitted hour
| of exercise, meaning households will be able to visit a park"
| [0]
|
| and recoil in horror at how your country has become an
| authoritarian police state.
|
| [0] https://www.9news.com.au/national/coronavirus-nsw-
| restrictio...
| sneak wrote:
| Yup, it's crazy. Now we're coming up on a million dead in the
| USA, many of them entirely preventable, and the culpability
| stands directly at the feet of the culture warriors on both
| sides of this partisan divide.
|
| (Does the previous sentence upset you and make you want to
| point fingers at your opposing partisan group? If so, you may
| be part of the problem I am describing.)
|
| Only fools try to win an argument with their spouse, or pick an
| unnecessary fight with their neighbor.
|
| It's really the senseless, avoidable destruction, death, and
| suffering that bothers me.
|
| People in the USA will cut off their own nose to spite their
| face.
|
| Today the Times is reporting a bipartisan effort to fund and
| support the >100k kids who lost a parent or caregiver recently.
|
| The mind reels.
|
| Even before we hit 100k dead, I wondered how many fewer would
| have to die if the pandemic had broken out in a non-election
| year.
| ianmcgowan wrote:
| "both sides" hardly seems fair in this context. If your
| spouse is drunk and about to get in a car and drive you
| absolutely need to win that argument.
| DFHippie wrote:
| > the culpability stands directly at the feet of the culture
| warriors on both sides of this partisan divide
|
| Both sides? Huh.
|
| > Does the previous sentence upset you and make you want to
| point fingers at your opposing partisan group? If so, you may
| be part of the problem I am describing.
|
| Interesting. Another way to think about it is that if you
| always punish everyone for anyone's malfeasance, there is no
| penalty for malfeasance. It's a great way to ensure
| malefactors continue malefacting.
| mmmpop wrote:
| Sometimes the "correct" people are such insufferable,
| hypocritical assholes that the other side will slice its
| neck to spite the body, regardless of how incorrect they
| may be. If people can't see this game of chicken being a
| pretty sizable part of our issues then they should check
| their own biases.
| DFHippie wrote:
| I think you nailed it. The people patriotically spreading
| covid, attacking our system of government, preventing any
| action on climate change, and so forth _don 't actually
| think they're doing the right thing_. They just feel so
| slighted and aggrieved, so disrespected, that they see
| harming their uppity neighbors as the greatest good. They
| are Ahab and the libs are their white whale.
|
| The thing is, people don't respect you when you behave
| like that, when your ego is more important than their
| life. You can't make people respect you by hitting them.
| There's the tipping point right there.
| bsder wrote:
| > Does the previous sentence upset you and make you want to
| point fingers at your opposing partisan group? If so, you may
| be part of the problem I am describing.
|
| "Both sides" is neither courageous nor meaningful. It is
| simply ceding the field to the motivated and anointing them
| as the meaningful.
|
| At what point will you stand up? At what point will you affix
| blame? At what point will you seek justice?
|
| We know the answer. You will stay silent while millions die.
| We have been here before.
|
| "We preferred to keep silent. We are certainly not without
| guilt/fault, and I ask myself again and again, what would
| have happened, if in the year 1933 or 1934--there must have
| been a possibility--14,000 Protestant pastors and all
| Protestant communities in Germany had defended the truth
| until their deaths? If we had said back then, it is not right
| when Hermann Goring simply puts 100,000 Communists in the
| concentration camps, in order to let them die. I can imagine
| that perhaps 30,000 to 40,000 Protestant Christians would
| have had their heads cut off, but I can also imagine that we
| would have rescued 30-40,000 million [sic] people, because
| that is what it is costing us now." -- Rev. Martin Niemoller
|
| You can have the comfort of your "Both Sides"--just don't
| delude yourself that you will take action "at some point"--
| because you never will.
| belval wrote:
| I am skeptical of the framing of the original work in the
| article. If you actually read the original research, it boils
| down to building a model on willingness to cooperate based on
| differing views and observing that past a specific point
| cooperation is no longer possible. This is not uninteresting for
| the scientist in me, but the kind of large generalization made in
| the article are simply not supported by the work nor by the
| authors.
|
| To be fair, the abstract is somewhat asking for it given this:
|
| > Confronted with a deadly global pandemic that threatened not
| only massive loss of life but also the collapse of our medical
| system and economy, why were we unable to put partisan divisions
| aside and unite in a common cause, similar to the national
| mobilization in the Great Depression and the Second World War?
|
| The world is complex and while trying to model that complexity is
| an interesting problem, this kind of statement (by a co-author)
| falls short of my expectations for rigorous scientific
| communication and vulgarization:
|
| > "If we reach that point, we cannot unite even in the face of
| war, climate change, pandemics, or other challenges to the
| survival of our society."
| xupybd wrote:
| This might be a positive. Maybe modern society allows for more
| diversity of thought?
| belval wrote:
| I am not arguing that their research is useless or
| uninteresting, simply that it shouldn't be communicated like
| it actually proves anything for on-the-ground polarization.
|
| It's a bit like when we have AI papers that anthropomorphize
| their model by saying they benefit from "dreaming". This is
| true among the community of experts that actually work on the
| topic, it is simply irrelevant or downright misleading for a
| more "public" audience.
| blakesterz wrote:
| > "If we reach that point, we cannot unite even in the face of
| war, climate change, pandemics, or other challenges to the
| survival of our society."
|
| We no longer have differences in opinion, we have differences of
| reality. Climate Change, pandemics, January 6th... the list goes
| on and on now.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| I'd be surprised if we haven't already passed such a tipping
| point.
|
| For me, the exclusion of Lawrence Lessig from political debates
| was a big indicator that things were already off the rails.
| [deleted]
| DFHippie wrote:
| Well, we're at a point where foreign attacks on our elections are
| a partisan issue, the response to a pandemic which has killed
| some 770k citizens is a partisan issue, whether or not we can use
| democratic elections to select our leaders is a partisan issue,
| to say nothing of catastrophic climate change. But then, for much
| of the first century of the existence of the US whether or not
| some humans could own others as slaves was a partisan issue, and
| then whether you could secede if an election didn't go your way
| was a partisan issue (hey, history rhymed!). If there are tipping
| points, we seem to be able to make the phase shift back the other
| way again, albeit with horrendous casualties. So there's hope.
| hhs wrote:
| > But then, for much of the first century of the existence of
| the US whether or not some humans could own others as slaves
|
| Also, debt peonage was practiced for a long time after that [0,
| 1].
|
| [0]: https://www.pbs.org/tpt/slavery-by-another-
| name/themes/peona...
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_by_Another_Name
| dr-detroit wrote:
| Sean Hannity has been openly calling for "peaceful"
| preparations for civil war since the election. Everyone in my
| town are switching their cars to matte black battle cruisers
| for some reason and the nasty hateful comments about the evil
| libs get discussed openly in any store I walk into. Shoppers
| and employees. The point is tipped my friend next move is yours
| unless you want to swing from a lamp post at the next big
| Drumph rally.
| _dain_ wrote:
| everything would be great if it weren't for that other party
| making everything a partisan issue
| neurobot123 wrote:
| The polarization is mostly between those who trust mainstream
| media and those who don't.
|
| Not sure what can be done with media pushing disinformation for
| political reasons, any regulation there would risk violating
| the 1st amendment.
| georgeecollins wrote:
| >> any regulation there would risk violating the 1st
| amendment.
|
| Perhaps, but its a risk the US took for decades (1938 - 1985)
| and the political climate was less divisive during that
| period. You can't say "nothing can be done" when things can
| and have been done that we don't do anymore.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCC_fairness_doctrine
| jacobr1 wrote:
| What is interesting is the loss of the "commons," here.
| Even if we brought back the fairness doctrine, in practice
| the fragmentation of the media landscape would still drive
| a different style of discourse. We aren't going to go back
| to 3 national news broadcasts.
|
| And the justification for the doctrine extended the same
| way. It didn't regulate newspapers for example. Because the
| airways aren't privately owned, but rather leased from the
| public, the doctrine was considered more a regulation of
| this common space, than a regulation on speech on general.
| stepanhruda wrote:
| citation needed
| makomk wrote:
| The mainstream media is very much part of the problem. For
| example, both the idea that the US could've avoided a
| substantial proportion of those pandemic-related deaths and
| people's beliefs about how it could've done so are the result
| of systematic, partisan misinformation by trusted
| publications like the New York Times about how the US
| compares to other countries, what those other countries have
| been doing, how well it works, the actual evidence for stuff
| like vaccines and masks, and so on. (One thing that stood out
| to me lately is that their readers evidently think Europe did
| much better, from the comments section - and it's obvious
| why, because pretty much the only comparisons with Europe the
| NYT publishes are ones that make the US look bad, and if they
| flip the other way it stops publishing them.)
|
| Some of this unfortunately leaked into the narrative here in
| the UK, like the stupid idea that the reason we were failing
| was because our incompetent government couldn't achieve South
| Korean levels of mass testing - something which the media
| kept pushing even after their actual level of Covid testing
| fell massively behind the US and UK, and even after it became
| clear that their test and trace wasn't nearly as effective at
| controlling Covid as the media spin claimed.
| jimmygrapes wrote:
| I can't recall if it was satirical news article,
| photoshopped meme, or real thing, but it went something
| like this:
|
| > AMISH COMMUNITY UNAFFECTED BY COVID-19 > Reporters asked
| a local community member how they have avoided the deadly
| pandemic despite interacting with known carriers. The man
| responded, "We don't have Internet or TV."
| tablespoon wrote:
| > One thing that stood out to me lately is that their
| readers evidently think Europe did much better, from the
| comments section - and it's obvious why...
|
| People who post in comments sections are a tiny
| unrepresentative subset of readers.
|
| In my experience, the NYT comment section is mostly filled
| with garbage by partisans who cannot tolerate or process
| anything except that which fits their chosen perspective.
| For proof, just read comments attached to opinion articles
| by their token non-liberals. I don't think anything of
| value can be inferred from such a self-selected
| dysfunctional group.
| DFHippie wrote:
| What are the measures by which the US is doing better than
| continental Europe? What are some things the NYT was
| publishing but stopped publishing when they didn't fit the
| defeatist storyline?
|
| I don't doubt that partisan propaganda spread as news is
| among the chief reasons the US is at war with itself right
| now, but you lose me when you pick the NYT as the chief
| culprit.
| makomk wrote:
| Overall, the US seems to be doing about as well as
| continental Europe in ways that actually matter, like
| deaths. What the NYT did was cherry-picking figures - for
| example, for a while last winter they kept comparing
| Spanish cases to Florida cases to downplay the Spanish
| wave as less bad, even though the trajectory of the
| Spanish outbreak was much scarier, and then suddenly
| forgot about that comparison when Spain passed them. (The
| Spanish press pointed out that their outbreak was worse
| than the US based on the NYT's metric and described it as
| such, which is partly how I noticed it happen.) I think
| that was a replacement for some other, broader comparison
| between the US and Europe they dropped earlier on after
| it stopped making the US look bad. It was really blatant
| too - they kept on reusing the same comparisions week
| after week as the gap gradually narrowed, and then when
| it would've flipped poof that metric went away.
|
| Similarly, they stopped comparing the actual per-capita
| level of Covid testing in South Korea and the USA when
| the US passed them and not only started using meaningless
| metrics like test postivity (the two countries had...
| very different ideas on who to test, which didn't include
| most people with symptoms in South Korea) but outright
| claimed it was a lie to say the US was now the country
| doing more Covid testing using the swapped metric. I'm
| pretty sure there were quite a few others too which I've
| forgotten about or just missed. Haven't really been
| following their reporting so much lately.
| tzs wrote:
| US compared to EU countries in CIVID deaths per capita
| [1].
|
| [1] http://91-divoc.com/pages/covid-
| visualization/?chart=countri...
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| Here is the original research:
| https://www.pnas.org/content/118/50/e2102144118
| travisporter wrote:
| Thank you open access! But did I find a typo?
|
| "Nevertheless, we make no claims about the model's predictive
| accuracy. The model is highly abstract and remains to be
| empirically calibrated and tested. Nor can we assume that
| tipping points would obtain in radically different
| applications, such as affective polarization, voter
| polarization, or media polarization."
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| They were documenting the computational model that they used
| and they did note that it had some predictive success.
|
| Additionally,
|
| " We see indications of empirical validation in recent
| events. Prior to 2019, one might have assumed that a global
| pandemic would bring together those who disagreed on issues
| for which hot-button righteous indignation was a luxury that
| could no longer be afforded. Instead, mask wearing became a
| partisan crest that identified friend and foe on a partisan
| battlefield. Similar dynamics can be observed in the two
| impeachment trials of former President Donald Trump. In the
| first trial, evidence of collusion with a foreign government
| failed to exert the expected unifying effect. In the second
| case, an attack on the US Capitol initially elicited
| bipartisan outrage, followed by a reversal of position among
| Republican leaders in the weeks leading up to the Senate
| trial."
| umvi wrote:
| It seems to me that the pandemic itself is not that big of a
| threat to society - after all, even if we did absolutely nothing
| and went about business as usual, some small X% of the population
| would die, hospitals might be forced to do bed rationing for a
| while (leading to more deaths), but the vast majority of citizens
| would get better in a few weeks due to their natural immune
| systems. 20-30 years in the future you wouldn't be able to tell
| it ever happened.
|
| The threat to society as it relates to the pandemic is all due to
| red vs. blue political in-fighting over how much responsibility
| and power the government should have for protecting its citizens.
| That plus the added threat of economic turmoil due to
| commercially onerous government mandates/policies/efforts to
| reduce X% (lockdowns, capacity mandates, rent moratoriums, etc.).
|
| I just find it interesting that society is tearing itself apart
| over a problem that essentially solves itself over time
| regardless of our actions, meanwhile society is not tearing
| itself apart over a problem that does not solve itself over time
| (climate change) and where doing nothing will eventually have
| consequences of apocalyptic proportions.
| throwawaytemp27 wrote:
| Seems like completely made up pseudo-scientific bs?
|
| Edit (due to downvotes): Like they make up a model based on the
| past. Probably the model is massively tuned to the past data set.
| If it makes any testable predictions about the future, I would be
| very surprised if those predictions ended up being more accurate
| than chance.
| 9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote:
| If you read the actual research, they clearly state that they
| aren't asserting that their model currently holds predictive
| accuracy, while also noting that it did have successes.
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