It’s getting worse, I reckon. The world is being polarised. It upsets me when otherwise smart friends fall into the trap of seeing the world in binary terms. Good versus evil. Black versus white.
The problem is the way we access information on the internet. It’s pull rather than push: we choose what to read, watch or listen to. This self-selection process makes it very easy for us to live in a bubble.
In our bubbles, we create a self-consistent world around a narrative that we have selected, and which we reinforce by confirmation bias, marshalling evidence that supports our view and rejected anything contradictory. There are some bubbles that are better than others: for example, I’d rather live in a liberal bubble than a selfish, dogmatic, intolerant one. But bubbles are bubbles, whatever their colour, and they obstruct right thinking.
This bubble of confirmation bias has always been the case, to a degree. Consider religions, cults and political parties. By surrounding ourselves by people who think the same way, we distort our view of the world.
We begin to separate people we meet: are they with us or against us? We find it incredible that anyone rational could think differently. It’s the bubble effect.
The Internet has made the creation of bubbles that much easier, and the skins of these bubbles rather thicker. The result is that we can no longer have any meaningful discourse, and we have an impoverished, simplified view of reality, filtered through very thick and highly tinted lenses.
In the wine world, we see this with natural wine. On the one hand, people suggesting that conventional wines are full of additives, dangerous to our health, and chemical. On the other, people maintain that natural wines are all flawed and feral, and that this movement is just a fad.
We need to grow up. We need to stop seeing the world in binary terms. We need to put ourselves in the shoes of others. Once in a while, it’s good to change our media diet. Rather than be quick to judge the attitudes and beliefs of others, let’s try to understand why others think differently. Had we been subject to their culture, peer group and media diet, might we think differently?
That’s not to say we shouldn’t be politically active or vocal in support of causes of merit. It’s just that we shouldn’t just do this from a binary position. People are rarely all good or all bad. Political parties are rarely all good or all bad. The same is true of religions, and styles of wines. This sounds a trivial thing to say, but being able to accept a world where everything is mixed, and achieving a nuanced understanding of complex issues, takes maturity and wisdom. It’s something we’d do well to acquire.
7 Comments on Binary thinking and bubble creation
Preaching to the converted, Jamie.
The people whom your message might make stop and think are not reading your blog.
How’s about getting the Daily Mail to publish it as a ‘Vinous Viewpoints’ op-ed piece?….though that would be preaching to the non-converted and i doubt it would have any effect there either!
Even if one tries to be open-minded, a big part of our information supply comes from sources such as google and facebook, which further filter the flow of information. Filter-bubbles get tailor-made as you interact with the systems, giving you only information that the system thinks you’re intrested in (or have previously shown to be), and opposing views get pushed further back in your search results or get removed from your newsfeed.
That’s an important point. There’s something structural about social media that really accelerates the bubble-forming process
Social media is designed that way to keep you engaged. This TED talk explains it quite well. And alternative search engines such as DuckDuckGo don’t use filter bubbles or track you in any way.
Great piece and very true. Trouble is there’s money in feeding you advertising and information related to what you like. In fact it probably suits marketeers to have you clearly defined as it makes their job easier and they can more easily target. Political parties and other special interest groups doubtless like it too. In an ever more globalised world we seem to have an increasingly narrow view. Education has to be the key and this needs teaching in schools.
Have you heard about StartPage.com? Its a search engine that allows you to search Google with complete privacy protection. Because Startpage doesn’t store your search history, you’ll break your bubble. AND also no irritating ads that chase you around the internet! 😉
You’re part of my bubble, Jamie!