In his regular column in IEEE Spectrum last month, Robert W. Lucky reviewed a book, Overcomplicated, by Samuel Arbesman:
When I saw the title... I assumed that it would be a warning that we technologists had gone too far in creating complex systems... but as I discovered upon reading the book, Arbesman does not say that complexity is necessarily bad or that we should seek simplicity. Instead, he maintains that systems are now unknowably complex, that they will become even more so, and we should… just get over it.
I haven’t read Arbesman's book, but it occurred to me that its basic premise about the products of our technology may apply to social phenomena as well. That is, just like cars, power plants, and computer programs, our social networks, government bureaucracies and regulatory systems are so complex that no one person can fully understand them. I think the recent election illustrates this in at least a couple of ways.
First, Clinton's loss suggests the election process was not fully understood by people who predicted a different outcome. That's not to say those who predicted Trump's win were smarter or better informed-- Trump's supporters were claiming the election was rigged right up to the end. Even Scott Adams of Dilbert fame, whose ego is second only to that of Trump himself, qualified his prediction of a landslide three months before the election as Trump's poll numbers continued to drop. There's probably still a feeling among progressives and rational conservatives that 2016 was an anomaly, and that if we can just survive Trump's administration things will return to normal. Democrats and the media may learn something from their most recent mistakes and adjust accordingly, but future elections will be unlike those of the past. Online and robo-call polling, information silos and fake news, cyber security and a host of other issues are all part of the new normal. The only reliable constant will be change, as political campaigns move further and further beyond the understanding of a single human.
My second observation of the recent election is that the stress driving technologists to call for greater simplicity is similar to the disenchantment of voters fed up with "business as usual." IANAP[sychologist], but it seems to me natural that people would want simple solutions to problems that affect them. When Trump says "Only I can fix it" or "I know better than the generals" or "Regulations kill jobs," it has the appeal of simplicity. Nuance is lost on Trump's base. They consider anything they can't understand to be part of the problem. As further evidence of our political system's growing complexity, consider that it's not just Trump voters who believe it's broken. There's quite a lot of disagreement about how to fix it.
Again, IANAP, but I've noted a couple of terms in particular that have been associated with Trump's base: cognitive dissonance and conspiracy theorist. While searching for an online copy of Dr. Lucky's column, I came across another recent article from IEEE Spectrum, interesting albeit disheartening, Congress to Curtail Methane Monitoring. It may be a stretch, but I see a connection with the above discussion:
Global warming... is not a moving issue for Republican leaders or President Donald Trump, who reject the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change.
What moves them are complaints from industries that "burdensome" regulations unnecessarily hinder job growth and— in the case of methane rules— domestic oil and gas output.
Regulations can be harmful or helpful, and their effect on jobs shouldn't be the only measure of their value, but if simplicity is your only guide, deregulation wins every time. Even if Trump himself does not, many in his base believe unequivocally his assertion that global warming is a hoax.
As discussed in the IEEE Spectrum article, one downside of methane deregulation will be to slow the development of leak detection technology, although state regulations, e.g. in California, will continue to provide some incentive. What really struck me, though, was the lone comment:
Since humans can not change the climate of Earth, monitoring methane is a waste of time and money. Thus the cuts. This is only the tip of the iceberg. Many more wasteful spending cuts coming soon.
Why on earth, I thought, would someone so obviously challenged be reading IEEE Spectrum? Since the discussion forum is handled by Disqus and the commenter hadn't hidden his/her profile, I decided to check some of his/her comments on other articles.
Help me! I've fallen down the rabbit hole and I can't get up. From the same commenter, on another recent IEEE Spectrum article, Will Rooftop Solar Really Add to Utility Costs?
Its a little known fact that, while your power meter may be spinning backwards, the power you think you are contributing to the grid is actually terminated and goes nowhere. This is because the cost and danger of allowing you to place power on the wire is so expensive, it is simply cheaper to pay you a rebate for your generated power and throw it away.
Think about it. When a storm knocks down power lines, they shut off the power so that the lines can be repaired. How on earth would they shut off the power to the line if 100 home were also pushing power onto the wire? The cheapest and safest solution is to NOT enable the home to generate power but pay the homeowner so they feel good and the law requires it.
A good reporter would investigate and report on this little known fact.
What the ****? Is this some new conspiracy theory I haven't heard of yet? I searched DuckDuckGo for "net metering hoax" and found, not at all to my surprise, a few articles opining that net metering is bad policy. Its detractors say it will drive up electricity costs, etc., because the utilities are being forced to buy power from customers at retail rates and weren't being compensated for their investment in the grid infrastructure. I couldn't find anything, however, even remotely suggesting the nonsense in that comment.
I was sorely tempted to add a comment in reply, but as I looked down the discussion thread, I saw it was unnecessary. Of 19 comments in the entire discussion, nine were replies to the one above, all refutals. You gotta love the geek discussions, though-- no profanity, just
The assertion by Biff is total 'alternate facts'.…
That is complete and utter nonsense.…
You just made that up.…
Biff, This is just plain WRONG!…
You're won't and you don't understand how electricity works.…
I suppose this 'fact' is so little known that you will have problems stating a reference?
No conspiracies-- just the facts, please!