The Megalith: a Model of Political Change

Great Debates
1

A large crowd of people are standing in an open field. A huge stone is also there.

Each person has a preference for the location of the stone. Each person’s preference is different, although the distribution clusters around one or more modes.

Each person attempts to push the stone toward their preferred location. The farther the stone is from a person’s ideal spot, the harder that person pushes. As the stone moves around the field, the people continuously adjust the direction and force of their pushing.

Eventually, the forces balance and the stone stops moving, but the people never stop pushing, because it is impossible for everyone to be satisfied.

If all the people are equally strong, this represents ideal democracy, and the stone will come to rest with an equal number of people pushing on all sides.

To move the model a step closer to realism, we should posit that some people have more pushing strength than others. This represents inequality of political power. The stone will still come to rest, but the crowd of people around it will be somewhat lopsided.

In some cases, one individual is far stronger than the others, and can overpower the combined efforts of a whole crowd. This represents tyranny. In this case, the stone will likely stop very close to this one person’s preferred position.

Regardless of the degree of equality or inequality, the people never perceive the stone as being in the right place, except for perhaps a lucky few whose ideal spot is right where the stone happens to come to rest. Everyone else just keeps pushing forever.

One can keep adding complications to the model — changing preferences, a sloping field — but what I have described is basically how I think the world works.

2

Cool story, bro. So what’s the debate?

3

Kinda, yeah. Interesting metaphor, and reasonably accurate. One could easily add refinements, such as the “party system” where people can unify to accumulate additional pushing power – and the “politics” business where people can exchange pushing directions for favors. (“If you help me push rock ‘A’ northwards, I’ll help you push rock ‘B’ eastwards.”)

There’s also the “constitutional limitations” refinement, where, no matter how many people might be pushing in that direction, we’ve agreed that the rock does not get pushed into the crevasse.

But…no real debate here: I think it’s a pretty good model.

4

I don’t know if there is much of a debate; the subject matter seemed appropriate for GD.

I am interested in hearing what sort of refinements other people would suggest. All the refinements I think of tend to make the model more grim, probably because I have an exceedingly dark view of politics and society. So I’m thinking, maybe the stone runs over people and crushes them; maybe some guy tries to kill the people who are pushing in what he considers the wrong direction; maybe some people see the stone move far away from where they want it to be, and just give up in despair.

Also: what do you think of the implication of permanent, near-universal dissatisfaction? If that’s the way things really are (and I tend to think so), does it make the whole struggle pointless?

5

Your example doesn’t really explain how the stronger push ends up equalizing out. You should specify that they’re in a semi-spherical pit or something.

I’d try to add something which notes the difference between pushes based on reason, knowledge, and experience versus that which is based on popular perception, ignorance, and disinterest. Ideally, those in the first category would have enough pushing power to balance the rest, but only in the areas for which they were actually qualified.

6

In the broadest terms, yes, there will always be a competition between those who want liberty and those who want security. Those massive social forces will always be pushing back and forth.

In lesser terms, most of what we spend our real time pushing over are smaller, temporary issues. Abortion, gun control, immigration, and so on. These will seem silly to our grand-children, who will have their own highly polarizing issues to push back and forth.

7

Those two phrases cannot both be true.

8

There’s no need for them to be in a semi-spherical pit to explain why the stone always comes to rest. Each person is pushing toward a point, so even if there were only one person pushing, with no one to balance the forces out, the stone would stop eventually.

If you allow for people’s preferences and/or strength to change over time, then it becomes possible that the stone might never stop moving.

9

Ah, no I’d dispute that model. I do think that there would always be a tug towards the mean, due to general sanity. People might want something, but they’ll generally recognize - when everyone is against them - that they need to ease off on a few points or compromise on a few things. No tyrannical dictator gets everything he wants, not even Stalin or Mao. And subsequently, the further from the mean the great leader’s vision, the harder it is going to be to push things there. Minus a strong personality at the head of the ship, everything is going to push back towards sanity over time.

10

Can we assume a spherical stone in a vacuum?

11

I’m pretty sure that math only works for cows.

12

This is about politics, which does not happen in a vacuum. The model needs the economic side of society. In a capitalist economy, that might go like this: after pushing, people go back to work to produce food. The few owners get lots more food than everyone else, even though they don’t actually produce any food themselves. Because they are the only ones who get enough to eat, they are much stronger than the people who do the work. And the owners use some of their extra food to hire some people to push on their side. When workers complain that the rock is now pushing them into the river, the owners topple another rock onto them.

13

I would add that in the real world there is an ideal spot for this megalith to rest. This spot may well be different than the completely fair democratic consensus opinion of where the megalith should rest.

This spot could be represented by a solid dry patch in a section of bog. Some people insist on dragging the megalith into the bog, despite the fact they end us standing ankle deep in cold, dirty water.

14

If this is a usefully model, what predictions does it make about the 2016 US presidential election? If it can’t make predictions, of what use is it?