THINKING of POLLS

 

This morning, I am thinking about polls. Not “the Poles,” who are the people of Poland, but these pesky things asking for our opinion.

 

I have just gotten yet another of these spam emails asking me to answer a survey, a.k.a. pole, on what I think of this, that, and the other. I labeled it SPAM and onto the great ethernet it went unanswered.

 

Unless you have turned off and unchecked all information in the last few decades, you’d know that opinion polls have become unreliable as far as election results are concerned. My sense is that they were never reliable as far as anything and everything is concerned. The so-called “science” of polling just isn’t scientific.  

 

We’ve heard the analysis and excuses that go something like this:

Polls are conducted via landlines, and people with landlines no longer reflect the population.

People lie because some answers are deemed “uncouth.”

The pollsters asked the question in the wrong way, either ineptly or deliberately.

 

Yeah, yeah, yeah. All the above. But there’s the uglier reality that most polls are bought and paid for by interested parties and are meant to be used not as information but for persuasion.

Why is this “ugly” you might ask?

Because the underlying reality of our species is that most of the time most of us go with the majority opinion. If most people think thus, barring any true knowledge to the contrary, we go with what most think.

 

Herd mentality is part of most species. Ours is no exception. Individuals lack expertise regarding most public matters. How many of my friends have the expertise in climatology or energy science or economics? Yet they seem to hold strong convictions on climate change, nuclear energy, and the best way to do the most good for most people.

 

How did we come to our convictions?

 

We went with what most people say.

 

How did we know what most people say?

 

We listened to the polls.

 

How did the polls know?

 

Because we told them.

 

It gets worse: we penalize individuals who think for themselves. It’s safer in a group, and those who are not joiners are a threat.

 

So, yes, I’m thinking about polls. I’m a conventional person, not a rebel or a prophet. But I don’t answer polls anymore and I pay little attention to media when they insist on quoting approval polls or polls that measure beliefs.