>The concept of a sociological critical mass was first used in the 1960s by Morton Grodzins, a political science professor at the University of Chicago. Grodzins studied racial segregation — in particular, examining why people seemed to separate themselves by race even when that separation was not enforced by law.
Curious where this researcher found examples of white flight in the 60s completely divorced from the reality of explicitly incentivized depopulation and segregation[1]. Very weird that it is used as an example of "spontaneous" sociological critical mass here, because it very much was catalyzed by real economic policy.
Flight and segregation emerge spontaneously in any population where people don't want to be a significant minority, even when they prefer some amount of diversity:
well it appears spontaneously in this game that has a hard set of deterministic rules, but there is no proof that actually this is the cause of demographic flight - just an argument. Probably a correct argument, but I am cursed with the tendency to see the opposition to my beliefs as perhaps true.
Correct, it is not a proof that things like explicit legislation or rampant levels of racism are not the actual cause in some specific instance -- they may be. But it does mean you cannot logically conclude, as many do, that neighborhood segregation is smoking gun proof of continuing rampant racism, or anything else.
For such an interesting topic, the many of the leading examples seemed weak. The racial segregation one seemed a bit strange to me too (is racism really the only reason people can think of? If an area is undergoing radical demographic shifts then there is going to be a lot going on), the business one seemed vague and the Independence one is underexplored.
It is an important topic but I wouldn't recommend reading this article on it. It seems to be a just-so story situation without much meat on the bone.
Interesting read. It puts into context the importance of luck in life. There is a group of people who become oppressed to the point that it becomes unbearable and they have a choice either to die by revolting too early without critical mass, or by letting themselves starve from the increasing weight of the oppression. In the case of the opioid epidemic, people have been/are driven to insanity and commit suicide by drug overdose.
You really don't want to be in that early oppressed group.
IMO, it's because human systems are over-systematized and over-regulated. It always causes oppression. Some group of people has to pay dearly for all the structures that are imposed on them. Laws and social structures essentially never work for everyone equally; at scale, many laws systematically steal wealth, power and opportunities from one group and give it to another.
Even the most well-meaning laws basically end up stealing from certain groups of people for the benefit of others. Especially on a complex global playing field. Just look at Africa. It's not their fault that they're stuck in poverty... Western powers keep installing corrupt dictators by sponsoring coups. The dictators then saddle their citizens with debt. The people have little say. Then basically they become so poor that they are forced to immigrate to the rich countries which are causing the problems... And for the most part, join the lower class of that society where the oppression continues under a different form.
They get to be oppressed in this slightly different way while also contributing to the continued oppression of their people back in their home countries through the gift their cheap labor to their oppressors in their new country, which enriches them. This is made possible by a combination of ignorance and intergenerational low self-esteem inflicted upon them by their oppressors as a result of manipulation of the political systems of their previous countries.
IMO, US leftwing politics are extremely short sighted with their approach to immigration because they are building a critical mass of oppressed people in the US. Some people will be grateful initially but the gratefulness will soon turn to disdain once the new reality sinks in.
That makes a lot of sense, well thought! The only thing I would like to add is regarding the critical mass of oppressed people in the US, at least when it comes to immigrants. I think the first generation struggles the most, but their children, who are raised - if not born - in the country face less issues, and things then improve from one generation to the other.
Granted, for generations there will be a difference between their standard of living and the one from their non-immigrant counterparts on average, but that gradual reduction might be enough to avoid reaching the tipping point.
Better never means better for everyone. And it always means worse for some.
> always means worse for some.
Can't agree. Say, when a new treatment emerges for a disease that was affecting some part of the population, it's better for the cured, and not any worse for all others.
Even simpler, at the very foundation of daily life: when two people willingly exchange something, they are both better off, by their subjective measures, else they would have done that. This applies not only to exchanging goods for money, but even to exchanging friendly smiles.
If all life were a zero-sum game, the world would never progress to its current state.
> it's better for the cured, and not any worse for all others.
Won't anyone think of the business owners who lost their steady stream of income from treatable but incurable illnesses?
Life is not a 'zero sum game'. Just because someone benefits from something does not mean someone else is exploited or oppressed.
Many in the anti-capitalist crowd have the mindset that wealth is not created, but just spread around. If someone gets rich, it must mean others got poorer. If that were true then everyone would be getting poorer as the population grows (finite resources spread ever thinner within a growing society).
If you're comparing critical mass in physics with critical mass in sociology, I already know you're full of it without needing to read any further.
> The concept can explain everything from viral cat videos to why changing habits is so hard.
Somehow this line persuades me of exactly the opposite.
Why?
Because claims that one singular concept or idea can explain pretty much everything in life have, historically, been quite false. Worse, such claims tend to attract people who like to have one simple solution for everything, or like to have one single thing that's root of all evil, or like to have one simple explanation for everything, etc. The damage such people can incur, especially when equipped with a grandiose enough concept, have (again, historically) been quite incredible.
Indeed! Reaching the critical mass in a nuclear reaction pushes things apart, while reaching the critical mass in a social movement helps pull even.more participants.
Is there not a value in drawing interdisciplinary ties between fields? Physics underpins reality, would it not be feasible that it's laws scale to higher order complexities?
See Pepsi rebrand for answer.
Curious what conclusion you draw from this. Care to elaborate?
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That seems like a shallow dismissal