Fish Democracies Consider the question (using fish) of whether uncommitted members of a group make it more democratic. I

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Fish Democracies Consider The Question Using Fish Of Whether Uncommitted Members Of A Group Make It More Democratic I 1 (314.59 KiB) Viewed 50 times

Fish Democracies Consider the question (using fish) of whether uncommitted members of a group make it more democratic. It has been argued that individuals with weak preferences are particularly vulnerable to a vocal opinionated minority. However, recent studies, including computer simulations, observational studies with humans, and experiments with fish, all suggest that adding uncommitted members to a group might make for more democratic decisions by taking control away from an opinionated minority.¹ In the experiment with fish, golden shiners (small freshwater fish who have a very strong tendency to stick together in schools) were trained to swim toward either yellow or blue marks to receive a treat. Those swimming toward the yellow mark were trained more to develop stronger preferences and became the fish version of individuals with strong opinions. When a minority of five opinionated fish (wanting to aim for the yellow mark) were mixed with a majority of six less opinionated fish (wanting to aim for the blue mark), the group swam toward the minority yellow mark almost all the time. When some untrained fish with no prior preferences were added, however, the majority opinion prevailed most of the time.² How Often Does the Fish Majority Win? In a school of fish with a minority of strongly opinionated fish wanting to aim for the yellow mark and a majority of less passionate fish wanting to aim for the blue mark, as described above, a 95 % confidence interval for the proportion of times the majority wins (they go to the blue mark) is 0.09 to 0.26. Is it plausible that fish in this situation are equally likely to go for either of the two options? O Yes O No