4 ms·

The (famous) experiment seems to prove that mice are happy with the benefits of relatively high levels of social organization until the burdens of close quarter

The (famous) experiment seems to prove that mice are happy with the benefits of relatively high levels of social organization until the burdens of close quarter living and constant company drain them of their will to live and their ability to thrive. It amounts to a pretty strong argument for American style independence and personal liberty. The implication, I think, was that it was supposed to also endorse the laissez-faire economic system undergirding those things, even if only as a necessary evil. As a mammal who hates confined spaces, I can mostly get on board with that.

adrianN 4y ago
The famous experiment seems to prove that a large number young people are bad for social stability in a mice society. That amounts to a pretty strong argument against infant healthcare /s. I don't think we should generalize too much from mice to men. Deriving social policy from what works for mice seems like a very bold move to me.
- BlargMcLarg 4y ago
  You can't generalize too much, nor can you assume humans will just "fix it for everyone" like the author seems to imply we are some enlightened, higher species. That assumption can also backfire. A highly adaptive species capable of grouping up gives leeway for some extreme solutions which will solve the problem for a subpopulation at the cost of another. Humans might solve the problem, but not in the way which is best for the entire population. Plenty of examples in both the past and the present.
- mschuster91 4y ago
  > The famous experiment seems to prove that a large number young people are bad for social stability in a mice society. For what it's worth: there are strong indications suggesting a link between a large number of young, especially male, people and the emergence of social unrest [1][2][3]. [1] https://www.jstor.org/stable/26271410 https://www.jstor.org/stable/26271410 [2] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/03/young-people-key-defusing-unrest/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/03/young-people-key-defu... [3] https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/03/angry-young-men-are-making-the-world-less-stable/284364/ https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/03/an...
  - RalfWausE 4y ago
    ... and because of this, mankind has developed an interesting game called "war"...
    - kipchak 4y ago
      Though this creates a bit of a problem if you're no longer having wars.
      - mschuster91 4y ago
        There is a theory that precisely this is why Putin decided to try and take over Ukraine with most of the troops coming from piss poor regions of Russia. For Putin, it likely still is a win-win scenario: the fallen soldiers won't protest in their home regions and demand reforms, their families will worship them as heroes and even if the war fails in the end and only Crimea and Donbas get under Russian control [1], it will still have been worth the effort. [1] Note that I wish for Russia to be completely driven out of Ukraine and to be treated as a warmonger like Germany was after 1945, this is unfortunately not realistic.
- Tepix 4y ago
  A young populace is indeed closely linked to violence. The book "The Human Tide: How Population Shaped the Modern World" by Paul Morland has some interesting thoughts on the topic. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43198718-the-human-tide https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43198718-the-human-tide
  - adrianN 4y ago
    I find that sarcasm is always best when you can somewhat plausibly argue that it's serious.
  - tremon 4y ago
    There's also the theory that humans caused the mammoths to go extinct not by hunting them to extinction directly, but by killing the adult males (because they have the largest tusks). Without a strong dominant presence to keep them in check, juveniles going through musth became so violent that they started killing each other and the females they pursued.
  - hnbad 4y ago
    The problem with that assertion is that it's so simplistic that it's meaningless. Having more young people doesn't magically cause more violence. Those young people don't exist in a vaccuum. Adolescents generally don't have an income and are thus dependent on their families to provide for them. Families having more children also means they have more expenses and need to allocate more time to parenting and "family time" for each child to still receive the same level of care. Additionally there are many economic and cultural factors why poorer people are more likely to have more children than wealthier families. Availability of contraception and abortion further exacerbates this. "More young people" generally means poor people having more kids. Even if the number of children increased equally across all economic categories, this would still mean more additional poor kids than more additonal rich kids because of the size of those groups (and because not-wealthy-but-not-poor families could end up poorer because of the additional expenses). But sure, young people cause violence.
    - Tepix 4y ago
ben_w 4y ago
As the article itself says, "Ultimately Calhoun’s work functions like a Rorschach blot—people see what they want to see." Even if mice and humans really were the same, the article also demonstrates that there are many different hypotheses that fit most of the observations, but all of them seem to be falsified by some of the observations.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
poulpy123 4y ago
I'm fascinated that you can get to this conclusion from the result of some kind of mice prison experiment
- sgt101 4y ago
  Even more fascinating is that the OP and several commenters don't seem to have read the article...
doctor_eval 4y ago
(In mice)

adrianN 4y ago

The famous experiment seems to prove that a large number young people are bad for social stability in a mice society. That amounts to a pretty strong argument against infant healthcare /s. I don't think we should generalize too much from mice to men. Deriving social policy from what works for mice seems like a very bold move to me.

BlargMcLarg 4y ago
You can't generalize too much, nor can you assume humans will just "fix it for everyone" like the author seems to imply we are some enlightened, higher species. That assumption can also backfire. A highly adaptive species capable of grouping up gives leeway for some extreme solutions which will solve the problem for a subpopulation at the cost of another. Humans might solve the problem, but not in the way which is best for the entire population. Plenty of examples in both the past and the present.
mschuster91 4y ago
> The famous experiment seems to prove that a large number young people are bad for social stability in a mice society. For what it's worth: there are strong indications suggesting a link between a large number of young, especially male, people and the emergence of social unrest [1][2][3]. [1] https://www.jstor.org/stable/26271410 https://www.jstor.org/stable/26271410 [2] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/03/young-people-key-defusing-unrest/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/03/young-people-key-defu... [3] https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/03/angry-young-men-are-making-the-world-less-stable/284364/ https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/03/an...
- RalfWausE 4y ago
  ... and because of this, mankind has developed an interesting game called "war"...
  - kipchak 4y ago
    Though this creates a bit of a problem if you're no longer having wars.
    - mschuster91 4y ago
      There is a theory that precisely this is why Putin decided to try and take over Ukraine with most of the troops coming from piss poor regions of Russia. For Putin, it likely still is a win-win scenario: the fallen soldiers won't protest in their home regions and demand reforms, their families will worship them as heroes and even if the war fails in the end and only Crimea and Donbas get under Russian control [1], it will still have been worth the effort. [1] Note that I wish for Russia to be completely driven out of Ukraine and to be treated as a warmonger like Germany was after 1945, this is unfortunately not realistic.
Tepix 4y ago
A young populace is indeed closely linked to violence. The book "The Human Tide: How Population Shaped the Modern World" by Paul Morland has some interesting thoughts on the topic. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43198718-the-human-tide https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43198718-the-human-tide
- adrianN 4y ago
  I find that sarcasm is always best when you can somewhat plausibly argue that it's serious.
- tremon 4y ago
  There's also the theory that humans caused the mammoths to go extinct not by hunting them to extinction directly, but by killing the adult males (because they have the largest tusks). Without a strong dominant presence to keep them in check, juveniles going through musth became so violent that they started killing each other and the females they pursued.
- hnbad 4y ago
  The problem with that assertion is that it's so simplistic that it's meaningless. Having more young people doesn't magically cause more violence. Those young people don't exist in a vaccuum. Adolescents generally don't have an income and are thus dependent on their families to provide for them. Families having more children also means they have more expenses and need to allocate more time to parenting and "family time" for each child to still receive the same level of care. Additionally there are many economic and cultural factors why poorer people are more likely to have more children than wealthier families. Availability of contraception and abortion further exacerbates this. "More young people" generally means poor people having more kids. Even if the number of children increased equally across all economic categories, this would still mean more additional poor kids than more additonal rich kids because of the size of those groups (and because not-wealthy-but-not-poor families could end up poorer because of the additional expenses). But sure, young people cause violence.
  - Tepix 4y ago

ben_w 4y ago

As the article itself says, "Ultimately Calhoun’s work functions like a Rorschach blot—people see what they want to see." Even if mice and humans really were the same, the article also demonstrates that there are many different hypotheses that fit most of the observations, but all of them seem to be falsified by some of the observations.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

poulpy123 4y ago

I'm fascinated that you can get to this conclusion from the result of some kind of mice prison experiment

sgt101 4y ago
Even more fascinating is that the OP and several commenters don't seem to have read the article...

doctor_eval 4y ago

(In mice)