Not enough data

I like data, gobs and gobs of data. I like gigabytes, terabytes, petabytes, and whatever comes next. I’m particularly fond of data about groups — their preferences, predilections, penchants, partialities, and politics. Yes, I’m aware of the tyrants and lowlifes who use data destructively to abuse people and amass power. This is a drawback that powerful things — like corporations, nuclear power plants, the wired world, gene editing, artificial intelligence — have in common. We need them, but they can be dangerous. The answer is regulation, not rejection.

I like to imagine the topology of data, the hills and valleys of data we have about every subject that we’ve deemed fit to study. There are some subjects — say, the global distribution of Formosan subterranean termites — that can boast a ton of data. Conversely, there are subjects, many that are keenly important, with a dearth of data. One such subject is comparative cultural values. We need a set of metrics that tells us how close (or far apart) the values of any two cultures are. If we had a way to reliably measure cultural distance, we’d have a tool that could show where cultural collisions might occur. Forearmed, we could use the science of mediation to find the roots of our value differences and work at reconciling them.

Fortunately, there are prototypes for such a tool that we can refine into better measuring instruments. One that I know of is called The Political Compass. It’s produced by an enterprise whose roots are deliberately mysterious. I suppose the owners don’t want their political views known for fear that a political agenda might be attributed to them.

Their test has 60 multiple choice statements that you can strongly agree with, agree with, disagree with, or strongly disagree with. Your responses are digested by a secret algorithm. Its output is a point on a graph whose x-axis is an “economic scale,” from politically left to politically right, and whose y-axis is a “social scale,” from authoritarian to libertarian. Thus the point, your score, can fall in any or four quadrants. Here’s the graphical score of a left-winger whom I persuaded to take the test:

The test isn’t strictly political. Statements about such subjects as abstract art, astrology, mental illness, the source of morality, keeping to our own kind, racial supremacy, the legalization of marijuana, and the basic function of education have a tenuous connection to politics. I’d prefer to call the test The Cultural Compass. Also, I’m uneasy with an axis labeled Authoitarian-Libertarian. To my mind, libertarianism is a dogma. I’d name this axis Dogmatic-Permissive. (If we lived in a pure libertarian society, we would quickly sort ourselves out into Givers and Takers. The Takers would become oligarchs and use their power to keep economic regulation nonexistent. In America, we are not far from that point now.)

I have another reason for wanting a cultural differentiation test. Presumably, it could not only quantify the cultural distance between countries, but also the distance between subcultures within a country. Every American knows there is a cultural chasm between Blue America and Red America, but we can only wonder at its breadth and depth. I think it’s enormous — as huge as the chasm between Blue America and, say, Hungary or Turkey. I’m convinced of it, and I hope these bits of data will convince you:

• There are more guns than people in America. [CHECK]
• 3% of American adults own 50% of the guns. [CHECK]
• All 50 states allow the concealed carrying of handguns but differ on giving permits to nonresidents. [CHECK]
• 31 states allow the open carrying of handguns without a permit or license. 44 states allow the open carrying of long guns, although 3 of these states require the long guns to be unloaded. [CHECK]
• The #1 killer of American children and teens isn’t car accidents or disease; it’s gunshot wounds. [CHECK]
• Over 95% of American K-12 schools conduct active shooter drills. [CHECK]
• 61% of Trump voters agree that “a group of people in this country are trying to replace native-born Americans with immigrants and people of color who share their political views.” [CHECK]
• In 2020, 55% of all the perpetrators of hate crimes in America were white. [CHECK]
• The number of teenage reports of hate speech on American social media doubled between 2018 and 2020. [CHECK]
• More than 40% of Americans do not believe Biden’s 2020 victory was legitimate. [CHECK]
• Last year, 24 new laws were passed in 14 states that allow state legislatures to interfere in the outcome of elections. [CHECK]
• 46% of Americans think a future civil war is likely. [CHECK]
• More than 50% of Americans see right-wing militia groups as a threat to the U.S.; a third say they pose an “immediate and serious threat.” [CHECK]
• 13 states have abortion “trigger laws.” These are laws that ban abortion if the Supreme Court overturns the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. [CHECK]
• 30% of white Americans believe nothing about racial inequality should be taught in public schools. [CHECK]
• In the past 9 months, nearly 1,586 books have been banned in school libraries, up from 483 in 2018. 41% of these feature characters who are people of color. 33% have LGBTQ themes, protagonists, or strong secondary characters. [CHECK]
• 34% of Americans are “not worried” about global warming. 30% say natural change, not human activity, is causing global warming. [CHECK]

This isn’t tongue-clucking data. It’s goosebumps data. It’s data that should call forth fear and rage. But those emotions are never on display from our leading Democrats. When Biden really gets up a head of steam, all you hear is the indignant yapping of a puppy. We desperately need leaders who talk like Chris Murphy. Such people are our real leaders, and we need to arm them with data that cries out like a siren and shakes us awake from our tepid discomfort.