Ally Pally's Victorian Theatre Reborn: See the Future

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on May 15, 2013 at 22:42

In this context, Thérèse, I'm using "Echo Chamber" in the sense I've frequently quoted it on this website. Following-up the ideas of the U.S. lawyer and author Cass Sunstein. And to some extent Clay Shirky, another writer who has strongly challenged Sunstein's views. Though many other researchers and authors have explored the question of how typical group psychological processes are accentuated by the internet - social media in particular.

Plainly, in a real echo chamber you hear your own voice multiplied and amplified. The writers I mention suggest a tendency online for like-minded people to select-into the views of others who agree with them. Which validates one set of beliefs and views.

The same processes can be at work face-to-face, of course. Or when people only read certain newspapers; or select particular radio or TV stations.

Nor is this perhaps so different from other settings. For example in phrases like "the Westminster Village" or Westminster Bubble" - meaning the shared insider values of Members of Parliament. (Compared to the lives of most ordinary electors.) And perhaps it's similar to what happens inside a religious group - especially a sect. And in political parties. (Especially the small sect-like ones.)  One difference though is that inside a small religious sect or tiny party people are usually aware that their ideas and belief systems are restricted and defended.

Online, the process often seems to be amplified. An online "community" may read other people's opinions which echo their own and so appear to validate their own. (How many "Likes" does someone collect?)

There can also be an illusion that people posting represent a far wider range of opinions than is the case. And that you're engaged in genuine debate. So you'll find people keen to deny they are part of any groupthink. 

As well as an interest in these ideas, and the implications for democratic decision-making, I also hope to understand how we might arrange processes which encourage people to be genuinely curious and open-minded. Partly this comes from a concern for evidence. On a particular topic, I may be right, partly right or quite wrong. I'd like to know.

In any case it's important and fascinating to listen and learn about other people's experience and how they see and feel and understand things. So I am attracted and delighted by those writers and artists and thinkers - and often just people - who have a warmth and curiosity and relish to understand how different others see and feel. And to share that.

People in echo chambers seem to lack this curiosity. They seem defensive and refuse to consider alternative views. Experiment disturbs their certainties. As do books and plays, websites, ideas and even evidence which challenges their own views. It must be ignored or dismissed. The favourite phrase of a character in a Dennis Potter play was "Am I right or am I right?

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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on May 16, 2013 at 9:04

Bonjour Alain!

This is one of your finest distraction pieces yet!

Are you right or are you right?

Yes you are right: we're just going to have to agree to disagree about AP. For you, the notion that AP is unsavable, malheureusement, is an idée fixe.

Call me old fashioned, but I reckon this massive HFL endorsement is the best news for Haringey in living memory and may this message echo through our Borough!

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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on May 16, 2013 at 17:30

If I can briefly return to Hugh's original excellent choice of subject (the wonderful future ahead for AP), today's Ham and High Broadway has a good account on pages six and seven. The story on page six is about the character of a future hotel: should it be a three star ... or a five star job?

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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on May 16, 2013 at 21:38

Thérèse, my old Mac seems to have recovered its powers of extracting PDFs from the pages of the H&H: you might be interested in the attached file which contains the articles I referred to this morning (sorry for attempting to drag away the discussion from echo chambers; I know AP doesn't interest everyone!).

Cinq étoiles Cartier

Attachments:

• 2013-05-16 Ham and High AP Hotel & AP150.pdf, 1.7 MB

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on May 16, 2013 at 18:48

Thanks for the compliment, Thérèse. Even if long ago I stopped thinking, let alone worrying about getting my stuff marked.

I think I recognise your description of when: "everybody is throwing everything in and then fending left, right and centre, with an audacity that they probably would not have used if they were face to face".  It seems like another topic which Clay Shirky has written about - online bad manners and sometimes sheer boorishness.

Pascal's wager is all very well if we're betting on the existence of God. And for some people a belief in Ally Pally eventually making a profit - or at least breaking even - does seem to be a matter of devout faith.

But perhaps less theologically we are dealing with Mr Micawber. A decent chap who tries to do the decent thing by himself, his family, and for "England, Home and Beauty". Living in the unwise expectation that: "something will turn up".

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