{"id":163904,"date":"2025-09-27T20:09:51","date_gmt":"2025-09-28T04:09:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=163904"},"modified":"2025-09-27T16:11:20","modified_gmt":"2025-09-28T00:11:20","slug":"winning-the-opinion-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=163904","title":{"rendered":"Winning The Opinion Game"},"content":{"rendered":"

David Pinsof writes<\/a>: We\u2019re a judgy species. We\u2019re constantly judging each other for every little thing we do. And we deny that we\u2019re doing this, because one of the things we get judged for, ironically, is being judgy.<\/p>\n

And we deny that we\u2019re trying to impress our judgy peers, because trying to impress them makes us look insecure and performative.<\/p>\n

So we judge each other for being judgy, and we desperately try to make each other think that we don\u2019t care what they think. It\u2019s all very confusing.<\/p>\n

This raises the question: how do we judge people? What do we judge them on? The answer is: preferences. We mostly judge people on what they like and dislike….<\/p>\n

We all know, deep down, that when people give us their opinion, they\u2019re trying to be better than us. We can feel it. But we cannot call them out on this, because then they\u2019ll get offended, and we\u2019ll look mean\u2014like we\u2019re trying to look better than them. So we\u2019re stuck nodding our heads and pretending not to be annoyed.<\/p>\n

How do we do it? How do we win the opinion game and transform our preferences into social norms? Well, one way is just by having lots of status. People sycophantically agree with whatever high-status people say, so our social norms\u2014our shared opinions\u2014will bend toward the interests of high-status people.<\/p>\n

Another way is to have cultural power\u2014to have a big platform where people listen to you. If you get to shout your opinions on a megaphone to a massive audience, then you\u2019re going to have a big advantage in the opinion game. So norms bend toward the interests of the culturally powerful.<\/p>\n

Another way to win the opinion game is, to be a bit more optimistic, by having genuinely good arguments about why your preferences are better than other people\u2019s preferences. Those arguments will involve externalizing your preferences\u2014that is, framing them as reactions to objective features of the world. The reason you like the stuff you do is because it is objectively good for you, or good for everyone. The reason you see things from your perspective is because it is objectively accurate or insightful. These are the sorts of arguments we make when we play the opinion game.<\/p>\n

Of course, these arguments are mostly bullshit, because we mostly don\u2019t care about useful truth or what\u2019s good for the world. We just pretend to care about these things to win the opinion game. \u201cI like the things I do because they\u2019re good for everyone. I see the world the way I do because it\u2019s useful and true.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

David Pinsof writes: We\u2019re a judgy species. We\u2019re constantly judging each other for every little thing we do. And we deny that we\u2019re doing this, because one of the things we get judged for, ironically, is being judgy. And we … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[42994],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-163904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pundits"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t