Essay 28. On Simple Reasons

Events in complex systems have simple  reasons

I half-seriously formulated it at the age of around thirty, listening to long confessions about relationships gone wrong. Watching myself from the inside, I saw that my personal problems seemed to involve a lot of factors. Nevertheless, they all somehow funneled down to a single simple reason that was difficult to acknowledge because of shame or guilt.
 
We commonly present a lot of reasons, trying to ease the internal pressure of cognitive dissonance (Essay 8). If there are so many circumstances against us, our weakness seems justified. This is an example of a simple reason.

With time, I came to conclusion that social life and politics had the same simplicity of  deep reasons. This view has a simple reason of its own: an abundance of reasons could paralyze a complex system.

        Of course, my questions may not be supported by facts, while the answers could be plain wrong.

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August 31, 2005.

        43.  Pope John Paul II was a modern man, highly educated, intelligent, and well  familiar with the unstoppable pace of history. Why did he so stubbornly resist any liberalism in birth control?

Simple reasons are always deep and hidden. Exactly  because of the reasons listed above he understood well that with the unstoppable pace of global history the Christians, and the Western Civilization with them, have the worst chances to survive unless there is a drive to multiply. Things and goods eat children. Things and goods have no faith. But children may have it. So, we have to start with children.   


        44. What is the simple reason behind the European Union?

EU means a discovery of America in Europe.

Modern capitalist country can be rich if there is a reservoir of poverty that maintains the gradient between rich and poor. This gradient has been supplied by the immigrants from former colonies. At some point the leaders of Europe realized that sooner or later the infertile Western Civilization would be absorbed or at least eroded by the influx. As the Communism had fallen, the gold mine of the East European poverty, which is Christian, White, and therefore Western, suddenly came to the surface, wide open for the continental drive to the East.


      45. Why are people rarely honest about simple reasons?

Money does not smell. Simple reasons do.

      47. Why did the USSR fall? 

Because designed for isolation from the world, it slightly opened borders to goods,  people, and ideas, in other words, to globalization.

A big misconception about globalization is to ignore that national constitutions and laws have no global power. The strongest wins. Globalization is indeed a global gamble. The most  likely political outcome is  the competition between the democratic camp and the strongest ever authoritarian camp, with an axis  China-Russia-AIC, where AIC stands for Authoritarian Islamic Countries. 
  

     48. Why could globalization be a threat to America?

Because the Declaration of Independence and the Declaration of Dependence (i.e., globalization, outsourcing, reliance on external energy and talents) do not seem to walk hand in hand.


     49. Why hydrogen as source of energy is a hoax?

Because before hydrogen can be combined with oxygen (i.e., burned), releasing energy--about 3.75 times more than the same weight of gasoline--it must be obtained by splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen, which requires exactly the same energy.   Where  would it come?  Hydrogen is an environmentally friendly, although even more lawyer-friendly, "form of energy," in the same sense as gasoline, but water is not a source of energy.  There is no free hydrogen on earth.

NOTE: It has been known for 150 years that coal and water can be converted into a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen ("town gas").

    50.  Why are so many countries ahead of America in public education?

Because  education there is part of culture. Culture is part of national identity. National identity is something one cannot sell.

In America, culture is part of business. Entertainment is part of culture. Education becomes part of entertainment. Entertainment is part of culture. Culture is part of business. And so on.


    51. Why is it difficult to restore education in America? 

There is no single simple reason, but there is a simple reason for the absence of a simple reason.

American history is radically different from the history of most developed countries because it was shaped by the  phenomenon of  open frontier.  When you are on the move to a new life, culture is a means, not the end. 


    52. Why can a country of, say, 300 million lose a war against a country of 30 million?

This is simple: if the war is accompanied by a Cold Civil War, the 300 millions are fighting another 330 millions. This levels the playground.

    53. Why is freedom of religion unlike any other freedom?

Because faith is sacred. With all your freedom of speech, you cannot argue with faith.


    54. Why is America in the state of a Cold Civil War? 


Because the entire historical situation in the world, together with America's place in it, is changing. Big historical change runs always in an unknown and unexpected direction. The Great Cold Civil War is the evidence of the ambiguity of the data and the lack of consensus in their interpretations.  It is like a debate before a great scientific discovery, minus the civility of science, plus the choice of only two colors for uniforms.
  
     55. But why is the Cold Civil War still cold?

Nothing unites people as much as human nature and nothing separates them as much. Well, humans have not only minds, but bodies, too. One cannot put either the Bible or the multiplication table on the dinner plate. The stomach calls for evading extremes, expanding the customer base, and getting along with others. What naturally eases the tension is the spatial segregation: North and South, East and West, City and Suburbs, Red and Blue.  Unfortunately, the longer the borders, the more surface tension (see Simple Reason 6).

    56. As it has been often noted, the conservatives and religious right are usually well organized and vigorous while the liberals seem sloppy and careless. Why?

Liberals are rationalists who believe, not always rationally, in reason, logic, and proof. They think that the benefits of personal freedom are as self-obvious as 2 ×2 = 4. You cannot fight for the truth of arithmetic because it is the universally acknowledged truth. On the other side, people quite irrationally worship different religions and ideologies, none of them ever proven to be better than the other. To convince somebody  in an idea beyond proof needs some motivation, training, organization, eloquence, and a good deal of reason. Money, too.


    57. Why are people unable to draw lessons from history?

   
Those who could seriously warn others are actually already dead . Those who had survived could draw only a lesson of optimism.

    58. Why  are we insatiable consumers?

Because the more we have, the more we have not. For example, if we have a car, we don't have a better car.  However, if we have a car and a boat, we don't have a better car and a better boat.  

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September 10, 2005

    59.  Why is America so careless?

The terrorists are not stopped before 9-11, the soldiers in Iraq are not protected in their vehicles,  space shuttle Columbia is a victim of neglect, New Orleans is not prepared against the flood, etc. Why?

This is an eternal question well beyond American experience. Why do people make costly, stupid, tragic, but predictable and avoidable mistakes?  To answer this question, let us assume that people do not make such mistakes. Could there be any simple reason for that? Obviously, not, which answers the question.  Something always goes wrong in a complex system. But see Simple Reason 71.

    60. But why all that falls on a single presidency?

Probably, the president  is too simple for the complex system.

   
    61. Why is our world so complicated?

Why, indeed? Each  elementary act of our life is simple: make a choice between two alternatives. The complexity comes only from the number of binary choices, which leads to a staggering number of combinations.

The presidential election is comfortably minimalist, like the choice of soup or salad.  Most people stick to their habits, unless somebody persuades them that one is better than the other. 

    62. Why should we watch out for simple people in the government?

Beware of simple people: they have only one goal. Most probably, it is different from yours, while a complex person may have a common ground with you as well as with your neighbor. 

    63. Why then do we elect a simple person to lead a complex system?

This is natural if we don't like our neighbor.


    64. Whatever history will say about George W. Bush, he has exacerbated the antagonism between parts of American society along many lines. There are plenty of reasons, but what is the simplest?

President's priorities have been to serve the team of people who ensured his election first, his party second, and the people third. To put it differently, the reason is the centrifugal order of priorities: from himself to the periphery. Great leaders do it the other way around, so that they have to unite the periphery first. 

   
    65. Why do we cherish democracy so much if it does not prevent large scale blunders?

In democracy you can blame only yourself. If so, the burden of guilt per person is really tiny as compared with the scale of a tragedy.   


    66. Why is equality impossible? 

All have the same value, therefore I have the same value. But it does not mean that you have the same value as I.

    67. Why is the US Supreme Court  so often split if the US Constitution is remarkably concise and clear?

Because the US Constitution is a result of an intelligent design, while the real life is result of evolution.


    68. Why do we need to know "why?"

Power comes from knowledge but knowledge comes from curiosity.

  
    69. What is the simplest reason behind the resurgence of militant religious orthodoxy in various parts of the world?

A chronic dissatisfaction with the government. God as commander-in-chief could not fail.

   
   70.  Why is there no link between money and culture?

We believe in the absolute power of money, which can bring people to the moon, win a war, feed the hungry, solve a problem, and elect a president. We are blessed with the singularity and transparency of money. Money is the simplest reason of all. All currencies are mutually convertible.  The most irrational thing in modern society is not to be tempted by money.

Culture by definition is irrational, like the deer's antlers and peacock's tail. This is why we are blessed with the diversity of the world.  But this is why there is no link between money and culture, unless by culture we mean the culture of money. 

   

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    September 23, 2005

    71. The world becomes more complex, but our knowledge grows and people are still assigned to manage limited projects. Why do people in charge so often lose imagination and fail as result?

Because  people who are in charge today have been living all their lives in the age of TV, the supreme killer of imagination. No wonder, both Bill Clinton and George W. Bush have demonstrated the loss of imagination on catastrophic scale.  See also Simple Reason 59.


    72. If  individualism is an essential part of American mentality, why is religious, social, and racial identity, i.e., belonging to a larger crowd, is equally important?

The question should be reversed: why do we believe in individualism if collectivism is the most ancient human attribute?

Because individualism is a myth. Myth always contradicts reality, but it is fit to be believable.

    73. Why is the phenomenon of open frontier so crucial for American history?

Because it made the myth of individualism a temporary reality.


    74. Why is the concept of a single superpower senseless?

Because the power must be proved in the contest with the equal in the same category.

    75. Why is America so anti-intellectual?

(Is it? It is more fair to ask why it seems anti-intellectual to the intellectuals. Anyway, the intellectuals have restated the question in affirmative numerous times.)

Because ideas cannot be taxed. This question leads to one of the most fascinating contradictions in the modern psyche. While few things are as repulsive for us as tax, anything that cannot be taxed is regarded worthless.


    76. Why has the war with Iraq failed the expectations of its initiators?

The simplest reason of all is incompetence. Unless you are Noah, you cannot be required competence regarding unique catastrophic events, like flood in a big city, but guerilla insurgents have been fighting regular armies throughout the entire human history, so that there is no excuse. Paradoxically,  there could be an excuse for the final failure: it happens all the time.

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    November 28, 2005

     77. In America, financial achievements are typically glorified and revered more than intellectual ones. Why?

Brains are from God, but  you have to earn money on your own. You cannot  lose your intellectual achievement, but you can lose your money.

     78. Why is the two-party system  flawed?

Because as "there is only one step from the sublime to the ridiculous" (Napoleon) , there is only one step from the two-party  to the one-party system. Fortunately, we are watching a misstep.
    

       79. Why is religion successful in operating large masses of people?

Because it possesses a powerful authoritarian means of control: supervision of open rituals. On the contrary,  in a democracy the only mass secular ritual of voting is secret and cannot be easily controlled.    

     80. Why would some people stubbornly deny a failure?

It makes sense. When you have lost so much, some resilience will be a gain.


    81. For some leaders the loyalty of their inner circle is of a crucial importance. What could be the reason?

    They have something to hide.

  82. Why do we as a nation need strong and invincible enemies?

    Because if an enemy is defeated, its features are kosher to borrow.


July 24, 2006


  83. Why has Israel no chance to survive against the militant Islam?
       

  84. Why has Israel decent chances to survive against the militant Islam?

 Because of the very nature of history: historical event is the one you do not expect.           

85. Why is America in no danger of undermining the Constitution and transforming itself into an authoritarian society?

Because of the great distance between American democracy  and authoritarian  rule.  The Constitution was designed to make such jump impossible.

86 . Why is America in danger of undermining the Constitution and transforming itself into an authoritarian society?

Because any great distance can be passed in a sequence of small easy steps.

See APPENDIX 4

APPENDIX

1. My theory belongs to a whole category of similar (but not identical) principles, the founder of which was William of Occam (or Ockham), who lived in the 14th century. His position became known as Ockham Razor:

            Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily

There is also Hanlon's Razor :

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity

I have to mention also theory of simple reasons in Artificial Intelligence, but I do not know what it is.

A simple reason does not leave any further "why."

3.  After picking Reason No.10, I got a feeling that I had read something obliquely relevant. And I found it:

There are high welfare categories as well as low ones. Some professors work hard, said the Dean. Most of them do. But a professor when he gets tenure doesn't have to do anything. A tenured professor and a welfare mother with eight kids have much in common....
                                           Saul Bellow, The Deans December, 1982,  Chapter 18.