How many jellybeans? 
David Runciman
- Profiles, Probabilities and Stereotypes by Frederick Schauer
- The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the Many are Smarter than the Few by James Surowiecki
Most of us, most of the time, are deeply prejudiced in favour of individual over collective judgments. This is hardly surprising, since we are all biased. First, we are biased in favour of our own opinions, which we tend to prefer to those of anyone else. Second, we are biased in favour of individuals generally, because we are all individuals ourselves, and so are broadly sympathetic to the individual point of view. We like to think of people exercising their personal judgment, and not just blindly following the rules. For example, who wouldn’t prefer, when appearing before a judge, to learn that the judge was willing to hear each case on its merits, and exercise some discretion if necessary? General rules, we think, are likely to be discriminatory, because they cannot take account of special circumstances. Individuals, by contrast, can use their own judgment, and make exceptions.
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David Runciman teaches politics at Cambridge. He is the author of Political Hypocrisy and co-author of Representation, published by Polity Press.
Other articles by this contributor:
Why Not Eat an Eclair? · Why Vote?
Invented Communities · post-nationalism
Liars, Hypocrites and Crybabies · Blair v. Brown
The Cattle-Prod Election · The Point of the Polls
The Garden, the Park and the Meadow · After the Nation State
Cricket’s Superpowers · Beyond the Ashes
Tax Breaks for Rich Murderers · Bush and the ‘Death Tax’
Oh, the curse! · David Runciman hits a home run
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