The Cost of Simplism

My favourite quote on simplism

Steven R. Covey said (and he probably got it from someone else) a brilliant quote, “I would not give a fig for the simplicity on this side of complexity; but I would give my right arm for the simplicity of the other side of complexity”.

It means we seek an understanding deep enough so that the essence or key principles are known and understood. In the absence of the grasp of these key principles, we can come up with simplistic or partial ‘solutions’ that do not cover all circumstances or contexts – and have unintended negative effects when applied.

Steven J Lawrence in 2024 came up with a fantastic quote which is a parallel to the above, and as applied to Social Philosophy.

“When we apply oversimplified theories to a complex reality in a totalizing way – we are hypnotizing ourselves into becoming further disembodied from the world as it actually is – which has often led to breathtakingly negative outcomes throughout world history (and this assertion requires no hyperlinks)”.

Never a truer word was spoken.

Understanding this helps us avoid one of the most catastrophic failures of the human mind – spiralling misattribution of cause-and-effect.

In the Cobra Effect, we get more of what we don’t want, because we set up a counter-productive incentive system.

More accurately, in this case, misattribution means assigning the wrong cause to the effect. Spiralling misattribution is downright dangerous, as we hold onto (or even further entrench) our belief despite the empirical evidence.

An example in social philosophy would be:

  1. A social justice movement (climate, demographics, income distribution etc) sees a disparity.
  2. It misattributes this disparity to unfair discrimination.
  3. It applies ‘equity’ policies to correct the discrimination (which in this case didn’t exist), and which may have counter-productive unintended consequences. The effect of the policy is to make things worse (eg socialist countries were found to have higher tax rates but more income inequality or manager/worker wage differences than capitalist ones).
  4. This creates unconscious resentment in the ‘non-equity’ group (there are a number of system ways in which this can happen), who then begin to unconsciously discriminate.
  5. And ‘voila’ – discrimination now exists. So we need a social justice movement to solve it, and the pattern repeats. Go back to item 1. !!
  6. The real danger is the incentive system set up in the minds of the ‘social justice elite’. The more they fail (or refuse) to see their error, the more money they make, as the demand for their services keeps increasing as the disparity increases and becomes more obvious. The counter-productive system spirals.

Performance coaches understand this – they know their job is to succeed for the client and in doing so make themselves redundant as the client becomes self-dependent. Not to make the client dependent on them. And by staying close to empirical evidence (is what we are doing working, and is the success or failure caused by what we are doing?), it keeps us honest; our attributions become more and more accurate; and we coaches become more and more effective.

So beware the ‘expert’ class. They can create and exacerbate the problems they purport to want to solve. It is in their interests to do so. Ultimately, systemically and unconsciously, they make you dependent on them.

Watch out for your own misattribution of causes of effects, and watch out for the self-hypnotised ‘experts’. In systems theory misattribution sets up terrible system problems. And in the social sciences, it’s human beings who suffer from the counter-productive policies.

Read again and remember Steven’s quote, “When we apply oversimplified theories to a complex reality in a totalizing way – we are hypnotizing ourselves into becoming further disembodied from the world as it actually is – which has often led to breathtakingly negative outcomes throughout world history (and this assertion requires no hyperlinks)”.

Go well, stay aware, and set up systems that work.

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