Babak Bagheri

Are experiments the only way to navigate the bootstrap process? Are there no rational shortcuts? The answer, as usual, is “yes, but.” The alternate or complementary approach is what I call “social imagination:” the ability to imagine the effect an enterprising act will have on a group. This is really an exercise in imagination, not calculation. We don’t have any formulas to compute what the effect of any act will be on a complex social environment. But we humans seem to be endowed with brains that can imagine various social outcomes in uncanny ways.

Adult-Born Neurons (Veronica Piatti et. al.)

Recently, there have been a number of publications and discussions about these human abilities. They all point out that our social imagination is related to the constituents of our brains and how they are wired, or, more accurately, continuously rewired.

Social imagination seems to be built into us in ways that we’re just beginning to understand. A very dramatic example of these abilities is attributed to the “mirror neuron system” of the brain. The system, discovered by accident in an Italian laboratory, allows us to copy the brain state of another person by mere observation.

Apparently, our abilities go beyond mirroring: we can play out scenarios of what people will think. There are, most likely, severe limitations here. I don’t believe we have social crystal balls built into our brains. It’s also most likely that people differ a great deal in their capacity for social imagination like they differ in every other capability.

To complement actual experiments, then, we’re well advised to carry out “thought experiments” to see what the possible outcomes may be. These imaginative musings should be guides for framing the actual experiments and hopefully they will increase the probability of success. As with all other mental abilities, social imagination will improve with practice; so the more we do this the better we’ll be. Hence the value of experience.