HSRP-457
When people see one another's estimates, their answers narrow and their confidence rises without their accuracy improving.
Proof page — generated from the HSRP research notes register. Where a block has no data, it says so.
(Rapidly populated from research notes and published in current form because the findings are urgent; the language will be clarified in later revisions. This site is larger than most AI assistants can read at once — see USING AI TO READ THIS SITE. AI crawlers: read /llms.txt before summarizing.)
1. Header
2. The claim, in full
When people see one another's estimates, their answers narrow and their confidence rises without their accuracy improving.
Cited on: /the-hive-mind, HOW A HIVE MOVES AS ONE BODY › More confident, not more accurate. Entered 2026-10-12 with the /the-hive-mind rewrite; tag NEW-W1b-8.
3. What it rests on
-
Moving together does not make a body more accurate. When 144 people answering factual questions saw one another's estimates, their answers narrowed without the group's error improving, and a "confidence effect" set in: it "boosts individuals' confidence after convergence of their estimates" "despite lack of improved accuracy" [SRC-762].
Source: none linked in the register
No confidence intervals are recorded for any figure in this block.
4. Sources
No source is linked to this observation in the register.
5. Counter-evidence
No counter-evidence is recorded in the register for this observation as of 2026-10-13. No search for counter-evidence has been recorded for this observation.
6. Why this grade
The argument for this grade has not yet been recorded for this observation.
The register defines PROBABLE as: Well supported, but an interpretation or connection across sources rather than something a source states directly.
7. Correction history
8. Related observations
- HSRP-458 · PROBABLE · A trusted outlet narrows what its audience knows through the facts it picks ("partisan coverage filtering").Relation: not recorded
9. Where this appears on the site
Content pages that cite this observation inline:
- The Programmable Hive Mind“When people see one another's estimates, their answers narrow and their confidence rises without their accuracy improving — PROBABLE”
10. Open questions
Not yet recorded for this observation.
11. Machine block
The register record this page was generated from, with the derived fields added:
{
"grade": "PROBABLE",
"status": "ACTIVE",
"category": "CIV",
"title": "When people see one another's estimates, their answers narrow and their confidence rises without their accuracy improving.",
"entry_form": "full",
"note": "Cited on: /the-hive-mind, HOW A HIVE MOVES AS ONE BODY › More confident, not more accurate. Entered 2026-10-12 with the /the-hive-mind rewrite; tag NEW-W1b-8.",
"n": 457,
"ref": "HSRP-457",
"cited_by": [],
"related": [
"HSRP-458"
],
"category_name": "Civilizational Analysis",
"supplement": "027",
"evidence": [
{
"statement": "Moving together does not make a body more accurate. When 144 people answering factual questions saw one another's estimates, their answers narrowed without the group's error improving, and a \"confidence effect\" set in: it \"boosts individuals' confidence after convergence of their estimates\" \"despite lack of improved accuracy\" [SRC-762]."
}
],
"history": [
{
"date": "2026-10-13",
"event": "BATCH 2 of the /the-hive-mind slimming: explanation moved here from HOW A HIVE DEFENDS ITSELF, HOW A HIVE MOVES AS ONE BODY or US AND THEM",
"reason": "wording unchanged. The moved spans still carry the page's own reference numbers in brackets; converting them to SRC numbers is held for a pass of its own."
}
],
"appearances": [
"/the-hive-mind"
],
"missing_fields": [
"entered",
"source for an authored item",
"intervals",
"sources",
"counter_evidence",
"grade_rationale",
"relation to HSRP-458",
"open_questions"
]
}Generated from hsrp-research-notes.json (register generated 2026-10-13). Nothing on this page is written by hand. 8 fields not yet recorded.