Warp wrote:

>   I have always wondered why humanity likes extremes so much.

I guess because seeing the world in black and white is easier than 
reasoning about shades of grey? It's the only reason I can think of...

>   Another common problem seems to be that people always need someone
> to hate, someone to blame, someone to be accused of all the problems.

I read somewhere that a scientific study showed that amoung American 
social groups, there was a need for a "deviant". I forget the exact 
experiment, but they found that no matter which way they put a bunch of 
kids into social groups, eventually one or maybe some small number of 
the kids would be singled out as "the deviant", and thereafter harrassed 
and bullied. Change the social groups and the person who's the deviant 
changes, but there still *is* a deviant.

The study was done in America. I forget where I read all this, but the 
study made subtle hints that similar results were not found in 
non-Western societies.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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