Ranking: The Unwritten Rules of the Social Game We All Play

by Péter Érdi

Human beings are competitive. We want to know who is the strongest, who is the richest, and who is the cleverest of all. Some situations, like ranking people based on height, can be ranked in objective ways. However, many "Top Ten" lists are based on subjective categorization and give only the illusion of objectivity. In fact, we don't always want to be seen objectively since we don't mind having a better image or rank than deserved. The Unwritten Rules of the Social Game We All Play applies scientific theories to everyday experience by raising and answering questions Are college ranking lists objective? How do we rank and rate countries based on their fragility, level of corruption, or even happiness? How do we find the most relevant web pages? How are employees ranked?

This book is for people who have a neighbor with a fancier car; employees, who are being ranked by their supervisors; managers, who are involved in ranking but may have qualms about the process; businesspeople interested in creating better visibility for their companies; scientists, writers, artists, and other competitors who would like to see themselves at the top of a success list; or college students who are just preparing to enter a new phase of social competition. Readers will engage in an intellectual adventure to better understand the difficulties of navigating between objectivity and subjectivity and to better identify and modify their place in real and virtual communities by combining human and computational intelligence.

Translation editions available in German, Korean, Japanese, Complex Chinese, and Simplified Chinese.

264 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2019

Reviews

[Mihály Szabó · Rating 3 out of 5]

Alapból érdekesebbnek gondoltam a témát, mint amennyire végül megfogott. Akadtak a könyvben emlékezetes részek (pl. a párválasztás matematikai egyenlete: akkor lesz a legnagyobb valószínűsége, hogy megtaláljuk életünk párját, ha a lehetséges jelöltek 37 százalékával randevúzunk, majd szakítunk velük, de ha jön valaki, aki kicsit is jobb, mint az eddigiek - "Elég Jó úr/kisasszony" -, azt viszont ki kell választani), illetve érdekesebb kérdések (rasszista-e az Oscar?, a művészek rangsorolása, a korrupció mérése), más, hosszan kifejtett témák viszont éppenséggel hidegen hagytak (pl. a hitelintézetek rangsorai), megint másokról szívesen olvastam volna bővebben (választási rendszerek).
Maga a kiadás szép, igényes, jó kézbe fogni a kötetet. A belbecsre sem lehet sok panasz, néhány apróságot felett szemet hunyva (pl. DNS helyett DNA maradt a szövegben, tizedesvessző helyett pedig tizedespont) dicséretet érdemel a fordító és a szerkesztő is, a sokféle címfokozat tipográfiája viszont számomra nem volt eléggé átlátható (és annyira logikusnak sem éreztem a sokszoros szövegtagolást).
Külön érdekesség, hogy Érdi Péter angolból fordított művének szövegét több helyen megtöri: röviden kiegészíti, illetve kommentálja a leírtakat (szögletes zárójelben, kisebb betűmérettel, így jól megkülönböztethető az alapszövegtől).

[Daniel Mok · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book highlighted our tendencies referencing ranking list in making our decision. In many cases, ranking exercise may depend on a number of factors with different priorities or weighting. To make an object formula to get a numerical ranking is a difficult job and there are many ways the ranking could be manipulated. In many cases, the ranking may depends on others making the exercise heavily affected by social network described in Connected (book). In fact, higher education is one of the sector with many detail rules in ranking which also created issues in alienating them from its mission (education, see Higher Education-How Colleges Are Wasting Our Money and Failing Our Kids---And What We Can Do about It. The author is not complaining, but just to remind us how to understand the ranking published by different organizations.

[Britta · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wieder mal einiges gelernt. #sachbuchliebe
Auch wenn mir ein paar zu viele Generalisierungen hier drin sind, ist ea doch ein guter Augenöffner und Start in die Thematik.

[Jean-Simon Fortin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Book on social hierarchy. Not that many things were knew to someone who reads widely on the topic.

[C. · Rating 1 out of 5]

有點抱歉給了這麼驚人的低分。
堅持到12%，我讀不下去了Q__Q

[Yeju · Rating 2 out of 5]

Learned tons but probably not the most enjoyable (?) read

[Giulio G. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book has a very wide description of facts (ie. psychological facts) around contemporary issues on impact of HCI and Big Data on those social processes involving sorting lists of things (rankings). I will recommend it if you have a curiosity toward these social processes.
It will blend classical theories from different scientific fields (economics, biology...) without providing a unified, overimposed vision. Some of the anectodes in the book are witty and generally is a very relaxing reading for undergraduates or casual readers. The final message will be something very sound and stoic: "Rankings are a mix of objective truth and subjective views. Let's make a good use of them, but don't go made because of them."