Talk:Consensus

One can make an analogy in mathematical terms by envisioning the distribution of opinions in a population as a Gaussian curve. We would then say that the consensus would be a statement that represents the range of opinions within perhaps three standard deviations of the mean opinion.

It's now balanced with a criticism of applying formal methods, and other possible definitions are included. These are discussed more exactly in the consensus decision making article.

The paragraph that follows seems much more useful. Are there any political theorists out there who can clarify the issues? It seems to me that this is an issue that Locke, Rousseau, de Toqueville, and others must have debated... SR

yes, but their opinions would be more appropriate to cite in an article on consensus democracy, which is, consensus decision making applied to government. This article should remain as narrow as possible. I am wondering whether consensus action[?] should get its own article, too.

• The analogy is indeed awkward - I recognize this; put it down to the result of too much recent thinking about probability distributions. It is, however, a somewhat difficult concept to express. Consensus appears to be a range of opinions, mixed, boiled down, and all the contriversial parts subtracted until all that remains is the common ground. I am, as you can tell from that equally clumsy analogy, at something of a loss for how to express this properly. I hope that someone will replace that excerpted analogy with a better explanation. -- April

on the meta site there are many discussions of consensus, most in some specific context of the wiki itself, but there seems to be no agreement there either.

On the French Wikipedia, there's a slightly better article and did you know that Consensu means unanimous ?

that probably suggests a problem with french politics. ;-) In English there are two different words, and that's for very good reason.

It may be time to refactor. Suggest as follows:

*consensus as it is, only, more focused on formal and mathematical statements, linking to more formal issues like artificial intelligence. Clear statement to see other articles for specialized issues: *consensus decision making which is how collective intelligence is formed, and which involves questions of non-formal statements, partial commitment, changing of minds, etc. More or less as it is. *consensus democracy, which is, consensus decision making applied to government, detailed discussion of Locke, Rousseau, de Toqueville, and others - relation to grassroots democracy, deliberative democracy, anticipatory democracy, semi-direct democracy and other models. Obviously this must focus on control of law and the military using the consensus methods. *consensus action[?] which is more related to non-violent resistance, anarchism, and "active creation" of truth by taking common action in concert. Many more issues since it does not rely on authority or even rules.