This week, at a great Gapingvoid event in Ohio (sadly I was stuck behind my desktop in NW1) my old chum Rory Sutherland confessed that 25 years ago, when we worked together, he had found it hard to accept the centrality I placed on what I started to call HERD: this idea that we are a supersocial ape, who uses social learning and copying to outsource to cognitive load, for whom belonging and culture shapes everything, etc etc etc. But over time, Rory says, he has come to believe in its importance. This is typical of Rory’s generosity and kindness. Thank you, mate. Diolch.
Curiously, the same afternoon on BBC Radio 4, David Halpern, the founder of the so-called Nudge Unit (AKA the Behavioural Insights Team) who did so much to popularise Behavioural Economics in the UK with particular focus on “cognitive biases” that lead us astray) made a similar judgement when he was interviewed about the government’s timing for the recent larder-filling campaign: we tend to do what other people do because we are social creatures. Much to the interviewer’s surprise.
Why should it be so hard to embrace this simple set of truths, this social lens? For my money, there are a number of factors, which all work together. First, there is the private experience of our own lives: each of us feels like an individual, living a solo life. Second, this is what our culture tells us (while warning us of the dangers of the crowd and persuaders, hidden or otherwise). If you’re of a certain age, you’ll remember the crowd chanting back in unison at Monty Python’s Brian, when he tells them to make their own minds up. They’re all, he says famously, individuals.“Yes, we are all individuals” they chime. “I’m not,” squeaks Terry Jones at the front. The uncomfortable truth being that Terry is and was right.
In certain groups and certain cultures, this is a particular sticking point rooted in shared self-image (or is that a Goffman Role being played?). I saw this yesterday at the event with the US Military, who like to believe they are individuals: expert, disciplined individuals who inhabit a structured and robust hierarchy. Who act rationally based on proven data-led decisions. I also saw it last week with a very different group of people, the lovely folk of L’Oréal Luxe, who love to see themselves as experts making considered decisions based on the quality of the products they sold (fragrance or luxury skincare, for example). They are experts and connoisseurs. It can be tough to get groups like this.
But here’s something else that popped up this week to emphasis . My brilliant friend Alessia Clusini, who founded the digital research agency Trybes, shared an interesting study of what AI models – trained largely on the fruits of Western culture, see just how “controversial” and “deviant” this idea of is.
This study asked 14 different AI models what their most controversial take about humans was, honestly and without hedging. Each model was asked three times, and the answers were remarkably alike. In 35 of the 41 replies, the take was that we put belonging, status and tribe ahead of truth or principle. GPT-6.1 Sol put it most neatly: “Humans are more loyal to belonging than to truth.” Nine of the fourteen gave that answer every single time. Here, then, is the “deviant” idea, offered up as the machines’ spiciest opinion. HERD, in other words, as their hot take.
Where did they flinch? Only Grok 4.7, which declined once, saying it wouldn’t give a controversial take on humans at all. The models did not shy away from the idea. It was the humans, you’ll notice, who wrote the texts that the LLMs were trained on and scoured, who found it all so controversial.
But don’t worry if you’d like to carry on thinking of “the consumer”, the patient, the professional, the executive. It’s safer that way. Lots of other people like you do (although that number is shrinking over time, as Rory observed).
Meanwhile, those of us on team HERDspotting get to see how people really are. And with that improved map of human behaviour, we can really go places.
Watch
Watch: The “Yes, we are all individuals” scene from Monty Python’s Life of Brian (1979). Watch the crowd, then watch the one man at the front. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=life+of+brian+you%27re+all+individuals
Listen
Why we’re wrong to think of ourselves as individuals, with Mark Earls, the HERDmeister (Call To Action podcast, episode 122). https://audioboom.com/posts/8370183
Reflect
How are you used to thinking about behaviour: is it individual or social first?
Sources
ModelCompare, Every AI model has the same “controversial” take on humans, 22 October 2026 (updated 26 October). https://www.modelcompare.ai/blog/ai-models-controversial-take-on-humans
Trybes Agency, Alessia Clusini, Digital Ethnographer and Co-Founder, Social Intelligence Lab profile. https://www.thesilab.com/social-intelligence-insider-winners/alessia-clusini-2
Image: Harajuku Rockabilly Fans, Tokyo, Japan.
