Math is a Harsh Mistress (When it Comes to Voting)

Image from Harvard Political Review
[Link]

I know voting is a civic duty. Many people died to give you a vote and a say. Many nations in the world would give much to be able to vote. Please vote in the presidential election for those reasons. But to those of you who are getting so wrapped up in this race that flames are coming out of your nostrils , I have some information I'd like to share with you.  You might want to sit down first.

I want you to look at the amount of people following you on Twitter. Or Facebook. Or all the people you know at work.  Or at school.  Got them all counted?  Good. Now I want you to understand something.

Even if you got ALL the people above to vote one way or the other in a national presidential election your efforts would be statistically insignificant. Your efforts would not sway the election one way or the other.  This isn't my opinion.  It is math.

Now if you are a political volunteer who has done extensive foot or phone canvasing for the last six months or so you may, if a huge percentage of the people you came in contact with changed their vote due to your efforts, have a statistical impact in a tight race due to our electoral system.  But to be honest the chances of that scenario happening are statistically remote (what is the political "conversion rate these days?") Regardless doing political activism outside of just voting in the presidential election is actually one of the points I'm heavily advocating here. If you want to have an impact on politics at the national level, you must do more than just take a half hour off of work one day (or from your soap operas, the internet, school, whatever) and vote.  If that is it, you are, and I don't say this to be mean, having zero significant impact on who the next president will be.  Zero. None. Nada. If you are one of these folks, the rest of this article is for you. And for the rest of you who might be be much more politically involved, I still think there are things you can pick up from below.

A national election, according to math, is more like a complex system produced hurricane. You  mathematically don't control the outcome, the system does. The presidential election is going to go one way or another, and you don't have enough power to change which way it goes. Just like you blowing against a hurricane wouldn't change the hurricane's course in any measurable way. Even if you got 100's to blow against it, the hurricane would still go where macro systemic forces have determined it's path will lead with no regard to your efforts. Presidential elections are the same.

Now I'm not trying to discourage you from voting in the national presidential election. What I am trying to encourage you to do is-

1. Don't hate people who vote different than you do because of who they voted for in the presidential race.  A given person's vote might be indicative of a larger world view that you might find distasteful, but they are just followers of that worldview.  Their vote is not responsible for putting any president into office according to the harsh laws of math and statistics. They might believe they have had some sort of affect, but this is purely a misunderstanding of facts and figures.  They do not hold that kind of power according to math.  So you can stop hating them for doing something that they did not do. 
2. Don't consider people who vote for a third party a significant threat to your favored electoral outcome one way or another. Mathematically they are not. You can stop hating them for their vote too.
3. Vote in and pay more attention to local elections, where your vote does have significance. 
4. Get involved in the political process much earlier and in different ways. If you wait until the field of say 50 million potential leaders has already been vetted for you down to a handful, I would argue you all ready missed the "having an impact" boat a long time ago.
5. Pray. "The prayers of a righteous man [or woman] availith much." When it comes right down to it God is going to have a greater say in who is going to be allowed to be president then your one vote ever will.  Maybe instead of wasting so much time trying to convince others who should be president you should be trying to convince God who should be.  He does listen. In fact I would argue that He is looking down at America and anxiously waiting for people to ask Him to intervene. Not just in this presidential race but in many things. But we are just too busy. 

Also check this link out [Link].  I worry that the collective good argument will be used to keep people voting and thinking that is all they have to do to make an impact when more is required, but the article brings up some good points.

I had about eight more paragraphs written but I think the above is what I'm trying to get across. Vote, but don't become so egotistical that you think yours or someone else's presidential vote is solely responsible for who the next president is. I know the stakes are extremely high but please keep the above in mind else it is easy to blame others for something statistically impossible for them to be responsible for. Instead focus locally and use other ways in addition to voting to make an impact. If you do, you have shot at making a difference.