Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds explained

Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds
Border:yes
Author:Charles Mackay
Country:United Kingdom
Language:English
Subjects:Crowd psychology, economic bubbles, history
Publisher:Richard Bentley, London
Release Date:1841
Media Type:Print

Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds is an early study of crowd psychology by Scottish journalist Charles Mackay, first published in 1841 under the title Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions.[1] The book was published in three volumes: "National Delusions", "Peculiar Follies", and "Philosophical Delusions".[2] Mackay was an accomplished teller of stories, though he wrote in a journalistic and somewhat sensational style.

The subjects of Mackay's debunking include alchemy, crusades, duels, economic bubbles, fortune-telling, haunted houses, the Drummer of Tedworth, the influence of politics and religion on the shapes of beards and hair, magnetisers (influence of imagination in curing disease), murder through poisoning, prophecies, popular admiration of great thieves, popular follies of great cities, and relics. Present-day writers on economics, such as Michael Lewis and Andrew Tobias, laud the three chapters on economic bubbles.[3]

In later editions, Mackay added a footnote referencing the Railway Mania of the 1840s as another "popular delusion" which was at least as important as the South Sea Bubble. In the 21st century, the mathematician Andrew Odlyzko pointed out, in a published lecture, that Mackay himself played a role in this economic bubble; as a leader writer in The Glasgow Argus, Mackay wrote on 2 October 1845: "There is no reason whatever to fear a crash".[4] [5]

Volume I: National Delusions

Economic bubbles

The first volume begins with a discussion of three economic bubbles, or financial manias: the South Sea Company bubble of 1711–1720, the Mississippi Company bubble of 1719–1720, and the Dutch tulip mania of the early seventeenth century. According to Mackay, during this bubble, speculators from all walks of life bought and sold tulip bulbs and had even declared futures contracts on them. Allegedly, some tulip bulb varieties briefly became the most expensive objects in the world during 1637.[6] Mackay's accounts are enlivened by colorful, comedic anecdotes, such as the Parisian hunchback who supposedly profited by renting out his hump as a writing desk during the height of the mania surrounding the Mississippi Company.

Two modern researchers, Peter Garber and Anne Goldgar, independently conclude that Mackay greatly exaggerated the scale and effects of the Tulip bubble,[7] and Mike Dash, in his modern popular history of the alleged bubble, notes that he believes the importance and extent of the tulip mania were overstated.[8]

Chapters

Volume II: Peculiar Follies

Crusades

See also: Crusades. Mackay describes the history of the Crusades as a kind of mania of the Middle Ages, precipitated by the pilgrimages of Europeans to the Holy Land. Mackay is generally unsympathetic to the Crusaders, whom he compares unfavourably to the superior civilisation of Asia: "Europe expended millions of her treasures, and the blood of two millions of her children; and a handful of quarrelsome knights retained possession of the Kingdom of Jerusalem for about one hundred years!"

Witch mania

See also: Witch trials in the early modern period. Witch trials in 16th- and 17th-century Western Europe are the primary focus of the "Witch Mania" section of the book, which asserts that this was a time when ill fortune was likely to be attributed to supernatural causes. Mackay notes that many of these cases were initiated as a way of settling scores among neighbors or associates, and that extremely low standards of evidence were applied to most of these trials. Mackay claims that "thousands upon thousands" of people were executed as witches over two and a half centuries, with the largest numbers killed in Germany.

Sections

Volume III: Philosophical Delusions

Alchemists

See also: Alchemy.

The section on alchemysts focuses primarily on efforts to turn base metals into gold. Mackay notes that many of these practitioners were themselves deluded, convinced that these feats could be performed if they discovered the correct old recipe or stumbled upon the right combination of ingredients. Although alchemists gained money from their sponsors, mainly noblemen, he notes that the belief in alchemy by sponsors could be hazardous to its practitioners, as it wasn't rare for an unscrupulous noble to imprison a supposed alchemist until he could produce gold.

Books

Influence and modern responses

The book remains in print, and writers continue to discuss its influence, particularly the section on financial bubbles. (See Goldsmith and Lewis, below.)

See also

References

External links

The book is in the public domain and is available online from a number of sources:

Notes and References

  1. Book: Mackay, Charles . 1841 . Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds . Richard Bentley. London . 1 . I . 978-1-4142-2016-1 . 29 April 2015. Book: Mackay, Charles . 1841 . Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds . Richard Bentley. London . 1 . II . 29 April 2015. Book: Mackay, Charles . 1841 . Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds . Richard Bentley. London . 1 . III . 29 April 2015.
  2. Book: Mackay. Charles. Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds. 1841. https://web.archive.org/web/20040623130633/http://www.litrix.com/madraven/madne001.htm. dead. 2004-06-23. 23 March 2018.
  3. Book: The Real Price of Everything . Lewis, Michael . 2008.
  4. Book: MacKay, Charles. Extraordinary Popular Delusions, the Money Mania: The Mississippi Scheme, the South-sea Bubble, & the Tulipomania. 8 June 2013. 2008. Cosimo, Inc.. 978-1-60520-547-2. 88.
  5. Book: Odyyzko, Andrew. Andrew Odlyzko. Charles Mackay's own extraordinary popular delusions and the Railway Mania. 2012. 2.
  6. Web site: Tulips. library.wur.nl.
  7. Book: Famous First Bubbles . Garber, Peter M. . 2001.
  8. Book: Tulipomania: The Story of the World's Most Coveted Flower & the Extraordinary Passions It Aroused . registration . Dash, Mike . 2001.
  9. Book: Baruch, Bernard. Bernard Baruch. My Own Story. New York. Henry Holt. 1957. 242–245.
  10. Web site: Ohayon. Albert. John Law and the Mississippi Bubble: The Madness of Crowds. NFB.ca Blog. 22 June 2011. National Film Board of Canada. 22 June 2011.
  11. News: China Bubble Mania . Forbes . 2009-10-30 . 2007-05-30.
  12. Book: . Gaiman, Neil . 1991.
  13. Web site: The Madness of Crowds, Past and Present . https://web.archive.org/web/20081222094540/http://www.businessweek.com/managing/content/dec2008/ca20081216_263901.htm . dead . 22 December 2008 . BusinessWeek . 2009-10-01 .
  14. News: The books cashing in on the crash . The Independent . 2009-11-23 . London . 2009-11-20.
  15. News: Phoenix Leads the Way Down in Home Prices . . 2009-11-23 . David . Streitfeld . Jack . and Healy . 2009-04-29.
  16. News: The subprime dominoes in motion . https://web.archive.org/web/20070317201501/http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/IC16Dj04.html . unfit . 2007-03-17 . Asia Times . 2010-11-15 . Julian . Delasantellis . 2007-03-16.
  17. Web site: To be honest, it's totally random . New Statesman . 2009-10-12 .
  18. Book: The Wisdom of Crowds . registration . Surowiecki, James . 2004. Doubleday . 978-0385503860 .
  19. Web site: Extraordinary Popular Delusions And The Madness Of Crowds - Information Society . Bandcamp . 3 August 2022.

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