# Do Americans lack the brain hardware necessary to run a democracy? (Part 1 of 2) Date: 2026-05-20 Next Part: https://disrael.github.io/blogs/raw/do-americans-lack-the-brain-hardware-necessary-to-run-a-democracy.part2.md --- --- ### Do Americans lack the brain hardware necessary to run a democracy? We can only fight racism, misogyny, and greed if human intellectual hardware is adequate. I’m switching to first person to make the case it is. Recent accusations against human brain competence have reached new highs. There is an enormous base of ride or die Trump voters that are even now, in May of 2026, not giving up on their boy. Some commentators say its a cult. Others say humans have built in responses to anyone different that prevent rational thinking. Still others say humans cannot handle logic and science enough to even have shared experiences with reality. #### Is there a Trump cult? According to AI, if Trump supporters are a part of anything then it’s not a cult but a sect. ![Image](https://disrael.github.io/blogs/assets/do-americans-lack-the-brain-hardware-necessary-to-run-a-democracy-c08d9b588e.png) You are not born a Trump supporter and neither were Trump voters taught to vote Trump as children. Furthermore while you could have seen Trump in media, read his book, been told about him in church, it’s very unlikely you met Trump in person or that he had anything to say to you that didn’t also apply to millions of others. Trump voters did not lose their personal freedom or finances upon entering the sect. Very importantly, as a sect you benefit from all of the early age indoctrination the denomination you are splitting from achieved. As a sect of Republicans / Christianity, Trump voters are particularly against liberal values like tolerance, pluralism, and equal opportunity. We don’t know how the human brain works, but I think opposing tolerance, pluralism, and equal opportunity is a software problem. Let’s do a thought experiment to see this. #### Imagine you live in a zero sum world Imagine you are transported to some alternate reality where of you and your 9 neighbors, one must be consigned to live in poverty (not really that alternate as American poverty rate is a staggering 10.6%). Further imagine that the only way for you and your children to avoid poverty is to join other neighbors ganging up on someone in your neighborhood. Would you keep your values of tolerance, pluralism, and equal opportunity and risk consigning you and your children to poverty? Note that you don’t have to be poor yourself to be overcome with this fear — just live in a world where not everyone can avoid poverty. Belief that this is a zero sum world is not a cult and also not a knee jerk reaction to people that are different. Also zero sum sect explains most of what we see from Trump’s base except for being idiotic enough to think Trump would help them. **For now let’s table the idiotically thinking Trump would help them and come back to it later.** The question then comes down to whether or not Trump’s base lacks the brain hardware necessary to have shared experiences with reality. #### Can someone reasonably believe our world is zero sum? In a country that is [running a caste](https://medium.com/the-polis/are-impoverished-americans-a-caste-c06850244f04) (my last blog), anyone can reasonably believe that society is zero sum with dire consequences for falling behind. Anyone can reasonably believe that allowing more American immigration might result in their losing their place in the dominant caste. Whether or not immigration actually is a threat is irrelevant (currently America’s declining birth rates imply we need immigration). If we don’t want people to fear immigrants then stop running a caste system. Similarly any man can reasonably believe that woman going to college in higher numbers is a threat to his position in the dominant caste. The caste system is based on education and women are doing better in academia — end of story. The same applies to racism against any race not currently doing well in school. If we make education more equal than anyone or their children could lose their acceptance in college. Again I can only repeat that these zero sum, anti-liberal values ideas are going to become popular again and again in a country oppressing a caste. #### Why didn’t this sect elect someone to stop the inequality? Now returning to the idiotic part of this caste electing Trump and continuing to support him even though he obviously never had any intention of helping them. In an evaluation of intellectual hardware we have to distinguish between mistakes and incomprehension. For instance Nicolae Ceaușescu of Romania was eventually executed with his wife. Francisco Franco of Spain died of natural causes while still in power but then his body, with majority approval, was exhumed and reburied somewhere more humble: > According to a poll by the Spanish newspaper, *El Mundo*, 43% of Spanish people approved of the exhumation while 32.5% opposed it. Opinions on the exhumation were divided by party line, with the Socialist party strongly in favour of the exhumation as well as the removal of his statue there. Wikipedia has António de Oliveira Salazar of Portugal followers as being an [actual cult](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ant%C3%B3nio_de_Oliveira_Salazar). > The media used the expression “golden era of Ceaușescu” and a plethora of formulaic appellations such as “guarantor of the nation’s progress and independence” and “visionary architect of the nation’s future”. Still people came back to their senses after Salazar’s death. The Viktor Mihály Orbán period in Hungary ran from 1998 to 2002, and 2010 to 2026. Citizens of a country must be allowed to make mistakes without being accused of being incapable of democracy — the question is how big and often of a mistake is acceptable. Trump’s falling poll numbers clearly indicate he is a voting mistake: ![Image](https://disrael.github.io/blogs/assets/do-americans-lack-the-brain-hardware-necessary-to-run-a-democracy-1449085a56.png) Is Trump too big or too often of a mistake for a reasonable democracy? ![Theories of why candidates lowering taxes win](https://disrael.github.io/blogs/assets/do-americans-lack-the-brain-hardware-necessary-to-run-a-democracy-f67b893d7c.png) *Theories of why candidates lowering taxes win* This [paper](https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/portal/189770082/Hope_Limberg_Weber_EJPE_In_Press_Corrected_Proof.pdf) rejects the, “I’ll be rich someday.” and ignorance of inequality explanations. When provided information about the lack of fairness of inequality and how much taxes on the rich have fallen, the paper found that opinions could change. > Our fairness treatment, which provides individuals with information about the role of luck in being a top income earner by informing subjects about the level of inherited wealth amongst the richest US citizens, has a substantial and statistically significant effect on core fairness beliefs, as well as on preferences for cutting the top federal income tax rate. On average, the fairness treatment reduces tax cut support by roughly 5 percentage points. > Furthermore, informing respondents that previous cuts to top income tax rates did not coincide with higher economic growth leads to substantially lower support (of around 6 percentage points) for cutting taxes on the rich. However, this effect cannot be explained by individuals changing their core beliefs about the macroeconomic benefits of cutting taxes on the rich. Across models, beliefs in potential ‘‘trickle-down effects’’ are surprisingly stable. Instead, the treatment causes respondents to update their beliefs about how taxes on the rich have evolved. Knowing taxes on the rich have fallen substantially in recent decades provides a reference point for respondents, making them significantly less likely to support (further) tax cuts for the rich. On the other hand it seems nothing could stop their respondents from believing in trickle down economics even after almost fifty years of it failing. So there is an element of rejecting reality to this, but maybe that has an explanation. --- **[Continue reading Part 2 of 2](https://disrael.github.io/blogs/raw/do-americans-lack-the-brain-hardware-necessary-to-run-a-democracy.part2.md)**