How Many Friends Do You Have?

the AZEL PERSPECTIVE Commentary on Cuba's Future, U.S. Foreign Policy & Individual Freedoms - Issue 211

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No, I am not asking how many Facebook friends you have. I am asking about casual friends you actually know and keep in social contact with. Let’s say the people you would invite to a large party you are hosting. That figure, according to British anthropologist Robin Dunbar, is approximately 150. In social science that quantity is known as Dunbar’s Number. Facial recognition glasses In the 1990’s, Dr. Dunbar noticed a peculiar correlation between the brain size of primates and the social groups they formed: the bigger the brain size, the larger the social groups. He hypothesized that animals with bigger brains could remember more of their peers and thus interact with a larger number. He extrapolated his findings to the size of the human brain and came up with 150 as the natural limit to the number of meaningful relationships that humans can have. There is also an absolute limit of 1,500 to the number of people we can put a name to a face. Professor Dunbar explains that we generally have up to five friends -often family members- in our closest circle (your BFFs), ten in the next closest circle, followed by a circle of thirty five, and a final group of one hundred. He estimates that we devote 40 percent of our available social time to the inner core of five friends, and another 20 percent of our time to the ten friends in the next circle, so that altogether we devote about two-thirds of our social time to just fifteen people. Other researchers have found that Dr. Dunbar’s predictions appear to hold true, and Dunbar’s Number has become of interest in anthropology, evolutionary psychology, statistics, business management, and military planning. For example, the company known for the Gore-Tex brand discovered that when more than 150 employees worked together in one building, it gave rise to a variety of social problems, impairing employee cohesiveness. The company started building work centers with a limit of 150 employees. When production capacity needed to be expanded, the company would build another 150-employee building. Similarly, military companies do not exceed 150 soldiers in most armies. Cleary, online platforms like Facebook are changing the nature of our human interactions. And, via social media, we can keep up with the lives of more than one hundred and fifty people, but social media cannot replicate the shared experiences of face-to-face social bonding. Without face-to-face relationships, we fail to establish deeper friendships. Dr. Dunbar explains that the amount of social capital we have is pretty fixed, because it requires time investment. So, the larger the number of people we interact with, the lower the average social capital we can share with each person.   The big social question centers on what happens with a generation that is learning to see virtual interactions as the same, or preferable, to old-fashioned physical friendships. Social scientist fear that, by spending so much time online, new generations may not get enough person-to-person experience to develop effective social interaction skills. Ironically, despite platforms like Facebook, or perhaps because of them, we will enter a future populated with less socially competent people.  And, as our virtual friends replace our face-to-face ones, we have no idea of the implications of such a change in our political or economic relationships at large. Yet, technology may come to the rescue. New technologies such as the facial recognition-enabled smart glasses being developed by several companies would enable the glass wearer to identify any face we look at. These glasses have cameras embedded in the frame which allows the wearer to scan faces to be compared with a database of faces.  Using face recognition technology, the name of the person is then sent to a display embedded in the lens of the glasses. Developers claim that facial recognition-enabled smart glasses can identify faces in less than a second. With these glasses I can identify anyone at the next party without having to admit that I do not remember who they are. My circle of friends would expand exponentially. So much for Dunbar’s Number, I need these glasses. Please let us know if you  this article. We welcome your feedback. Abrazos,  Lily & José  (click on the name to email Lily or Jose) José Azel, Ph.D. José Azel left Cuba in 1961 as a 13 year-old political exile in what has been dubbed Operation Pedro Pan - the largest unaccompanied child refugee movement in the history of the Western Hemisphere. He is currently dedicated to the in-depth analyses of Cuba's economic, social and political state, with a keen interest in post-Castro-Cuba strategies. Formerly, a Senior Scholar at the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies (ICCAS) at the University of Miami, Jose Azel has published extensively on Cuba related topics. In 2012 and 2015, Dr. Azel testified in the U.S. Congress on U.S.-Cuba Policy, and U.S. National Security.  He is a frequent speaker and commentator on these and related topics on local, national and international media.  He holds undergraduate and masters degrees in business administration and a Ph.D. in International Affairs from the University of Miami. José along with his wife Lily are avid skiers and adventure travelers.  In recent years they have climbed Grand Teton in Wyoming, trekked Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania and Machu Pichu in Peru.  They have also hiked in Tibet and in the Himalayas to Mt. Everest Base Camp. They cycled St. James Way (El Camino de Santiago de Compostela) and cycled alongside the Danube from Germany to Hungary. They have scuba dived in the Bay Islands off the Honduran coast and in the Galapagos Islands. Their adventurers are normally dedicated to raise funds for causes that are dear to them.  Watch Joe & Lily summit Kilimanjaro. Books by Dr. José Azel "Liberty for beginners is much more than what the title promises. It is eighty themes touched with the wisdom of a master, and the charm of an excellent communicator. Anyone that wishes to understand why countries do, or do not progress, will find in this book the best explanations. If it was in my power, this work would be required reading for all college and university students, and I would recommend its reading to politicians, journalists, and policymakers. With this book Azel accomplishes what was achieved in France by Frédéric Bastiat, and in the United States by Henry Hazlitt: brings together common sense with intelligent observation, and academic substance. Stupendous" Carlos Alberto Montaner Buy Now "Libertad para novatos es mucho más de lo que promete el título. Son ochenta temas tocados con la sabiduría de un maestro y la amenidad de un excelente comunicador. Cualquier adulto que desee saber por qué progresan o se estancan los pueblos aquí encontrará las mejores explicaciones. Si estuviera en mis manos, esta obra sería lectura obligatoria de todos los estudiantes, tanto de bachillerato como universitarios, pero, además, se la recomendaría a todos los políticos y periodistas, a todos los policy makers. Azel logra con este libro lo que Frédéric Bastiat consiguiera en Francia y Henry Hazlitt en Estados Unidos: aunar el sentido común, la observación inteligente y la enjundia académica. Estupendo." Carlos Alberto Montaner Compre Aqui In Reflections on Freedom, José Azel brings together a collection of his columns published in prestigious newspapers.  Each article reveals his heartfelt and personal awareness of the importance of freedom in our lives.  They are his reflections after nearly sixty years of living and learning as a Cuban outside Cuba. In what has become his stylistic trademark, Professor Azel brilliantly introduces complex topics in brief journalistic articles. Buy Now En Reflexiones sobre la libertad José Azel reúne una colección de sus columnas publicadas en prestigiosos periódicos. Cada artículo revela su percepción sincera y personal de la importancia de la libertad en nuestras vidas. Son sus reflexiones después de casi sesenta años viviendo y aprendiendo como cubano fuera de Cuba.  En lo que ha resultado ser característica distintiva de sus artículos, el Profesor Azel introduce con brillantez complejos temas en  breves artículos de carácter periodístico. Compre Aqui Mañana in Cuba is a comprehensive analysis of contemporary Cuba with an incisive perspective of the Cuban frame of mind and its relevancy for Cuba's future. Buy now Pedazos y Vacíos is a collection of poems written in by Dr. Azel in his youth. Poems are in Spanish. Buy now

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