Let us draw on our collective intelligence. But how do we self-organize to pool our knowledge, in order to accomplish together what we cannot do alone? –RFI

Mehdi Moussaïd calls himself a “foulologue”, or crowd behavior, and goes beyond mere discourse, conducting experiments and analyzing our collective behavior in real-life situations. This is the discipline he explores in his latest book, Do We Need a Leader? –Charlie Hebdo 13/12

Under certain conditions, a collective can accomplish intellectual feats that no single member of the group could achieve alone. What are those conditions? How to identify and harness them?

What mechanisms enable a collective to write Wikipedia, solve highly complex scientific mysteries, or take on Garry Kasparov at chess?

In the field of collective intelligence, researchers are first challenged to understand how this remarkable form of intelligence works. Then, to understand how to bring a crowd to make good decisions, or even—why not—channel it towards useful goals.

Do we need a leader for this?

This work of popular science outlines the experiments and methods of collective intelligence, shedding light on our relationships with others.