How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself • Hacker News Board

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#71

Post by CJefferson » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 5:55 PM UTC

davidiach wrote: post #33

CJefferson wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that someone on a site like hacker news (which I like consider are on the more intelligent side) would make a comparison like this, deeply disturbs me. We clearly have fundamentally different world views. (edit: I don't want this to sound like davidirch shouldn't have that opinion, just that it's easy to assume people will share your opinion) I don't understand how you can be against what seems to be a compl…

1. Tutoring does not make a dumb person smart. Your IQ does not grow because you have a good teacher. 2. Complaining about people not having a fair chance in an age where everybody has access to the internet (which is pretty much all human knowledge) is just wrong. 3. You don't need college to rise to the top - that's just a myth (check out Thiel Fellowship website, they have lot's of materials on this topic). 4. The…

Firstly, I hoped I made clear I didn't think the fact someone disagreed with me made them stupid.

Secondly, lots of people spend a lot of money on tutoring. I believe it helps people get significantly higher exam results, which then allows entry into significantly better universities. Do you disagree?

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#72

Post by mfsch » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 6:31 PM UTC

There are two parts to both “merit” and “cracy”. Merit can be thought of as your abilities and talents or as your willingness to work hard. “Kratein” means to rule (i.e. have responsibilities, make decisions), but in this context it’s often seen as earning money (i.e. having a comfortable life style).

I would say that in an ideal meritocracy, the people with the most knowledge, abilities and intelligence should be the ones making the decisions and carrying the responsibilities. The willingness to work hard, however, should determine income, luxury and comfort.

The problem, of course, is that the powerful usually try to make themselves and their friends wealthy, but maybe this separation of the idea of meritocracy into (knowledge/ability = power/decisions) and (hard work = wealth/comfort) is what we as a society should strife for.

Thoughts?

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#73

Post by Livven » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 6:44 PM UTC

davidiach wrote: post #33

CJefferson wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that someone on a site like hacker news (which I like consider are on the more intelligent side) would make a comparison like this, deeply disturbs me. We clearly have fundamentally different world views. (edit: I don't want this to sound like davidirch shouldn't have that opinion, just that it's easy to assume people will share your opinion) I don't understand how you can be against what seems to be a compl…

1. Tutoring does not make a dumb person smart. Your IQ does not grow because you have a good teacher. 2. Complaining about people not having a fair chance in an age where everybody has access to the internet (which is pretty much all human knowledge) is just wrong. 3. You don't need college to rise to the top - that's just a myth (check out Thiel Fellowship website, they have lot's of materials on this topic). 4. The…

2. How many students aged 6-12 do you know that are willing to voluntarily spend time learning and studying? Zero?

Don't kid yourself. Just because knowledge and information is out there and accessible for free doesn't mean a child will have the ability and motivation to seek it out on their own. They're children, after all. What and how they learn will largely depend on parents and school.

3. You don't need a plane to get from New York to London. There are ships. You can even sail across the Atlantic! (there must be a fancy Latin term for this fallacy?)

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#74

Post by sophacles » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 6:46 PM UTC

betterunix wrote: post #37

ap22213 wrote: post #23

Given the audience of this site, it's interesting that this topic has even floated toward the top. And, it's also interesting (but hardly surprising) that most of the comments are blindly for meritocracy. Yeah - meritocracy sounds great in principle. And, we can agree that it's leagues better than aristocracy. But, over generational scales, aristocracy and meritocracy are very closely aligned. Meritocracy begins firs…

"meritocracy sounds great in principle. And, we can agree that it's leagues better than aristocracy" Meritocracy is a form of aristocracy. The word "aristocracy" comes from the Greek words for "best" and "power," or in other words a system where those who are most fit to rule will be the leaders of society. It sounds great in principle, the only problem is the definition of "best."

This may be true of the greek words, but language shifts. Now the word aristocracy refers to a system by which a class of people is in charge, and in which membership of said class is almost completely dependent on parentage. It is also of note that in this class system, membership and genetics are more important than any other factors such as wealth, intelligence, "merit" (as we generally use the term: displaying high ability and accomplishment in tasks).

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#75

Post by yummyfajitas » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 6:55 PM UTC

kryptiskt wrote: post #8

"For instance, standardised tests were supposed to favour the brainy, but the $4.5 billion test-prep industry, which disproportionately caters to the rich, indicates that this is being gamed. Intelligence tests should be more widely used." As if intelligence tests weren't gameable and didn't favor the prepared. What's worse is that they test a very narrow definition of intelligence. That cure would be worse than the…

SATs are actually not particularly amenable to test prep (unless Kaplan is funding the study).

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124278685697537839.html

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#76

Post by sophacles » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 7:08 PM UTC

larsonf wrote: post #62

It seems some of us are missing the implication of the article. Let's say, for the sake of argument, that there really were a way to negate all advantages a person could be born into. No social networks, no additional wealth, no additional opportunities, etc. A place where everyone is born at 25 at the exact same moment: no friends, no past, no parents, no money. We can call this place 'Equalistan', population 1 mill…

There are many strange and not necessarily good assumptions in this post.

1) How is it "merit" is strictly about genetic variation, rather than a combination of said genetic ability and a record of the use of it (achievement).

2) How is it that equality is strictly about starting position, rather than starting position resource allocation protection? One can have a meritocracy in which resource allocation is not about more-to better. It can in fact be about responsibility and accountability being greater. Not saying I agree with this, it is just a hole in the argument.

3) Resource distribution need not be 0-sum. There can in fact be more than 2 categories of "mine" and "not mine". There can be categories such as "available to everyone", "available to no one", and variations on "available to some". [1]

4) deserves is always and strictly a moral argument. There is no justification of deserves that doesn't at some point refer directly to axioms (morals). Therefore we again get to assumptions that need be discussed.

[1] Here in lies all the interesting stuff. Interplay between "some people get access" and "mine" categories of resources are where all discussions like this are really happening. How you define "some people get access" really can change the end result of "mine" for various actors. Similarly, "everyone gets access", in reality, is very tricky. For instance you could claim, and be mostly right, that everyone gets access to computers (via public libraries etc). Yet, not everyone gets access to training in effective computer use - that is reserved for "some people get access", where the rules are 'has enough money for proper training' (aka defining access rules on how much is already in your "mine" resoures). It is a complicated interplay.

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#77

Post by cbeach » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 7:11 PM UTC

vannevar wrote: post #19

stcredzero wrote: post #13

An "entrenched meritocracy" is a contradiction. It's not a true meritocracy. Instead, it's an aristocracy claiming to be one, which is a bit tautological, since every such class claims it deserves its privileged position. People in other times and places believed they deserved their privileges just as sincerely as you do right now. Of course, the situation is different because we're smarter than they are ;)

Yes, the article brushes aside the idea of wealth redistribution, but the simple truth is that, all else being equal, the more money you have, the easier it is to make more of it. It's like a marathon that gets easier as you go on. Even the wealthy acknowledge it: "The first million is the hardest." So we have (or had) a progressive system of taxation to attempt to counter the natural flow of wealth toward the wealth…

I disagree. A threshold amount of wealth makes it easier to make more, sure. But IMO that threshold is low (i.e. enough to cover the basics of life). Rich people can lose wealth far faster, and far more easily than poor, trust me. The difference is that people who are capable of becoming wealthy are generally able to make more (through sensibly investing their cash and working hard in good jobs)

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#78

Post by shawn-butler » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 7:11 PM UTC

mfsch wrote: post #72

There are two parts to both “merit” and “cracy”. Merit can be thought of as your abilities and talents or as your willingness to work hard. “Kratein” means to rule (i.e. have responsibilities, make decisions), but in this context it’s often seen as earning money (i.e. having a comfortable life style). I would say that in an ideal meritocracy, the people with the most knowledge, abilities and intelligence should be th…

I would consider spending some time with Plato's Socratic dialogue The Republic if you haven't already.

The tension of a timocracy devolving into an oligarchy depends greatly on the concept of justice in play at the time. I often hear in the valley "work hard, play hard" as a justification of oligarchic excess, when it should actually be "work hard, work harder" or "work hard, play less".

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#79

Post by neilk » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 7:17 PM UTC

michaelochurch wrote: post #24

stcredzero wrote: post #13

An "entrenched meritocracy" is a contradiction. It's not a true meritocracy. Instead, it's an aristocracy claiming to be one, which is a bit tautological, since every such class claims it deserves its privileged position. People in other times and places believed they deserved their privileges just as sincerely as you do right now. Of course, the situation is different because we're smarter than they are ;)

Of course, the situation is different because we're smarter than they are ;) First, we aren't the real elite. Founders are yeoman project managers at best, engineers are less than that-- not even able to raise a family in the Valley-- and even the venture capitalists are, for the most part, merely junior elite. I'm not so sure about that claim, anyway, given that IQ is relative. The intellectual edge of the modern el…

> Average people were a foot shorter, and were probably at an IQ level around 70-75.

A foot shorter, yes (we know this from all sorts of physical evidence) but how do we know the average IQ?

They also might have spent their mental processing power differently. Medieval people trained their memory much more - I think this also extended to the average peasant, but I can't find a reference right now.

Re: How to prevent a meritocracy entrenching itself

#80

Post by saraid216 » Sat, Feb 09, 2013, 7:32 PM UTC

sophacles wrote: post #74

betterunix wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"meritocracy sounds great in principle. And, we can agree that it's leagues better than aristocracy" Meritocracy is a form of aristocracy. The word "aristocracy" comes from the Greek words for "best" and "power," or in other words a system where those who are most fit to rule will be the leaders of society. It sounds great in principle, the only problem is the definition of "best."

This may be true of the greek words, but language shifts. Now the word aristocracy refers to a system by which a class of people is in charge, and in which membership of said class is almost completely dependent on parentage. It is also of note that in this class system, membership and genetics are more important than any other factors such as wealth, intelligence, "merit" (as we generally use the term: displaying hi…

Except that parentage was a critical concept in the Greek notion of the "best". The necessity of membership was less important, but it was still important.