The Technocracy Movement of the 1930s • Hacker News Board

Re: The Technocracy Movement of the 1930s

#141

Post by andrekandre » Sun, Apr 05, 2026, 1:02 AM UTC

jhbadger wrote: post #121

skywal_l wrote: post #92

An interesting critique of the meritocracy/technocracy: The Rise of Meritocracy by Michael Young. Written in the 50s it's prescient to what has been happening since. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rise_of_the_Meritocracy

You can argue that a true meritocracy still wouldn't be ideal (as Young did), but that argument seems irrelevant -- the problem in the real world is that we pretend that we have a meritocracy, but often the person who gets the promotion or whatever isn't actually the best at their job, but is a cousin or fraternity brother of the person in charge -- the old "it isn't what you know, but who you know".

  > often the person who gets the promotion or whatever isn't actually the best at their job

it would be interesting to experiment with how people get promoted in orgs... maybe vote by co-workers? or by team members?

Re: The Technocracy Movement of the 1930s

#142

Post by andrekandre » Sun, Apr 05, 2026, 1:23 AM UTC

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #111

econ wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can eat olives without martini. The actual problem with technocracy (if done right) is that the work of experts grows increasingly incomprehensible to average men. Even if things work out perfectly, experts can't properly take risks or make a leap of faith in other people's name. (Not to argue our current democratic model is any good at it)

The problem is that there's never any single "correct" solution for any engineering problem let alone social ones, and there's no single axis of "intelligence" or "expertise" that qualifies any single individual or set of individuals to make decisions in the long term on behalf of whole groups of people. I am not a free market capitalist, I am a socialist; but I also believe in decentralizing decision making because…

  > there's never any single "correct" solution for any engineering problem let alone social ones

as an aside, in my experience its engineers that love the one-size-fits-all and apply-it-to-everything solutions... or perhaps this is just indicative of working in top-down tech-land idk...

Re: The Technocracy Movement of the 1930s

#143

Post by andrekandre » Sun, Apr 05, 2026, 1:24 AM UTC

tovej wrote: post #60

econ wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can eat olives without martini. The actual problem with technocracy (if done right) is that the work of experts grows increasingly incomprehensible to average men. Even if things work out perfectly, experts can't properly take risks or make a leap of faith in other people's name. (Not to argue our current democratic model is any good at it)

The actual problem with technocracy is that you create a formalized hierarchy of leaders and rabble based on some credential granting authority that the technocrats control. That's a recipe for disaster. The technocrats define who can be a technocrat, and can design the process to benefit them. The incentives are towards elitist, racist, cronyist policies that would select for sociopathic tendencies. What's the diffe…

  > What's the difference between a technocrat and a bishop in this case?

science (i say this with irony)

Re: The Technocracy Movement of the 1930s

#144

Post by charles_f » Sun, Apr 05, 2026, 1:42 AM UTC

spirodonfl wrote: post #81

Yep. Covered this many moons ago. I have a few episodes on this on my youtube. https://youtu.be/E6yg5Rj9owk

4 weeks is one moon, not many moons.

Re: The Technocracy Movement of the 1930s

#145

Post by wakawaka28 » Sun, Apr 05, 2026, 1:49 AM UTC

jongjong wrote: post #139

wakawaka28 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there are different life strategies that humans use. Some people need to survive based on skill more than others. The most obvious cases of non-skill strategies are the ones where people make a living based on having a certain physical appearance, or else live off of inheritance. This might be controversial but I think rich and powerful people are usually skilled. The skill might be pretty far removed from th…

Yep but there are strange undesirable characteristics that are being selected. Some of which we don't fully understand. For example, it is my personal belief that there is a selection mechanism for high suggestibility (by social media and search algorithms which can monetize it). Basically suggestible people are helped in their careers because they act like a money pipeline which redirects money they 'earn' back to s…

Suggestible people follow instructions and (sometimes) take fewer risks. It is simply infeasible to logically convince people of every single thing that they ought to know. I hate to infantilize people in this way, but even the most capable and inquisitive minds among us cannot reasonably investigate everything.

People socially align over a lot of things, not just ideas. They develop shared tastes and preferences.

Even very undesirable characteristics such as sociopathy have a function in society. It is sometimes necessary to emotionally detach oneself from situations to make the right decisions. These are not good for every role, but they are primitive survival mechanisms and still have a useful function in keeping the peace.

Re: The Technocracy Movement of the 1930s

#146

Post by throw0101c » Sun, Apr 05, 2026, 2:47 PM UTC

steve1977 wrote: post #89

recursivecaveat wrote: post #38

Technocracy always struck me as weirdly incoherent? If you take the economy, probably the most studied of government policies, it is not 1 number. There are many questions about what priorities ought to be. There is no 'expert' answer for how many starving poor people are a worthy trade off for a GDP point. Even if there was, there is an economist branch that disagrees with any possible position you might take. The q…

One issue with economy as a science is that it's a very soft science at best and just pseudoscience at worst. Which then kind of defeats the purpose of experts in the sense of technocracy. As an analogy, you can make a PhD in theology, but that is not proof that God exists.

> One issue with economy as a science is that it's a very soft science at best and just pseudoscience at worst.

Theoretical physicist Richard Feynman once stated “Imagine how much harder physics would be if electrons had feelings.”

There are falsifiable ideas and programs in economics—tax cuts paying for themselves, expansionary austerity, tariffs, etc—that are tried regularly:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansas_experiment

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expansionary_fiscal_contractio...

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariffs_in_the_Trump_administr...

The fact that the results of these experiments are ignored is hardly the fault of the those making correct predictions with correct models.

Re: The Technocracy Movement of the 1930s

#147

Post by geomack2 » Tue, Apr 07, 2026, 8:28 PM UTC

Havoc wrote: post #137

oa335 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also noticed that… another consequence of convergence of culture due to algorithmic management of attention?

Honestly I have no idea what to make of it. In my mind it could be: 1) Simple copycat - article author is watching predictive history which seems plausible given channels surge in popularity 2) Algo effects 3) Coincidence / think of pink elephant effect 4) An actual coordinated intentional campaign by [insert evildoer with insert evildoer motive here...or even 3 letter agency meaning well but ending up functionally d…

The essay was actually originally published last year, long before that Predictive History video came out

Re: The Technocracy Movement of the 1930s

#148

Post by gwerbin » Wed, Apr 08, 2026, 2:34 PM UTC

ccppurcell wrote: post #86

engineer_22 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My theory It coalesced at a time when science was becoming more accessible to the masses, more educated technicians running around engaging in work and trade. And these technicians were frustrated by bosses who didn't understand the science and technique behind things. So there was great inefficiency because the bosses hadn't caught up to the technicians in their understanding of the world. And so the political idea…

Not just that but the 30s was the tail end of a period of reduction and unification in science. If physics and biology (large portions of it) could be reduced to a handful of principles, why not economics and politics. Darwin, Maxwell, Einstein, Hilbert, the Vienna Circle. It must have seemed like science was on track to explain more or less everything.

It also didn't hurt that the economic equivalent of Newtonian physics (that is, if you make a lot of simplifying assumptions that all seem reasonable on their own) points to essentially laissez-faire free market capitalism as welfare-maximizing policy. It is not only better, but a moral imperative that you pursue such policy, lest you burden society with deadweight loss!

Perfectly timed at a critical point in history when the public and policymakers were fighting it out over Socialism. Economics not only provided the feeling of modernity grounded in scientific truth-seeking, but also conveniently aligned with the interests of big businesses at the time.

The same is still true today. People still fetishize science, and still fail to understand the difference between science and pseudoscience. And we are still teaching the same pseudoscience over and over in undergrad economics programs across USA, turning out generation after generation of confused 21 year olds who think they understand everything about the world because they read Hazlitt and plotted some indifference curves.