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I see the problem your example highlights. It has nothing to do with meritocracy. It has to do with social policy. > You’re right though, meritocracy wouldn’t
by slibhb 5y ago
I see the problem your example highlights. It has nothing to do with meritocracy. It has to do with social policy.
> You’re right though, meritocracy wouldn’t be a problem if merit existed only to objectively improve the world.
Merit doesn't have to be objective. All we can do is subjectiviely do our best to determine merit using whatever tools we can. If we're wrong, we're wrong (and we will often be wrong).
Being wrong is fine and inevitable. It's not an excuse to say "meritocracy is bad".
- endisneigh 5y agoI’m not following you - meritocracy and subjectivity are inherently contradictory. Also, the example I gave and the problems it illustrate are inherent to the example - there’s no policy you could invoke that would remedy it. Feel free to share an example of how you’d fix the example to remove the dilemma, if you would like.
- slibhb 5y agoI don't agree. We have meritocracies based on things most people consider subjective (art, music, writing). What makes it a meritocracy is not that there's some objective measure of merit, just that there's an attempt to determine merit severed from factors deemed irrelevant (usually birth, class, race, sex, gender, beauty, etc). No one is saying we have determined God's own concept of merit. "Merit" can and will shift over time. Different individuals will assess it differently. All we can do is our best.
- AstralStorm 5y agoAnd by doing the best, you mean doing the most to pervert that system into a hereditary feudalismn for own reproductive fitness, just like happened everywhere this was attempted. It starts with placing kids in better schools, cheating, disabling help programs and ends up at modifying tests to serve themselves better. And most importantly, by design creates an underclass of undesirables. People less able or outright disabled, who could be used by others to seize power.