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Essentially, elites come from among the people. People generate elites, who generate policy. Bias flows the same way. In any given nation, the people are very l

Essentially, elites come from among the people. People generate elites, who generate policy. Bias flows the same way. In any given nation, the people are very likely biased. Which generates biased elites. Who, in turn, generate biased policy. The problem is not biased elites. The problem is that humans are biased, and little can be done to remove their biases. Much less to ensure they don't manifest those biases in the results of their work.

wussboy 5y ago
I agree with everything except your last sentence. Much CAN be done to ensure those biases do not manifest in the results of their work. More generally, this is the power of our institutions.
- DamnYuppie 5y ago
  Which are formed by people with biases who are attracted to other people with biases. It is turtles all the way down.
  - h2odragon 5y ago
    Turtles would be so much simpler, tho. A tortoise will copulate with a boot for hours with no pretense about what he's doing or why. No justifications or excuses. Us hairless apes on the other hand, we'll act contrary to all our good sense in the firm belief that "the job requires it" or "the boss wants it this way" or worst yet "the rule book specifies it thus". We can knowingly compound our stupidity and decry the results. Then expect praise for following the rules. At least the tortoise gets the idea, at the bottom of the hole, "dig up, stupid!"
  - IIAOPSW 5y ago
    Institutions are error correction. We can form a less biased system out of constituent parts each of which is more biased than the whole.
popcube 5y ago
elites become intellectuals, intellectuals have their solid bias. whenever someone was converted, they will get same bias. e.g., world should be changed to 'better way' by them.
pjc50 5y ago
At some point you have to acknowledge that not all "biases" are bad; a bias may just be a value you don't agree with. Being biased against the extermination of all human life is a bias, but I think we'd agree it's a good one.
rrsmtz 5y ago
> elites come from among the people ... People generate elites That's just false! In every society, the elite class is overwhelmingly comprised of families who maintain their high social standing and wealth over decades or centuries. The lower classes are similarly static over the generations, and all classes have a class-specific bias. If you need proof, take a sampling of the 'Early Life' Wikipedia section of any elite you can think of. Even tech founders, who are more likely socially mobile than most other elites, have overwhelmingly had an upper-middle class upbringing at _least_.
- rayiner 5y ago
  Your second paragraph is completely at odds with your first paragraph. Founders coming from upper middle class families is not what a society with stable elites looks like. Zuckerberg for example did come from an upper middle class background. His father was a dentist. His grandfather Jack Zuckerberg was in the Air Force. And his great grandfather came here as an immigrant to Ellis island and worked as a fruit peddler and tailor.
  - pen2l 5y ago
    I see the point you're making (and mostly agree with it,), but I don't know about calling the Zuckerberg family just 'upper middle class', his grandparents came from humble beginnings, sure. But I'd rather say Mark himself comes from a squarely upper class background. Upper middle class households don't quite send two kids to Phillips Exeter Academy or boarding schools anywhere in that price range (50-60k per year). There's a big difference in income between a dentist who owns his practice and has other dentists working with him vs. just a dentist; Mark's dad was in the former category.
    - rayiner 5y ago
      Upper class families don’t have their kids transfer into Exeter after two years at public high school. But I’m fine calling that upper class, the point is that it’s not anything like generational wealth.

wussboy 5y ago

I agree with everything except your last sentence. Much CAN be done to ensure those biases do not manifest in the results of their work. More generally, this is the power of our institutions.

DamnYuppie 5y ago
Which are formed by people with biases who are attracted to other people with biases. It is turtles all the way down.
- h2odragon 5y ago
  Turtles would be so much simpler, tho. A tortoise will copulate with a boot for hours with no pretense about what he's doing or why. No justifications or excuses. Us hairless apes on the other hand, we'll act contrary to all our good sense in the firm belief that "the job requires it" or "the boss wants it this way" or worst yet "the rule book specifies it thus". We can knowingly compound our stupidity and decry the results. Then expect praise for following the rules. At least the tortoise gets the idea, at the bottom of the hole, "dig up, stupid!"
- IIAOPSW 5y ago
  Institutions are error correction. We can form a less biased system out of constituent parts each of which is more biased than the whole.

popcube 5y ago

elites become intellectuals, intellectuals have their solid bias. whenever someone was converted, they will get same bias. e.g., world should be changed to 'better way' by them.

pjc50 5y ago

At some point you have to acknowledge that not all "biases" are bad; a bias may just be a value you don't agree with. Being biased against the extermination of all human life is a bias, but I think we'd agree it's a good one.

rrsmtz 5y ago

> elites come from among the people ... People generate elites That's just false! In every society, the elite class is overwhelmingly comprised of families who maintain their high social standing and wealth over decades or centuries. The lower classes are similarly static over the generations, and all classes have a class-specific bias. If you need proof, take a sampling of the 'Early Life' Wikipedia section of any elite you can think of. Even tech founders, who are more likely socially mobile than most other elites, have overwhelmingly had an upper-middle class upbringing at _least_.

rayiner 5y ago
Your second paragraph is completely at odds with your first paragraph. Founders coming from upper middle class families is not what a society with stable elites looks like. Zuckerberg for example did come from an upper middle class background. His father was a dentist. His grandfather Jack Zuckerberg was in the Air Force. And his great grandfather came here as an immigrant to Ellis island and worked as a fruit peddler and tailor.
- pen2l 5y ago
  I see the point you're making (and mostly agree with it,), but I don't know about calling the Zuckerberg family just 'upper middle class', his grandparents came from humble beginnings, sure. But I'd rather say Mark himself comes from a squarely upper class background. Upper middle class households don't quite send two kids to Phillips Exeter Academy or boarding schools anywhere in that price range (50-60k per year). There's a big difference in income between a dentist who owns his practice and has other dentists working with him vs. just a dentist; Mark's dad was in the former category.
  - rayiner 5y ago
    Upper class families don’t have their kids transfer into Exeter after two years at public high school. But I’m fine calling that upper class, the point is that it’s not anything like generational wealth.