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>lineage just the way they refer to it is disturbing, bad enough favoring legacies but "lineage" makes it sound like they really think these people are somehow
by ren_engineer 5y ago
>lineage
just the way they refer to it is disturbing, bad enough favoring legacies but "lineage" makes it sound like they really think these people are somehow superior based on their bloodline. The new nobility, how dare these serfs with good test scores defile our institutions!
- halfmatthalfcat 5y agoIs a Harvard education really that spectacular anymore or is it more a social indicator? Feels like it’s prominence has wained over the past couple decades.
- DarylZero 5y agoThe education is probably nothing special but it's more about the social network.
- Jtype 5y agoIf you cut down on legacies then you lose the advantage of the social network. Kind of a catch-22.
- nitrogen 5y agoNot entirely. If the selection process ensures that the brightest (and luckiest) minds are all together, they will still be able to benefit one another over time, even if they didn't gain access to capital or connections beyond their cohort.
- brian-armstrong 5y agoAmazing to think that one movie could change a college's appearance so profoundly!
- DarylZero 5y agoWhat movie?
- skyde 5y agoif Harvard is not spectacular then what is? I mean what is replacing it’s role?
- hcurtiss 5y agoMIT
- pirate787 5y agoPrinceton
- sova 5y agoIIT
- selimthegrim 5y agoWhen IIT research is knocking people's socks off, let me know.
- sova 5y agoI was thinking more about power shifts, not inequitable comparisons :D
- xapata 5y agoIt is not clear that formal education in general is a causal factor for lifetime income, or merely a symptom of the same underlying cause(s).
- dragonwriter 5y ago> Is a Harvard education really that spectacular anymore or is it more a social indicator? Harvard has always been a social indicator that is also decent educationally in some areas (but not, AFAIK, superlative in any undergraduate field.)
- commandlinefan 5y ago> how dare these serfs with good test scores defile our institutions It's worth noting that the term "meritocracy" was actually coined by somebody criticizing the serfs defiling sacred institutions.
- recursive 5y agoI still haven't figured out why meritocracy is supposed to be a bad thing or exactly what is going on with it.
- pphysch 5y agoMeritocracy requires established experts to select candidates based on merit, which is quite different from the masses selecting candidates based on popularity (democracy).
- hpoe 5y agoI disagree with the experts part, after all under meritocracy Einstein is the greatest scientific mind of the 20th century however he wasn't even able to get a job in academia until after he produced ground breaking results.
- xapata 5y agoI think that was the implication -- that experts are often wrong. One could go the No True Scotsman route and say that a true expert would occasionally select randomly following a Bayesian Bandit approach for optimal decision-making.
- Glyptodon 5y agoBasically the average person hears it and thinks "smartest/best for the job objectively" which sounds fine, but in practice is often shorthand for "prestigious is better" aristocracy. One of those things where there are multiple levels of interpretation talking past each other.
- api 5y agoIt has more to do with the donations to the university that came from their bloodline predecessors.
- PeterisP 5y agoThey probably believe that their target market (i.e. donors) would consider it an advantage if their offspring would study together with people with "good lineage" (e.g. children of foreign leaders) - and I don't think that they're mistaken, I think that they likely know their market characteristics better than me or you.