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What are these complex decisions? Are politicians hired to debug code? To send rockets to the moon? To discover innovative ways to create profit? No. Polit

What are these complex decisions? Are politicians hired to debug code? To send rockets to the moon? To discover innovative ways to create profit? No. Politicians only have 1 job. Protect the minority from the mob. To ensure neutral refereeing between consensual adults. Thats it. Its not rocket science. In fact i venture that the avg rocket scientist would do a far worse job than your avg joe. Avg joe understands the limits of his intellect and has a healthy respect for the wisdom of crowds. The avg scientist has gone thru life being told how great they are, and now they think they know better than you and me. Kissinger, McNamara, Wolfowitz, Fauci et al believe their hubris to be true and have caused major damage with their decisions.

vineyardmike 5y ago
There are tough decisions. Laws are long and complex, and can have huge second order affects that need to be thought out. > Politicians only have 1 job. Protect the minority from the mob. > has a healthy respect for the wisdom of crowds. But is a politicians job to listen to the wisdom of the crowds? > The avg scientist has gone thru life being told how great they are, and now they think they know better than you and me. I sure trust a scientist more on their area of expertise more than I trust my own knowledge. I think people who rise to the top of their field generally believe their own hubris, not just scientists. Doctors think they can do anything, because becoming a doctor is so hard and well rewarded, engineers think they can solve anything because an engineers job is to solve (a specific subdomain of) things. Whenever an engineer tells me an issue is simple and they have the answer, if it's not their field, then they don't. This doubly applies to comments on HN, which have already solved economics, politics, and healthcare, just to name a few.

vineyardmike 5y ago

There are tough decisions. Laws are long and complex, and can have huge second order affects that need to be thought out. > Politicians only have 1 job. Protect the minority from the mob. > has a healthy respect for the wisdom of crowds. But is a politicians job to listen to the wisdom of the crowds? > The avg scientist has gone thru life being told how great they are, and now they think they know better than you and me. I sure trust a scientist more on their area of expertise more than I trust my own knowledge. I think people who rise to the top of their field generally believe their own hubris, not just scientists. Doctors think they can do anything, because becoming a doctor is so hard and well rewarded, engineers think they can solve anything because an engineers job is to solve (a specific subdomain of) things. Whenever an engineer tells me an issue is simple and they have the answer, if it's not their field, then they don't. This doubly applies to comments on HN, which have already solved economics, politics, and healthcare, just to name a few.