Meritocracy
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- Опубликовано: 23 авг 2015
- We've been taught to feel very good about the fact that many of our societies are now apparently 'meritocracies.' But the concept of meritocracy is - from close up - rather more peculiar than modern politicians make out.
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I think the video misses an important concept: supply and demand. You may in fact be meritorious, but at something society doesn't value. This is why we have virtuosos busking in subway stations and Indian PHDs driving taxis. A genius in mandolin-playing or a medical degree from India is just simply not in demand at the moment, and there is a large supply. These people don't fail economically because they aren't meritorious, or intelligent or talented. They fail because there simply is limited demand for the thing they are meritorious or talented AT.
+Conor Corrigan -not to argue or anything, but could I get a link to the things you said, "Indians PHDs driving taxis", and " medical degree from India is just simply not in demand at the moment".
***** www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/editorials/overqualified-immigrants-really-are-driving-taxis-in-canada/article4106352/
"Inventively titled Who Drives a Taxi in Canada, the study of 50,000 cab drivers concluded that half are immigrants. Two hundred are doctors or have PhDs, compared with just 55 of their Canadian-born counterparts. Twenty per cent have undergraduate university degrees or master’s, compared with 4 per cent of Canadian-born drivers. One of every three taxi drivers is born in India or Pakistan."
Conor Corrigan
Thanks, I read the report "Who drives a taxi in Canada", while its a good research on the subject, it just fails to list the colleges, these PHDs come from, and as an Indian I can tell you that in my country anyone can have a PHD as long as they have a little extra cash, but here its the University you do it from matters. And these taxi drivers, probably didnt belong to a good on.
But hey, thanks for replying back and have a good day.
Ciao
***** Thanks, that's actually an excellent point- I honestly hadn't considered the varying *quality* of education when applied to immigrant labour. I'm sure a top doctor from India would have no problem finding employment in Canada.
Though, as an Indian, I'm sure you'd prefer your top doctors to stay put! lol.
+Conor Corrigan
Unfortunately, we don't, everything "top" from our country ends up in the west, better living conditions and better pay, and as for these doctors, I'm telling you dude, everyone with enough cash here, can have a piece of paper that says, what you want it to say, you wanna be a doctor, sure give us 70lakhs, engineer 15-20 lakhs, thats why we have a system of entrance exams, for the top talents, that believe me do not drive taxis.
Because personally I am preparing for one of these exams, and in no way will drive a taxi.
But maybe after I get my licence,lol.
The first thing that came to mind when I saw this was motivational speakers and all those motivational videos on here. It seems that they all prescribe to this idea of meritocracy.
Absolutely. The “new age-y” self-help industry is rife with “pull yourself up by your bootstraps, anyone can be a winner” creeds. You believing that is necessary for you to buy their products. This is different from the personal responsibility of William James (father of modern psychology), or the Serenity Prayer said at AA. It is a magical thinking which has you believe that anything is possible, regardless of your present circumstances! This sounds endlessly optimistic, but under the surface, for those who fail, the message can be extremely cruel.
Great video explaining why it is not always fair to judge someone by their failures or struggles. Sometimes people struggle for reasons that are out of their control because of the randomness of life like they talked about. We should do our best to celebrate those who are succeeding without belittling or shaming those who are still struggling.
👌
I live in a poor country, where people hate meritocracy. Although i studied computer engineering, and was at the top of my class and worked very hard, i was never able to find a job. A bunch of my coleagues, who were very incompetent, but had many contacts never went unemployed. It still boggles me, because i was called talented many times, there's demand for my set of skills and i have soft skills as well, but i cannot find a job.
What do you think the reason behind it?
It is not what you know but who you know. I found this out in my first job.
@@computerscience473 it is because of connections. You rather want to hire someone you know than someone you dont know, comfort zone. Believe me i live in switzerland and everything is based on that
@@confiance1492 bingo, connections is a valuable tool that can be used by anyone no matter how competent or incompetent they are. It's also why Nepotism is a major issue, their connections with their families who succeed or can give them positions.
@@gamechanger8908 and that is the whole point of humanity living in an endless cycle of sin. If a Man of excellence who deserves his high status profile and wealth is giving to his children or beloved without him passing wisdom and put them to the test for his legacy, then people will be entitled and entitlement leads to comfort zone and sloth and that is making society weak. what we need is a justice section not bound to the government, solely for moral justice who is higher than government in order to punish corrupt politician corrupt CEO's, corrupt everything in order to maintain order. we need to battle the 7 sins or accept the cycle and put our faith in god.
Meritocracy started way back during 6th century BCE in China. not from Napoleonic times.
The modern Western tradition started with him. China's system was unrelated to developments in the West during the early nineteenth century,.
If you're talking about the meritocracy the idea it is related. Basically the same idea as Napoleon, officers and authorities should be hired on regard of merits, rather than heritage.
Alex von Seggern + It is very much related. The concept of meritocracy spread from China to British India during the seventeenth century, and then into continental Europe and the United States. With the translation of Confucian texts during the Enlightenment, the concept of a meritocracy reached intellectuals in the West, who saw it as an alternative to the traditional ancient regime of Europe. Voltaire and Francois Quesnay wrote favourably of the idea, with Voltaire claiming that the Chinese had "perfected moral science" and Quesnay advocating an economic and political system modeled after that of the Chinese.
The first European power to implement a successful meritocratic civil service was the British Empire in their administration of India: "company managers hired and promoted employees based on competitive examinations in order to prevent corruption and favoritism." British colonial administrators advocated the spread of the system to the rest of the commonwealth, the most "persistent" of which was Thomas Taylor Meadows, Britain's consul in Guangzhou, China. Meadows successfully argued in his book, published in 1847, that "the long duration of the Chinese empire is solely and altogether owing to the good government which consists in the advancement of men of talent and merit only," and that the British must reform their civil service by making the institution meritocratic. This practice later was adopted in the late nineteenth century by the British mainland, inspired by "Chinese mandarin system."
China didn't measure its time in BCE.
Khangis Khan
how is positive discrimination "great"? how is that meritocratic?
I think positive discrimination is just a smart way of saying equality
+Riley Johnson Equality of outcome and equality of opportunity are two very different things.
+Riley Johnson AFAIK positive discrimination goes against meritocracy. If a company has to have a certain number of employees of black skin color, then they have to prioritize those over people that might be better suited for the job at hand, but aren't black, so they don't get the job.
Alex R Positive discrimination in politics is any policy that is specifically designed to help a small group of society. For example, people who are blind recieve extra aid because is it deemed they need it, but it is, in fact positive discrimination. We might deem this fair, and so it isn't considered controversial. It is not far removed conceptually from any policy that somehow benefits a small group of society, for example landowners or farmers.
Merit, as the video alludes to, is highly political, so saying that positive discrimination is "against meritocracy" is a political statement, not an analytic one. One might claim a semantical argument for such a position, but then one will fail to recognize that the meaning of words are also political. the word "Meritocracy" implies a worldview, a set of positive statements about how to world works, which is why we must also discuss what we think is important, just and fair to use as argument and basis for policy in our society, in addition to what those positive statements are and whether we can verify them empirically or achieve some kind of political concensus.
These discussions and investigations will show what we're really trying to do with our meritocratic policies, and test whether meritocratic policies are good or fair.
xMartyZz I guess "positive discrimination" in the context of a video meant the promotion of the one who possess certain non-conventional ability or preference. For example, the unversity group project is the opportunity for all of its members, but the team have to account for the preferences and abilities of the individuals, so the person with for instance more artistic view or the one enjoying drawing in a notebook during the classes can be encouraged to become a designer or concept developer, even though this can be the less/more significant part of the project, than the responsibilities of others, even though they may not find roles within the project that correspond to their abilities or preferences.
Positive discrimination is the opposite of meritocracy
+James Harold Wilson
Wait then. If 5 compete and 1 in 5 succeeds, that means 4 must fail or fall short, due to their inability to reach the standards of the 1. The 4 will not gain the success of the 1 because as competent as they may be, 1 has proven himself superior.
Please enlighten me. If discrimination (based on applicable ability) is not the proper term for this, then what is?
Yes but meritocracy does not work on its own
James Harold Wilson Don't worry. Positive discrimination does not mean what you think. Look it up!
You're a prejudiced Darwinist. Meritocracy is neither about wilderness nor racism, that's why we need Tools like positive discriminaiton to implement it and make equality of opportunity real. If 5 compete even if one of them coming from the ghetto, is coloured, a muslim or has a "disability" and is the 1st ( of her university )and has better skills than the others she will never have the same professional opportunities as the phallocrat blue bloods living in the City of London or in the 16ème ! Positive discrimination is Nothing but a mere symbolical reparation which aims at fighting the predudices and discriminations that the slaves have had to endure throughout History so as to reproduce the privileges or the 1% er of the 1/5.
???
I would love an updated version of this that highlights how oppression plays into meritocracy. It's not just "random" or "bad luck" that others are actively oppressing people.
JUST FYI: The concept of a meritocracy dates back to Confucius in China. So this whole liberal nonsense about meritocracy being a white supremacist invention is false and the real racists are those that claim meritocracies are "western inventions" that perpetuate racism. #StopAsianHateCrimes
Yea I know right. Historical oppression really held back those Jews and Asians didn't it?
everyone has been oppressed at one point or another. the Irish were indentured servants. people think that's not the same as slavery, but it is exactly what happened to the native americans.
if we were never told how to behave by the english and your culture almost destroyed, ireland would be a pagan paradise.
Our society has cognitive dissonance regarding Meritocracy because we're told to also value Inheritance. For many, life is about eternal improvement, and that includes handing wealth to our descendants.
We value reciprocal friendship and favours in our social circles, which means we're better off than those who don't have these friends. Nepotism makes a mockery of Meritocracy, but these things aren't oppression, per se. What might be described as "failure" is often the result of being ignored when those in more powerful circles hand out favours to the people they know.
I think the author of the piece has failed to take these factors into account and that stating "randomness" and "bad luck" show a lack of insight when it comes to finding an explanation for why Meritocracy doesn't work as we might expect.
@@anredd1 meritocracy is just as stupid in any culture regardless if it was ancient china or modern united states. It could be considered white supremacist in the united states because claiming we live in a meritocratic system when white people in the united states have exponentially benefited through out the history of the country while other races were repeatedly batted down is ignoring the true falsehood of "meritocracy" in the country where ones economic status is most predictable by their parents race and their grandparents race
I feel as though the complaints being made here are more about problems that arise when a society makes the claim of being meritocratic while not actually being meritocratic. In a truly meritocratic society, the only poor people WOULD be those who didn't deserve anything more. The US claims to be meritocratic but one look at the American music industry, for instance, pretty much proves the claim to be false.
Geoff Stockton It's tricky. An argument could be made that knowing people is part of what earns you success.
Geoff Stockton But a truly meritocratic society could only exist in a perfect world, where there is no such thing as chance or risk, what he is saying in the video is that there will always be bad luck and good luck which will affect you no matter your merit or skill. So even in a completely meritocratic society, the most brilliant scientist in the world might be swindled out of all their research and be left broke on the street, or the most imaginative author might have had a broken childhood, robbing them of the confidence and self-esteem necessary to publish one of their books.
A good point made
+MalicProductions An argument can be made that proximity to people and benefiting from it, it is cronyism, a form of privilege and not merit.
Young Hegelian There's a fine line between cronyism and networking. The latter is a skill that often resembles the former when done well.
"And we should retain,a little of the old fashioned modest belief in a distinction between what someone earns and what they´re like as humans"
THIS
love it ^^
If you think about it, meritocracy is only possible for one or two generations: if I work hard/have a great idea and get wealthy, my children will inherit that money, power, connections and my last name. They didn't work for that but still get a head-start compared to others without wealthy parents. It's tricky to create a sustainable meritocracy when inheritance comes into place.
Meritocracy never works. Look at hindu caste system or English class system, all the castes/class speak same language, follow same culture, belong to same race, follow same religion yet the ome of lower class/caste are discriminated, because those in upper class/caste used their inheritance to gain more political and economic power and began a clear bias, the upper caste people in Hindu Caste system claimed themselves to have a lineage to various gods and those in uk class system called themselves blue blooded.
"... a distinction between what someone earns and what they're like as humans." Bravo, a thousand times yes. Also, thank you for this eloquent look at the backhanded side of our meritocratic beliefs along with the dehumanizing and lack of empathy that can arise for those who are so-called "at the bottom." Not everyone not everyone has the same support, not everyone has the same setbacks or pitfalls, not everyone has the same information, not everyone has the same luck, and moreover not everyone starts at the same place. Further, our society is rife with non-meritocratic bits. A little imagination goes a long way to understanding our own positions and the positions of others.
There has never been a true meritocracy, how can you say that equal starting points have existed while inheritance still exists?
Those borne into wealthy families are already at the finish line, while us peasants without a vast inheritance or family network start at or behind the starting line.
The dangerous part of meritocracy is when people claim it to be, when in fact we live in an extremely unmeritocratic system.
Indeed. The system is rigged from the beginning.
Meritocracy isn't social Darwinism. Meritocracy makes no moral proclamations of people's worth based on their job, but simply that the most able should be given the job.
Exactly and the least able should not. (INCLUDING DISABLED PEOPLE) being the LEAST abled.
if(and only if) the deficients deficiency affects that especific job in some way, then yes.most deficients have physical deficiencies, witch dont matter much, since mosts quality jobs nowadays require intelect instead of strengh or speed. and if you have some mental deficiency them A) bad luck ^10 and B) you can still pick up a good job with the correct medication. rare are the cases where a sickness makes you completely unable to work, and in that case theres not much to be done, no matter what society you live in.
edi: english.
I don't understand, are you saying that Darwin's Theory makes moral proclamations or are the two sentences in your comment unrelated? In any case, how is meritocracy not social darwinism?
Keerthana Gurushankar Social Darwinism is NOT Darwinian evolution. 2) Social Darwinism says that everyone is were they deserve to be because of some innate property. The rich are rich because they're better than everyone else. The poor are poor because they're lesser than everyone else. 3) Meritocracy says whom ever is the most qualified (note when I say qualified I mean more than just who has the fanciest degree. I mean who has the skills, the drive, etc.) should get the position.
It's not "able", it's merits.
Merits are the combination of personal virtues and abilities.
Darwinism is set against meritocracy because it is rooted for the congenital acquisitions.
"Positive discrimination"? That is in no way, shape or form meritocratic.
NoctisAugustus constructive criticism???
He's not talking about real meritocracy. To me, this seems more of a corruption tutorial than anything else
Positive discrimination would be if I have someone that doesn’t display the best qualities and capabilities to perform I task I give them, they would be disqualified. Everyone is given equal opportunity to compete for said Task, and given the same education. But if they don’t utilize those resources then I wouldn’t want them perform said task but would suggest an alternative task. A surgeon is given proper education to and acquires the necessary skills, that’s why you go to them and not someone that works out of the back of a mini van.
@@jager0724 He is explaining why real meritocracy doesn't exist.
Meritocracy does not merely fail because of luck. There are a lot of structural non-ramdom factors that make it very hard to achieve, like the inheritance of economic, social,cultural and symbolic capitals, which gives huge head starts to some and huge handicaps to others. That sort of structural inequality of opportunities largely persist in modern societies. Bourdieu has a lot of interesting things to say about this topic. You guys should make a video about him.
Every single (not one, every single) critique of meritocracy is actually directed at the lack of meritocracy. Even this video confuses an age where with think we're completely meritocratic with an actually completely meritocratic age, where you only fail through your actions (a.k.a. A desirable society).
Meritocracy doesn't mean that we attempt judge the merit of people (like God), but instead we judge the merit of the actions of people (like, ya know, judges, which is a role God is okay with).
The problem with competition is there are always more losers than winners, and failure breeds failure as much as success breeds success.
Before the industrial revolution people moved up and down the socioeconomic ladder through meritocracy. The difference now is that the people at the bottom have a much higher standard of living now than back then and so they tend to have more children than those at the top, which is exactly the opposite of the way it had been. This creats a surplus of people at the bottom who have less innate ability on average than those at the top. This imbalance is what causes problems in a meritocracy.
people think that failure is a fatality. Success is a process and not a stagnated finish line, we will be trying to improve ourselves until the day we lack our basic functions.
There are winners and losers at every rung of the meritocratic ladder. It's all relevant to how you rank in relationship to others. The real winners are the ones who don't give up when they fall short of their goals.
@@psychicspy The reason Monopoly sucks is it's too realistic. Except for being able to play again. If you're forced to play, and most people are, you're forced to lose, on average. If all competition is voluntary, that's fine. But my point is, competition increases net suffering if the competition is coercive. Which things like competing for jobs are.
@@marcvesper
I played a lot of Monopoly while growing up despite most often loosing to one of my best friends who I now know was extremely gifted.
Without competition the best and brightest have no hope of reaching positions in society where they can then effect changes that advance our civilization. Most of the suffering that you attribute to competition is really the results of low intelligence, low impulse control, and the environment they create along with a tiny sprinkling of what most people call luck. Good or bad.
A meritocracy wouldn't try to judge whether people are fundamentally good or bad, only if they are fit for the job they're vying for. I don't think it implies taking on a god-like role.
If we assume that luck is equally likely to affect both able and stupid people, I think, a perfect meritocracy is achievable.
We could then look down at failures as a collective entity, but never think poorly of any individual failure.
Excellently put.
Keerthana Gurushankar you simply can't believe both things as truth.
Yes, there have been records in history that several different cultures have practiced meritocracy in collective areas. Range from politics, to culture, to ethnicity etc.
We are still not in a meritocracy world, and sure many people wouldn't want it. Those who are already in top and who gain wealth and resources by means not from themselves.
Meritocracy though goes beyond that , I suggest you read the book "the rise of meritocracy "- by sociologist Michael Young That's where the term comes from, it's a lot more extreme merit based system than "fit for the job" criteria, it's more like the idea that jobs require an elite standard that the ability and effort of average people can't compete wit so there's a social dramatic divide of poor people "dummies" vs rich "smarties" people. In his book the higher jobs and educational opportunities are mostly reserved for 130 IQ plus
Yes, a meritocracy is the best system, but that should also be included in the voting system. Only rational people should be allowed to vote democratically.
I stopped watching at "good things like positive discrimination".
yeah like wtf did they mean by that....???
@@gubblebubble3976 Things like affirmative action. Rewarding people if they belong to a group that's been discriminated against and punishing other groups that haven't been.
Fascinating. I tend to lean more towards favoring a meritocracy, but this piece has raised some excellent and important questions that I will need to think more about. I'm actually quite excited at the prospect of learning what my answers will be, and if they will change my way of thinking. I really love this channel and the way it forces me to constantly reevaluate my positions on things. With every video, I feel as though I'm learning something new. Not necessarily because of new information being presented, but because of new questions I had not thought of - through which I can then explore new possibilities.
That last sentence feels very good and right.
I think John Rawls would have something to say here. This idea that humans are to be measure and judged by their ability to consume is disgusting.
Hooga I am not a fan of the state, but the veil of ignorance is a great contribution. I don't have to agree with or even like a person, to acknowledge a good idea. Rawls' ideas about fairness are pretty good. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.
The entire way we view the world is wrong. We live in a society where our very survival is linked to our ability to consume. We are slaves to this system, we worry that some of our needs will be neglected in order to meet the needs of others, etc.
Someday, far off in the future, perhaps we will recover from the psychological and sociological damage of capitalism and corporatism. We can build a money-less society with horizontal leadership and where the point of life is the develop our minds and creativity. But until that day we will fight and argue over crumbs like so many seagulls, in the bleacher seats after a ball game.
Hooga I believe he prefaced your point with "The entire way we view the world is wrong", just saying.
Ahh yes I can only see half the color spectrum too *I can't even*
I suppose it to be a measure.
Exactly, thanks for explaining it so well for everybody. On one side, I'm convinced, there's our Karma and its results, which each person is directly responsible for. But life is much more complex and there are many other (some of which indeed very random) forces that determine the exact circumstances of our lives. If you make every right choice in thought, speech and action in your entire life, you might still get cancer, die in a plane crash, or be cheated by friends or colleagues who go on to become the CEOs of the worlds biggest companies, while you remain a "peasant".
The problem with the idea in this is that you assume we already have a meritocracy, we don't, mostly due to family really, inherited money, contacts, power etc. And since we don't have a meritocracy those worse off don't deserve it and I don't think most would argue they do. Also the idea that jobs or money have moral connotations I think is fairly silly, I'd say the "old fashioned" idea of being a good person being separate from success is still held by many if not most and even were it not is not a necessary result of a meritocratic system (as long as it's not an economic meritocracy). Also I'd argue that a meritocracy doesn't have to be an economic meritocracy, one could run a meritocracy where people do the job they are best at and enjoy most but also have a more socialist economic model. Also you switch part way through the video from talking about a general meritocracy (which I think most would argue for) to an economic meritocracy (which, though many would argue for it, not all would)
***** I may have misunderstood it but it certainly seemed to be saying belief in a meritocracy is flawed because some people fail and their failure is their fault too. And it seems to imply that we have a meritocracy or if not in one there would still be failures. The point about switching from discussing meritocracy in general to economic meritocracy still stands.
Wilf Shaw Many do view people by their economic background... extensively.
Bob Jove ,yeah, but that is not meritocracy....
***** , so meritocracy is flawed because poor ppl have no one to blame for their failure.
But meritocracy also gives a chance to a poor personne to succede, while other systems do not ofer any way out for theese poor ppl.
So wich one do you think is less flawed ?
.. anyway, what we have is the worsed combination...ppl THINK we live in a meritocracy , so poor ppl are blamed for their poverty, when in fact all wealth is inhereted and there is no way out from poverty for the majority...
+speedy "But meritocracy also gives a chance to a poor personne to succede, while other systems do not ofer any way out for theese poor ppl."
"gives a chance", or in other words, depends on a significant amount of *luck*. And you haven't identified *which* other systems-- certainly a system with a functioning safety net can mitigate the problems with luck. In addition, not everyone has the same ability-- though you could argue that the amount of ability one has is also largely due to luck-- not everyone gets to have a high IQ. How is the poor person with a low IQ able to utilize the "chance to succeed" in a meritocracy? Should all stupid people simply be poor, as punishment for something they may have no control over whatsoever?
"So which one do you think is less flawed?"
It's NOT the one that presumes that "giving a chance to a poor person to succeed," is sufficient to solve the problems inherent in luck and ability, that's for certain.
the problem is we dont start on equal footing. so a disadvantaged person may have the innate ability to become "successful" but may not have the resources/opportunities to achieve that success.
Tahirah M Sounds like capitalism
You could also argue that people who are born into wealthier families do not feel like they need to work hard because they will be supported by inheritance, so it works both ways.
Lottery winners don't invest well. Neither do people who inherit wealth and they lose that wealth (for the most part). In pure, non-cronyistic capitalism, those who know what to make and how to make it well will succeed and those who don't, won't. At a quicker rate then now, because now you can get lobbyists to turn government power against your competitors and people have no choice but to pay you because you have a monopoly.
Yes, to approach the meritocracy, the inheritance system must be destroyed. But that would be extremely hard, to dispose a system humans have practiced thousands of years.
Can u clarify on "equal footing"? In a country where everyone had access to free or at least subsidised education, there's no reason to blame on one's supposed incompetence if you're just lazy to learn.
The illusion of meritocracy where there really is none is pretty toxic. Those with REAL merit do things to benefit the WHOLE of society, rather than just themselves.
dangerouslytalented I believe society should be tailored so that such greed benefits the whole. Expecting people to be good for good's sake is nice, but not every rich guy out there can play at being the next Carnegie or Nobel. Goodness as a byproduct should be the number one goal of modern society.
I've seen this message on Meritocracy in at least 10 iterations. While it does bear repetition in some senses, one question I'm always left with is: how can we be expected to judge others based on their human decency, rather than ostensible material traits? I agree: bling is a horrible measure of the worth of a person, however, on the flip side, we can't realistically just "assume the good" in everyone and not judge; nor can we possibly know how good a person is based on a few interactions. As long as "hard work" or the cunning to hoard enough money to look as though one has worked hard is our yardstick, the poor, disabled and unemployed will always look reprehensibly "idle". We have the ability to offer secure and basic education, housing and nourishment to everyone--but because these things continue to be privatized and monetized, the inequality that comes from this system distracts everyone away from developing their soul, for a change.
But wait a minute! If everyone believed this video it would lead to the establishment of social safety nets, a certain minimum degree of financial security for everyone and the acceptance that we have a moral responsibility beyond just looking out for ourselves. And that would mean that some billionaires might have to settle for being multi-millionaires because of higher taxation. And we can't have that, now can we?!
llaauuddrruupp
If there was acceptance about a moral responsibility beyond looking out for oneself, higher taxation would be unnecessary. Likewise probably with the social safety nets and financial security. But this comes with its own problems. Humans just keep evolving in consciousness and we should try to always adapt our societal framework around that.
llaauuddrruupp It's entirely up to them what they should or should not settle for. It would be naive to think that billionaires would settle for multi-millionaire status simply for the benefit of those who, as automation becomes ubiquitous, are only going to grow less useful to society at large. There is room for idealism but you can't just mandate extra theft without expecting rebellion from those who, as per the logic of the video, are clearly our superiors in some way in addition to wealth.
I'd say that the point of the video is that, beyond wealth, rich people are NOT superior. Note where the narrator mentions how random outcomes are. Rebellion? How are they going to rebel? By shutting down production and klling their cash cow along with it? Assuming the rejection of the meritocratic mindset would be global, they would have nowhere to go and no choice but to keep going under the conditions the majority sets for them. Also, you haven't seen a rebellion before the hungry, oppressed masses have finally had enough of starvation wages and disrespect from the upper classes and decide to take matters into their own hands.
llaauuddrruupp A global adoption or rejection of any singular idea is possible, as long as there are more than one civilization left alive on the planet there will be a place for the wealthy to run to. They would rebel by saving as much of their wealth from the unwashed masses as possible before moving on to more favorable environments. Either the plants would be put on hold until the laws once again favored them; best case scenario they would be leased or sold.
The rebellions of the poor and hungry will be undermined at every turn by the wealthy and the intellectual now. Current trends point to leaderless movements and leaderless movements lead to infighting. Just look at how effortlessly Occupy Wall Street was reduced to debates about who was more oppressed while the media screamed communism. Then compare that to the Tea Party movement being pegged as a gaggle of racists even though the picture they used of a man open carrying his assault rifle happened to be conveniently cropped so as to avoid showing the fact that he was black right as hardcore religious minded folks co-opted it in much the same fashion as the race baiters managed to do in Occupy.
A revolution is possible perhaps, but so far the last few attempts by the United States have started out limp wristed and easily undermined.
And the point of a meritocracy is that the rich by definition would be the ones who were superior in the most number of ways. Or at least in the most important ways. The video brought up luck in passing and pointed out that as society grows more meritocratic minded we tend to ignore this luck, but it would be short sighted to claim that luck was the only thing on the side of the rich. Being able to play or game the system requires a drive that most people, myself included, do not have. To simply write them off as the same as the rest of us only more powerful is to do yourself and any movements you support a disservice. If the rich are to be your enemy then you should at least treat them with enough respect to know that they are fully aware of the potential revolt of the lower class and will do everything in their power to stop those revolts from gaining any traction.
+MalicProductions They'll run? Rubbish. Those who want to make money will begin to make what money they can even if this is less than they are used to. Those that do run can be replaced. You just have to have the right policies in place.
Those who are advantaged are not generally superior they are usually just privileged or lucky. EG. Bill Gates... perfect place at perfect time because mom could afford that private school. After all there would be a factory available, possibly with a skilled and/or trained workforce ready to go.
Taxes are not theft. They are the price of civilization.
Though you go into it a bit you forgot to mention that for society to be truly meritocratic you would have to take children away from their parents because it can be seen that which school you go to is a big factor in life
Very glad I stumbled over this channel, keep up the good work 👍🏻
Although I am strongly in favor of it, isn't meritocracy a contradiction in itself?
Say for example you are born to a man of merit, who earns well and can afford you a comfortable life and decent education. Now obviously you need good education to land a good job. So you are sent to an expensive school and later an expensive college. Now why are these institutions more expensive than others? Because their more meritorious teachers merit higher salaries, as do their administrators, management etc. So you are more fortunate than a more meritorious child born to a less meritorious father. Isn't that contradiction ?
ALSO, the case of marriage. Suppose a meritorious woman works hard and earns herself a decent living. But she falls in love with and marries a far less deserving man, thus allowing him to enjoy a privileged lifestyle he could have never attained on his own merit. Isn't that another contradiction?
i mean lol no shit? you've just discovered M A R X I S T thinking
That is not a contradiction but a continuity of itself. Meritocracy literally acknowledges that. And sees the reward of benefiting your children or loved ones as part of that incentivization to do better. if not, are you implying that money should only be spent on yourself, and disappear with you into death?
In fact, in the world's most successful meritocracy, Singapore, what they do is to prevent you for inheriting far too much, by limiting housing ownership to 99 years, increasing inheritance taxes, scrapping cars once they reach 10 years on the road, creating quotas for elite schools to accept non-affiliated members of society. This means that people and future generations have to continuously work to be able to share this society, and to be able to own a home and assets.
Meritocracy is not a ground-zero, where everybody has the same starting point. It accepts inequalities, as does Singapore. It wants to create an equality of opportunities, a desirable outcome, but not necessarily one where you can ever achieve, and that is where the pullback by the government is done to regulate the system. Anybody who looks at a system at its extreme end, is missing the point about systems. They can be tailor made to your society's starting point, progress, maturity, resources and education.
In meritocracy if you create enough value to let it flow down to your family members, that's what you earned. Just as much as the government is there to ensure inclusivity, and to provide a trampoline for the lower-income and less fortunate to jump.
It is not there to EQUAL the difficulty setting. If you're born poor, you still have to work harder than your peers to get where you are. If you're born stupid, you still have to put in the extra effort to study, to get good grades. but that's where personal responsibility and fate come in.
Meritocracy is not a stand alone.
This is just a way of thinking, there would still have work to do in the government system to get to that ideal as close as possible. Actions they could take to do so is forcing separate goods (not being able to share money) as a couple or with children, making it illegal to have “privileges” for association, taking in count that every individual must earn his own value. Which would also be questionable, because there wouldn’t be 100% freedom, but that doesn’t mean less opportunity. In fact, that reminds me a little to Communist/Socialist idealism but with a twist to it. Same thing would happen to schools, there would only be a unified public educational system, and not private, because otherwise, those differences would occur. Pretty much all businesses would be supervised to assure that everything is “fair” and according to the “system”.
I've had arguments with people over disability who will absolutely refuse to see that not everyone is created equal, at least mentally. (They are willing to concede that some people who are born without an arm or leg may be at a disadvantage.) The biggest problem with the idea of meritocracy is that it rewards people for their results, not their efforts and then assigns a moral designation based on 'success'. There is obviously a bell curve for intelligence that has something to do with genetics, and something to do with nutrition and something to do with socialization, and even something to do with effort spent trying to educate yourself, but in the end it's still possible to get access to all the best environmental advantages and the best attitude towards work and still not wind up being a genius, or even average intelligence.
I can't think of an economic model that could reliably reward people for putting in their best effort. There are too many variables, but I'd really rather define merit based on goodness and effort over talent.
I'd rather define it on competence.
correct.
Positive discrimination is frankly condescending. Lowering standards for certain jobs, being treated like you're unable to perform as well as you white male peers just because of the way you were born and need an extra help? that's discrimination alright. I'd rather be poor than be patronised.
+Paul Olsen Yeah, actually this IS a SJW channel.
All I see are strawman and ad-hominem fallacies.
Rejecting reason in favor of name calling and missing the point.
+Paul Olsen What does SJW stand for?
Nick C Social Justice Warriors - often used in a derogatory way to refer to over sensitive collectivists who find offense in everything, believe in patriarchy, white privilege etc.
Confuzzled Tomato Not quite...
But nice spin, implying patriarchy and white privilege aren't real.
It isn't "often" used in a derogatory way. It is straight up derogatory.
Social Justice Warrior is a pejorative label applied to bloggers, activists and commentators who are prone to engage in lengthy and hostile debates against others on a range of issues concerning social injustice, identity politics and political correctness. In contrast to the social justice blogosphere at large, the stereotype of a social justice warrior is distinguished by the use of overzealous and self-righteous rhetorics, as well as appealing to emotions over logic and reason.
An SJW could just as easily argue against feminism or racism, as they could argue in favor for. It's a remark on the method of argumentation, rather than a remark on the argument itself.
profound! i never looked at it this way, never thought there was a flipside to meritocracy
There is one side of the argument that has been overlooked and is that even though every goal can't be achieved and we are all subjected to our limitations and circumstances we shouldn't simply give up and blame society for everything because that way you become fully dependant on others as if life should be framed under a sort of social justice while stripping away the power to better your situation by yourself because why should you? If life is unfair and society owes you everything then why work or make and effort to achieve anything, life becomes meaningless. Both sides of the argument are wrong, the blind meritocracy and the anti-meritocracy, we should aim for a society that embraces compassion and cooperation, aiming its efforts so the playing field is leveled and the basic needs are met , where opportunities are available for everyone and people wouldn't starve or die from thirst.
I think I understand your point of view: Meritocracy is a great romantic belief which works perfectly as a simple idea on paper,
but as my Dad says, "Sh*t happens". :)
Merit is largely subjective. It's generally determined by cultural values. Our culture here in Britain tends to value superficial things like having a mortgage. driving a car, earning money, being normal and contributing tax to the system regardless of whether or not this social schema is wise or healthy.
Too few people question their social and cultural environments. Too few people question the assumptions that underpin our culture and society.
Isn't it about time we did?
Then all you would need to do is arrange a civil standard that "merits" something other than paying taxes and driving cars. Done.
How do you reconcile "positive discrimination" with meritocracy?
Thanks for this great video!
A little talk on ex ante and ex post (re-)distribution of opportunity (goods as well as wisdom) in the sense of meritocracy vs other systems such as an eqalitarian view would be welcome.
Positive discrimination is so hated because it affects everyone, and the majority is affected negatively. The whole Idea of affirmative action is to help the "unfortunate" get the same opportunities as the "fortunate". Looking from the point of view of the "fortunate" it's preety frustrating witnessing people who did little to no work to get that job or whatever when you worked so hard. Looking from the point of view of the "unfortunate" it's an immense opportunity, without which many would live much worse lives.
So you want to get a job? The employer judges your merit by a large amount of criteeria: education, criminal background, social skills etc. Most people take for granted the fact that most of these factors aren't entirely their "merit". A child raised in the ghetto hasn't had the possibility for a good education or development of social skills. Maybe he tried harder than most of us, maybe he "deserved" to get in a prestigeous college, but the circumstances made it too hard for him to "succed" soley based on "merit". The point is that for a meritocracy to even be possible, all must start from exactly the same point,only then will it be possible to judge ones true merit.
Is it Ukrainian painting at 00:35? I if is - its a really grate cheer to todays Ukrainian Independence Day, Thanks!!!
Sharif S LOL
Sharif S Илья Репин, Украинка у плетня.
Konstantin Konev Спасибо, замечательная картина!
Alexei Babich Thanks!
+Sharif S do you know the artist's name?
Alan's voice has taken a deeper sexier approach to exploring grand ideas today, am I the only one who noticed the coldy undertones
Ya with meritocracy, the questions are: 1) which qualities constitutes "merit"; 2) who has the right to determine what constitutes "merit"; and 3) can the crucial component of opportunities be fairly made available to all -- since opportunities for merit can be leveraged to become tools of those who attained merit, against those who have not attained merit.
Is quite hard to discuss meritocracy when people doesn't have equal opportunities in their lives and most politicians and not willing to discuss this aspect. How can a teenager born and raised on the slums in Rio de Janeiro or Nairobi be able to compare with a teenager who study on a Ivy League school when trying to establish itself in a academic career for example? To be able to have a true meritocracy you must establish true equality between all people, otherwise the meritocracy fallacy will only perpetuate inequality, inequality like the one in the US for example.
Judging people according to their status or income is the ultimate superficiality. And in case you consider yourself somewhat better off , there is an incredible vanity in assuming that you made it all by yourself. Because if you think long enough about it, in every success you had there is the work and sacrifice of so many people in your life who contributed to it.
In fact it is a good exercise in gratefulness to sit down and write their names on a paper. You will feel eternally in debt. The next step would be to imagine that there are so many people in this world who just didn't have any of it. They didn't have that wonderful sister who were always there for you, the teacher who gave everything so that you and all his students could be even better than him, the doctor who diagnosed the disease no other doctor could and saved your life, the woman who trusted you and rented her apartment to you even though you didn't have a proper job as a student, the lady at the foreigners office who arranged your papers, people you met by chance who ended up being your friends for life...
This is all incredible good luck. That's why rather than looking down on people who were just unfortunate, we must feel like we owe them something, since they didn't have all that we had.
For friends who want to learn and think more on the subject I highly recommend the documentary" Status Anxiety " which is on youtube, the wonderful book with the same name ( which was a number one international bestseller) and the TED Talk
" A kinder, gentler philosophy of success". All of them by Alain de Botton .
Hi, I saw some of your comments on The School of Life RUclips channel and you seem very interesting (more specifically, I am talking about the ones on the Hagel video). I have lived in Germany and know exactly what you mean... I am absolutely fascinated by The School. As an engineering student, what a great way to learn more about Philosophy and beyond. Maybe someday, sometime, we could chat/ discuss about some of the videos/ topics. Feel to shoot me an email: matfsi@gmail.com
All the best :)
+Lua Veli I would love to meet you sometime in Germany too Lua! ;)
+Matheus Silva Dear Matheus and Rebecca, very sorry for my late reply. It's because I always want to write back properly and wait for a better and calmer time which never comes!
I think both of you are from Brazil. If you come to this part of the world sometime, send me a message. I will make you a tea. I live in the German city most populated with Brazilians ( Cologne) . I have clearly noticed this, on the day Germany won that football game during the world cup.... I have never seen so many sad faces behind Brazilian flags on the streets before... But they are all safe and back to life now:-)
Anyway, thank you so much for reading what I sometimes write. Best wishes. Um abraço!
Um abraço, que fofa *-* Thanks Lua!
yeah that was a hard time for us,football means a lot to our self image unfortunately, because we have so many challenges football offers a escape, something we were successful at,and the loss of another star in a year marked by protests and a hard time in our economy really broke our heart....but I'm sure everything will be fine soon! I'm backpacking in Europe next year and I haven't think about Cologne but that would be fun! I can bring you some good Bossa nova discos and you can enlighten me with your eloquence! Um beijo :*
+Rebecca Monroe Hey Rebbeca, don't worry about the CD's. I have a Brazilian friend here who has a huge archive. She always copies stuff for me. Let me know when you are around. Have a nice weekend!
The odd thing about this video is that seems to both at once buy into and fight against the idea that wealth = personal value. We can have an economic meritocracy, where wealth is distributed based on economic merit, and still not base our value judgments on a person's wealth. A wonderful person may choose not to chase after wealth and still be deemed wonderful by society at large, without doing away with the concept of a meritocracy.
Could some kind soul please inform me of the painting shown at 4:44?
Much appreciated!
"Bad Luck" can be used as an excuse for not working hard enough. If you were born in a poor family, that doesn't mean that you will be poor too when you grow up. I belive that everyone can live a decent life if they work hard enough.
People are not equal, they have never been, but what that gives us is greater variety in skill.
For example a poor person will probably have more empathy, a rich person will disregard money entirely(because of the huge amounts of money they have). A person is better at cooking, one at driving, one at math and so on.
Because everyone is good at something, everyone can make a living.
*Meritocracy* doesn't mean not having empathy for someone who *can't do* something, it means not having empathy for someone who *doesn't want to*.
Have a too large middle class, and it will flatten out via liberal market, the winners have only been lucky to be first to grab the gains.
Everything , intelligence , physical health and beauty , stamina and being born into the right family etc : depends totally on luck
Ever heard of STOICISM
I've had unbelievably good luck, I came from abuse and shouldn't be where I am now, this video is correct in saying luck and contacts have a lot to do with it. But that being said once I started being good to others selflessly is when my luck skyrocketed, there's no science to it. But it was very true . U get back what you put out
"The man who has much has often earned every bit of it. The man who has little has often earned every bit of it. May every man be rewarded commensurately in accordance with their contribution."
0:14 "This is a beautiful idea responsible for some good things... positive discrimination"
Positive discrimination is still discrimination.
Yeah, but would you rather have a trained pilot in the cockpit of your aircraft, or a toddler?
What? You'd rather have a trainrd pilot? That's discrimination against babies who want to work as pilots without training!
Discrimination based on skill isn't bad. Discrimination based on things like race, sex, religion, and looks is usually bad.
why using "I want to look intelligent, I want to be taken as a serious philosopher" sentences?? You should make a video about these kind of "trying to look like a philosopher" persons
I want a video about the people using the word "haphazardly" in order to look like a philosopher.
Could you guys please give us the options of subtitles?
Sometimes I find it hard to understand
(Not expert in english yet) I believe that the LUCK factor exists, i also believe that every person forges his own luck, i have read a lot of books that describe this fact in so many ways, but i've also seen it in real and proved it in my experience aswell. Meritocracy, i believe, it's not only necessary but indispensable to have a great civilization going. I also know that the world isnt fare, sometimes we deserve success but it's taken from us, life is much more harder for some and much more easy and happy to others, that's life. But no matter what state we are in, we always have an almost complete level of control over ourselves and a certain level of it over the exterior circumstances. Therefore, we can push forward to success no matter what, we just have to work in our circle of influence (Stephen Covey), and it eventually grows.
¿Is that easy? perhaps not, and sometimes it looks like it's impossible, but we keep working in ourselves even harder, so we can support, each time, even colder winters (Jim Rohn). An image that I downloaded recently says "If i work hard, i dont have success warranteed, but if i dont work hard, i have failure warranteed. That's the best summary for personal philosophy in my belief.
For example, i'm from Venezuela, i'm native in Spanish, but i work hard to dominate english, both spoken and writen. I chose that, nobody told me, many of my classmates can do exactly the same effort i'm doing, but the they choose not to do so, that's their choise, their life. Ive readed almost 40 books, some of my classmates read more, but the most of them, couldnt be bothered. That's life, that's choice. And we cannot change them, people has to change themselves.
Also, i understand that i can read 100 books, but one of those persons that never reads, could get a better position in life, because i also understand that this is the society i live in. In my country, Meritocracy cant be found nowhere, here predominates the influences and relationships 150% more than any other part of the world, in my believe. But i'm mentaly prepared for that and i work harder and harder every time to make that particular point, less and less important, as my capabilities, vision, strategy and action capacity grows in time. That's why i believe success is inevitable to everyone if they commited to work hard on themselves.
Regards
Brilliant explained. It's impossible to get 100 % meritocratic, because of the randomness of the world. But getting more meritocratic than we currently are is therefore a good step.
Greenland
Umm, no; you just include a degree of randomness to the idea of meritocracy as explained here
arxiv.org/abs/0907.0455
which covers problems with meritocracy such as criteria may not be reflective of performance, hierarchical structures invariably lead to the Peter Principle (and by my estimation are inherent to hierarchies in general), and plain old corruption that develops within any power structure.
Sadly none of this was touched upon in the vid, instead concentrating on removing agency from people despite bad luck, and not critiquing the structures themselves which are a large source of the problems.
In other words, randomness must be a part of any meritocracy, very much in the tradition of Rawls's veil of ignorance
I don't think I necessarily agree with the darkside of meritocracy point, and here's why: Firstly, the definition of success is based on what an individual believes is successful, or a worthy ideal. I have some friends who have humble ambitions and are truly satisfied with them. Second, in a meritocracy, I would think that people nearer the "top" would be smart enough to know that there will be a lot of people who have not yet "made it" simply because they lack the know-how or tools to do so. Not to say that they will forever lack those things, just at their current moment of "failure". A true meritocracy would strive to balance the scale of resources as well. It won't be a true meritocracy until the game is fair for all players across the board, not simply because the game can be won. Some people do start closer to the top than others. Give it time though.
at the heart of these kinds of arguments lie some pretty grand implications that unfortunately tend to go unaddressed. 'Whether or not people have free will' seems to be the hidden point of divergence in this case.
"...among other things" I would've added at the end there. It's not all economic. So much of it is emotional.
positive discrimination is a good thing? are you on drugs?!
Not really, meritocracy imply an equality at the begining. If there is no equality, there is no meritocracy, because some have more work and more distance to travel.
Positive discrimination and meritocracy described as one concept is a paradox.
Rogsterius Ideally it shouldn't be. Take for instance handicap accessibility enabling Stephen Hawking into a university to lecture. The concept has been abused as of late however.
+Rex Irkalla Not really. "Positive discrimination" is a way for a society to transition from being a non-meritocracy to a meritocracy. Since no society has done that in human history, there is controversy regarding whether or not these measures should be permanent or temporary. In addition, there is no real way for us to determine exactly when different social groups (in the USA's case, ethnic groups) are on the same playing field. So if one would say that positive discrimination should be temporary, the question of when to end it comes up. In conclusion, a meritocracy itself would not apply Positive Discrimination, but a society transitioning to a meritocracy might.
In order for a society to be a true meritocracy, merit should be the only definer of success and wealth. However, modern human society does not currently have merit as the sole criterion of success. Therefore, in order to establish a perfect meritocracy, we need to have everyone start from the same point. Positive discrimination, though not perfect, is a decent attempt to give easier access to institutions for the poor. In time, the people who were poor due to bad luck would be able to find success under this access, while those who lost because of less than savory life decisions will stay at the bottom. Again, it is not perfect. It does have flaws, but it is in place to counteract previous unmeritocratic actions.
Stephan Popa A meritocratic system takes no consideration to how someone achieved their ability to produce profit. As every system I can think of, it sure has its drawbacks. But the prime advantage of such a system is far more important; that is: you will never be discriminated against when you're in fact the most eligible applicant.
+Stephan Popa THANK YOU
This does a good job of explaining meritocracy in a macro sense but what about in a company. One situation does not equate to another
Merit isn't in the individual alone. Its something that has to be recognized from the outside. I don't think its too much to say that one can have merit in ways that others choose not to recognize, or are simply unable to. That being said, it could be the case that one's poor position is due to others not seeing the value of their merit and not just because they lack a merit in itself
possitive discrimination aka affirmative action is positive?
the thing is, is that affirmative action will, in the long term, cause every race, sex and everyone else that is being positively discriminated to underperform on average. this means that when affirmative action is a thing, on average, workplaces (or anything else) with for example more blacks, mexicans, women, lgbt's (JUST EXAMPLES, PLEASE DONT LINCH ME) will persorm worse than thier non-discriminative counterparts.
crumble son *lynch, *perform, *their.
+Confuzzled Tomato
you really go through someones comment to find all his typo's and mistakes? I don't even notice someone writing thier instead of their and neither do my fingers realise they pressed the "i" first instead of the "e".
(linch was a pretty stupid mistake though)
Positive discrimination? Seriously?
Maciej Łukasiewicz Angry middle-class white dude detected.
+jacquessayang I'm an angry poor black female and I don't like positive discrimination either, or people like you.
@@humanrays Then you have internalized your own bigotry, thank you.
In an ideal meritocratic society (or as close as you can get to one) what happens to wealth that people's families have made? And how is the government selected? Do people that have contributed more to the society have more say as to who goes into power or would that remain democratic?
No form of discrimination is good, not even if you attach "positive" to it.
Discrimination is how we make all decisions.
positive discrimination is exactly the opposite of a meritocracy
another great video! your videos are always a comfort.
a big chunk of the merited ones, have to deny the "bad luck" variable(i like to call it context)of course is an imperative to them because otherwise they will have to acknowlege that maybe they had had"good luck", and that, god forbid, could cheapen their entitlement, so they viciously attack those below as lazy or undisciplined in order to cloud the mirror and not see how much context has had a hand in their success.
The problem this video is aiming at, yet misses, is that we do not truly live in a meritocracy. Rather, we live in a society that thinks it is meritocratic, yet many people start life at advantages or disadvantages based off things like, the area you grew up in, whether your parents were educated, if you inherited money or even inherited good connections. The fault lies in those who believe we live in an idealized meritocratic society and then go on to blame those who were born disadvantaged for not achieving the same as those born advantaged. In a truly meritocratic society, everyone would have the same quality of education and the same job opportunities, "luck" would be almost irrelevant and nonexistent.
As always, interesting video. But I do want to point out a few deficiencies in its thesis and assumptions.
First, this video conflates Meritocracy as a reality, and PERCEPTION of Meritocracy. The assumption is that we currently live in an economic Meritocracy and therefore that leads to lower empathy among the economically disadvantaged. The point is logical in its own way, but disingenuous to the fact that we do NOT indeed live in a Meritocracy, since those born into advantaged households certainly do have a statistically much higher chance of success than those not. The idea that there is actually a real Meritocracy right now is arguably one of propaganda to justify the current economic paradigm and mask the idea that it is in fact not true as evidenced by the current paradigm of low inheritance taxes, cronyism and nepotism in government and economic disadvantages of the poor.
Second, economic meritocracy is an important, although insufficient factor to consider. What about civic and political Meritocracy? For example, rulers are now voted in by the masses, many of whom are, in our current democratic system, not sufficiently educated enough to make an informed decision, leading to election results being a product of what for all practical purposes is a superficial popularity contest amongst panderers. What if instead, only those who have demonstrated sufficient knowledge of civics, the issues or the like can then EARN the right to vote, thereby elevating elections to high-brow discussions with intellectual honesty and standards? Would not the best (rather than the most superficially popular) lead?
Finally, must Meritocracy be defined merely as the rewarding of merit? What about the cultivating of merit and the rigorous dedication to equal opportunities? The video touched upon this when it described compulsory education. Imagine, for example if education were not supplied by the state, and yet other than that, there was still an economic "meritocracy?" would this not be a pseudo-meritocracy, since the rich would then have the advantage to buy their children the ability to prove their "merit?" Taken to its logical conclusion, an education system that is revolutionary overhauled to increase standards ubiquitously, affording every single citizen the right to ACCESS to voting rights, but whose voting rights are earned nonetheless, would be a CIVIC meritocracy that is surely an upgrade from the current paradigm.
With that said, much respect.
I can summarize everything you said above, bar the last sentence in 1 word. Singapore.
Everyone is responsible for their own lot in life. Meritocracy in today's society simply put; means that if a white man and a black man put in for the same job, and the black man has less credentials than the white man, he should not get the position. Ever hear of the saying, may the better man win? Now I'm
Not saying white men are better, I'm saying the man better qualified deserves the position. If a company chooses to take the less qualified man out of faith in him, that's that companies decision. You shouldn't force minority quotas on companies and tell them, no, you are lawfully obligated to take on this number of minorities and this number of women, even if white men candidates are better qualified. That, simply put, is discrimination. Isn't that what you liberals are against? Meritocracy is a fine model and although we are aware it will never be perfect, it is way more logical and fair than minority quotas.
Equality of opportunity, not equality of outcome. I dig
Research shows overwhelmingly that the most significant determinant of a person's achievement and status is the achievement and status of their parents. That means that achievement can have a burdensome lineage in families.
If there is a justification for "positive discrimination" socioeconomic status of one's family might be a better guide than race, gender, etc. But this is of course much less easily apparent than those characteristics that now determine affirmative action.
I also see meritocracy as a way for people to have jobs and roles in life that are the most fulfilling. The smart and creative have jobs that require those aspects, the hard working and the strong willed people have jobs that require those aspects and the unlucky people that were blessed with no good traits due to nature or nurture should be given jobs that require no skill or talent because it would be cruel to give them a job that they can't handle. Also some collectivist policies will be present in my version of a meritocracy. Because everyone deserves some happiness and some money because being human is being with merit. Charity and meritocracy don't need to be mutually exclusive. It can mean good people who want to help people can get more money to pay to charities based on their merits. In a true meritocracy charities would be paid by the government depending on merit. The charities who do the most good get the most money.
it is possible to have subtitles in portuguese?
Ok, thanks
+The School of Life I can sub the videos in portuguese for you if you want, I`m portuguese.
+The School of Life It would indeed be wonderful if "School of Life" material could be available in more languages. I would very much like to be able to share these videos with my fellow francophones. I would gladly become involved in the translation effort.
+Jonh Snow
We could divide the work.
I'm brazilian and I was meaning to repost some of the videos with subs on my own channel, even though I don't agree with every point on every video, they are still very well explained! Congrats +The School of Life!
+Alisson Carlos Why not practice and improve your English with the videos?
I think meritocracy focus too much on the job and too little on the individual. The biggest problem is that after a long enough period of sorting, merit, however defined, turns out to have a nontrivial heritable component (frequently correlated with IQ).
you are an idiot
ha ha, I love when there is an explanation of something and at just over the 1-minute mark it jumps headfirst into a false binary, [government or the holding of power by people selected on the basis of their ability.] not solely their ability and therefore failures aren't solely their own as well. One could argue that on the spectrum of thinking that "mostly" could be used as a descriptor, but that would require thinking and weighing, kinda like how life actually works.
Hard work and success is still the great equalizer no matter what your circumstances are. Excuses and victim mentality will get you nowhere.
One huge mistake: Western society is not as meritocratic as it likes to claim to be. Social mobility is still small (especially in the US! What American dream?) and the social position and income of parents is by far the most important metric to predict future success.
Add to this the total randomness of so much in life and success becomes just another word for luck.
No society is meritocratic.
Tell that to Kenyan immigrant's son who ended up as US president.
Or a descendant of a barber from Germany who became president as well. USA has enough social mobility.
@@gabbar51ngh : Yeah,er... social mobility is measured over a whole population, not two outliers.
If you look at the changes of an average person born in the lowest income class to make it to middle class the US scores really badly.
Okay, it's time to get real for a second. You have shown several politicians, including Dr. Ben Carson. But you simply didn't show the ONLY American politician that is actively talking about meritocracy; Carly Foirina. I know this is a Europe-based channel, but as an under-construction RUclips channel, this is not the type of mistake someone makes when they have nearly 400,ooo subscribers. (Nice job on approaching 400k, by the way.)
And they showed Hillary Clinton and obama, while they are socially consequentialist and anti meritocratic, especially for government positions and education. This video also seems to imply people should be consequentialist for things they have no relation to
If you had told me that videos about economy,politics,society and philosophy could be this damn interesting I'd have called you a madman.
*had told me two years ago
What is it called when person A makes person B help person C?
i loved the message but the delivery not so much. To me it seems very clear: In a true meritocracy there could be no losers. Per definition. Exactly the same causes (wich is the definition of meritocracy in the way you used the term in the video) will always lead to the same outcomes. Thats physics. (unless you take quantum stuff in account but uh...)
But physics also tells us that this can never be possible, at least not in any way we can imagine.
So there won't ever be a meritocracy.
And there will always be multiple complexly intertwined reasons for anybodys success or faiulure. They break down to luck with your genetics, and luck with your everyday comeup.
Yep
"true" meritocracy. Physics? Do you compare Human society into physics? Are you dumb?
If you know that is true, please provide the proof. It will make you rich for discovering such a revolutionary theory.
Many things in math an d physics actually have unstable outcomes, so you don't know physics and math anyway
PompiTube Biophysics is a thing you know.
What he said is not even true, because physics can lead to several outcomes. Like in unstable state. He knows nothing about math and physics, what a dumbass Darwinist.
PompiTube truth is relative. It doesn't necessarily have to do with Darwinism at all. Reread what he said. Sounds like you can't comprehend what is being said. You are just jumping to conclusions and resort to name calling.
Hilarious number of viewers who took issue with the matter of positive discrimination. Society isn't just a collection of individuals because there are institutions as well. The purpose of things, like affirmative action, are to offset systemic forms of prejudice that are the result of innumerable sociological factors.
Frankly, it seems to me that people who do not understand the value of positive discrimination ought to put some effort into informing such a view with something besides misguided intuition.
Institutions are made up of people, without people there are no institutions. Institutions don't make choices, the individuals that make up that institution do. No individual who hires people in the modern age has thought while reading someones CV "Oh cool, this guy is gonna save the company millions, oh he can program as well? Previous experience in graphic design? That'll be usefu- OH wait, he's brown. I won't hire him." It is naturally disincentivized through how the economy functions.
If someone discriminates against someone who would do a great job because they have the "wrong" skin color and therefore doesn't hire them and hires someone less competent with the "right" skin color, he will be loosing money. Therefore he would want to hire people based on merit, not skill.
Now let's say you have a quota that you have to fill. "30% blue people and 70% green people." You only have 15% blue people. Two people search for the job, but the green guy applying is way more skilled. Now comes the dilemma. Chose based on color or choose based on merit? Now we flip it. The blue guy is more skilled, so you would have chosen him anyway. Those are the two situations that quotas generate. Only one of them where the quota comes in to play, and that one and only time it's nothing but a problem.
And yet a gain, another great video!
Try living in a country with no meritocracy, like Brazil. It's much worse! When the competence hierarchy is messed up, there's nothing left but poverty and chaos. That's much worse than what you've got.
Positive discrimination or affirmative action is a way of redressing the disadvantages caused to people who've been subjected to disadvantages due to historical and current discrimination and systemic injustice. It's a way of fighting discrimination and giving the oppressed room to escape the cycle of oppression, injustice and poverty.
Positive discrimination, are you insane? What you are talking about is treating the majorities as 2nd class citizens by affirmative action and all that. For a channel that advocates so much for thinking, compassion, justice and so on, this, to me, was just awful and revealing of the true underlying ideologies of your channel that I just can't support, so, I'm unsubscribing. You didn't had to include positive discrimination but instead you wanted to peddle your BS.
Also, meritocracy is GOOD because it pressures individuals to not just "work" but to excell, which isn't to say that luck doesn't exist or that "poor people had it coming", there are unlucky people but even those that are just lazy have to be taken care of as human beings that they are, meritocracy can coexist with fair treatment and human rights and so it should.
Shoot for the moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the stars. Shoot for the clouds, and if you miss you'll hit a flagpole.
There's this book called Dice World by Brian Clegg that studies how randomness influences our daily lives. Not that I agree with his reasoning throughout the whole book but he makes some interesting points about success in the very first chapters.
Basically, he states that huge successes are always random. He claims there's no point on trying to be or discover the "next" Steve Jobs or the "next" Shakespeare. Once these individuals become famous we can (and we do) spend hours and hours trying to analyze their habits or how they "did it" but this is mistaking causation and correlation. You only need to reach a certain competence level that will allow you to be really successful and it doesn't matter how much you improve over this "minimum" (He uses the metaphor of a lottery: You need to be good enough to buy the lottery ticket but the rest is a matter of chance). The reason behind this is that success depends on the perception of other people which, in large numbers, is simply random.
While this only applies for huge-worldwide-historical successes it still makes an interesting point about the video. If we were to believe this that gives us a meritocratic system that "works" in the sense that you have people praised for their merits and such. However, it will change the underlying concept of merit being self made with no luck to the exact opposite: it's all a matter of luck. So, luckocracy, anyone?
For some of us, failure is success.
Does this go for cultural status? Like having an artistic career in music or painting?
You could also argue about our lovely, unequal intelligence curve. Its gaussian shape shows that intelligence is not distributed equally and thus some people are born with unfair offsets which is unmeritocratic right from the start: although this may not be the sole reason for one's demise, one cannot deny it plays a great role on it.
Philippe Fanaro K. (btw intelligence is linked to a lot of things. Most agree that it's BS and isn't really reflective of anything. )
Bob Jove Most of our jobs (doctors, engineers, lawyers, etc) nowadays rely on cognitive intelligence, logical argumentation, reasoning; someone with a high IQ should have an advantage then. I would be amazed if you picked up successful people in somewhat stabilished professions and found out that they have below average or even average intelligence. (Please don't include CEOs and the great variety of business assholes we have today, a great many of them only got there through petty crimes, cheating and other types of disloyal attitudes... could one use a high IQ to cheat your way to success? Well, contradict me if you can...)
There are of course other types of intelligences and some professions favor them, those in the service business would benefit from good emotional recognition.
Also, there is a lot of exceptions, but let's just stick to the mean.
The point I'm trying to convey is that intelligence is an advantage: not a necessary condition for success. If you have a source (or even yourself) which contradicts the above, please cite it, I would love to read it (and I mean it, I don't have feelings for my opinions, they are bound to be gone as soon as they become useless).
Philippe Fanaro
A source that contradicts that intelligence is required? I'm not really talking about professions. I'm mostly criticizing the idea itself and am calling for people to question it because of its shaky origins.
Bob Jove Wtf, I didn't say intelligence is required, I said it was an advantage. I mean a source that contradicts that intelligence deeply enhances one's chances of success in whatever the field one chooses.
I even feel inclined to state: if intelligence wouldn't matter, I guess we should give equal rights to apes and alikes... I mean, ultimately, intelligence is what got we humans where we are, and frankly I think someone like Gauss would be able to be successful in any field...
But, whatever, this discussion seems to be going nowhere.
Philippe Fanaro
Tbh I think we're talking about two different things.
So, in light of the arguments going on in the comments section...
+The School of Life what is your definition of "Positive Discrimination"?
Is equality or the idea of being equal a subjective concept?
Thanks for the great video.
Oh this reminds me of that ted talk, you guys should do more of that!
This channel is so great, many thanks 😊😊😊
It should be notes that for you to have merit, your actions inherently have to be more valuable to society, and if your actions are more valuable, you willl receive more economical reward. But, what determines how valuable your actions are? It could be argued that if your actions contribute more to the greater good, they are more valuable, and they should be rewarded on a bigger manner. But, what contributes more to the greater good' What defines what is more important? Many positions could be argued from this questions, and one of them, is that we have been taught to beleive that if a person has more credentials (like a college degree) their actions should have more merit. That is why an accountant gets paid more than a plumber. But, the problem radicates on the fact that for you to acquiere credentials, you need to go to college, and to go to college, you need money. And what happens if you dont have money? Then it will be much more difficult for you to accquire credentials, which predestines you to earn less as your actions will very difficultly be seen as meritorious.
I have to write a 1500 word essay for tomorrow based on meritocracity xd, wish me luck