I rather enjoyed this article by Scott Alexander, and I think the world probably needs to do some thinking about expertise.
It is a capability set; it is not a priesthood.
slatestarcodex.com/2020/04/14/a-f…
It is a capability set; it is not a priesthood.
slatestarcodex.com/2020/04/14/a-f…
There’s sort of a narrative recently around “Oh sure, you think a phenomenon can be modeled with high school math. Such simplisme.”
Yep, that thought is wrong, for most things which are not amenable to high school math. But *there is a reason to learn and use high school math.*
Yep, that thought is wrong, for most things which are not amenable to high school math. But *there is a reason to learn and use high school math.*
Probability is another field of math which is very within the reach of a high schooler. It does not perfectly describe the game of poker but is quite useful.
There are poker players who don’t buy probability, as a field. Other poker players love discovering them at their table.
There are poker players who don’t buy probability, as a field. Other poker players love discovering them at their table.
You would think “I seem to be losing to these people deploying probability; perhaps my model ‘the gods are fickle’ needs an update” would convince poker players, but surprisingly even with extremely visible, salient evidence of losing some people, otherwise normal, say “I won.”
Given a much more positive sum domain than poker for correctly predicting future behavior of the universe and adapting to it, I would hope we would not say “Hmm, chip counts are one thing, but let’s compare CVs to determine who actually won here. Listen to them this/next time.”
