[PEN-L:28709] Expertise

["Justin Schwartz" <jkschw@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

> Justin Schwartz wrote:
>
> > In my typical, class-blinkered, petty bourgeois manner, I am a real fan of
> > expertise. Democracy has its place, but not in micro-managing the use of
> > real expertise by real experts. There are skills that require long study
> > and constant application to master, and where the opinion of the populace
> > has no damn role, except indirectly in setting general ethical standards
> > and rules and regulations embodied in law. Don't tell me how to manage my
> > shop.
>
> Even if we, as taxpayers, help pay your bills?

Only for another week. Then large evil corporations will help pay my bills.

Pass legislation establishing professional standards and establishing
ethical requirements, then get the hell out of my way. If I were
representing you you would not want all and sundry kibitizing, telling me
how to do my job. Any more than as a journalist you would want all and
sundry telling you (except in the form of letters to the editor) how to do
yours.

> You're a big fan of an abstract quality called intelligence, and you're an
> equally rabid fan of an abstract quality called expertise?

Oh, I see, abstract is bad. Must be unreal. Lucky that labor values are so
concrete, we can all see them.

But seriously, there is no substitute for brains and none for skill and
knowledge either, and everyone here knows it. I do not say there is a single
unitary quantity called intelligence, any more than there is a single
unitary thing called skill. But just because there are multiple and
incommensurable intelligences and skills doesn't mean that it is meaningless
to say that you want the smartest and most skilled carpenter, physician,
attorney, teacher, even journalist, to do the job. No? Or do you say, in
choosing your collaborators, well, I don't believew in abstract quantity
like intelligence or skill, so it really doesn't matter how good my
coworkersa re. Somehow I doubt it.

> Doesn't the demos get any chance to decide where this intelligence and
> expertise are deployed, towards what end,

Sure. In a general way. That has to do with setting legislative and
professional standards.

> and with what reward?

Doug, you are becoming uncharacteristically illiterate. Did I say anything
that implied that expert remuneration ought not be as democractically
determined as anyone's? I was talking about micromanagment by the clueless,
not about pay.


> Or should we trust you just because you're experts?

You don't have much choice, do you? Any more than I have a choice in
trusting my physician or carpenter because s/he's an expert. I mean, sorry,
guy, that's what expertise means, other people know more than we do about
something. Or, more rarely, we know more thanm others.

jks


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