Experts don’t just tell us facts; they also offer recommendations as to how to solve individual or social problems. We can often rely on the recommendations even if we don’t understand the underlying analysis, so long as we have picked good experts to rely on.
Experts don’t just tell us facts; they also offer recommendations as to how to solve individual or social problems. We can often rely on the recommendations even if we don’t understand the underlying analysis, so long as we have picked good experts to rely on.
There is a key right there. Ability in rational thinking and understanding of common biasses can drastically impact who we consider as a good expert. The most obvious examples are ‘experts’ in medicine and economics. I suggest that the most influential experts in those fields are not those with the most accurate understanding.
Rationalist training could be expected to improve our judgement when choosing experts.
True. But it is still easier in many cases to pick good experts than to independently assess the validity of expert conclusions. So we might make more overall epistemic advances by a twin focus: (1) Disseminate the techniques for selecting reliable experts, and (2) Design, implement and operate institutions that are better at finding the truth.
Note also that your concern can also be addressed as one subset of institutional design questions: How should we reform fields such as medicine or economics so that influence will better track true expertise?
Experts don’t just tell us facts; they also offer recommendations as to how to solve individual or social problems. We can often rely on the recommendations even if we don’t understand the underlying analysis, so long as we have picked good experts to rely on.
There is a key right there. Ability in rational thinking and understanding of common biasses can drastically impact who we consider as a good expert. The most obvious examples are ‘experts’ in medicine and economics. I suggest that the most influential experts in those fields are not those with the most accurate understanding.
Rationalist training could be expected to improve our judgement when choosing experts.
True. But it is still easier in many cases to pick good experts than to independently assess the validity of expert conclusions. So we might make more overall epistemic advances by a twin focus: (1) Disseminate the techniques for selecting reliable experts, and (2) Design, implement and operate institutions that are better at finding the truth.
Note also that your concern can also be addressed as one subset of institutional design questions: How should we reform fields such as medicine or economics so that influence will better track true expertise?