Good point. So far, no one has suggested that professors be selected randomly, but I would not rule it out. Young, who saw the meritocracy as morally corrupting, was enobled and joined the House of Lords!
I agree that the onus is on those proposing to do away with merit-based selection to show that their proposed alternative(s) is/are better. I also agree that many of our academic colleagues are very quick to suggest changes to selection processes that they would not want to see applied to their own profession, though maybe that is an area ripe for overhaul, given it is pretty much the last remaining instance of lifetime job tenure. Was it William Buckley who said “I would rather be governed by the first 2,000 people in the telephone directory than by the Harvard University faculty.”?
Good point. So far, no one has suggested that professors be selected randomly, but I would not rule it out. Young, who saw the meritocracy as morally corrupting, was enobled and joined the House of Lords!
I agree that the onus is on those proposing to do away with merit-based selection to show that their proposed alternative(s) is/are better. I also agree that many of our academic colleagues are very quick to suggest changes to selection processes that they would not want to see applied to their own profession, though maybe that is an area ripe for overhaul, given it is pretty much the last remaining instance of lifetime job tenure. Was it William Buckley who said “I would rather be governed by the first 2,000 people in the telephone directory than by the Harvard University faculty.”?