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James_Miller comments on Open thread, Dec. 29, 2014 - Jan 04, 2015 - Less Wrong Discussion
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It is unfair and perhaps gross, but I still think it's true. For utilitarian reasons, U.S. should prioritize the productivity of high math ability people (who are often nerds) over that of the average citizen.
Please justify your claim.
edit: in particular, in light of the average nerd's reliance on lots of non-nerd workers. (I did just envision a lot of infrastructure that incentivizes nerd support, which I admit I kind of like, but not, I'm afraid, for particularly well-thought-out reasons.)
My claim is that the average nerd creates far more positive externalities through his/her work then the average American does. I do not have rigorous statistics to back this up, but I believe it is probably true because nerds have high IQ and conscientiousness and this is strongly correlated with income (and so taxes paid) and nerds tend to work in STEM fields and these, I believe, have more positive externalties than most fields do, and nerds dominate the software industry and this industry plays a big part in U.S. economic growth and military power. Also, if (like me) you believe that the future of mankind will come down to whether we get friendly AI right, then our species' fate is in the hands of a few ultra-nerds.