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Lumifer comments on Open thread, Oct. 5 - Oct. 11, 2015 - Less Wrong Discussion
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Ha!
"In this paper, I take the position that a large portion of contemporary academic work is an appalling waste of human intelligence that cannot be justified under any mainstream normative ethics."
Out of Harvard, no less.
Does he know which portion is the waste of intelligence?
You can't know which. You can only infer from the overall effect I'd guess.
I agree. I was flippantly making a point on the lines of this quote
-John Wanamaker-
This assumes that there is a high social opportunity cost to academics' time.
Not quite -- this assumes there is a high opportunity cost to high-IQ people being in academia.
A majority of people in academia don't strike me as actually that high-IQ.
That does not mean their time couldn't be more valuable elsewhere.
Compared to what?
Compared to groups of other people selected for intelligence, like engineers, mathematicians or professional politicians.
What I find remarkable about academics is that they seem to have much longer attention spans than any of these other groups. But in quick learning, logical reasoning or handling unfamiliar information, few academics impress me as much as a typical member of these other groups will.
This is strictly my informal observation, but I've studied and worked in universities for 17 years now, so I do think it is a fairly informed one.