[chosenbreed37]

> Just as we break up monopolies to give competition a chance, we should be working hard to break feedback loops that enforce hierarchy of classes so we can give everyone a chance to be successful or fail on their own.

Mmm...with respect to enforced/entrenched class hierarchies you argue that we should break them up. That looks good on paper but when it comes down to it many parents/families who are smart do their utmost to give their children a leg up. Is this not legitimate? Isn't this, generally speaking, how families that have retained status/prosperity across generations?

[idrios]

Just to clarify, I said to break feedback loops that enforce class hierarchy. I agree that parents/families should do their utmost to give their children a leg up, but the game also needs to be fair for all players.

Take universities for example. They're not-for-profit institutions that are dedicated to the pure advancement of knowledge. They're a purely good thing. But as the job market required workers of higher skill and knowledge, and as colleges became a necessity for anyone pursuing a sustainable career, tuition prices rose massively. Wealthy families can still afford university tuition and still have all the opportunities that come with, whereas poor families who don't earn scholarships are left with fewer options.

So universities--which still are a purely good thing--have now enabled a feedback loop for furthering the gap between rich and poor. The solution would never be to break up universities, but to break their role in this feedback loop (by, for example, making them not a prerequisite for employment, or by enabling more universal access).

Likewise, I fear for a future where genetically engineered super humans exist, where they are only born of families who can afford it, where employers will hire with exceeding prejudice in favor of people born this way, where universities will likewise favor people like this, and where the rest of humanity gets left out.