This post’s claim seems to have a strong and weak version, both of which are asserted at different places in the post.
Strong claim: At some level of wealth and power, knowledge is the most common or only bottleneck for achieving one’s goals.
Weak claim: Things money and power cannot obtain can become the bottleneck for achieving one’s goals.
The claim implied by the title is the strong form. Here is a quote representing the weak form:
“As one resource becomes abundant, other resources become bottlenecks. When wealth and power become abundant, anything wealth and power cannot buy become bottlenecks—including knowledge and expertise.”
Of course, knowing arbitrary facts (N values of an infinite sequence of randomly generated numbers) is not what’s meant by “knowledge and expertise.” What is?
I’d suggest “sufficient and necessary knowledge to achieve a given goal.” A person who can achieve a goal, given some reasonable but not excessive amount of time and money, is an expert at achieving that goal.
As others pointed out, just because a person calls themselves an expert in goal G doesn’t mean that they are. John’s point is that being able to identify an expert in goal G, or an expert in identifying experts in goal G, when you yourself wish to achieve goal G, is its own form of expertise.
This in turn suggests that finding, sharing and verifying expertise is a key problem-solving skill. At any given time, we have:
Questions nobody can answer.
Answers nobody can understand.
Answers nobody can verify.
To these short statements, insert the qualifiers “crucial,” “presently,” “efficiently,” and so on. Some of the most important questions are about other questions, such as “what questions should we be asking?”
I expect these problems to be simultaneous and mutually-reinforcing.
This post’s claim seems to have a strong and weak version, both of which are asserted at different places in the post.
Strong claim: At some level of wealth and power, knowledge is the most common or only bottleneck for achieving one’s goals.
Weak claim: Things money and power cannot obtain can become the bottleneck for achieving one’s goals.
The claim implied by the title is the strong form. Here is a quote representing the weak form:
“As one resource becomes abundant, other resources become bottlenecks. When wealth and power become abundant, anything wealth and power cannot buy become bottlenecks—including knowledge and expertise.”
Of course, knowing arbitrary facts (N values of an infinite sequence of randomly generated numbers) is not what’s meant by “knowledge and expertise.” What is?
I’d suggest “sufficient and necessary knowledge to achieve a given goal.” A person who can achieve a goal, given some reasonable but not excessive amount of time and money, is an expert at achieving that goal.
As others pointed out, just because a person calls themselves an expert in goal G doesn’t mean that they are. John’s point is that being able to identify an expert in goal G, or an expert in identifying experts in goal G, when you yourself wish to achieve goal G, is its own form of expertise.
This in turn suggests that finding, sharing and verifying expertise is a key problem-solving skill. At any given time, we have:
Questions nobody can answer.
Answers nobody can understand.
Answers nobody can verify.
To these short statements, insert the qualifiers “crucial,” “presently,” “efficiently,” and so on. Some of the most important questions are about other questions, such as “what questions should we be asking?”
I expect these problems to be simultaneous and mutually-reinforcing.