2018-11-14

Reading Notes 2018.11.14

Rob Reich on "Is philanthropy bad for democracy?", from Rationally Speaking
--Many philanthropists donate to fancy schools that really don't need extra money. Maybe public policy should be: tax-deductible donations to support public schools should be conditioned on whether or not the school that you're supporting with your donation has a certain percentage of kids who are on free or induced lunch.
--It's true that the philanthropists could have had put the money into business or politics rather than philanthropy. But when an individual creates a company, as you were describing, or say gets elected to government and then has an opportunity to direct public resources, there are forms of accountability that are kind of internal to the marketplace and internal to the operation of government, that hold that power in check in a certain way. Philanthropic power by contrast is almost wholly unaccountable. >>這一點也是台灣的財團喜歡用財團法人控制企業的原因吧。台灣就連企業都沒有完整的監督與制衡,更別提慈善或公益事業的權力問題了。

# Christopher Chabris on "Collective intelligence & the ethics of A/B tests", from Rationally Speaking
--People who have good social and emotional skills enhance group intelligence more than experts of specific, technical fields.
--Women enhance group intelligence, but there may be a selection bias that the women got selected into the sample tend to be more intelligent than average women.