You met pilots? There is a reason we don't let them run the show. Particle physics? Yes, the field that gave us the biggest existential threat to humanity that we had to restructure our whole planet around to try to avoid—at great harm to us (UNSC). Solid foundations are no cure.
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I think it's a delusion to think that solid foundations (I'd say what you mean is a more granular understanding of causal mechanisms within the domain) somehow make the topic itself less subject to what is essentially the public's right: setting the trade-off point. 2/3
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Also, finally, it's amazing how everyone thinks that *their* field is above the hoi-polloi in a way that other fields are not. I'd suggest applying the same lens to one's own domain as well and you'd immediately find the same problem, just more camouflaged to one's own eyes.
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I'm sympathetic to this point (we all know much less than we think we do.) But it seems like an epistemic problem to me. Knowledge/prediction of airplanes is of a different kind (not just degree) than knowledge/prediction of complex social phenomena.
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Commercial aviation is an example of very complex social phenomena—like all such phenomenon, field ranges from aerodynamics to manufacturing to foreign policy to sociology to human psychology to economics and more: one in which pilots have close to zero autonomy or control over.
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I certainly don't think pilots should be running the show :) But, empirically, commercial aviation has demonstrated a degree of practical success that simply can't be compared to foreign policy -- that seems uncontroversial to me. So the question is why.
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One important answer is that, contra your claim, Chris, pilots have practically *zero* say over commercial aviation, and we have taken the whole field out of their hand and decided, politically, where the trade-offs are, and that they are in the realm of safety. 1/2
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Replying to @zeynep @Chris_arnade and
So it's the politics of aviation that make it safe, not advanced technical understanding of aerodynamics. Which is my point, again, almost every advanced technical field thinks it's their technical understanding and always forgets what had to be done to get it under control.
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737 Max is actually a really interesting case (I know a lot about it; will eventually write) and I think it's one of the strongest examples for what I'm saying but can't fit it into tweets. :-D Pilots are rightly mad, but different issue there.
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