To all "it's merit based" responders: if you reward skills before they are introduced in the public school system, the vast majority of rewardees will come from extremely privileged backgrounds that support and incentivize them to acquire those skills privately.
To all "it's merit based" responders: if you reward skills before they are introduced in the public school system, the vast majority of rewardees will come from extremely privileged backgrounds that support and incentivize them to acquire those skills privately.
Environmental factors are hard to fix by schools (YouTube channels can help if kids manage to escape shorts & co). We can (and you personally do) remove entry barriers and make society in general more permeable. Nepotism is a problem. The defunct part of elitism is not that talented people are in charge but the contrary. You wouldn’t prevent kids from learning to play instruments or sports before they are taught at school, would you? I wouldn’t endorse limiting the development of children in order to make them more equal to the average - even if that means children of academics might have easier access to (some) knowledge. BTW Reality tells me that not every teenager is as much thrilled by submitting to NeurIPS as you 😄.