> if the brain-damaged child strangled by his umbilical cord achieve just as much as the normal child, he has more merit.
I think you need to start defining what you mean by "achievement" and "merit," because "equal achievement" and "greater merit" are not the same things from my perspective. If a brain-damaged child achieves just as much a normal child, they have equal merit, from my perspective.
Again, I think a lot of people are conflating meritocracy with social justice. I think this attitude stems from the fact that people think meritocracy is "good," and that social justice is also "good," so meritocracy must necessarily be socially just, when that is not the case. Meritocracy alone is neither inherently socially unjust or inherently socially just.
It's worth noting that 'merit' in the 'test scores' approach just means scored X on test Y and/or Z on test W. So if (for example) someone gets low SAT scores, but cures cancer, they don't get admitted, because 'cures cancer' isn't part of the admissions criteria.
Setting aside the fact that in reality the person who cures cancer will get admitted because colleges take into account academic honors and achievements, and setting aside the fact that there is a high correlation between test score and likelihood of discovering a cure for cancer, the point you are making is one of "what constitutes merit," which is entirely tangential to my original point (which in no way equated merit to solely test scores).
I think you need to start defining what you mean by "achievement" and "merit," because "equal achievement" and "greater merit" are not the same things from my perspective. If a brain-damaged child achieves just as much a normal child, they have equal merit, from my perspective.
Again, I think a lot of people are conflating meritocracy with social justice. I think this attitude stems from the fact that people think meritocracy is "good," and that social justice is also "good," so meritocracy must necessarily be socially just, when that is not the case. Meritocracy alone is neither inherently socially unjust or inherently socially just.