ISSUE68 人们信任专家的问题

TMACJAMESUID: 2836445

TOPIC: ISSUE68 - "People make the mistake of treating experts with suspicion and mistrust, no matter how valuable their contributions might be."
WORDS: 742
TIME: 00:45:00
DATE: 9/2/2010 12:39:13 PM

1、专家的确是在某些领域取得成就的人，他们对于自身领域的了解很深入
2、但是，有时候专家的观点受到非学术的影响，以至于不纯粹
3、在一个良性的社会中，人们对于专家还是比较尊重的

I partially concur with the statement that mistrusting experts sometimes is a potential harmful thing to the public as well as the society. The execution of Socrates is an illustrative example of the consequence that the public suspects the great thinker, opining him to be a traitor to Athens, which later turned out as nothing but a tragedy. So the relationship between the common people and these experts in every field is rather sophisticated but without universal consensus about the criteria. Yet ultimately, it is the society and people who are about to take the aftermath.

Generally speaking, experts possess more profound and conversant knowledge in their own field that others can hardly surpass. What we call "expert" is not a causal concept that could be applied to everyone, even though each individual is capable of certain expertise. In a social sense, experts are people who have devoted significant time and energy, sometime with their innate talents, into specific field so that gain a deeper understanding about it. Like in the field of mathematics and economical theory, John.F.Nash has gained the PHD in his 20s, and one of his recommendation letters contained only one sentence: "He is a genius." Hence his understanding and knowledge in that field is certainly superior than most of us, and if there is no sufficient reason, we need to listen to him about his ideas concerning about the field such as the implementation of Game Theory.

Notwithstanding, even though those experts usually have their advantages, their opinions might not be sheerly professional without any other influences. Such cases happen a lot in China nowadays that in the media, the name of professor often equals to "beast" due to their similarity in Chinese pronunciation. And the reason for the nickname is that there are too many so-called professors whose views are always desperately defending the wealthy class, and to do so, they even go against the basic principle of their academic expertise, like forging statistics and other mean methods. Thereby, people in China cast deep doubt on them, treating those experts with suspicion and mistrust. Frankly speaking, those experts did pay much to gain their positions today, but they inappropriately exert their reputation, and eagerly to attain public attention, so there is no wonder that the public despise them. Thus if the expert is influencing by certain interests that results in bias and intended deception to the public, it is reasonable for the people to abandon them, regardless of what they might have achieved before.

The value of expert is unquestionable, as long as they stand by their consciousness and never bow to any mundane interest. People are not daft who have twisted minds inclining to mistrust experts who provide them with the technical and social progress. On the contrary, people always tend to think how reliable those experts could be, until they are deceived by those experts for many times. Thereby, if we wish the relationship between experts and people would not continue like what is in China now, the social mores entails to change. The modern society is symbolized by the specialization of discipline and expertise, which categorizes people into different fields and wishes them would adhere their professional ethics. But under the temptation of luxury, some experts contravene their professional ethics, resulting in the disgrace of their group. Only when everyone in the society would strictly follow their job regulations and ethics, then people could once again start to trust those experts with the admiration they deserved.

Accordingly, the social ethos plays a vital role during this process of mistrusting. If one society is fluffy in nature but boisterous in the surface, then no one in there would sit down and concentrate on their jobs. And the entire social structure would be disheveled that experts have no credence and ordinary people have no expert to turn to. And the recycle would only become worse if the suspicion between them is not alleviated. People should trust experts, and experts should be trusted, as long as they are all what they should be. However, under a sick society, no one can be healthy anymore.

Simply put, there is solid reason for people not to trust and value those experts, due to their own misbehaviors. And to alter the situation, those experts should begin by reflection about themselves. Furthermore, the societal mores of pursuing sumptuous life must be reversed, or those experts would never be back on track.

全篇写下来，感觉对于专家的贡献方面提的还是不够，应该多讲一些，否则就是偏题了