Noted economist and commentator, Judith Sloan, has a few words to say today in Catallaxy Files under the heading, "Beware the 'experts'". She refers to a much longer piece by an American, William L. Anderson, whose article can also be read on the same site. I've never heard of him, so I'm sticking with Sloan, who sees things from our Australian point of view. Her summing up is as follows:

Initially, there was a case for seeking expert advice because political decisions had to be made in a hurry. But since then, it is clear that the experts are just making it up. "They have no understanding of economic costs", and just make calls "according to the principle of extreme caution".

She makes particular reference to Queensland's Chief Health Officer, who is one of the 'experts' in a "made up job" : the sort of job that was handed out to "political mates" after their clinical careers had often "stalled".

She asks if it has been a case of "pick your expert", as there has been conflicting information between state and Commonwealth 'experts', and adds that the whole thing has really been about politics.

Most of the imposed social restrictions have not been based on real evidence. The closure of international borders being the exception. And the "consistent messages", making us feel like "mugs" are not appreciated.

Rather than the coronavirus leading to an era when people pay more respect to the so-called experts, Judith Sloan's guess is that the reverse will happen: experts will be seen as narrow, self-seeking types with no skin in the game. "They deserve to be treated with suspicion and scepticism".

ttbn- Yes we should be careful not to give up our judgement to experts. Good point.

Experts are more likely to get things right than the general population, but are far from infallible. What's really needed is crowdsourced scrutiny of what the experts are saying, so that the errors and shortcomings (occasionally in their reasoning but more often in their assumptions) can be quickly identified and corrected. This is something that's well suited to working at home, so deserves to be high on the government's list of priorities at the moment.

It won't be, though. The government would rather avoid scrutiny, and would prefer to pick experts to support conclusions already reached.

I tend to appreciate people who know rather than experts !

Yeah, we should put our trust in ignorance instead of expertise. Let's get bricklayers to perform surgery, surgeons to look after the taxation department, accountants to do chemical analysis, analytical chemists to mind children, childcare workers to defend criminals and lawyers to lay bricks. It will be a great social experiment, lots of fun for everyone, and I'm sure there are no hidden downfalls.

Or maybe some people might like to get over themselves and accept the fact that sometimes, over-endowed with exceptional wisdom and common sense as they may be, sometimes people who have been specifically trained in one area of expertise and who have worked and gained experience in that field for their entire working life, maybe - just maybe - know slightly more about their area of expertise than 'commentators' - commentators being people whose meaningful contributions to the advancement of mankind ranks somewhere between that of advertising executives and junkies.

I assume we are talking about the cornavirus and the expert medical advice government has relied upon to navigate a safe passage through the pandemic for the vast majority of Australians. At all times the experts, people like Professor Brendan Murphy, have reiterated that they were advising on a situation that was unprecedented. Despite the great difficulties so far, and things can change without a moments notice, Australia has dodged a bullet and the evidence shows that there are many Australians alive today who otherwise would be dead.

Compared to others, our political leadership has performed well in this crises. Unlike Trump in America, and now some fool in Brazil who have disregarded real expert advice and taken it upon themselves to dole out the "knowledge" with disastrous consequences.