Ben Golub

I have talked a lot with you guys over the substance of this issue and have enjoyed it greatly but let me just say two things that are a little more abstract.

sakky -- "meritocratic freshman class" is like "windy prime number". The adjective doesn't go with the predicate. You mean to say "high quality class" or something. Let's just try to speak sensibly.

Anyway, I think one is not being honest if one says that final class quality is all that matters. Hypothetically, say rejecting all Jews means you enroll all the smart anti-semitic WASPs who hate Jews, and these WASPs are the smartest. (Don't think about the historical example this is inspired by. Just take the hypo as given.) Objectively, you get the best class, but by what means? The market values what you are doing, but what is that worth? Some things, like truth and justice, are more important than classes and markets.

As for mollie's claim that Caltech's way results in de facto discrimination, let's just think for a second. The fact that the incoming class is lily-white doesn't imply discrimination. It might (and, in fact, does) mean that no minorities qualified at the Caltech level applied. To put it very starkly (though this is a bit of an exaggeration), setting a standard so high that no minorities can meet it is not racial discrimination. Just because all the winners are white and Asian, doesn't mean you didn't give the other people a fair chance. Mollie, you're about to marry a white guy. (Mollie's love life entails de facto discrimination!!) Do you discriminate against non-whites? Admissions is the same -- the only difference is the n.

:-)