Comment by exe34
2 days ago
it doesn't break down - see comments about rules above. it was the perfect example to prove yourself wrong.
2 days ago
it doesn't break down - see comments about rules above. it was the perfect example to prove yourself wrong.
I disagree with all of those examples, they are misunderstanding what it means for the metric to break down in the context of the law, but alas. "If you run a different race" lol.
That's the key part. The metric has context, right?
And that's where Goodhart's "Law" comes in. A metric has no meaning without context. This is why metrics need to be interpreted. They need to be evaluated in context. Sometimes this context is explicit but other times it is implicit. Often people will hack the metric as the implicit rule is not explicit and well that's usually a quick way to make those rules explicit.
Here's another way to think about it: no rule can be so perfectly written that it has no exceptions.
could you explain what you think the difference is?
a metric is chosen, people start to game the system by doing things that make the metric improve but the original intent is lost. increasingly specific rules/laws have to be made up to make the metric appear to work, but it becomes a lost cause as more and more creative ways are found to work around the rules.
Exactly, that's the definition. It doesn't apply to timing a 100m race. There's many such situations that are simple enough and with perfect information available where this doesn’t break down and a metric is just a metric and it works great.
Which is not to the detriment of the observation being true in other contexts, all I did was provide a counter example. But the example requires the metric AND the context.
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