Kind of like any venture where you try as hard as possible and yet fail ?

Kind of like an athlete in the olympics who ends up losing by a fraction of a second? Idk, they don’t get the gold right?

So, in your world, the best software developer gets paid the most (gold), the second best gets paid less (silver), the third best gets paid the least (bronze), and everybody else works as slaves because they're losers.

Could you please not post like this? It leads to low-quality flamewars, and there's specifically a guideline against it:

Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

"As you all know, first prize is a Cadillac Eldorado. Anyone wanna see second prize? Second prize is a set of steak knives. Third prize is you're fired." - from Glengarry Glen Ross

There's capitalism in a nutshell.

Except first prize was granted by your parents and upbringing. Second prize was partially because of parents and upbringing, but with a bit more luck.

And bronze? Yeah, well they're just lazy and bad and they deserve what little they have - cause the Gold and Silver earned what they have.

And this goes all the way back to the proverbial Adam and Eve?

Don't we then all have the same ancestors and therefore all equal opportunity?

"Don't we then all have the same ancestors and therefore all equal opportunity?"

Just about every study done on the subject shows that the family you're born into has a HUGE effect on how successful you'll be in life.

Yes, and presumably some parents work hard to give their children a good future and some do not.

Is this irrelevant? Why is it not acceptable for someone that had better parents to do better?

That's because children are seen as innocent. We can blame someone in poverty of "making bad choices"... What choice is there for a newborn to make bad choices?

Yet, we have little issue,society speaking, condemning a baby and their family to a life of poverty to continue that cycle.

Or should we say that the newborn/baby deserves lack of medical care, substandard food or hunger,substandard housing, less/lacking education? If you believe they deserve that, can you explain what actions a baby can do differently?

Hard work of the parents doesn't really factor into it. It's the social standing of the parents. A single mom who works 2 jobs works harder than most of us on this board. Yet, our kids are going to have it much, much, much easier than hers would.

"Why is it not acceptable for someone that had better parents to do better?"

If your whole schtick is about "meritocracy", then having people start out better by default defeats that entire thing.

One thing about meritocracies - someone gives the merits and demerits.

Why do they deserve that power? What checks and balances exist to prevent them from entreanching themselves and family/friends?

Follow the money and power.

1. I didn't bring religion into this. You did. 2. I reject to what amounts to a nice story with no basis in fact. If I remember my judeao-christian studies, the woman was less than the man in those stories.

3. It is evident that even being born, not all babies are equal. And that's before we consider socioeconomic status.

Should humans be considered as equal? Of course. However its quite easily demonstrated that people aren't.

This is reductio ad absurdio.

I think you can ignore the religious mention and in good-faith (ha!) take their point to be that we ultimately have common ancestors. Then respond that your family has a strong effect but it's not the only one.

Suppose a average married couple had a child and also adopted a rock. By your reasoning, the rock would perform exactly as their living breathing child, right?

Please don't do this here.

What's so wrong with pointing out someone else's absurdity?

It was a tacit insult taking the form of an argument. That adds no information, it just lowers discussion quality and encourages worse from others.