Liverpool followers jostle for a have a look at the on-field VAR display at Anfield stadium
Alex Dodd – CameraSport by way of Getty Photos
In case you have watched any soccer – or soccer – over the previous few years, you’ll know that the sport has been consumed by controversies over its new refereeing know-how. The video assistant referee (VAR) system was launched to the English Premier League in 2019 to scale back refereeing errors and get extra selections proper. As a substitute, it has created new sorts of uncertainty and undermined our understanding of basic guidelines like offside and handball. It has additionally infuriated followers, who can typically be heard chanting “it’s not football any more” after a long-winded VAR examine.
It’s honest to say that soccer followers prefer to get irate, particularly when refereeing selections go in opposition to their group. However as I argue in my new e-book, I Can’t Cease Considering About VAR, there’s extra to this than meets the attention. As somebody whose job entails growing new strategies of measuring academic attainment, I’ve thought lengthy and arduous concerning the explanation why VAR has been so irritating. I consider its issues relate to the problem of pinning down goal actuality, the issue of exact measurement and the human dislike of uncertainty.
What I’ve additionally come to understand, nonetheless, is that VAR exemplifies the bounds of rationality in lots of walks of life far past the soccer area. As such, a short exploration of the historical past of measurement extra broadly – from makes an attempt to pin down the boiling level of water within the 18th century to the battle to precisely assess the…
