I agree with everything you said, if you say "changes the purpose" rather than "destroys the purpose" - change/destruction being a value judgment, but a characterization I would make. I think the author would agree with you, and addresses this as well.

To your question: "Is there any guarantee that getting rid of the notability criteria is going to result in a more meritocratic system?" I think that there are no guarantees in cultural changes, and the best way to be wrong about the outcomes of cultural change is to predict any outcome with certainty. That said, if uncertainty was a sufficient argument against cultural change, then we'd all be hunter/gatherers.