I do not agree with Notre Dame bias. I do agree that 2 loss teams should not be ranked until they have 6 or 7 wins to go with it.
However,
ND lost to current #2 Miami on the road by 3 points. The game was tied at 24 and the game winning FG was with 1:07 left in the game.
ND lost to current #5 Texas A&M by 1 point. The game winning TD came on 4th down with 0:13 left in the game.
How much can the voters penalize a team for those 2 losses? Plus, factoring that they were in the National Championship game the year before.
In this specific case, Ranking them #16 is ok IMO. Ranking them Top 12 would be bad.