Young, talented and fed-up: scientists tell their stories • Hacker News Board

Re: Young, talented and fed-up: scientists tell their stories

#181

Post by hasbroslasher » Fri, Oct 28, 2016, 4:51 PM UTC

sseagull wrote: post #93

hasbroslasher wrote: post #40

I'm curious why this field hasn't been "privatized" to some degree. Why doesn't division of labor apply? Why not have scientists go off and do their research and rely on a team that is skilled at hoarding grants or publishing works from raw data? I imagine it's probably due to some institutional barriers (e.g. you can't get funding outside of a university context). I imagine the reason is as always - our leaders are…

> Why not have scientists go off and do their research and rely on a team that is skilled at hoarding grants or publishing works from raw data? Partly because science is very specialized. If I work on something new, then it's possible there is very few people in the world that know it or will easily understand it. I couldn't have someone else write a paper or grant proposal based on it - either they wouldn't understa…

>The mistake, in my opinion, is making the number of papers published a metric on which you determine a scientist's worth. Just like most metric-ization of society today, it's a bad idea.

Nodding intensifies

It really is just a logical extension of capitalism - defining and measuring productive units so that you can optimize the means. What people fail to see time and agin is that incentivizing metrics gains is incentivizing metrics games (sorry that just came out gross and punny). It's no longer about doing good science/work/music/programming, it's about getting those numbers up so you can look good to the overseers

Re: Young, talented and fed-up: scientists tell their stories

#182

Post by ArkyBeagle » Sat, Oct 29, 2016, 2:44 AM UTC

fsloth wrote: post #172

ArkyBeagle wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to bust yer bubble :) , but the Founders were largely deeply indebted aristocrats who felt mostly a slight to their honor. That is largely why the Revolution happened. The British Empire continued into the "sun never sets" level. The effects of the British Empire on the colonies has been a mixture of good and bad. They thought about it hard, in a John Stuart Mill way about it. They were often wrong, many were…

"I hate to bust yer bubble :) , but the Founders were largely deeply indebted aristocrats who felt mostly a slight to their honor. That is largely why the Revolution happened." Sorry, I was a bit hyperbolic. I did not claim the founding fathers were anything but what you say. From historical perspective, what they achieved, was an exceptionally good outcome. Namely - they created a new system of government that did n…

I am flatly skeptical that changes of that scale can be designed at all. We in the US enjoy many institutions which took decades to mature to any use. It takes dedicated bureaucrats decades to fine tune such things. And most simply don't make it.

Example: there was much meddling in the 1930s with farm production. It took until the 1970s before the modern version of farm subsidy latched in - call it 4 decades. ( See the film "King Corn" for an excellent treatise)

I've just never been able to use Maslow to make predictions. It just doesn't explain things like poets at all. People who "move up the Maslow hierarchy" often become duller and duller - all the weight of maintaining that drags em down. I've known too many people who didn't know where their next meal was coming from, and for some of them, that was a sort of freedom.

I think the magic of the Founders was all the shuffling off to The Colonies of all the malcontents and radicals, in a time when that produced favorable results. You'd get more current theory at Harvard than at King's College.

Re: Young, talented and fed-up: scientists tell their stories

#183

Post by ArkyBeagle » Sat, Oct 29, 2016, 2:46 AM UTC

fsloth wrote: post #173

ArkyBeagle wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best ( biggest impact ) ways in which human suffering has been relieved have largely been A Whole Lot about people accumulating imaginary play chips. An example - Alexander Fleming and penicillin - getting penicillin to large scale production and to market was a huge task. Most things are like that.

Yes - as I stated in another comment we need prices and markets for resource optimization. The comment to which I replied chaffed at thinking there could be any other system than what there currently is. To me this is a dangerously rigid way to view the human life. Everything should be questioned, if only to find answers.

"Other systems" have had a very dismal track record so far. we're down to the gap between what people say and what they do in our system. That's a profound problem. We're limited now by artifacts of human cognition.

Re: Young, talented and fed-up: scientists tell their stories

#184

Post by fsloth » Sat, Oct 29, 2016, 8:38 AM UTC

ArkyBeagle wrote: post #183

fsloth wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes - as I stated in another comment we need prices and markets for resource optimization. The comment to which I replied chaffed at thinking there could be any other system than what there currently is. To me this is a dangerously rigid way to view the human life. Everything should be questioned, if only to find answers.

"Other systems" have had a very dismal track record so far. we're down to the gap between what people say and what they do in our system. That's a profound problem. We're limited now by artifacts of human cognition.

"Other systems" have had a very dismal track record so far.

Yes, historically we are doing pretty good. This proves sometimes changes in systems improve things. This is why questions that generally lead peoples to think of other systems should be approached with kind questioning and inquiry rather than scoffing them as rubbish off-hand - we should amswer why they often are impossible.

"That's a profound problem. We're limited now by artifacts of human cognition."

Yes, this is a very good summary of the other half of the problem. The other is figuring a dynamical model of the economy (which might or might not be impossible).

Re: Young, talented and fed-up: scientists tell their stories

#185

Post by fsloth » Sat, Oct 29, 2016, 9:06 AM UTC

ArkyBeagle wrote: post #182

fsloth wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I hate to bust yer bubble :) , but the Founders were largely deeply indebted aristocrats who felt mostly a slight to their honor. That is largely why the Revolution happened." Sorry, I was a bit hyperbolic. I did not claim the founding fathers were anything but what you say. From historical perspective, what they achieved, was an exceptionally good outcome. Namely - they created a new system of government that did n…

I am flatly skeptical that changes of that scale can be designed at all. We in the US enjoy many institutions which took decades to mature to any use. It takes dedicated bureaucrats decades to fine tune such things. And most simply don't make it. Example: there was much meddling in the 1930s with farm production. It took until the 1970s before the modern version of farm subsidy latched in - call it 4 decades. ( See t…

I would claim the founders had a design intent. And the bureaucrats after them. As with any large systems, the design formulation and system building is an ongoing empirical process.

I would still hold not replicating a familiar monarchy or degenerating into a dictatorship was an achievement. I'm not saying anything about any other aspects.

The thing with psychological models is that they are models and as such cannot replicate all observed phenomena. Just like physical models can't. In general we can observe that poor people lack the resources for doing what they like and struggle unhappily while rich people need something else than just wealth to keep them happy - a long term goal, a hobby and so on. I think Maslows model captures this phenomena on the level of human populations. It does not explain art. I doubt no model understandable to humans could capture all facets of human life.

Re: Young, talented and fed-up: scientists tell their stories

#186

Post by ArkyBeagle » Sun, Oct 30, 2016, 6:55 PM UTC

fsloth wrote: post #185

ArkyBeagle wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am flatly skeptical that changes of that scale can be designed at all. We in the US enjoy many institutions which took decades to mature to any use. It takes dedicated bureaucrats decades to fine tune such things. And most simply don't make it. Example: there was much meddling in the 1930s with farm production. It took until the 1970s before the modern version of farm subsidy latched in - call it 4 decades. ( See t…

I would claim the founders had a design intent . And the bureaucrats after them. As with any large systems, the design formulation and system building is an ongoing empirical process. I would still hold not replicating a familiar monarchy or degenerating into a dictatorship was an achievement. I'm not saying anything about any other aspects. The thing with psychological models is that they are models and as such cann…

What the Founders did a lot was line through the word "God" and substitute "the People". This is true to the extent that Thomas Paine ( I think that's the right person ) was followed. There certainly was a design intent - that is very true. And to an extent, Canada has had a parallel model that's worked extremely well for them. Becuase the Canadian system evolved over longer spans of time, it "feels" more empirical and less ... design-ey than the US.

The US model hasn't really been all that replicated - the Parlimentary model has proved to be more common ( possibly because of the extent of the British Empire ) . The US has advanced the idea of democracy but it's done differently. I would say we do not really know why the US has worked out as well as it has.

I just think Maslow is too reductive. There are some really happy poor people out there. To my eye, a lot of outcomes for especially, say African Americans in the US depends on much more ephemeral factors - like strong family ties - than Maslow would predict.

Meanwhile, wealthy people can be quite anomic and neurotic. I've done medium well, and I spend my time as if I were a student and trying to connect with family. The people I know who have done better seem more isolated and feel more trapped than I do.

Happiness is as much a chosen thing as a matter of resources.