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China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

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Re: China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

#211

The quality debate about scientific merit aside, if the U.S. wants to remain "the best", then we need to incentivize the best scientists and researchers in other countries to come here and become U.S. citizens. A lot of famous physicists, mathematicians, and logicians have done this over the past 100 years. Unfortunately, the attractiveness of becoming a U.S. citizen is waning because (1) current U.S. policies on sci…

> Unfortunately, the attractiveness of becoming a U.S. citizen is waning because (1) current U.S. policies on science are extremely unfavorable to foreign researchers and (2) other countries are making it much more desirable to remain a citizen there than to become a U.S. citizen (this is a net win for humanity though)

Don't forget (3) being tax compliant as a US citizen/perm resident. Since Obama made this worse with FACTA, Trump now with GILTI, etc., US citizenship and permanent residency has become extremely hostile to expats.

Re: China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

#212
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, for instance, the NSF's budget has been static in nominal terms since the Bush years (or at least that's what the program manager told me the last time.i was on a panel). Getting a grant, especially for young researchers looking to establish a track record, is very difficult in this environment.

OK, but the NSF research budget (7 billion) is small potatoes compared to the NIH (37 Billion per year), and DOD (70 Billion). And it's about the same as the Department of Energy (7 Billion, not including the national labs). There is plethora of other Federal agencies that fund research, such as the EPA, NIST, NASA, Federal Aviation Administration, Food and Drug Administration, even the Bureau of Land Management is i…

Where does that funding come from? Why, your pocket. Imagine if the 1% who pays the 50% of that had that money back, how much better our society would be.

Re: China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

#214
post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're all missing one important point: The advancements of translation technology. In due time it might not even be necessary to learn any other language at all. I wouldn't even put a single penny on Chinese becoming the dominant language, even besides this fact.

How much has it really advanced? I hear this all the time, but I am always unimpressed when I see actual results.

Not much admittedly. But the potential is there, just no one really put any effort into it yet.

Re: China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

#215
post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this [0] is a step in the right direction. I also think legislation regarding campaign finance, which would supersede Citizens United, is desperately needed. [0] https://www.warren.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/warren...

This is just a speech. There's nothing specific in here at all.

If you’d rather not listen for the details, here they are:

1. Members of Congress, judges, and high-ranking executive branch officials would be forbidden from owning individual stocks while in office. It would force the president and cabinet members to divest assets that could present conflicts of interest.

2. Members of Congress would be forbidden from lobbying after they leave office, existing lobbying restrictions would be tightened, and greater disclosure of influence peddling would be required.

Re: China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

#216

The quality debate about scientific merit aside, if the U.S. wants to remain "the best", then we need to incentivize the best scientists and researchers in other countries to come here and become U.S. citizens. A lot of famous physicists, mathematicians, and logicians have done this over the past 100 years. Unfortunately, the attractiveness of becoming a U.S. citizen is waning because (1) current U.S. policies on sci…

Not to mention the antiquated immigration system wherein, a country of birth is given preference over qualifications and pay for granting permanent residency, disadvantaging nationals from populous nations like India and China.

https://www.cato.org/blog/150-year-wait-indian-immigrants-ad...

I know many of my peers from grad school are exiting US after a few years of grad school due to this.

Re: China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

#217

The quality debate about scientific merit aside, if the U.S. wants to remain "the best", then we need to incentivize the best scientists and researchers in other countries to come here and become U.S. citizens. A lot of famous physicists, mathematicians, and logicians have done this over the past 100 years. Unfortunately, the attractiveness of becoming a U.S. citizen is waning because (1) current U.S. policies on sci…

There is also the matter that for a smart young American, Law, Medicine and Finance are far more financially rewarding endeavors than Science.

Re: China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

#218
post #200
post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linguists don't really believe in objectively easy or difficult languages. Subjective difficulty depends on your interests and what languages you already know. As a Norwegian, I found German far easier to learn than English, French and Spanish.

Hmm. It seems clear that where you start from plays a role. At the same time, it seems obvious that Latin grammar (3 genders, 6 cases, 4 verb conjugations, 5 noun declensions, multiple moods etc) is more complex than Italian... or am I wrong?

> At the same time, it seems obvious...

English: "My wife sent me an email", but "My wife sent an email to me".

Yes, very obvious :)

Re: China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

#219

The quality debate about scientific merit aside, if the U.S. wants to remain "the best", then we need to incentivize the best scientists and researchers in other countries to come here and become U.S. citizens. A lot of famous physicists, mathematicians, and logicians have done this over the past 100 years. Unfortunately, the attractiveness of becoming a U.S. citizen is waning because (1) current U.S. policies on sci…

But you weren't attending MIT or CalTech I bet.

Re: China now the most prolific contributor to physical sciences, engineering, math

#220

The quality debate about scientific merit aside, if the U.S. wants to remain "the best", then we need to incentivize the best scientists and researchers in other countries to come here and become U.S. citizens. A lot of famous physicists, mathematicians, and logicians have done this over the past 100 years. Unfortunately, the attractiveness of becoming a U.S. citizen is waning because (1) current U.S. policies on sci…

US certainly has a cultural problem, out of all major countries out there, US has a weird position where a significant population denies evolution/climate change, and turned those topics into highly political charged issues. Also the US education system prior to college takes an another interesting aim to cultivate students' confidence, not by equipping them with logical training, but circumventing hard subjects like…

> what China demonstrated here is, that it is totally possible for a poor country to bootstrap itself

All the American and European companies who moved production there bootstrapped China. The money had to come from somewhere. China saw the immense opportunity in western greed and ran with it.

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