Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

nzz.ch

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–350 of 374 posts

Re: Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

#341

Post by wolverine876 »

colinmhayes wrote: post #319
wolverine876 wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> let me offer my reading between the lines But the rest is entirely fabricated and ignores the clear statements of the advisor themself, which is that they didn't want to offend China and would for that reason terminate the relationship. > the advisor had a convenient out and took it How is it a convenient out? 'CCP pressure' doesn't sound like a convenient reason. The advisor could have pulled the 'you're no long e…

There was no CCP pressure. Only a Chinese Phd student in Canada who forwarded the supposedly racist meme to the advisor.

You don't know that, and that's not how the advisor portrayed it.

Re: Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

#342

Post by amrcnimgrnt »

bobthechef wrote: post #259
amrcnimgrnt wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't suggest anything, generally I avoid suggestion. It's pusillanimous. Switzerland has a lot of freedom, certainly compared to China and other European countries. It's without a doubt my favorite country, one I'd want to live in. But, as we're finding out, the "free speech protections" that we drone on about are only as good as we are willing to insist on. "freedom of speech is protected in this country" is mea…

> So Charlie Hebdo (who are disgusting, btw) should have been fined in Switzerland. Charlie Hebdo is indeed disgusting. They're nihilists from a cultural milieu that know no moral limits. There is a difference, as you say, between rational criticism of Islam and its mockery and charity is a pretty good way to distinguish between good and bad behavior (i.e., even assuming Islam is terribly flawed, it is uncharitable t…

Your post is long and I don't disagree with much really, except maybe your flirtations with some restrictions on speech. Certainly we all understand, even in the USA, the concept of a "provocation". And on it's face a provocation is something that is hard to allow.

My problem with that is that criminalizing the provocation has lead in all liberal countries except the US into the criminalization of things that offend the sensibilities of the powerful.

I'd allow Charlie Hebdo to continue swimming in the cesspool of mediocrity it belongs, and I'll put up with blasphemy, if in exchange I have the full unrestricted freedom to argue for my conscience.

Re: Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

#343

Post by amrcnimgrnt »

eplanit wrote: post #258
esquivalience wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another reading of this is: "freedom of speech is protected in this country". And that is true, not the fairytale you suggest it to be.

But, many (predominantly on the Left) are now seeing liberal free speech as outmoded. Though he's not a serious person, former Prince Harry (who, with his wife, use their celebrity to champion Progressive causes) recently called the 1st Amendment "bonkers"[1]. Even The Atlantic publishes its doubts about it.[2] My stepfather grew up Jewish in Germany in the early 20th century. He was 13 years old when Hitler became C…

You had a wise grandpa.

This concept of "it can't happen here" is so infuriating. So much hubris in so few syllables. I think it angers me, not only because there's an underlying sentiment of being better than everyone everywhere else, but because the sentiment itself opens the floodgates.

Re: Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

#344

Post by amrcnimgrnt »

jeswin wrote: post #249
nova22033 wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Big Tech squashing our rights How exactly has big tech squashed your rights?

What I find frustrating is discussing something relatively trivial when talking about a totalitarian state. I am not from the West, and I do wonder if people bring up these just to be polite or to sound impartial.

Tell me, is your country one where loosing your job would be considered a relatively trivial or benign punishment for mouthing off? Because in my parents' country they would have been thrown off an airplane for what this kid did.

But I didn't grow up in my parent's country. I grew up in the West. And I cherish very jealously my rights and refuse to trivialize cancel culture, blasphemy laws etc. And if we in the West had taken our rights seriously this kid wouldn't have been fired.

Re: Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

#345

Post by amrcnimgrnt »

rob_c wrote: post #297
jeswin wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I find frustrating is discussing something relatively trivial when talking about a totalitarian state. I am not from the West, and I do wonder if people bring up these just to be polite or to sound impartial.

It's usually to point out commonalities to get people to emote when having a conversation I find. Yes comparing the scales of the Chinese sensorship to googles deplatforming of uncomfortable topics is not nice. But explaining how one can lead to the other also explains to people in the west why something is bad. Especially when people would readily sleep walk into enabling technologies that would enable state sensors…

But I'm not comparing Switzerland to China!

I'm just pointing out that this kid had a really naive attitude of where our rights currently stand in the West. And I think the story is the proof - the kid got canned.

Re: Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

#346

Post by amrcnimgrnt »

belter wrote: post #244
amrcnimgrnt wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't suggest anything, generally I avoid suggestion. It's pusillanimous. Switzerland has a lot of freedom, certainly compared to China and other European countries. It's without a doubt my favorite country, one I'd want to live in. But, as we're finding out, the "free speech protections" that we drone on about are only as good as we are willing to insist on. "freedom of speech is protected in this country" is mea…

Sounds wonderful. Would then my religious convictions be protected in Switzerland according to law or does my deity has to contact the Swiss government somehow ? Because I am a Pastafarian, and I can't stand the abuse and mockery anymore. I was thinking of emigrating to Switzerland. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster

No because pastafarianism is a funny, if aged, joke among atheists. You don't sincerely believe in the spaghetti monster, and the courts could hold you in contempt.

But why would an atheist who likes to mock religion want to live in a country that criminalizes it?

Re: Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

#347

Post by s1artibartfast »

wolverine876 wrote: post #280
s1artibartfast wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't want to be his sponsor either. It just shows either a complete misunderstanding of the power dynamics of an outsider doing research in China, or poor judgement.

> I wouldn't want to be his sponsor either. It just shows either a complete misunderstanding of the power dynamics of an outsider doing research in China, or poor judgement. If your priorities are power dynamics, that would make sense. But there are other priorities, such as freedom of speech and open inquiry, which are more important, on which research and knowledge and freedom itself are based.

Ideally yes, but there are practical reality to working with the Chinese government, taking Chinese government grants, and going to Chinese schools.

If you choose to persue these opportunities, you must understand there are tradeoffs and conditions.

Re: Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

#348

Post by s1artibartfast »

mcguire wrote: post #315
s1artibartfast wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't want to be his sponsor either. It just shows either a complete misunderstanding of the power dynamics of an outsider doing research in China, or poor judgement.

Speaking as someone who has been through the academic dance party, I wouldn't want to attend an academic institution in Switzerland. I've heard of many breakups between students and their advisors, although this seems particularly ill advised, but I've never heard of the institution kicking the student out immediately. Or of the other faculty not finding a place for him. Their dedication to academic integrity is susp…

They didn't have to kick him out. He was withdrawn from school, had a falling out with the PhD advisor he needed to get back in, then sued the school. After he sued the school and lost, professors really didn't want to be his advisor.

Re: Swiss Ph.D student’s dismissal spotlights China’s influence

#349

Post by hermitsings »

NotSammyHagar wrote: post #33
vagrantJin wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think they are not? Is it different or worse from the US foreign policy of "lets kill brown people half way across the world"? The anti-China rhetoric has to stop somewhere.

The US has a lot of problems and bad behavior. Yet we can talk about it without worrying if the us govt is pressuring our employer to fire us, without worrying about the safety of family members & friends living in the us will be rounded up. China is not that place. It's not anti-Chinese rhetoric to point our reality. China is the place where people wonder when the authorities are coming to take you to the re-educati…

Agreed. At least, US is a free country.
Post reply on HN