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Science Is Getting Harder

mattsclancy.substack.com

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Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#61

Post by derbOac »

cycomanic wrote: post #57
aborsy wrote: post #38

Having been long in academia, what has increased is commercialization of all kinds of science, number of science managers (like modern day billionaires, taking credit for the work actually done by the graduate students and postdocs, growing to be huge), number of politicians putting their names in various papers (I see managers co-authoring on average a paper per week), brutal competition for status and citations, ex…

I think we underestimate the amount of politics that was going on in science previously. Really compared to the shenanigans with Newton, Leibnitz or Hooke and Newton, much of what we see today is quite harmless. Or take for a more recent example Teller and Oppenheimer. I think in science (but not only in science) we tend to idealise the old days and scientists, because we remember the discoveries not the politics and…

I often wonder about this, and have talked about this all with older colleagues. My sense is some things were the same, but others were really different.

Even looking at the peer review process: it was much more informal in the distant past, and maybe more akin to what happens today with invited papers in my experience, or with small open source software projects.

There were certaintly very petty but intense personal squabbles in the past but that's a bit different from the pervasive structural issues in science today.

At some level too, I don't care what it was like 100 years ago. I can still see the problems today.

Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#62

Post by spicymaki »

foobarbecue wrote: post #52
aborsy wrote: post #38

Having been long in academia, what has increased is commercialization of all kinds of science, number of science managers (like modern day billionaires, taking credit for the work actually done by the graduate students and postdocs, growing to be huge), number of politicians putting their names in various papers (I see managers co-authoring on average a paper per week), brutal competition for status and citations, ex…

I'm a scientist at heart, and my PhD is science, but this is a very good description of why I decided to work as an engineer instead.

I worked for a midsize company that required the CEO be named on all patent applications. I am not sure engineering is exempt.

Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#63

Post by Beldin »

cycomanic wrote: post #59
btrettel wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is especially true in math and physics. You will find that no matter what problem you can think of, either it has already been solved to the highest level of abstraction, or it's an unsolved and famous problem, or not worthwhile/trivial. This hasn't been my experience in fluid dynamics. There are so many places where one could apply a standard approach that people haven't. It takes some effort and experience t…

I agree with you there are so many areas still vastly unexplored, fluid dynamics or the whole area of complex systems is definitely a prime example. Stephen Hawkins called his inaugural lecture "Is the End in Sight for Theoretical Physics?" suggesting that we are very close to the end of theoretical discoveries. Although less famous I would argue that prediction was just as wrong as "640kB should be enough for everyo…

He discusses in (if memory serves) "A Brief History of Time" whether we will keep on discovering ever-more accurate physical theories, or if there's a theoretical limit. The Planck scale offers a theoretical limit, so there's hope.

At any rate, that is how I understood him. Not that we're nearly there, but that our current path of discovery seems finite.

Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#64

Post by hankman86 »

This should worry everyone. Economic progress is intimately tied to scientific discoveries. And if that’s slowing down, we may still see some business model innovation (think: Uber), but less progress that increases humanity’s collective wealth.

Making matters worse, population count in highly educated countries is shrinking, inevitably leading up to fewer brains trying to solve hard problems than before. For now, I don’t see the remaining countries with a growing population making up for this loss in collective cognitive capacity devoted to science.

Perhaps we shouldn’t fear universal AI as much as we should cheer it on as the future saviour of science.

Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#65

Post by adamc »

yk wrote: post #33

Some of these measures are not really convincing, most obvious Nobel prices/paper, the rate of Nobel prices/year is fixed so when the number of papers goes up, the rate of publications that get a Nobel goes down.

Yeah, some of the measures were curious, such as unique keywords per 10,000 papers. It isn't clear to me what we should expect if science was doing fine -- more unique keywords total, yes, but per 10,000 papers? Why?

In general, I think the paper needs a stronger argument about what a null hypothesis should be and why that is violated.

Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#66

Post by giantg2 »

I feel like life in general is getting harder.

There is less chance of escaping past mistakes, or more chance that a mistake will ruin you. There are more things you have to stay on top of benefits and finance wise. There are more options for many things, which leads to more analysis of what's best. The systems we use every day, from cars to computers, are more complex.

Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#67

Post by snowwrestler »

cycomanic wrote: post #57
aborsy wrote: post #38

Having been long in academia, what has increased is commercialization of all kinds of science, number of science managers (like modern day billionaires, taking credit for the work actually done by the graduate students and postdocs, growing to be huge), number of politicians putting their names in various papers (I see managers co-authoring on average a paper per week), brutal competition for status and citations, ex…

I think we underestimate the amount of politics that was going on in science previously. Really compared to the shenanigans with Newton, Leibnitz or Hooke and Newton, much of what we see today is quite harmless. Or take for a more recent example Teller and Oppenheimer. I think in science (but not only in science) we tend to idealise the old days and scientists, because we remember the discoveries not the politics and…

Yup, the point of the “scientific method” is that it works regardless of petty personal politics, so long as empirical evidence remains the standard.

To some extent it depends on the weakness of humans for status and competition, because they are powerful motivators to drive advances.

Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#68

Post by timr »

snowwrestler wrote: post #67
cycomanic wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we underestimate the amount of politics that was going on in science previously. Really compared to the shenanigans with Newton, Leibnitz or Hooke and Newton, much of what we see today is quite harmless. Or take for a more recent example Teller and Oppenheimer. I think in science (but not only in science) we tend to idealise the old days and scientists, because we remember the discoveries not the politics and…

Yup, the point of the “scientific method” is that it works regardless of petty personal politics, so long as empirical evidence remains the standard. To some extent it depends on the weakness of humans for status and competition, because they are powerful motivators to drive advances.

Science continues to work, but the work of being a "scientist" really sucks because of this stuff.

I personally left science because I could see it had 98% overlap with what I'd do as an engineer (or entrepreneur, in the case of a PI), with a tiny fraction of the monetary benefit. Being a winner in that system is a great life, but it rests upon a huge pyramid of people who are working their butts off at low pay and lower prestige, for a brass ring that few will ever grasp.

Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#69

Post by cycomanic »

timr wrote: post #68
snowwrestler wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup, the point of the “scientific method” is that it works regardless of petty personal politics, so long as empirical evidence remains the standard. To some extent it depends on the weakness of humans for status and competition, because they are powerful motivators to drive advances.

Science continues to work, but the work of being a "scientist" really sucks because of this stuff. I personally left science because I could see it had 98% overlap with what I'd do as an engineer (or entrepreneur, in the case of a PI), with a tiny fraction of the monetary benefit. Being a winner in that system is a great life, but it rests upon a huge pyramid of people who are working their butts off at low pay and l…

I agree with you. Being a scientist has become worse (although I would argue that is true for many other jobs as well). A PI nowadays really works like the leader of a small startup constantly looking for money to keep the ship afloat without the prospect of a big payout at the end.

Re: Science Is Getting Harder

#70

Post by sbf501 »

cycomanic wrote: post #57
aborsy wrote: post #38

Having been long in academia, what has increased is commercialization of all kinds of science, number of science managers (like modern day billionaires, taking credit for the work actually done by the graduate students and postdocs, growing to be huge), number of politicians putting their names in various papers (I see managers co-authoring on average a paper per week), brutal competition for status and citations, ex…

I think we underestimate the amount of politics that was going on in science previously. Really compared to the shenanigans with Newton, Leibnitz or Hooke and Newton, much of what we see today is quite harmless. Or take for a more recent example Teller and Oppenheimer. I think in science (but not only in science) we tend to idealise the old days and scientists, because we remember the discoveries not the politics and…

Weren't scientists of old after endowments from kings and royalty, too? Further, I seem to recall a Vertiasium about the guy who solved the cubic, fighting for a position at a college by dethroning another professor through an academic duel.
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