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> The grants should go the best proposals, not to those with the proper genitalia, melanin content of the skin, and correct religion of those applying. I'm confused. At least at the NSF, about 60-70% of their awards go to white men. Are those the appalling discriminatory practices, or what do you mean?
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> If the scientists haven't left science behind after an experience like this, probably nothing will....I think I should feel angry, but I just feel sad for all the humans involved here, I hope they manage to come out with a more positive perspective than I'm able to here. As someone who spent far too much of my life pursuing that goal, I have an unpopular opinion: US science needs some cuts. The first project (the s…
A fair bit of "science" is about providing training to the following generations. Sure, your example isn't going to turn up any new insights into structural racism but it is something that you can point grad students at to learn how to capture data. Diabetes is getting worse, just saying that "we looked at poor people's problems 50 years ago so don't need to look at them again" isn't going to flag it up.
Great! Do actual research into curing/treating/preventing diabetes. Do randomized trials on nutritional interventions in poor communities! Do any of a million other things that might actually affect the problem.
Do not: perform another observational study to see if poor people get diabetes more than rich people.
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So where are researchers who want to study topics you don't personally like supposed to get funding, in your view?
> So where are researchers who want to study topics you don't personally like supposed to get funding, in your view? I'm sorry, was I not clear enough? Bad research should not get funding. Or at least, it shouldn't get it for decades and decades , while producing no results [1]. One's desire to do research into irrelevant questions does not entitle you to support in the name of "science". [1] I'm OK with some crap sc…
But that begs the question -- how do you determine what is relevent and irrelevant research, beyond just consulting your personal feelings? Because if you have a sure and nonbiased way to do that which will satisfy all the current stake holders (the entire tax base and US population), I think everyone would agree we should that!
But if you don't have a proposal beyond "I don't like it, it's bad" then I'm sorry, the current system with all its flaws (delegating funding decisions to renowned experts in their respective fields rather than the sensibilities of the HN comment section) is far superior to that.
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So where are researchers who want to study topics you don't personally like supposed to get funding, in your view?
From anywhere except from the tax payer. Lord knows there are academic institutions sitting on a lot of cash.
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> You seem strongly in favor science that you understand, and opposed to research that you don't take an interest in or have read. Just say it the clear way, so that everyone can see what you're doing: if I don't like it, it must be because I don't understand it.
I'm not well-versed in social science either so I don't have a slam dunk here, but I'd be very willing to bet it's more involved than you're portraying. To flip it on your space telescope, another one? They've been doing this for years, they're just going to tell us there's a lot of galaxies out there, boring.
You’re not “flipping”, you’re just making a silly reduction.
There’s tons of things we don’t know about black holes. We don’t need another study to tell us that poor people are sicker due to past racism.
(One can certainly argue that it’s not worth the money to know more stuff about black holes. I am agnostic, but at least I see the difference in kind between the quality of the questions.)
Currently there are lots of systems that are in chaos. Rather than demand reversion back to mean, we should be asking, "Before we reset this system back to the way it was, was it working and are there improvements to be made?" Because the current chaos can be viewed as an opportunity to improve, and we should take it because may of the systems in chaos today, were dysfunctional or in need of modernization yesterday.
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From anywhere except from the tax payer. Lord knows there are academic institutions sitting on a lot of cash.
Why not, I pay taxes too and I want researchers to study things you don't like. I don't want to fund the military, should they get their funding from Lockheed? Lord knows they have enough...
> When the shutdown ended in mid-November, Reynolds’s team had just two weeks to get on budget. It failed. The plan the group submitted would cost too much and take too long. “Our last hope was that NASA headquarters would understand what had gone on and give us some leeway,” Reynolds says. NASA did not. After nearly 10 years of work, AXIS was dead. If the scientists haven't left science behind after an experience li…
> If the scientists haven't left science behind after an experience like this, probably nothing will....I think I should feel angry, but I just feel sad for all the humans involved here, I hope they manage to come out with a more positive perspective than I'm able to here. As someone who spent far too much of my life pursuing that goal, I have an unpopular opinion: US science needs some cuts. The first project (the s…