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

U.S. science is in chaos

scientificamerican.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 1001 posts

Re: U.S. science is in chaos

#191

Post by Draiken »

godsinhisheaven wrote: post #175
irchans wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Certainly most universities now have a very strong liberal bias. I think most science departments were left leaning in the 1950s, but it is stronger now. (I think colleges and universities have always been more progressive than the general populous.) The administrations of universities are now very strongly Democrat leaning. I think that Trump just sees a lot of Democrat run institutions and thinks, "Why should the g…

Exactly man exactly, most every professor in the United States hates Donald Trump. 80, 90, 95%+ of professors at about say, 90% of all universities hates Donald Trump and the Republican party and will gladly tell you they do. The thing is, this isn't a new thing, they also hated the last R guy, and the R guy before him, and so on and so forth. What did they expect would happen? Trump to just continue funding these pe…

> What did they expect would happen? Trump to just continue funding these people that hate him?

So you believe it's expected that a president will de-fund everything that supports their opposing party? I'm sure that's a totally great idea that won't cause any issues whatsoever.

American politics are so absurd.

Re: U.S. science is in chaos

#192

Post by inigyou »

fn-mote wrote: post #167
inigyou wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently, in the US, money is an infinite resource. One need only look at the world's latest one point five trillionaire. Where is the money coming from to support that valuation? And why is it being spent to maintain that valuation? Part of it is accounting tricks (sell 5% of a company for $20, and you're worth $400 with only $20 changing hands) but there's also genuinely a massive unexplained amount of money in ex…

> Currently, in the US, money is an infinite resource. […] Try harder to engage in dialog. Basic economic theory contradicts your claim. You need a much stronger logical argument to have any credibility.

Um, "basic economic theory" would include the processes that create money and the limits on them, which can be disabled, and what happens if the limits are disabled

Re: U.S. science is in chaos

#193

Post by roysting »

embedding-shape wrote: post #4

> 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…

There is a far deeper problem, a systemic and foundational one; and unfortunately the whole system and all its components are all so vetted to the current rotten and distorted system that no amount of good intentions or personal dedication or will can overcome it. Unfortunately for us all we are at the precipice of a chasm and the forces of nature are upon us.

Re: U.S. science is in chaos

#194

Post by Draiken »

innagadadavida wrote: post #161
Rebuff5007 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Science being partisan right now has nothing to do with funding. It has to do with the disdain that the people currently in power have to live in a shared reality with the rest of the poulation. Theres a monumental leap from saying "lets not invest in climate change because thats not a good use of tax dollars" to "lets not invest in climate change because its a hoax."

Any “investment” here directly translates to more human activity that will make climate change worse not better. It is hypocritical to have these climate conferences and fly there burning jet fuel. The need of the hour is to drastically reduce the GDP - we need to rewind the clock 50years. But this will never happen because folks will lose jobs and scientists will lose their funding.

Definitely. We should ignore it and it'll go away by not going into these damn climate conferences. There are so many of them!

Re: U.S. science is in chaos

#195

Post by kingnothing »

svachalek wrote: post #127
api wrote: post #16

After the election my very first thought was that this is the start of the Chinese century, since America has voted to step down. Seems to be playing out.

The US situation is mitigated by both Russia and China deciding to make massive, foolish maneuvers at the same time as ours. However neither can match how stupendously we are lighting our future on fire in every possible dimension.

What are the foolish maneuvers that China is making?

Re: U.S. science is in chaos

#197

Post by mothballed »

fn-mote wrote: post #167
inigyou wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently, in the US, money is an infinite resource. One need only look at the world's latest one point five trillionaire. Where is the money coming from to support that valuation? And why is it being spent to maintain that valuation? Part of it is accounting tricks (sell 5% of a company for $20, and you're worth $400 with only $20 changing hands) but there's also genuinely a massive unexplained amount of money in ex…

> Currently, in the US, money is an infinite resource. […] Try harder to engage in dialog. Basic economic theory contradicts your claim. You need a much stronger logical argument to have any credibility.

the US can trivially and renewably acquire infinite money (in USD). It is an infinite resource.

Wealth on the other hand....

Re: U.S. science is in chaos

#198

Post by cubefox »

snaking0776 wrote: post #107
cubefox wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I think it’s less that it’s impossible but more that we don’t have any clue as to what causes differences among groups and many people use such measured differences as evidence for pretty deplorable ideas. There’s much more evidence for social determiners than anything biological. Everyone outside of Africa shares a single ancestor 20,000 years ago. There’s far more genetic diversity within Africa than the rest of th…

> I think it’s less that it’s impossible but more that we don’t have any clue as to what causes differences among groups

I think we have a lot of clues, but scientists who dare say so get heavily censored by largely left-wing media and academics. Even in this forum my comment above got heavily downvoted and flagged.

> Past research has a eugenicist bias because early statisticians were eugenicists seeking evidence for the ideas. I would argue that’s why the social determiners research is valuable to help offset that.

Current bias goes clearly far in the opposite direction, which is bad. There is no "offsetting" with the past which would make an existing bias less bad.

Re: U.S. science is in chaos

#199

Post by cubefox »

IsTom wrote: post #135
joenot443 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally, but there’s a lot more to science than just evolution.

Sure, but that's one of examples OP gave and it doesn't match my experience. Doesn't leave a great impression of the rest of the argument.

For the record, I provided a counterargument and it got flagged and downvoted.

Re: U.S. science is in chaos

#200

Post by chneu »

stainablesteel wrote: post #185
Schlagbohrer wrote: post #33

My friends from grad school who went on to become professors tell me that not only did their grant funding dry up, but they were unable to follow through on hiring many of the grad students they had planned to hire, since the students came from foreign countries and faced new visa restrictions. So the money for science is gone, the people to do to the science are gone, and the institutions continue to not support the…

[flagged]

Not really true but white Americans love to say that. Americans are the biggest bullies and and victims.
Post reply on HN