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Terence Tao on the suspension of UCLA grants

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Re: Terence Tao on the suspension of UCLA grants

#321

Post by jaredklewis »

wisty wrote: post #320
jaredklewis wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why suggest math PhDs unless it's in bad faith? Maybe because this thread is about a math PhD (Terrence Tao)? I’m also surprised you believe academic economists have much power. These days, most politicians from both parties in the US proudly reject more or less all of mainstream economics. Sometimes, the work of academic economists can have some small influence on decisions at the Fed, so I guess that is something…

If only politicians mattered why doesn't Trump sack virtually everyone in DC? The government is a large organisation and its middle management is both vast and powerful. And this huge middle management is obliged (arguably) to listen to academia unless otherwise instructed by politicians (who are too few in number and mostly not talented in steering large organisations so much as they are used to just going with the…

Do you have some specific examples of this phenomenon you would be willing to share? You seem to feel that academics have a lot of influence in the world, but I am extremely skeptical of this hypothesis. IME academics are generally ignored except when they are saying something we like. Or the corollary: we go find the academic that is saying the thing we like and ignore all the other ones.

If we take specifically the field of economics for a moment (since I know a bit about this one), what are examples of "middle managers" sticking to the recommendations of economists?

Because it's not hard to make a list of ideas that economists generally love and pretty much everyone else hates: paying organ donors, carbon taxes, land value taxes, charging for public parking, getting rid of minimum parking requirements, allowing surge pricing of various kinds, unilateral free trade, cash transfers instead of in-kind benefits, and abolishing the mortgage interest deduction. Honorable mention to congestion pricing, which economists of course love, but is interesting because support for it actually went up in NYC after implementation; support was pretty low before implementation.

Re: Terence Tao on the suspension of UCLA grants

#322

Post by nosianu »

aaomidi wrote: post #290
nosianu wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here in Germany, in Berlin, these "protests" included wrecking a lecture hall and seriously injuring a Jewish student. - https://www.rbb24.de/politik/beitrag/2025/04/berlin-humboldt... (April 2025) - https://astafu.de/node/589 (February 2024) (Both links are German language - that should not be a problem anymore these days I hope) I don't see why you refuse to even consider that there is more than 1 and 0 absolutes.…

Anti Israel protests are the best opportunity for agent provocateurs. Something we have evidence of Israel actually doing: 1. https://mondoweiss.net/2012/05/operation-glass-houses-idf-ag... 2. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/4/10/mustaribeen-israels... Israel is probably the “strongest” nation in figuring out propaganda and mass disinformation campaigns. It is extremely easy to say an entire protest is invalid be…

> “Fed posting” is a thing people are slowly learning to spot.

Are you accusing me? I waited patiently for years building a profile here, for this one moment, to derail this comment, yay!

> Anyway these protests are legitimate despite the events that you’re mentioning happening

And so is the violence I linked to. If you have ANY proof whatsoever that the lecture hall and the Jewish student were actually attacked by Jewish saboteurs - despite the identity of the people involved known - please post it.

Otherwise you are the one doing the shitposting here.

> Something we have evidence of Israel actually doing:

So now you can just tell everybody to ignore any and all events that don't fit your narrative? How convenient!

And by the way, those "protests" would gain a lot of credibility if they were also targeted against Hamas.

Re: Terence Tao on the suspension of UCLA grants

#323

Post by wisty »

jaredklewis wrote: post #321
wisty wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only politicians mattered why doesn't Trump sack virtually everyone in DC? The government is a large organisation and its middle management is both vast and powerful. And this huge middle management is obliged (arguably) to listen to academia unless otherwise instructed by politicians (who are too few in number and mostly not talented in steering large organisations so much as they are used to just going with the…

Do you have some specific examples of this phenomenon you would be willing to share? You seem to feel that academics have a lot of influence in the world, but I am extremely skeptical of this hypothesis. IME academics are generally ignored except when they are saying something we like. Or the corollary: we go find the academic that is saying the thing we like and ignore all the other ones. If we take specifically the…

I'm partly just explaining what Trump supporters think.

The lump of gdp fallacy in which an urban Cafe is equal to a factory is maybe something I think is an issue?

Trump supporters disagree with economists on Carbon taxes, low tarriffs, and immigration.

And even economists to some extent pick and choose the issues they push from the less biased body of work they produce.

Re: Terence Tao on the suspension of UCLA grants

#324

Post by aaomidi »

nosianu wrote: post #322
aaomidi wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anti Israel protests are the best opportunity for agent provocateurs. Something we have evidence of Israel actually doing: 1. https://mondoweiss.net/2012/05/operation-glass-houses-idf-ag... 2. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/4/10/mustaribeen-israels... Israel is probably the “strongest” nation in figuring out propaganda and mass disinformation campaigns. It is extremely easy to say an entire protest is invalid be…

> “Fed posting” is a thing people are slowly learning to spot. Are you accusing me? I waited patiently for years building a profile here, for this one moment, to derail this comment, yay! > Anyway these protests are legitimate despite the events that you’re mentioning happening And so is the violence I linked to. If you have ANY proof whatsoever that the lecture hall and the Jewish student were actually attacked by J…

> Are you accusing me?

Not at all. I’m saying that it’s useless to measure a protest based off of an action of one or two individuals. Which is always just one or two individuals.

Re: Terence Tao on the suspension of UCLA grants

#325

Post by exe34 »

defrost wrote: post #105
andrepd wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, your "pure" capitalism tends to do that. Kinda similar to the people who say of the SU "but it was not true communism".

The people that founded the SU openly declared that it wasn't communism, just a managed phase on the way to actual communism (that never happened). Either way, we're talking here about small in groups treating a larger out group as sheep to be manipulated and harvested.

It's almost like the road didn't go where they said it would.

Re: Terence Tao on the suspension of UCLA grants

#326

Post by qcnguy »

aaomidi wrote: post #289
qcnguy wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow that's not at all extraordinary. That's the core of the reason they're paying giant fines. The Ivy Leagues have for years been using admission policies that are designed to reduce the number of Jews, Asians and whites they admit. It's always been illegal but the Democrat administrations never enforced the law because they liked what the colleges were doing. Now there's a new administration that doesn't and wants…

Do you have proof from any source? Trump admin does not count. Literally any independent research body that says there was a systemic effort to bar Jewish people in these institutions?

Their own internal documents. Am on phone so won't Google all this for you but the idea it's some vague allegation isn't true. They're not even trying to defend themselves on that ground because they mostly admitted to it in public already. Their defence is that they feel they should be able to do it, not that they didn't.

Re: Terence Tao on the suspension of UCLA grants

#327

Post by jaredklewis »

wisty wrote: post #323
jaredklewis wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have some specific examples of this phenomenon you would be willing to share? You seem to feel that academics have a lot of influence in the world, but I am extremely skeptical of this hypothesis. IME academics are generally ignored except when they are saying something we like. Or the corollary: we go find the academic that is saying the thing we like and ignore all the other ones. If we take specifically the…

I'm partly just explaining what Trump supporters think. The lump of gdp fallacy in which an urban Cafe is equal to a factory is maybe something I think is an issue? Trump supporters disagree with economists on Carbon taxes, low tarriffs, and immigration. And even economists to some extent pick and choose the issues they push from the less biased body of work they produce.

Ok sure but can you point to even one instance anywhere of the will of politicians being subverted by “middle managers” (as you say) listening to academic economists? It doesn’t happen because no one listens to academics.

I’m confronting your assertion that academics have power in our society and you haven’t put forward any arguments that they do

Re: Terence Tao on the suspension of UCLA grants

#328

Post by defrost »

exe34 wrote: post #325
defrost wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The people that founded the SU openly declared that it wasn't communism, just a managed phase on the way to actual communism (that never happened). Either way, we're talking here about small in groups treating a larger out group as sheep to be manipulated and harvested.

It's almost like the road didn't go where they said it would.

Pretty much, I'm naturally cynical about any waving about of either "Capitalism" or "Communism" as neither has really existed in any pure form and the devil is always in the details.

That, and the propensity of those who seek power to dangle whatever shiny utopia best suits their end of fooling the masses.

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