NSF faces shake-up as officials abolish its 37 divisions

Post by faster » Fri, May 09, 2025, 4:59 PM UTC

oldprogrammer2 wrote: post #303

arunabha wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One piece of evidence would be that Russia, Belarus and North Korea have been specifically excluded from US tariffs. You could argue that the net effect is negligible since we don't import a lot from those countries, but the signal being sent to long term allies is devastating to America's future relations with them.

The US has trade sanctions with those countries.

Post by hackyhacky » Fri, May 09, 2025, 5:01 PM UTC

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #341

hackyhacky wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> DEI in practice is illegal No, it isn't, and this assumption is based on a poor understanding of what DEI is. The right paints DEI as a directive to hire less-qualified people based on their race. In reality, DEI just ensures that everyone gets a fair chance regardless of their race.

You speak of equal opportunity . What happens in practice is enforced equal outcomes which entails compromising on principles and standards to get the desired result. i.e. "Group X is under-performing at math" so therefore the problem is with inherent bias in math and we won't expect engineers and scientists to have competency in this domain to get the makeup of people we have decided upon from the start.

Post by lokhura » Fri, May 09, 2025, 5:03 PM UTC

pinko wrote: post #338

lokhura wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here you go https://www.commerce.senate.gov/services/files/4BD2D522-2092... It's not 55%, it's more like 25% of the budget.

So after the first simple question, we're already at less than half the original claimed figure of 55% (a bad sign for its credibility, if you're a Bayesian!). But more importantly, I'm familiar with the linked document, and it's garbage. It was thrown together practically overnight to justify a political decision that had already been made, and in its incompetent haste, flagged proposals that had phrases like "diver…

Post by philipwhiuk » Fri, May 09, 2025, 5:08 PM UTC

josephcsible wrote: post #294

matwood wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They're going through every federal agency making cuts, not singling out this one in particular. That's BS. They are already bragging about raising defense spending.

> They are already bragging about raising defense spending. Sure, but that's the exception. The cuts to the NSF are the norm.

Post by tinktank » Fri, May 09, 2025, 5:11 PM UTC

UncleOxidant wrote: post #179

ddahlen wrote: post #38

I have been in and out of the academic world my entire career. I have worked as a programmer/engineer for two universities and a national lab, and worked at a startup founded by some professors. There is huge uncertainty with the people whom I have worked with, nobody seems to be sure what is going to happen, but it feels like it wont be good. Hiring freezes, international graduate students receiving emails to self d…

The irony is that in their supposed effort to "Make America Great Again" they're going to end up accelerating China's rise. We may have decided that basic research is no longer something we want to do, but China's going to continue to forge ahead and leave us in the dust. All thanks to people who have no understanding of how anything works, but only want to tear things down that they don't understand.