PhDs only were adopted universally in 1917 with some resistance and apprehension.
The issue here is that academia forgot what it was about a long time ago and is now having to face the consequences for a hundred years of bad decisions.
"the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
41–50 of 81 posts
Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is that your way of saying: I don't care? Because it sounds are if you're relativizing the problems to the level where you don't have to. You don't specify what you think "no longer matters." And so there's no way to judge what you think is the impact. > My bet: a lot of the things we used to do were habit, ceremony and gatekeeping much more than being necessities. Yeah, right. "I've got a calculator, so we no longer…
It’s a general sentiment about the way I think things are heading. You seem angry about it, that’s for you to figure out for yourself.
Nero probably even enjoyed seeing Rome burn. I think other people might have been angry. Don't be Nero.
Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
#43We’re at the point of learning that some things that used to matter no longer do, and some things we used to think mattered never did. It’s a going to be a shock to everyone, and this same phenomenon is happening everywhere, not just academia or software engineering. My bet: a lot of the things we used to do were habit, ceremony and gatekeeping much more than being necessities.
So the value is in those who where actually kept outside by the gatekeepers. Those that can use the new tools and are no longer kept at bay by those that need artificial moats. The very same innovation that creeps to the front of society in a war, is going to be liberated. I toast to that.
What is possible as ground-truth, if the "tarbabies" of society get sidelined can be seen in Ukraine.
Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
#44We’re at the point of learning that some things that used to matter no longer do, and some things we used to think mattered never did. It’s a going to be a shock to everyone, and this same phenomenon is happening everywhere, not just academia or software engineering. My bet: a lot of the things we used to do were habit, ceremony and gatekeeping much more than being necessities.
I find that I'm much more tolerant of bad spelling and terrible punctuation because I know that a human being wrote it in the end. It's kind of hilarious that a sign of poor quality is now a sign of passion if not quality now.
Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
#45Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
You’re probably right, but I’d also bet some things that we’re about to sweep aside will turn out to have been necessities and we’ll find it very difficult to bring them back.
To be pedantic about it, if something is a necessity it can’t be done without by definition. So if you’re in that position whatever you’re talking about wasn’t a necessity. Is this like Socrates thinking that reading will make people lazy and forgetful?
More like how using hand-held computers programmed for dopamine hits could further entrench a sedentary lifestyle, reduce social cohesion, and lead to individual brain rot
Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
#47I have a PhD and I completely support AI disrupting the field. If AI disrupts your field, the culprit is most likely not AI.
“If algorithmic targeting disrupts your society, the culprit is most likely not algorithmic targeting” Or replace AI/algorithmic targeting with tech in general and the disruption target with whatever it targets and you’d realize the problem with the sentence. Technological advances have disrupted plenty of fields. That doesn’t mean those fields were fundamentally flawed. Every arena has a certain degree of dysfunctio…
Travel agents are not extinct AT ALL. They pivoted from selling margin-less flights to design more curated travel packages. Different and nichier market for sure, but not extinct.
Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
To be pedantic about it, if something is a necessity it can’t be done without by definition. So if you’re in that position whatever you’re talking about wasn’t a necessity. Is this like Socrates thinking that reading will make people lazy and forgetful?
> If something is a necessity it can’t be done without by definition You fail at being pedantic. If you wanted to be pedantic about this, it would first be necessary to define what it is a necessity for . Are the things being swept aside a necessity for the universe to continue existing? No, definitely not. But perhaps they could be a necessity for the (academic) culture to prosper . Which do you think is more likely…
Wow, that’s needlessly aggressive, but you do you.
I wonder what it is about this subject that makes people so angry? I think I’ll settle on status. People are afraid of having their social status taken away by AI and become irate at the thought of it.
Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
#49I have a PhD and I completely support AI disrupting the field. If AI disrupts your field, the culprit is most likely not AI.
Could you expand on that?
In no way getting a PhD or doing published research is an act of science or human progress, and it's been like that for probably 20 years.
It's an act of coordinated methodology in showing respect to previous peers by acknowledging that you read what they wrote when they were acknowledging even more previous peers.
Every attempt to do something new is rejected unless you take 99% of something that has been done and try to add your 1% to it.
But the thing is that you don't even want to do that, you need to either have a publishable/defensible thesis, or if you already have a PhD, pursue a tenurable track and grants which never collides to productive human progress.
So yes, AI could very well run tenure track career more efficiently and with better results. It's not AI the problem: it is the checks and performance indicators that are in place that make it very easy for AI to dominate and very exhausting for a human to follow.
A good researcher with good AI knowledge would (and should) dominate their field.
* Medicine is luckily saved from this, with some exceptions.
Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If something is a necessity it can’t be done without by definition You fail at being pedantic. If you wanted to be pedantic about this, it would first be necessary to define what it is a necessity for . Are the things being swept aside a necessity for the universe to continue existing? No, definitely not. But perhaps they could be a necessity for the (academic) culture to prosper . Which do you think is more likely…
Wow, that’s needlessly aggressive, but you do you. I wonder what it is about this subject that makes people so angry? I think I’ll settle on status. People are afraid of having their social status taken away by AI and become irate at the thought of it.
My response to you has no bearing whatsoever on the subject of this thread. I work at a successful AI startup and am set to retire for life comfortably no matter what happens. It's your specific class of action that irritates me. These orange websites are plagued by people intentionally misrepresenting other people's words and telling them they're wrong based on things they didn't actually say. It's the most annoying, detrimental-to-conversation kind of comment you can possibly make. And it does pedantry a bad name! There's nothing wrong with being pedantic, and drilling into the details to get everything right. But drilling into the details and getting them wrong is offensive and the only purpose it serves is to annoy everyone around you.
Going back to my programming example, suppose your compiler decided to interpret 'var x = 2' as a string and then told you you were wrong, throwing an error instead of compiling your program, even though it's the compiler being defective and not adhering to the established language rules for type inference. That's you, in this conversation. That does not add to the conversation. The compiler needs to be fixed so it stops doing that.